Best device to buy to run XBMC?

nicknack35 said:
Has anybody seen these. They look really good and all reviews look really good

Minix Neo X8-H Quad Core Android Smart TV box 2GB RAM - 16GB ROM - Full DD/DTS
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I bought the plus version a month ago off the bay great piece of kit and well supported by Minix with software upgrades
 
cant link due to rules but i have tried Kodi on mutiple devices.

The ARM stuff is ok but i have much preferred running it on a proper X86 either on Windows or Linux its just much more flexible and for me has the benefit for using it as Steam in home streaming device for the TV from the gaming PC

Look at thinks like the Asus Vivo and Zotac barebones kits.
 
I have 2 kodi devices. An Intel nuc downstairs as my main system running windows 7 and attached to a 42" TV and Denon av amp. In the bedroom I have a raspberry pi 2 running openelec and that is just attached to a 22" TV on the wall.

The pi is a good option for kodi. Supports auto frame rate switching and I have a flirc attached so I can use a remote. Its small and light too so can be hidden behind the TV. I have mine stuck on the back using Velcro type stuff.

The nuc I would say is better in that it does HD sound, has an ir receiver built in (can be powered up from off) and the picture quality is better than the pi. It also does auto frame rate switching but costs a little more than the pi after I added ram and an ssd. I have kodi running in a shell so when the nuc is powered on it goes straight in to it bypassing windows.

Both I would say are as stable as each other and I am running the latest beta version 15 of kodi. I have had android devices like the fire TV and although they are okay there is no auto frame rate switching on the ones I have tried. Also I found the picture quality inferior to both the pi and the nuc.
 
The only reason anyone should run a windows build is if they are doing something that specifically requires windows.

If you only need kodi then check out openelec.
 
Thanks. Yeah been looking at openelec today. Got a couple of PI 2s being delivered tomorrow with all the grubbing so necessary. The sd card comes with NOOBS pre-installed. Not sure if open elec is on there. If not I'll put it onto another card and go from there.
Looking forward to having a tinker with it.
 
Avoid the Amazon/google products if you're wanting to playback 24p content.

I've been using a Acer Revo for a while which supports 24p playback, I got a amazon fire TV for testing, loaded up Kodi on it and noticed a massive difference in 24p playback. Scenes which pan across noticeably stuttered.

Pi2 is fine, but some skins really put a lot of pressure on it - pausing a 1080p movie and navigating through the controls was quite laggy in my experience.

Considering movies/blu rays are shot at 24fps it really boggles the mind why these media devices don't support it.

I tried to have a chat with amazon about it but they weren't interested.
 
You should have no issues with 24fps content at 60Hz on an android device due to 3:2 pulldown. 50Hz you will get the stutter on panning shots. A device that does native 24p is preferable but Android just doesn't do it at the moment. I myself am using a fire tv at 60Hz for Kodi and won't change until it is time to go 4k.
 
I notice stuttering on my Sony 55" tv using Fire TV, my TV is 1080P 60hz, I have tried the video options such as sync to display and sync to TV, tried buffer settings in the advancesettings.xml etc... but still see it, especially noticeable on fast paced action moments, and the bigger the film rip the worse it is, I have a 10gb and 16gb blu Ray rip of The Fifth Element and Avatar, both stutter badly and its frustrating, never had that issue on the WD TV live as it supported 24p. But even smaller rips stutter, films and TC episodes.
 
Well further to my last post... I moved the AFTV upstairs to the LCD in my room, its now connected to wifi and it pays both films perfectly, I can only assume its something to do with either the HDMI cable as its now using one from an old sky box, or its because it is no longer using HDMI pass through for the audio, either way im much happier with it now. I can now play my Band of Brothers DVD rips without stuttering which I could not do before when it was connected to my Denon amp with HDMI pass through enabled.
 
UKDTweak said:
Well further to my last post... I moved the AFTV upstairs to the LCD in my room, its now connected to wifi and it pays both films perfectly, I can only assume its something to do with either the HDMI cable as its now using one from an old sky box, or its because it is no longer using HDMI pass through for the audio, either way im much happier with it now. I can now play my Band of Brothers DVD rips without stuttering which I could not do before when it was connected to my Denon amp with HDMI pass through enabled.
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Could it be your Sony TV? I have a Panasonic plasma and have no issues, maybe you should try connecting direct to the Sony see if you still have the issue.
 
The only device connected to the TV is my Denon Amp. the TV has and amp are ARC enabled so the AFTV was connected via HDMI to the AMP Only. But it was an old HDMI lead I had been using on my WD TV Live, so hence why I say it was either the cable of the passing through to the amp.
I now have an Amlogic S802 M8 running OpenElec and Kodi plugged into the Denon amp for my Sony and it uses pass through too but works a treat.
 
Pi 2, connected through my AV receiver to my TV, which has Hdmi Cec, so I can use the tv remote. Works perfectly, the only annoyance is lack of a remote on/standby button, but I decided to purchase some remote controlled plug sockets, sorted!
 
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