HTPC software?

Permabanned
Joined
29 Mar 2006
Posts
1,148
Location
Manchester, UK
What software do you use on your HTPC?

Is Media Portal the best to use as a front end?

I have read somewhere that you can use ffdshow to upscale everything? Does this work well or is it a waste of CPU?

What codec packs should I install? and will I need anything else?
 
My personal software setup is this:

Codecs: FFDshow, CoreAVC, Haali media splitter. That will cover almost everything but Quicktime and Realmedia. If you want those, get QT lite and real alternative.

Software:
Theatertek DVD player - Works great with a remote, and will pass the video over to FFDshow for post processing (ie upscaling). I use it almost exclusively for video playback. A quick XML file is all you need to add mkv and mp4 support.

The PC version XBMC seems to be coming on nicely, and it's worth keeping an eye one. Give it a try. I've never really liked Media Portal. It seems overly complicated and a little clunky for me.

Upscailing is totally worth it, and it hardly strains modern CPUs.
 
Agree with bigpops on the codecs although I don't use ffdshow any more. I also agree with him about Media Portal although it's very popular so maybe it's just personal taste.

VMC is my preferred front end, seems to support all codecs I've thrown at it so far.

As for upscaling, it doesn't seem to be of any benefit if you are using any of the current gpus. Using it with my GTS seems to just increase CPU usage with no obvious benefit to picture quality. FFdshow upscaling for older gpu's seems to give good PQ benefits though if you take the time to set it up.

Hope that helps.
 
XBMC is good, I have the Mac version on my iMac but I will be adding a TV Tuner at some point and want one program to control everything so XBMC cant do the TV part.

VMC would be easiest but It doesn't organize your TV shows like media portal and XBMC does it? Although they are all sorted in to Program Name/Seasion/S01E01.mp4 So it might be OK. Ill have a play with VMC after and see if it seems ok when i add my TV shows to it.
 
I use MediaPortal. It's real strength is in its skins and plugins. The base package is nothing special, but plugins like mp-tvseries are brilliant.
 
haven't tried XBMC for the pc yet as i jumped straight into MediaPortal and never looked back.....setup properly MP is an amazing program.

XBMC still sounds a bit lacking to me in the video playback dept from looking on their forums, if they fix that 3:2 pulldown problem a lot seem to be getting i'd give it a shot coz it definitely looks pretty nice actually.


I use MediaPortal. It's real strength is in its skins and plugins. The base package is nothing special, but plugins like mp-tvseries are brilliant.

yep the tv series plugin is just awesome
 
My set-up connected to my 50" plasma

XP32 bit

GB PVR (freeware HTPC software with loads of free plugins)
haali mkv splitter
ffdshow
k-Lite code pack ( ONLY installed the cyberlink mpeg2 decoder for dvd's)
xml radio times for 14 day program guide

Using a hauppage Nova-T 500 a dual freeview tuner
 
MediaPortal w/ 'My TVSeries' plugin all the way :)

Meedio looks a lot nicer, but it's a nightmare to configure...

XMBC for Windows also looks awesome (OpenGL interface is awesome), but is still a bit limited at the moment without tv-card support.
 
Yeah i've had media portal problems on Vista and XP.
Never got the hang of it. its always slow, common crashes and random glitches
 
I use Mediaportal, and its a tweakers dream, ive got it setup with the TV side aswell, and ive got it to a truly excellent stage now, pause,rewind,record live tv, the TV series plug in excellent, its a real easy to use front end aswell, once setup its superb, especially as its free:p

Ive not used it with Vista, but with XP ive had no real problems.
 
Hmm, I have vista on at the moment. Would it be better putting XP on for media portal then?

Its going to be used for Media Center/File Server... I think file sharing in XP might be easier too?
 
Yeah i've had media portal problems on Vista and XP.
Never got the hang of it. its always slow, common crashes and random glitches

complete opposite to my experience using MP which i run in Vista 64, in fact i think it works better under Vista than XP.

i'm going to try XBMC but i already know it's HD + general video performance will put me off straight away versus MP.......but if they can fix that it might be the best of the lot.
 
Back
Top Bottom