AlNipper49 said:Get one Roku and I'll share my Plex library with you. Easy peasy.
jayhoz said:Ok, I'm going to slowly acquire the components for a Plex server with Rokus as the playback devices. I do not plan on doing any gaming on this at the moment. I'd like the headroom to push three concurrent 1080P streams though that scenario will be extremely infrequent.
This is going to be a slow burn so the wife doesn't see the true cost of this thing.
Purchased
Roku 3 (refurb)
OCZ ARC100 120GB SSD for the OS
Needed / Questions
Case - I'd like this small and quiet, but with enough room to expand as needed. Thinking of doing a RAID setup. Is four internal bays enough?
CPU - Thinking an i5 like the 4690K ?
Motherboard
RAM - 4 or 8Gb ?
Power Supply
Graphics Card
OS
The Roku has been purchased big boy.
Roku has shitty codec support and often needs transcoding to play stuff back, which Plex or Mediatomb will do on the fly.SuperManny said:I use XBMC for my HTPC and love it, I believe Plex integrates well with XBMC but I've never used it. What is the benefit of going with Plex?
I use an old computer running Windows as the "server" at the moment and it works great sending files to several devices at once. I assume you need the newer CPU and graphics card because Plex trans codes from the server instead of the playback device?
SumnerH said:Roku has shitty codec support and often needs transcoding to play stuff back, which Plex or Mediatomb will do on the fly.
XBMC's a much nicer product but doesn't transcode on the fly, so you need smarter players that will play all your codecs or you need to transcode everything ahead of time. You can use XBMC + Rokus if you transcode everything ahead of time, but you take a one-time quality hit when you do that and it's a moderate PITA.
(I use XBMC + WDTV Live SMP players and avoid transcoding).
SuperManny said:
Interesting, I haven't had any issues with streaming just using XBMC as the front end on other PCs and most recently an Amazon Fire TV, which streams the files from the old computer through SMB. The old computer is also used as my main HTPC in the Family Room but I've been thinking of either converting it to a full time server or buying/building a home server.
The Fire TV (and Fire TV Stick) can run the android version of XBMC (now called Kodi). It'll do MKV over DLNA or SMB with that.SumnerH said:
PCs running XBMC will play pretty much anything you throw at them (even more than the WDTV). The Fire TV is more limited than the Roku 3; it won't play VOB, MKV, or AVI files, unless things have changed recently.
jayhoz said:Any thoughts on this case? It says it holds 6 3.5" internal drives. Do you think I could fit 6 HDD plus one SSD?
Fractal Design Node 304
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16811352027&nm_mc=AFC-C8Junction&cm_mmc=AFC-C8Junction-_-na-_-na-_-na&cm_sp=&AID=10446076&PID=3938566&SID=
jayhoz said:Any thoughts on this case? It says it holds 6 3.5" internal drives. Do you think I could fit 6 HDD plus one SSD?
Fractal Design Node 304
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16811352027&nm_mc=AFC-C8Junction&cm_mmc=AFC-C8Junction-_-na-_-na-_-na&cm_sp=&AID=10446076&PID=3938566&SID=
Nick Kaufman said:Last time I was shopping for large capacity hds, I remember that after reading reviews on Newegg, I formed the impression that Hds more than 2TB had a higher percentage of customer complains; something like 20-30% gave them 1 star which in my mind meant a bigger risk with my data. Things may have changed since then.
Also, although I am a big fan of Western Digital, I remember going for the Samsung green version, although I don't remember why.
SumnerH said:Roku has shitty codec support and often needs transcoding to play stuff back, which Plex or Mediatomb will do on the fly.
XBMC's a much nicer product but doesn't transcode on the fly, so you need smarter players that will play all your codecs or you need to transcode everything ahead of time. You can use XBMC + Rokus if you transcode everything ahead of time, but you take a one-time quality hit when you do that and it's a moderate PITA.
(I use XBMC + WDTV Live SMP players and avoid transcoding).
http://support.roku.com/entries/56698214-Roku-screen-mirroring-compatible-devices claims so. Or Android 4.4.2 or later, but I've got nothing there I want to screencast.Nick Kaufman said:Why? It only mirrors win 8.1?
jayhoz said:Should I be concerned with H97 v. Z97 chipsets? The H is $23 cheaper.
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813128721&nm_mc=AFC-C8Junction&cm_mmc=AFC-C8Junction-_-na-_-na-_-na&cm_sp=&AID=10446076&PID=3938566&SID=
http://www.superbiiz.com/detail.php?name=MB-Z97NWF&c=CJ
Nick Kaufman said:Ok, after considerable thought and googling, I ve concluded that what I want is an XBMC box connected to a shared network drive.
I assume the shared network drive on a computer which is on 24/7 won't be a problem, although I am not sure whether I should have XBMC or codecs installed on that computer ( noone is going to be watching anything there either way).
The xbmc box should be doing the transcoding on its own and should be as easy to use as possible.(thanks again to sumner for explaining transcoding to me). I ve done some research on them and i ve come across dozens. Two common threads I see is that the android on them doesn't work and that their remote controls suck.
However, you can flash them with linux and that turns them even more exclusively to xbmc boxes and that's fine by me. Moreover, I came across the xbox one remote control and I know that if I can pair it with flirc I can get it work with lirc on linux. Jayhoz you should look into it, it looks as the most elegant remote control out there.
I should note, that I ve never toyed with linux, but....
Anywho, does anyone had a good experience with an xbmc box or knows for a fact that it will play on its own all the codecs you will throw at it?
Nick Kaufman said:Anywho, does anyone had a good experience with an xbmc box or knows for a fact that it will play on its own all the codecs you will throw at it?
SumnerH said:
Depends on the hardware. XBMC on raspberry pi and many embedded android devices has limited codec support. On a standard desktop PC (even one in a fancy media case that looks like a PVR or whatever) it'll play anything you throw at it.
You'll have to be more specific with what you mean by an "xbmc box".
I have a similar setup at my house. 1 old PC that stores the data, 2 Amazon Fire TVs with android version of XBMC sideloaded, and several PCs with XBMC. I've never had any problems with codecs at all, its plays all of the different files types I've thrown at it. Setting it up isn't difficult but its not always straight forward and the customization is pretty much limitless. Luckily there is a large community behind it so there are a lot of resources available. The thing that took me the longest to get setup correctly was the backend mySQL database, which ensures that the library and watched list are shared between all devices.
Nick Kaufman said:
Yeah, I ve heard good things about FireTV and XBMC; i ve got no need for an sql database; I will take a closer look, thanks.