Comments on: A Media Center at Home http://avi.alkalay.net/2009/04/running-a-media-center.html Digital Awareness and Flying Spirit Fri, 05 Feb 2010 10:57:17 +0000 http://wordpress.org/?v=2.9.1 hourly 1 By: Avi http://avi.alkalay.net/2009/04/running-a-media-center.html/comment-page-1#comment-137753 Avi Sun, 26 Apr 2009 10:43:27 +0000 http://avi.alkalay.net/?p=1097#comment-137753 I have read about Popcorn hour and apparently it can not play HD movies encoded with H.264. What makes me scare is its H.264 HP@L4.1 while most H.264 videos use L5.1 which need more CPU power. I'll post all the costs to build my MC, good suggestion ! I have read about Popcorn hour and apparently it can not play HD movies encoded with H.264. What makes me scare is its H.264 HP@L4.1 while most H.264 videos use L5.1 which need more CPU power.

I’ll post all the costs to build my MC, good suggestion !

]]> By: netmask http://avi.alkalay.net/2009/04/running-a-media-center.html/comment-page-1#comment-137750 netmask Sun, 26 Apr 2009 02:34:52 +0000 http://avi.alkalay.net/?p=1097#comment-137750 Nice article! You just forgot to mention dedicated media centers, like <a href="http://www.popcornhour.com/" rel="nofollow">Popcorn Hour</a> (<a href="http://mteixeira.webset.net/blog/20081029/popcorn-hour/" rel="nofollow">I have one myself</a>). I had my first contact with the media center idea when I got my (now deceased) Xbox 360. Since it didn't work well with Linux (it required Windows Media Center or Vista), I decided going with Popcorn Hour. Nowadays you can find dedicated media centers from major companies like Linksys, D-Link, HP, etc. IMHO they're worth the investment (most of the times cheaper than a fully-fledged PC) because since it's a very specialized hardware and OS, it tends to use less resources, less power, be less complex to manage, and don't need any special software running on the "storage" side (you can use a home NAS, or another desktop with enough HD to share files using NFS/SMB/whatever). BTW, can you post your ideas of how much would it cost to build the media center the way you describe? Anyway, your tutorial is great. Keep up! :) Nice article! You just forgot to mention dedicated media centers, like Popcorn Hour (I have one myself).

I had my first contact with the media center idea when I got my (now deceased) Xbox 360. Since it didn’t work well with Linux (it required Windows Media Center or Vista), I decided going with Popcorn Hour.

Nowadays you can find dedicated media centers from major companies like Linksys, D-Link, HP, etc. IMHO they’re worth the investment (most of the times cheaper than a fully-fledged PC) because since it’s a very specialized hardware and OS, it tends to use less resources, less power, be less complex to manage, and don’t need any special software running on the “storage” side (you can use a home NAS, or another desktop with enough HD to share files using NFS/SMB/whatever).

BTW, can you post your ideas of how much would it cost to build the media center the way you describe?

Anyway, your tutorial is great. Keep up! :)

]]>