JDPFu.com 2025

So I’ve been happily using a TiVo for the last 6 years. For about 2 years before getting a TiVo, I attempted to build my own Media Center PC. I was a little too early in the cycle then.

TiVo records videos, plays audio files from my network, plays specifically formated videos from my network, pulls internet shows local and lets me pull most content from the TiVo to archive. There are other “features” that require payment that I don’t use – Amazon and TiVo are connected so you can purchase movies and have them delivered to your TIVo.

So, it’s 2009 and media center solutions abound. Freevo, MythTV, LinuxMCE, Microsoft MCE, XBMC, Boxee, ApplyTV, Piren, and a host of proprietary solutions. Many of those listed support ripping, audio, DVDs, transcoding, shoving them into a database, home automation, VoIP/PBX, YouTube, Google Video … the list goes on and on.

My needs are fairly trivial.

1. Playback Video files for the common media types (avi, mpg2/4, mp3, wmv, rm, rmvb, mkv, xvid, divx, HiDef, and hysical DVDs); basically, anything that VLC can playback should be supported.
2. Playback Audio files with playlists and common groupings (artist, album, genre, keyword, etc.); the interface of gnump3 would be fantasic, but Amarok and xmms are nice too. AC3 audio is mandatory.
3. Image slide show – to show off all those travel photos.
4. Connect to media locations on my network with sshfs, nfs, smb, and http
5. Remember those locations and store the connection info securely
6. Fast control over the aspect ratio, video size, and interlace/progressive
7. Control the playback via a web or keyboard-only interface (no mouse); Ideally, my N800 will be the remote control
8. No need to setup a “Media Library” to playback a stupid video. That’s were all those big solutions listed at the top fail.
9. Not slow on a machine with dual core, 4GB ram, fast disk, and WiFi-G or faster networking. I just removed MythTv, XMBC, MS-MC, and LinuxMCE because they were all dog slow. Push a button, wait 10 seconds for something to happen slow. Windows Media Center was dog slow running on the main partition – not in a VM!
10. I don’t need any recording
11. I don’t need any ripping
12. Just want to provide a URL to a few directory areas and go.

I find it odd that people put up with this BS. My MediaGate is fantastic except it doesn’t have the horsepower to play newer format video files.

So now I’m trying Piren. In theory, it is a tight, “live” media player distro. It is 250MB and doesn’t need to be installed. I plan to run it as a VM on my laptop. Crossing my fingers that this ends my search.