Media PC

[AHarvey]

Hi all,

I am looking at canning Sky+, it's a pain in the backside, I've had 4 boxes in 3 years, needs restarting for no reason and the price just keeps increasing.

I've got a HP EliteDesk PC sitting around spare. [email protected] 112GB SSD and 4GB ram but think it can be upgraded to 8GB. Unfortunately, it's got onboard graphics and it doesn't seem to have space to install a separate graphics card or tv card (it's the small form version of the PC, think it's a 800 G1)

Is it any good as a media PC running some Linux media install? Would it be possible to get live TV on it somehow? Could you record live TV to an external drive (or upgrade the SSD) and what would the best way of controlling it be? Phone app or separate remote?

My other options are a RasPi B but that will be extremely limiting regarding recording and playback of live tv although it would allow netflix etc if I decided to go that route.

Last option would be a custom build but it's a little out of my price range at the moment

 

[Tom B]

The spec is more than enough for a media server, but you might want a bigger HDD for storing videos. I have mine set up (running at i7 5500u so slightly better, although a laptop dual core cpu) with Arch Linux and some in-dev custom software I'm building.


Best thing you can do is try it and see, installing most linux distros takes 10 minutes so you could play around. Alternatively try a liveusb and see how it runs, you'll probably be surprised how fast it actually is.

You won't be able to record TV in Windows or Linux without a TV tuner card, but this will go for any PC. However, you can get USB tv tuners for about £50, although I haven't any experiences so can't make any recommendations.

For controllers, try KDEConnect, it basically lets you use your phone as a touchpad/keyboard over wifi (and possibly bluetooth).. but I think you have to use the KDE desktop.

FWIW, I also run games on my media PC via Wine/Steam, it's not really a gaming system but jackbox party pack and rocksmith (both of which are better on a TV) work flawlessly, along with Mega Drive and SNES emulators via an xbox controller.

 

[AHarvey]

Thanks, I am going to have a play around with it, although I've used Linux before it's only been for 10 mins here and there.

I'll also have a look for a USB tuner card and yeah, the current HDD isn't big enough but I am going to look at some other options, either a bigger SSD (cost ) or an external USB 3 drive.

If you could have a tv tuner card (or usb version) would it run Sky through it? I know you can access free sky channels without a sub but don't know if it's only through the sky box.

 

[Tom B]

You'd be better off getting a tuner with freesat. I can't link to competitors but a quick google for usb tv tuner freesat brings up a few results. Most of them worth with linux but you'd be better of checking before you buy one

 

[AHarvey]

nice one i'll have a look.

I think in the next couple of days I'm going to put Ubuntu on a usb and setup OSMC, give that a try first

The wife has got to watch all her programs on Sky+ before we think about cancelling