[ILUG] of mp3's and living rooms..

[Ciaran Johnston]

paul at clubi.ie wrote:
> Could make a nice little MythTV box alright.. (from research, it
> seems MythTV should handle the user-friendly part for DVD/MP3/video
> playing (seems), and it does DVB-T too, apparently).

We have a MythTV box at home - an old AOpen XCube with a TV card and an
external IR receiver, a 1GHz Athlon Duron and 512Mb of RAM. It all works
fine, as far as it goes, but we rarely use it for the TV. So, basically it
is there to play MP3s and show photos to the relatives. Eventually I
stopped the MythTV interface from loading automatically (there is still a
button on the remote to trigger this if we really want it) because it's
just easier, and more powerful, to use KDE with a wireless keyboard and
mouse - plus you can sit on your sofa and surf the web while watching TV
if you want, without having to hook out the laptop.

The only problem is that the fan (which is about 2 years old) has started
to make a little more noise than it used to - it was very quiet indeed. I
originally used this box as a server under the stairs, and the only
problem I have with it (the XCube) is that the shape is a little bulky and
at odds with the typical stereo-type equipment you would have in your
sitting room.

MythTV is user-friendly to a certain extent, but a lot of the interface
(for MP3 playing at least) is quite counter-intuitive and driving it with
a remote is often irritating. That said, it is still a very nice piece of
software.

Freevo is also quite good, although it's been a while since I looked at
it. Unlike Myth, I believe it is more of an all-round "media-center"
application rather than a TV recording application with other media types
added as an afterthought.

Cheers,
Ciaran.