I'm frustrated with my HTPC, but I LOVE my media center and MyMovies UI. The family loves browsing the pics and the movie reviews to help decide what to watch. What I really want is a Non-PC for all my tv's so they can access my media server.

As far as I can tell, none of the media streamers have a decent UI. Instead, they all look like a glorified version of file explorer.

Am I missing something? Why hasn't a media streaming company embeded a light-weight OS/Linux with a slick UI for uploading movie images and data from sources like IMDB and Amazon?

Thanks!

-brad

XMBC with a modded xbox has a great user interface.
See the thread here:
http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?t=635294

They did'nt do it because they are busy making their own products work together while trying to stay as propretary as possible so they don't work with products of other companys...

DLNA and UPNP stickers have no value at all...
Same goes for mpeg4 support...
Marketing won't tell you about things like "bitrate limitations, which part of mpeg4 really is supported , maximum resolutions" ...

I'm a really big fan of a good gui - in fact the look and feel comes first after "does it work at all" - but these things SHOULD work as supposed first :mad:

Even a great media extender can be killed with bad server software. So far, I haven't seen any inexpensive server that's made me miss having a dedicated media PC.

Although this looks really promising (http://www.fusionrd.com), and at prices much less than Kalaidascope.

XBOX with XBMC is your only option. The interface is world-class. Used xbox's are cheap. I just went this route a week ago and can't believe how awesome it it.

The TVIX units support images for movies and folders. The advantage over the XBOX is that they can also do hi-def.

If you don't need hi-def the XBOX is a good route as it does so many things. I needed hi-def so I went with the TVIX route and have been really impressed.

Also (ignoring the legality of backed up dvd movies and tv shows) a hacked xbox was a little too close to the line for me. ;)

tolax

Also the new Netgear unit support clipart, auto-downloading from IMDB etc.

This has only just launched though so it might be a bit 'bleeding edge'. It does support H264 though which is nice.

Personally I will wait for the next generation of tvix units before upgrading.

tolax

Why is it so hard for these big companies to sit down and create a half decent graphical interface... I cant imagine it would be either difficult to implement or too expensive, so the decision to just use a file browser most of the time baffles me.

Hi I've got a TVIX unit "the cylinderical one", how do I get images for the movies and folders?

Roku HD1000 does this nicely via 3rd party video app MPlay. Plus the developer has created a nice web app to download movie info and coverart from IMDB.

http://www.permanence.com/MPlay/#screenshots

If you are willing to live with QuickTime compatible MP4 only movies, then AppleTV has a really slick interface. The reasons I returned my AppleTV were:

1) No support for XvID/AC3 without hacking around with the AppleTV software.

2) No support for H.264 High Profile (I have tons of my DVDs ripped this way and no desire to redo them all).

3) Streaming from iTunes requires that you have a computer with iTunes running all the time since the Firefly media server etc. could not interface with AppleTV when I bought it (the first day it came out).

Hi I've got a TVIX unit "the cylinderical one", how do I get images for the movies and folders?

You have to have all your DVDs stored in individual folders

Put an empty "icon.tvix" file in the root folder

In each DVD folder, download the cover art from imdb.com and save it as "folder.jpg" in the movies folder -- I've found IMDB scales best.

[this is from memory]

Roku HD1000 does this nicely via 3rd party video app MPlay. Plus the developer has created a nice web app to download movie info and coverart from IMDB.

http://www.permanence.com/MPlay/#screenshots

Very nice.. do you know if a third party application like this is possible on the tvix M5000??

Yes that will be good if this were the case, as the above process to get cover art on the TVIX sounds like a real malachy to me. Why can't they write decent software that will search the watch folders and go download the damned cover art!!!

Which ever manufacturer gets the media management side and the streaming and decoding options right is going to corner the market.

Talking of third party applications, what is the best server software out there at the moment, so far I've used Twonky Vision and wizd, I can't get Twonky to run on my set up maybe because of Vista, how Wizd works well with the Helios most of the time, doesn't link properly with Snazzio (which by the way is the crappiest of the 3 players I have) and I havn't been able to try it yet on the Tvix.

Are there any other excellent server software out there?

Why can't they write decent software that will search the watch folders and go download the damned cover art!!!
Check out a modded Xbox with XBMC (though I do download higher-rez files).
Which ever manufacturer gets the media management side and the streaming and decoding options right is going to corner the market.
Ditto (except for high-bitrate HD).
Are there any other excellent server software out there?
Unnecessary (though usable) with you-know-what.

It's hard to believe an old, out-of-production item is still at or near the top of the heap (thanks to the XBMC devs), but most of the more recent media players have serious-to-fatal shortcomings.

My issue is that 95% of my viewing is HD .ts or .mpg files, as far as I'm aware the modded X box can't handle this, although I'm a bit puzzled as to why. Are there any plans for the xbox to handle HD files?

My issue is that 95% of my viewing is HD .ts or .mpg files, as far as I'm aware the modded X box can't handle this, although I'm a bit puzzled as to why. Are there any plans for the xbox to handle HD files?

My understanding was that it is basically a limitation of the CPU horsepower available to the XBox hardware. The Wikipedia pages for XBMC and the XBox do a good job of explaining what kind of decoding the XBox h/w can support.

Thnaks, Can one expect the impending X-box black to have gretaer horse power for High Definition streaming?

Thnaks, Can one expect the impending X-box black to have gretaer horse power for High Definition streaming?

Just a clarification, my comment about horsepower was limited to the original XBox. By "X-box black" are you referring to the upcoming XBox 360 which is going to be released in black with HDMI etc? Here you have to rely on whatever MS provides (so far). XBox 360 h/w is more than capable of playing HD formats, but you are limited to the file formats MS supports because AFAIK, XBMC has not been ported to run on the XBox 360.

Yes I was referring to the X box Elite, wasn't aware that XMBX was only limited to the original X box, any comments why ths hasn't been configured to also run on the X Box 360

Yes I was referring to the X box Elite, wasn't aware that XMBX was only limited to the original X box, any comments why ths hasn't been configured to also run on the X Box 360

If you mean XBMC (rather than XMBX), it's what is called a homebrew program that was made using the development kits without MSFT's approval or signing the code. Thus it requires a modded Xbox (hacked bios or softmod) to run the code. If the hack the 360 (beyond playing copies/piracy) to allow unsigned code - you will see many many people rejoice. I have no use for piracy. XBMC in playing full high quality HD streams....another story entirely.

The 360 will be hacked soon enough and XBMC will make its way there. I will just take some more time since MS is aware it is likely to happen and did what they could to prevent it.

I for one was expecting this to happen much faster. The new platform, since it is not 'PC' based is proving much more of a challenge than anticipated. I am wondering if the hacker community will move on to the AppleTV instead since it is closer to the original Xbox platform than the 360 is ...
Patrick S.

Actually the hacker community took much longer to hack into the original xbox than it took to hack the 360.... Patience grasshopper.... Linux is already running on the 360 thanks to the hacking community...

And the walls come crumbling down... its just a matter of time!

The sad part is that the 360 was hacked for easy piracy very quickly. The source of revenue was compromised and now all the protection only serves to prevent some basic homebrew. What a pisser.

If you knew your history about xbox 1 you would know that there is zero difference in how both systems were hacked. The initial hacks were for allowing the playing of back up games. If you want to condemn the whole hacking community based on what the POS pirates do with that knowledge then you might as well just never use a hacked product. It is an inevitability that this will happen.

You need to learn to separate the hacker from the pirates... without the hackers who legitimately want back up ability and full functionality of a product we would be stuck with all of these POS out of the box attempts at media streamers.

You might as well never use your DVD backup software for that fact... Yes, the majority of its users are legitimately backing up their own DVD's but the pirates are clicking that icon just like you....

Based on your statement above the only solution is no hacking and no backup of the DVD's that we bought and payed for...

I do not know if the last comment was aimed at me, but even thought I do not own any of the 2 gen of Xbox. I did a lot of my homework. Maybe the hacks to get in the system are similar, but I doubt you'll be able to exploit the hardware as easely in the 360 than the original Xbox. Heck, the original Xbox is basically a stripped down PC (like the ATV), compared to the 360 which is more exotic hardware wise. MS wanted a piece of the cake fast with the first Xbox, the 360 is another story, hence the difficulty in running the Xbox games on the 360.
And I am in no way a pirate, more of a hacker. Reverse engineering software and protocols is part of the daily work I do. I buy my content or stream from legal channels, but the issues with streamers is that I want them to handle all my content, not just a fraction of them, thus the hacking to expand functionality and above all. I do write and run my own code sometimes.
My 2 cents
Patrick S.

If you knew your history about xbox 1 you would know that there is zero difference in how both systems were hacked. The initial hacks were for allowing the playing of back up games. If you want to condemn the whole hacking community based on what the POS pirates do with that knowledge then you might as well just never use a hacked product. It is an inevitability that this will happen.

You need to learn to separate the hacker from the pirates... without the hackers who legitimately want back up ability and full functionality of a product we would be stuck with all of these POS out of the box attempts at media streamers.

You might as well never use your DVD backup software for that fact... Yes, the majority of its users are legitimately backing up their own DVD's but the pirates are clicking that icon just like you....

Based on your statement above the only solution is no hacking and no backup of the DVD's that we bought and payed for...

If this was referring to my post just above your's, I think you are reading a whole lot into it that wasn't intended and I really don't see how it could be inferred either. Frankly I'm lost as to where this comes from so maybe this is in the wrong thread or some other issue.

I'm not taking a stance of any kind other than I'd like to see XBMC (homebrew) on the 360 and all the remaining protections on the console no longer prevent piracy in any way and serve only to block development at this point. Pretty simple straightforward point with nothing else attached or implied in any way.