ATV2 with XBMC - Groovy!!

Methanoid

Methanoid

Methanoid

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Just wanted to share my experience.

I have no interest in ATV2 in its bare virgin form but Jailbroken with XBMC installed it's great.

Totally silent, low power (so low it can be left on all times for instant response) and responsive (better if you put a lighter skin on like SLiK)

Plays 720p/1080p but of course only displays at 720p (but my bedroom TV is 720p).

I liked it so much I bought a 2nd :)

Anyone else using one with XBMC?
 
I really want to do this but the only thing stopping me from giving up W7 MCE is the recorded TV!

Is there any way of having TV recorded on a home server and dished out via XBMC?
 
You can link XBMC with MediaPortal (to do recordings) but I dont know if the plugin works with ATV. But surely your ATV2 could play any MCE recordings? I've seen scripts that auto convert MCE recordings to MPEG2 for example.
 
That sounds tempting for back home. How smooth does it run? And my experience with XBMC is the library mode is a bit bad at recognising files.
 
8t10 said:
And my experience with XBMC is the library mode is a bit bad at recognising files.
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Depending on how they're named and what scraper you use, it can be pretty good. I go with "title [year]" and it gets it right about 95% of the time. Only troubles it sometimes has is with remakes or obscure titles.
 
I use an ATV1 with XBMC and it's just as awesome. It can play 'some' 720p encoded files, depends entirely on the bitrate though. I just can't live without it really as it streams networked videos from my PC.

I am tempted by the ATV2 though, for its hardware alone.
 
Methanoid said:
Just wanted to share my experience.

I have no interest in ATV2 in its bare virgin form but Jailbroken with XBMC installed it's great.

Totally silent, low power (so low it can be left on all times for instant response) and responsive (better if you put a lighter skin on like SLiK)

Plays 720p/1080p but of course only displays at 720p (but my bedroom TV is 720p).

I liked it so much I bought a 2nd :)

Anyone else using one with XBMC?
Click to expand...

YES! Love it! :D Probably my best gadget for the price I paid.

Check out the The Quartz skin, just been released. Very much like the ATV2 stock look, very lightweight and very snappy. :cool:

What version of XBMC are you using?

Oh and btw rowmote works great if you have an iDevice :D
 
I bought an Apple TV 2 about 3 weeks ago with to put XBMC on it and I haven't been disappointed. It's great.

I use Homesharing controlled via the Apple Remote App on my iPhone to get music on my home cinema system and I use XBMC to get all my films and Tv Shows to the home cinema system.

XBMC is a bit glitchy when first setting up and adding media (it may crash a few times if you try doing too many things at once), but once set up, it runs pretty much perfectly. For around £100 it's very good value for money. Though I'm at a loss as to why anyone would buy one and use it in it's standard form.

Jimmy, do you have to SSH that quartz skin to the device? If so, is there a guide which says the correct folder to put it in etc?

Also, I run the latest stable version 10.0.7. Do you run the nightly builds? If so is it better to do this, are there any benefits?

As for organising your media for XBMC to scrape it correctly, organise your files and folders like this.

Movies: Movies/Film Name [Year]

TV Shows: TV Shows/TV Show Name (i.e. House)/Series Number (e.g.Series 1)/Episode Number (e.g. S01E01)

If everything is ordered and named like that, you wont have a problem. On the odd occasion it incorrectly names something, you can manually select the correct information from within XBMC.
 
Malc said:
Jimmy, do you have to SSH that quartz skin to the device? If so, is there a guide which says the correct folder to put it in etc?

Also, I run the latest stable version 10.0.7. Do you run the nightly builds? If so is it better to do this, are there any benefits?
Click to expand...

Yeah, easy to do. drop zip archive in "private/var/mobile/"

Iam on Darwin 10.04.0. I dont think that is the latest version. What are these nightly builds? Ive seen posts about them a lot. Ive only recently got mine, so still learning about it all at the min.


edwardcasbon1 said:
Hiya, any info on how to get xbmc onto the Apple tv 2? I'm interested in doing this, only if it's pain free though.
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Very very easy to do, need to JB your ATV2 first.
 
quickshot89 said:
not on the atv2 :(
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It plays 1080P with XBMC but as the hardware output is 720P its downsizing it back to 720P so a little pointless...

I'd hazard a guess that ATV3 with be dual core with 512Mb Ram and miraculously with 1080P output (so they can re-sell ATV to owners!)
 
my atv2 and tv don't get on when it comes to resizing a 1080 file. I can't get it to fill the screen horizontally without messing with the aspect.

also, all dialogue only comes out of the right speaker when downmixing to stereo, but I think that has been fixed in the latest unofficial builds.

Basically, I'm going to send it back to my bedroom and get a WD tv thing for main TV instead. (actually cheaper than the atv, and works better by all accounts)
 
I had WDTVs but the interface I didnt like and CBA to do the work with hacking FW and then having to create all the thumbs n sheets etc. XBMC is simpler.
 
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