Hardware Suggestions Needed..

[rolltide78]

Hey all. I've got Boxee running on this 3 yr old Dell OptiPlex GX260 Desktop 2.6GHz with 512 MB ram running Ubuntu and Boxee. I would love to get this thing in my living room next to my Xbox 360 and seamless connect it to my Samsung LCD HD but I need some help on what I need to add to it to make this work. I know I'll need a low profile HD video card, more RAM, and some device in order to hook this to my Logitech Harmony remote. I feel like this software has so much potential. I just don't want to get further into this and put more $$ and then realize it's not going to work out. Right now my 360 uses my VGA input on my TV and my Directv HD DVR uses one of the HDMI inputs.

Any suggestions would be great! Also, is there a way for Boxee to load automatically in Ubuntu when turned on? I'd hate to have to login to Ubuntu every time I turn it on and move a mouse to launch the app.

Thanks!
Gary

[tsella]

well, if your samsung lcd is from the past year or so, i'm guessing you have one vga port, 2 to 3 hdmi ports, and two component ports.

first, i would move the 360 to component. that would free up your vga to use any gfx you get for boxee. or if you get a card with hdmi (most of them are these days), you can get an hdmi to dvi cable.

you have not mentioned how your audio is connected, but do note that if you use hdmi-to-dvi, that's not going to transport your audio, and you'll have to share the 3.5mm trs (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/TRS_connector) jack between the dvi and vga ports.

anyway, you asked for hw..

gfx: the GX260 has pci slots, so look at one of these nvidia 5200 pci cards (http://www.newegg.com/Product/ProductList.aspx?Submit=ENE&DEPA=0&Description=nvidia+5200+pci&x=0&y=0). some come in low profile, some come with passive cooling (read quiet, no bogging down because of dust).
you can also get an agp card, but i don't which spec/voltage would fit this model, and you'll have to be extra careful about getting a matching card.

memory: a gig is going to suffice.

remote: you actually just need the ir port, right? get any windows mce ir remote with a usb dongle receiver (http://www.newegg.com/Product/ProductList.aspx?Submit=ENE&DEPA=0&Description=mce+remote&x=0&y=0). they will either work out of the box, or will require a minor hack to work under ubuntu.

and yes, there are several ways for auto running boxee under ubuntu.

first, you need to autologin (https://help.ubuntu.com/community/AutoLogin).

then add boxee to your session start apps (http://blog.mypapit.net/2007/08/how-to-start-application-automatically-in-ubuntu-startup-program.html).

there are more nifty ways to do it, like completely dropping gnome, and running boxee as your only X application FTW. i might do some blog post on that soon - its quite a hot topic.

[bizthepirate]

Is running boxee stand alone really that difficult? I mean, don't you just have to edit the xinitrc or .xinitrc file? I assume Ubuntu has one, after all. Because the run-boxee-desktop takes care of most of the boxee specific enviroment needs... However, I could see where some minor network hacks and etc would come in, but I don't think it would be that big of a deal if you preconfigured it, or had all that stuff run at boot... I might be mix matching distros a bit, but I think it's all the same in end...

[tsella]

@bizthepirate not difficult, if you are familiar with them bits :)

we actually had a setup for this, with some necessary stuff for setting resolution and network. its disabled now. may add this support in the near future.

[bizthepirate]

Well, the only real difficulty I would see is with networking, but if you boxee, like you said, could handle that (for example, a wireless media center in the living room?) then it wouldn't be so bad, considering that modern distros (ubuntu included) include the version of Xorg which can auto-detect and configure your resolutions for you, making that a piece of cake....

[rolltide78]

Thanks for your responses! My 360 is connected via VGA so I can get 1080p with HD DVD, etc. Audio is not that important since this will be for my bedroom where I don't have 5.1. Sounds great and I'm curious to try it out but I'm also thinking if I should wait for future releases before I drop some cash down on these parts. What do you think for the future of the app? Is there a feature roadmap?

[belovedmonster]

I'm sure this is only a matter of time until it's done, but in the future I suspect someone will make a Boxeebuntu distro which does away with gnome and has Boxee autostart and such like.

Now I think about it, that won't be far off what will ship if you buy a set top device with Boxee embedded.

[rolltide78]

I'm confused about the whole infrared to remote control stuff as well. I have a Latitude D620 as well that has an infrared port built in. Should I be able to connect my Logitech Harmony 890 remote to this port and control Boxee? It runs pretty well on this laptop in a dual boot fashion. Let me know!

Gary

[Jordan]

It looks like your laptop, like mine, has an IrDA port, which works differently than, say, the IR dongle that comes with a MCE remote. IrDA is intended for beaming data back and forth between laptops, PDAs, and so on, rather than remote control, and from what I can glean from the LIRC site (http://www.lirc.org/irda.html), only a tiny minority of IrDA chips support "consumer IR," which is you'd need to use a regular IR remote.

Probably the easiest remote solution is to get a cheap MCE remote that comes with a USB dongle (I bought this one (http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16880121003), no complaints a week on) and then have your Harmony remote learn to mimic it. The dongle adds clutter, but it works.

[rolltide78]

Tsella,

I'm thinking of taking your suggestions and going to get a new gfx card and some RAM. I'm looking at your list of cards you recommended here: http://www.newegg.com/Product/ProductList.aspx?Submit=ENE&DEPA=0&Description=nvidia+5200+pci&x=0&y=0 and I guess finding one that would be low profile, supported in Ubuntu, and have an HDMI port would be ideal obviously since I have an available HDMI port on my TV. I'm assuming to have audio pass through the HDMI cable as well wouldn't be an option so I'd just use that TRS connect cable you suggested and connect to an RCA jack. I'd say my budget for a card is $100 and lower. Let me know what ya think. Thanks! Oh..I'm also going with this remote.. http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16880121003.

Thanks for your help!
Gary

[dave]

Tsella,

I'm thinking of taking your suggestions and going to get a new gfx card and some RAM. I'm looking at your list of cards you recommended here: http://www.newegg.com/Product/ProductList.aspx?Submit=ENE&DEPA=0&Description=nvidia+5200+pci&x=0&y=0 and I guess finding one that would be low profile, supported in Ubuntu, and have an HDMI port would be ideal obviously since I have an available HDMI port on my TV. I'm assuming to have audio pass through the HDMI cable as well wouldn't be an option so I'd just use that TRS connect cable you suggested and connect to an RCA jack. I'd say my budget for a card is $100 and lower. Let me know what ya think. Thanks! Oh..I'm also going with this remote.. http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16880121003.

Thanks for your help!
Gary

That's a great remote for the price. You can put your IR dongle in your PC's floppy slot (like I did on my Shuttle PC that I had on DL.TV episode #244 (http://dl.tv/2008/08/dltv_ep_244_gadget_guy_dave_ma_1.php) or just velcro it to your media cabinet or PC case.

As for the video card, you won't find many HDMI output video cards these days, but you can use a cable to convert DVI output to HDMI (they are technology, but not PIN compatible) and still keep all of your digital signal quality.

That means that audio will need to come from your analog 3.5mm output, or if your motherboard has optical output, boxee can preserve DTS and Dolby Digital 5.1 output and push that to your receiver. :)

[rolltide78]

Thanks Dave. Which card do you recommend now? I know you had recommended the 7600 a couple of weeks ago. If you were to buy again would you get the same one? I've got a low profile Dell Optiplex GX260 so whatever I choose has to fit! Thanks!

[Gamester17]

NVIDIA Gforce 8400 and 8500 (fan-less) are highly recommended by the XBMC community users :D

[rolltide78]

Thanks! I'm so behind on my PC hardware. Now looking on pricewatch at the Nvidia 8500 I see lots and lots of different ones. Any particular vendor that you recommend? I'm also assuming that you'd go with 512 over 256.

Gary

[rolltide78]

Also...go with the Nvidia 8500 or the N7600GS SILENT/HTD/256M ? This machine is low profile...

[Gamester17]

Any particular vendor that you recommend? I'm also assuming that you'd go with 512 over 256Go with 8-series Gforce over 7-series (but not 9-series as the latest drivers for the 9-series are not mature yet), otherwise it doesn't matter, so just get the cheapest 8400 or 8500 that is fan-less and low-profile, (google to make sure that it comes with a low-profile bracket, some cards are low-profile but the manufacturer do not include the low-profile bracket in the box), ...HDMI instead of a DVI port might be a plus as well if that is what your TV/display.

:)

[rolltide78]

Thanks..do you think a P4 2.6 Ghz CPU is fast enough for 1080p (HD) content?

I guess I'll also need a dvi to hdmi cable for one of my tvs extra hdmi ports.

[Gamester17]

do you think a P4 2.6 Ghz CPU is fast enough for 1080p (HD) content?No, absolutely not when it comes to H.264 encoded video. Currently all decoding is done on the CPU, so you need a much faster CPU.

Intel Core2 Duo running at 2.0Ghz will in my estimate decode 90% of all 1080p H.264 videos out there perfectly.
Intel Core2 Duo running at 2.4Ghz will in my estimate decode 97% of all 1080p H.264 videos out there perfectly.
Intel Core2 Duo running at 3.0Ghz will in my estimate decode 100% of all 1080p H.264 videos out there perfectly.

This may change in 6-12 months from now as the decoder codecs get optimized, and the possibility to off-load some parts of the decoding process to the GPU might be implemented (but I do not expect that to happen within the next 6-months, and I expect that even a 3Ghz Pentium 4 with hyper-threading and GPU off-loading will able to decode 1080p H.264 videos unless they are especially encoded at a very low bit-rate).


I guess I'll also need a dvi to hdmi cable for one of my tvs extra hdmi ports.Like I mentioned above, some 8400/8500 already come with a built-in HDMI-output port, look for one of those.

[rolltide78]

Well there goes this being something that you can just use with an old machine and a few slight upgrades :( I'd have to buy a whole new box just to run this app. I guess I could still use it for standard media and Internet functionality but no sense in getting a new video card that can do HD if the CPU isn't fast enough. May not even be worth the trouble...

Thanks for your help.
Gary

[rolltide78]

One other thing..I was able to stream a 1080p copy of Monsters Inc that was aired on the BBC and I definitely could tell it was 1080p...looked fantastic on my setup. Why was this able to be clear?

On the other hand an IMAX "Into the Deep" 1080p stream looked good but had a slight choppiness.....

Is there enough HD content that doesn't require that codec that would be worth it? Forgive my ignorance on all of the HD codec / CPU tech..

Gary

[tsella]

re hardware, make sure you are able to find a card with pci or agpx2, which is what your setup supports. not sure if the new nvidias come with that at all.

you can always do 1080p, at 1mb/s :) meaning, its the bitrate, not just the resolution alone. if monsters, inc. was 5-10mb/s that would work nicely. and if into the deep is above that, well, it would be choppy

[rolltide78]

I am looking at this one only because its low profile and someone else suggested the 8500. Would this work? Also noticed it has a fan on it so maybe a tad loud.

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814162004

[tsella]

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814162004

nope. this is pci express

you need pci - see http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814139020 for example

[Gamester17]

One other thing..I was able to stream a 1080p copy of Monsters Inc that was aired on the BBC and I definitely could tell it was 1080p...looked fantastic on my setup. Why was this able to be clear?

On the other hand an IMAX "Into the Deep" 1080p stream looked good but had a slight choppiness.They are probably encoded in MPEG-2 or H.263 (DivX/Xvid), all IMAX I found online where encoded in MPEG-2. The H.264 codec is much more processor intensive than the older MPEG-2 and H.263 codecs.



Well there goes this being something that you can just use with an old machine and a few slight upgrades :( I'd have to buy a whole new box just to run this app. I guess I could still use it for standard media and Internet functionality but no sense in getting a new video card that can do HD if the CPU isn't fast enough.You do not need to buy a state-of-the-art graphic card for Boxee, there is no video decoding off-loading to the GPU in any case, all video decoding is done on the CPU, see:
http://forum.boxee.tv/showthread.php?t=136
tested on the following hardware:

gpu
nvidia 6150le igp, go7300 mobile, 8600m gt mobile and 7,8 series desktop gpus
intel 945*, 965, X3000, X3100 igp
ati x1600 mobile gpuAll those will output 1080p, so you will be able to upscale all videos to 1080p, ...but again, all video decoding is done on the CPU so you will need a fast CPU to be able to decode native 1080p H.264 encoded video (that is the codec format used on Blu-ray and HD DVD).

Note! You can use Boxee on an old slow PC with a 1Ghz Pentium III and 256MB RAM, and even it will upscale standard definition videos like DVD-Video movies to 720p and 1080p, but again it will not be able to playback decode native 1080p H.264 encoded video, for that you need a fast CPU.


PS! Maybe Team Boxee needs to put a FAQ together which explains this for all newcomers.

:o

[rolltide78]

Thanks for all of your help..both of you. I greatly appreciate it. I just want to make sure I get the right hardware. I hate getting something and it not work and then having to deal with the RMA junk....

Tsella...that card you just suggested is PCI but is 128 MB video ram enough? Also that doesn't look low profile.

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814139020

I guess with my small form factor machine its kind of a challenge finding something that fits and also that works in Ubuntu... fun fun :)

[tsella]

low profile bracket you can find:

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814139025 - Jaton 6200 256MB 64-bit DDR

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814139010 - Jaton 6200 256MB 128-bit DDR

[rolltide78]

Thanks so much. I wasnt able to find an 8500 thats PCI or AGP and also low profile :(

[dave]

Thanks so much. I wasnt able to find an 8500 thats PCI or AGP and also low profile :(

That's why I went with the 7600 series for my setup... Not top of the line, but looks great for upscaling DVD content. I hope that future tweaks to the ffmpeg and dvd player decoders help the old CPUs out by offloading the HD decode...

[rolltide78]

Just another question .... I have an Xbox 360... would it just make more sense to load Tversity up on a machine and stick to that setup? Just thinking of the costs involved here. Video podcasts, streaming HD content, and music are my primary interests..

Let me know your thoughts..
Gary

[Gamester17]

I hope that future tweaks to the ffmpeg and dvd player decoders help the old CPUs out by offloading the HD decode.They will somewhat, but you should not expect miracles :p


Just another question .... I have an Xbox 360... would it just make more sense to load Tversity up on a machine and stick to that setup? Just thinking of the costs involved here. Video podcasts, streaming HD content, and music are my primary interests.Wrong forum to ask that in, I suggest you checkout www.avforums.com (http://www.avforums.com)

[i3igi3yrd]

After playing around on Tversity and then running Boxee on a similar system to you, I'm recommending Boxee. The interface is so much more robust and feels like it is designed for what we are trying to accomplish. You do have a little more versitility in the way you set up TVersity, but I'm still saying Boxee is the route I'd recommend to you for the streaming and the setup at home.