POPCORN vs Revo/netbook etc

whitecrook

whitecrook

whitecrook

Soldato
Joined
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Hi all

A while back ( about 4 months or ) I got a popcorn A110 to watch 720p downloaded content, divx/xvids with minimum fuss and from the comfort of my arm chair using a remote. I had been using my main E2140 rig before but it went **** up and was laid in bits for months while my backlog of stuff to watch piled up., anyway..

It's worked fantastically for that purpose and I've probably watched a good few hundred hours of video through it.

I haven't really used any of the built in stuff, like web content, or the torrent abilities, or any other feature other than whack a 500g drive in and ftp stuff across.


I'm curious as to how something like http://lifehacker.com/5391308/build-a-silent-standalone-xbmc-media-center-on-the-cheap mentioned in this hread http://forums.overclockers.co.uk/showthread.php?p=15633774

would compare - I was a great fan of XBMC, mainly for compatibility reasons with dodgy rip and the excellent realtime a/v sync option by moving the stick. And still have my chipped xmbc here, although not in use since getting hd.

It seems to me a revo with XBMC (and a remote!) would look better, work better, and provide overall more functionality than a popcorn. Am i missing something. I can't beleive I didn't notice this sooner. I paid 179 for my pop corn, and a revo can be had for £150 + remote takes it to a similar price.

Plus the pop corn looks like crap IMO. It's just a bunch of menus slightly better than a windows explorer menu. ( i know that doesnt really matter as it's jut used to select a video to watch, but,wll why have mutton when you can have lamb)

I can't play a bunch of files one after another (play all) It's really slow to load stuff on (6 MB/s) Haven't managed to get networking working.

Am i missing something should I be getting more out of the popcorn?
Is XBMC installed on a revo actuall really slick and works ike a finished product? Is it bascally a linux distro, or is it specificlly tied to that one app, is it possible to duel boot it with windows or something? As media duties aren't required all the time. Does XBMC do TV recording?
 
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Hi, Cant comment on the XMBC, but like you I to have an A110 mine has a 1tb drive in, and I just FTP stuff to it, never really use any more of the functions either. Have you taken a look at the YAMJ skin for the Popcorn, really changes how it looks gives a nice image for the films and details about them too.

Also if as you state the only things you do with the popcorn is to FTP files to it to watch, is there really any point in spending more money on another box that will just do the same thing? Or are you now wanting to use more features?

I was thinking about swapping out my A-110 for a HTPC, to replace the Popcorn and my Humax HD box, but then I thought its a lot more money to spend on something that will only give me the same functions as I already have :)
 
The Nvidia ION chipset certainly does bring 1080p decoding to the ATOM processors, and it does mean that you can indeed build a reasonable media PC for little money.

I have found XBMC not that great at 1080p HD stuff, the audio support and quite frequent visual artefacts on total black screen of HD films to be a pain, and I still fallback to windows 7 MCE and coreAVC for hardware acceleration of x264.

Saying all that, if you want value for money, the Western Digital WDTV v2 (Live) is £75 and offers a better experience then your A110, it is absolutely tiny, and you can plug any USB HDD or stream over the network, the menu's are fast and it's just about visually pleasing enough.

But, the A110 isn't dead just yet, the latest firmwares offer excellent codec compatibility and it now has Cover Flow feature, which looks like this.
screenshot.jpg


The thing with NMT's like the popcorn hour is that like PC's, they are now over a year old, and new hardware is emerging quickly and prices are dropping all the time.
 
I presume thats YAMJ with coverflow enabled, or is coverflow completely seperate?

I struggled for hours trying to get YAMJ working with my a110 and never managed it - but with coverflow it may well be worth trying to sort out again
 
just a bit underwhelmed wit the popcorn. I thought it was supposed to be a plug and play appliance with good grounds for hackability. In reality it seems to be a plug and hack appliacne jsut to get it working nicely.

Still debating whether or not to have the HD in it or not, and whether to pt a 1.5tb drive in to replace the 500g drive. Why not jus tstream from the network?
 
FrankJH said:
I presume thats YAMJ with coverflow enabled, or is coverflow completely seperate?

I struggled for hours trying to get YAMJ working with my a110 and never managed it - but with coverflow it may well be worth trying to sort out again
Click to expand...

It is a much better method then YAMJ, it has a standalone program that just works, non of the 'hacking' involved running javascript for YAMJ..

I noticed it over on mpcclub
http://www.mpcclub.com/forum/forumdisplay.php?f=66

I did set my Dad up so he could use YAMJ, but he found it a pain and stopped using it, I'm going to set his up using this Movie Flow when I next pop over to spain to see him..
 
I found the popcorn so much better after installing a hdd into it, means I don't have to have my PC on as well, also makes using things like YAMJ much easier as you can store the files for it locally.
 
:mad: my a110 has gone **** up

I get the pch is loading screen on start up - and then just a black screen (for over an hour) - just as I was doing the last of about 5 firmware updates

Thats really ****** me off
 
FrankJH said:
:mad: my a110 has gone **** up

I get the pch is loading screen on start up - and then just a black screen (for over an hour) - just as I was doing the last of about 5 firmware updates

Thats really ****** me off
Click to expand...

Bugger!

Surely there is some really fiddly firmware update mechanism (tftp server) running in the background?

When I checked for my Dad, it seemed amazing that you have to serially flash all the firmwares, and not just go for the latest!

Hope you get it sorted!
 
borich_planner said:
the popcorn hour C200 is £308 and I can't see how it is worth that over the £180 or so for the A110

Borich
Click to expand...

Apart from the fact you can put a BR drive into the C200 and play BR discs..

And OT, I tried the latest build of XBMC yesterday to see what the new Camalot release was like, it's come on a fair way, and actually some of the skins are quite nice.. It played all my BR Rips (File structered) really well (didn't do the ISO's though).

But, it's still a pain to use, no media aggregation, and unless you put all your media is single files in one directory, the browsing element is inconsistent with launching your actual videos'..

All they need to do is go and use Media Browser for a few mins and see what a superbly easy to use system that is, and mimic it.
 
Legally they can't play iso'ed blu-rays for some reason in XBMC. Oh and the Revo is good. I have one in the bedroom with XBMC running, the only problem I have now is that I can't stream my blu-rays over my wireless networks (for obvious reasons) so that will have to wait until I move into my own house and I can drill holes and stuff for a wired connection.
 
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Hmm. Thinking Still trying to work out how to get cool theme like above.

If I run it without a disk can I use a USB disk successfully to have themes and a library and stuff? Can these things also be applied to a network share?

Would a good idea be to get either CF or SD to sata adaptor and install the software on that and use USB drives for actual storage?
 
Demon said:
Bugger!

Surely there is some really fiddly firmware update mechanism (tftp server) running in the background?

When I checked for my Dad, it seemed amazing that you have to serially flash all the firmwares, and not just go for the latest!

Hope you get it sorted!
Click to expand...
Thanks mate - I was trying to resolve a networking issue I had since moving house recently by applying the firmware, so Im not sure ftp would work but thanks for the reminder, its worth a try
 
my experiences with the popcorn hour a110 have been reasonably good. However, it does nothing more than an equivalent converted low-spec PC would do.

If anything, it is more restricted. However, the low power consumption and user friendlyness of it all (my other half can work it!) makes it a good buy. If they incorporated a TV tuner and recording software into the hardware it would be totally amazing though...
 
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