Any Raspbery Pi or XBMC fans here?

[Thanatopsis]

Originally Posted by Michael Stora

Unit arrived 90 min ago and I am already watching my home movie collection on my 50" plasma. I never had to attach a mouse or keyboard as it is reading my TV remote.

Youtube plugin is crashing so I will have a little work to do.

Mike

Very Cool. I'm jealous .

[Thanatopsis]

Something good may come out of ordering mine so late. I might get lucky and receive a Rev 2.0 board

[Michael Stora]

I'm loving Raspbmc! The documentary channel is one of the best. I'm still looking for a Daily Motion add-on and a Pandora add-on. I've found every other video site I've tried including some I've never heard of before.

Unfortunately, NetFlix requires Microsoft Starlight so it only works on the PC or Mac versions of XBMC because Microsoft refuses to support linux. I can still get Nexflix from my TV or Blueray (same with Pandora).

Apparently the VideoMonkey add-on supported Daily Motion but has not been updated for years and is broken. VideoDevil (we won't discuss the content ) and VideoMonkey were based on the same code but only the former project was kept active. VideoDevil has a lot of content, for those interested in that sort of thing.

Only problems:
1. Since it uses SMB not NFS, I need to change to more SMB-friendly (ie Windows legal) file names on my home network.
2. It has trouble identifying some movies unless you put the year in the file name and don't have a lot of other numbers in the file name (like resolution and duration). It detects short videos and misidentifies them as movies. You can manually edit the catalog.
3. The first 3 seconds of audio is distorted--not a big deal on a 2 hr movie but more an issue on a 3 minute song. Files also stop playing about 5 seconds too early. Everyone knows of these bugs so I am sure someone is working on it.

Other than that, it is amazing.

Mike

[RedJoker]

Got my Pi today. Not sure when I'll get to it but I bought one for my brother so I just threw one in for me too.

[Michael Stora]

The first reboot first fixed the YouTube plugin. I found a Pandora plugin and it works great.

RC5 is supposed to fix the audio glitches. It will also have the new approved Turbo overclock modes that won't void your warranty. It should be released soon. I bought and installed my MPEG2 and VC-1 codec license keys and verified that they are working. MPEG4 Part 2 (popularized by MEncoder, DIVX, and XVID) and MPEG4 Part 10 (h.264) work out of the box. If you but the MPEG2 license it works for MPEG1 as well.

Everything just works! I was watching a youtube video in bed last night on my Driod and I accidentally hit "play on XBMC". Moments later I heard loud noises coming from my living room downstairs. The Pi had used CEC to turn on my TV and sound system to play the video.

Mike

[sharkx]

I finally joined the club. While the graphics are amazingly fast, the processor is astoundingly slow. Compiling the tool chain has taken, so far, upwards of a week.

Bruce

GentooPi / # cat /proc/cpuinfo
Processor       : ARMv6-compatible processor rev 7 (v6l)
BogoMIPS        : 697.95
Features        : swp half thumb fastmult vfp edsp java tls 
CPU implementer : 0x41
CPU architecture: 7
CPU variant     : 0x0
CPU part        : 0xb76
CPU revision    : 7

Hardware        : BCM2708
Revision        : 0003
Serial          : 00000000d41b5313
GentooPi / # df -h
Filesystem      Size  Used Avail Use% Mounted on
rootfs          9.9G  2.4G  7.0G  26% /
/dev/root       9.9G  2.4G  7.0G  26% /
devtmpfs         93M     0   93M   0% /dev
tmpfs            93M  156K   93M   1% /run
rc-svcdir       1.0M   44K  980K   5% /lib/rc/init.d
cgroup_root      10M     0   10M   0% /sys/fs/cgroup
shm              93M     0   93M   0% /dev/shm
/dev/mmcblk0p1   56M   36M   21M  63% /boot
/dev/sda3       907G  223G  639G  26% /users
/dev/sdb1       917G  494G  377G  57% /users1
/dev/mmcblk0p2  1.8G  782M  891M  47% /rasproot
/dev/mmcblk0p3  5.6G  2.5G  2.9G  46% /gentooroot
cat /proc/loadavg
2.42 2.37 2.35 2/55 996

[Michael Stora]

The processor is similar in power to a 486 or first generation Pentium. If you are using a distro that has not implemented hardware floating point it is a real dog. I've read that the core is about 0.5. MIPS and the video about 24 MIPS.

Mike

[Thanatopsis]

Here's a Raspi put to good use.

[RedJoker]

Originally Posted by Thanatopsis

Here's a Raspi put to good use.

Holy Overkill Batman!!!

I've done this with pic microcontrollers but my keezer / fermentation controllers don't have a web interface. Guess I better get on that! I'll make mine Wifi and Bluetooth and then I'll be a step ahead!

[dukegrad98]

Forgive the bump, but this thread has been at the back of my mind ever since it was originally posted. I finally gave in today, and ordered myself an RPi to play with. I got the later generation with 512MB onboard. (Had to pay a tad extra on eBay since at least one official retailer is not taking orders right now.) I also picked up a cheesy cheapo acrylic case and a spare power supply.

Now the question...how I want to build it. I am exceedingly happy with my OpenELEC system running on a Foxconn book-sized computer. OpenELEC has an RPi implementation now, so I will likely tinker with that first. Mike's comments on his happiness with Raspbmc are certainly on my radar as well, but I hear it is slower.

In any case, hopefully all the parts will show up next week and I can tinker the next time I have a free hour or a rainy weekend.

Cheers, John

[Michael Stora]

Originally Posted by dukegrad98

Forgive the bump, but this thread has been at the back of my mind ever since it was originally posted. I finally gave in today, and ordered myself an RPi to play with. I got the later generation with 512MB onboard. (Had to pay a tad extra on eBay since at least one official retailer is not taking orders right now.) I also picked up a cheesy cheapo acrylic case and a spare power supply.

Now the question...how I want to build it. I am exceedingly happy with my OpenELEC system running on a Foxconn book-sized computer. OpenELEC has an RPi implementation now, so I will likely tinker with that first. Mike's comments on his happiness with Raspbmc are certainly on my radar as well, but I hear it is slower.

In any case, hopefully all the parts will show up next week and I can tinker the next time I have a free hour or a rainy weekend.

Cheers, John

As long as your current OpenELEC system gives you what you want video quality-wize, you'll probably find menus on the pi a bit slow, esp. when randomizing a playlist in a folder with 1200 mp3s.

The one I ordered first just arrived a couple days ago. It is the Model B Rev 2 but not the new 512MB model. Since it is usually setup with 128mb for the graphics engine, the 512MB model has three times the usable memory as the 128.

I'm going to do a second set top box upstairs. I'm debating just copying the library over or moving it to a house MySQL server.

Mike

[dukegrad98]

Originally Posted by Michael Stora

As long as your current OpenELEC system gives you what you want video quality-wize, you'll probably find menus on the pi a bit slow, esp. when randomizing a playlist in a folder with 1200 mp3s.

[SNIP]

I'm going to do a second set top box upstairs. I'm debating just copying the library over or moving it to a house MySQL server.

I was comparing the hassle-factor of installing OpenELEC versus Raspbmc, and may wind up trying the latter first. (I'm surprised that OpenELEC installation on RPi is so much more involved, given that it's a trivial installation on x86 architecture. I have a Linux system available to deal with it, but my days of being deeply interested in editing text files and cross-compiling...well, I'm just not the geek I used to be.)

I'm very happy with OpenELEC video quality. Mike, have you had a different experience? Of course, my library is all merely DVD quality. I do not have any 1080p content, or gigantic MP3 library, etc. Storage is currently local, so no network issues there. For me, it's just a gadget to consolidate an existing DVD collection and put the discs in a box at the back of the closet. In that regard, the system I already have works perfectly. I do not have a BD-ROM drive, and have not experimented with any higher-res content.

My RPi is out for delivery today, so hopefully I'll have time in the next week or two for tinkering with it. I don't mind keeping the library database on each unit updated independently, but I will probably have to shift from local storage on the OpenELEC box to a network-based repository that multiple gadgets will be able to see. Should be pretty easy, with a NAS or even just a big USB drive tethered off the wireless router (assuming access is fast enough). I'll post back once I have had some tinker-time with the new gadget.

Cheers, John

[Michael Stora]

Originally Posted by dukegrad98

I was comparing the hassle-factor of installing OpenELEC versus Raspbmc, and may wind up trying the latter first. (I'm surprised that OpenELEC installation on RPi is so much more involved, given that it's a trivial installation on x86 architecture. I have a Linux system available to deal with it, but my days of being deeply interested in editing text files and cross-compiling...well, I'm just not the geek I used to be.)

I'm very happy with OpenELEC video quality. Mike, have you had a different experience? Of course, my library is all merely DVD quality. I do not have any 1080p content, or gigantic MP3 library, etc. Storage is currently local, so no network issues there. For me, it's just a gadget to consolidate an existing DVD collection and put the discs in a box at the back of the closet. In that regard, the system I already have works perfectly. I do not have a BD-ROM drive, and have not experimented with any higher-res content.

My RPi is out for delivery today, so hopefully I'll have time in the next week or two for tinkering with it. I don't mind keeping the library database on each unit updated independently, but I will probably have to shift from local storage on the OpenELEC box to a network-based repository that multiple gadgets will be able to see. Should be pretty easy, with a NAS or even just a big USB drive tethered off the wireless router (assuming access is fast enough). I'll post back once I have had some tinker-time with the new gadget.

Cheers, John

John, I would go with Raspbmc on the Pi and not OpenELEC as it is not mature on that platform and as you mentioned, a pain to install and setup.

Except for a rare audio chirp which I think might be NAS-related (they increase when another computer is accessing the NAS), I have no playback issues, only slow menus, esp. for music.

Mike

[Michael Stora]

Here is why Pi orders take so long



1.5 Teraflops of GPU performance for $4,000 (that is as soon as someone develops a toolkit to use the Broadcom GPU as a general purpose processor).

Actually today you can do GPU performance for about $0.73 per Gf, but programming for GPUs costs hundreds of thousands of dollars.

Mike

[RedJoker]

I kinda forgot about this thread. My raspbmc is up and running. Still a few more things I want to do with it though....

[dukegrad98]

My RPi is also up and running on Raspbmc. However, I have not managed to do anything useful with it yet -- lack of storage.

I have 12TB worth of weekend online sale-price hard drives ($89 per 3TB drive) showing up this week, and will probably build them into a FreeNAS box set up for RAID5. Then I will have something to feed media to the RPi, and probably also the existing Foxconn box running OpenELEC -- will phase out its local storage. I'll report back when I get it all set up.

Cheers, John

[bhoov128]

I just ordered a Raspberry Pi from Newark - they say they have more than 20 in stock to ship immediately if anyone's thinking of pulling the trigger - and it'll replace the big tower computer in my living room that runs the movie rips to the TV. All my movies are currently stored on a server in my 'office' bedroom, which has a 3TB raid 5 array. Hopefully a fun project, if it all works well then I hope to replace my 55" tv with a projector and get a 10 - 12 foot picture

[RedJoker]

Originally Posted by bhoov128

if it all works well then I hope to replace my 55" tv with a projector and get a 10 - 12 foot picture

This is EXACTLY why I'm looking at the pi.

[Michael Stora]

Originally Posted by dukegrad98

My RPi is also up and running on Raspbmc. However, I have not managed to do anything useful with it yet -- lack of storage.

I have 12TB worth of weekend online sale-price hard drives ($89 per 3TB drive) showing up this week, and will probably build them into a FreeNAS box set up for RAID5. Then I will have something to feed media to the RPi, and probably also the existing Foxconn box running OpenELEC -- will phase out its local storage. I'll report back when I get it all set up.

Cheers, John

I sent with SMB for the first go-around but NFS is much faster.

Mike

[dukegrad98]

Thanks for the tip, Mike. Right now I am connecting by SMB. I have NFS turned on, but for some reason my XBMC machines don't see the NFS share at all. I don't know much about that, so it's something to research another day.

Anyway, I am sort of up and running. I put together my FreeNAS box over the weekend and transferred a couple hundred gigs of content to it. I can access it fine as a content source on my OpenELEC box via WiFi -- movies play smoothly.

I began tinkering with the RPi (Raspbmc) machine next. It also sees the FreeNAS server via SMB, over a wired 100mbps network connection. It updates the library correctly, and attempts to play the content when directed. My problem is that I am hearing the soundtrack through the television fine, but there is no video playback -- it just stays on the video menu screen. (All signal to TV is over HDMI.)

So...the tinkering must go on. I have PLENTY of bandwidth over the wire -- ten times more than I am getting over WiFi on the other box, which is working fine. After all I have heard, I'd be shocked if the RPi was choking on playing standard-def DVD type content back over a wired network connection...???

Cheers, John

[sharkx]

I can't help with the video but there's a good chance your NFS issues relate to differing version issues within NFS.

Bruce

[bhoov128]

Originally Posted by dukegrad98

Thanks for the tip, Mike. Right now I am connecting by SMB. I have NFS turned on, but for some reason my XBMC machines don't see the NFS share at all. I don't know much about that, so it's something to research another day.

Anyway, I am sort of up and running. I put together my FreeNAS box over the weekend and transferred a couple hundred gigs of content to it. I can access it fine as a content source on my OpenELEC box via WiFi -- movies play smoothly.

I began tinkering with the RPi (Raspbmc) machine next. It also sees the FreeNAS server via SMB, over a wired 100mbps network connection. It updates the library correctly, and attempts to play the content when directed. My problem is that I am hearing the soundtrack through the television fine, but there is no video playback -- it just stays on the video menu screen. (All signal to TV is over HDMI.)

So...the tinkering must go on. I have PLENTY of bandwidth over the wire -- ten times more than I am getting over WiFi on the other box, which is working fine. After all I have heard, I'd be shocked if the RPi was choking on playing standard-def DVD type content back over a wired network connection...???

Cheers, John

I might be inferring something incorrectly here: Have you ever had the rpi working at all with your video content or are you only using your super cool openelec system successfully? If you've never had the rpi working it might be a video codec issue.

[dukegrad98]

Originally Posted by bhoov128

I might be inferring something incorrectly here: Have you ever had the rpi working at all with your video content or are you only using your super cool openelec system successfully? If you've never had the rpi working it might be a video codec issue.

Your inference is correct -- this is my earliest alpha-testing of the RPi with my existing content, and I've never used the box before. It could very well be a codec issue. However, the separate OpenElec system is working fine out-of-the-box with the same data; never had to install anything other than the default OS on that box. All the movie content is standard .VOB file format. I haven't had a chance to tinker with the RPi since this past weekend, but I'm hopeful that I'll get it working soon. Thanks for thinking up a good lead for me!

I did stupidly delete all the content I had transferred onto the NAS box, but that's just a matter of pushing it back over there again. Doh!

Cheers, John

[tahamsh]

So... Does anyone have plans to put their Raspi to use in their FFR?

I've been running raspbmc for some time now; but it would fun to do a pi FFR crossover project!

[dukegrad98]

I see that this has bounced back up to the top, and I neglected to post an update. Indeed, my MPEG video problem was simply a matter of need to buy the license (about $3, I think) and update the keys in the config file to play movies. Done.

The problem now is the apparent inability of the RPi to stream movies from my NAS box correctly. It's on a hard-wired 100BT switched connection, so the network isn't the problem. It's possible that the Samba protocol is part of the issue -- it feels like a bandwidth issue, even though that doesn't make sense. Sometimes movies will not begin, other times they will play for five or ten minutes and then hang as though the machine is caching data. It's basically unwatchable. I haven't had any luck with NFS, which I hear is more efficient -- my RPi can't see the machine on that protocol.

My OpenElec box, running over an unimpressive 802.11g wireless connection, handles content from the same NAS over Samba without issue. For that reason, I've gotten lazy and haven't bothered tinkering further with the RPi. Next time there's free time...

Cheers, John

[Fezzek]

Out of curiosity, what would people try and use the Raspberry Pi for in their FFR?

Electronics is not my thing. But my wife is doing all the electronics for our MK4 and she asked me about the Raspberry Pi just last week.

She's a bit rusty on it, but if I give her a day without the kids interrupting I am sure she could come up with something. I just have no idea what you would use it for.

Martin

[RedJoker]

Goofy question: Has anyone gotten a Raspi to work as a stand alone, over the air Tv tuner? Every example I've seen streams from another computer. I want my Pi to act as an HDTV tuner for a projector.

I haven't spent any time on this in a month or so but I thought I'd see if anyone else has stumbled across this.

[Thanatopsis]

Originally Posted by Fezzek

Out of curiosity, what would people try and use the Raspberry Pi for in their FFR?

Electronics is not my thing. But my wife is doing all the electronics for our MK4 and she asked me about the Raspberry Pi just last week.

She's a bit rusty on it, but if I give her a day without the kids interrupting I am sure she could come up with something. I just have no idea what you would use it for.

Martin

I'm working on using it as a black box. My notebook is at the office so I'll post more details later in the week. Some of the things I'm looking at monitoring are:

Analog:

Engine temp
Oil temp
oil presure
Brake presure F
Brake presure R
charging system
range finder [front and rear]

Digital In:

Front and Rear tire rotation
ignition status
Head lights
Turn signals.
Brake status.
master power status
engine RPM
wiper status
hood alarm rear hatch & door

I2C:

Accel
Compass
Temp/hum/bar (2)
Luminosity / lux

USB:

Data drive.
Cameras.

Serial:

GPS

[RyanH]

Ive got 2 problems that the pi might be a solution to.

1: Detachable steering hub negates the ability to use self cancelling turn signal. Id like to replicate what the isis system does...momentary on for the turn signal switch and the blinkers run for say 10 seconds..unless your at a light and have your foot on the brake..the timer doesnt start running until your foot comes off the brake.

2: I would like to run my speedhut backlight dimmer off my headlight switch but the ohm ranges are completely different. I thought I could run the whole led pulsing through the pi.

Just a couple uses.

I worry about the car enviornment on the pi...vibrations and the strong possibility of it getting wet in the rain.

[Michael Stora]

Originally Posted by RyanH

Ive got 2 problems that the pi might be a solution to.

1: Detachable steering hub negates the ability to use self cancelling turn signal. Id like to replicate what the isis system does...momentary on for the turn signal switch and the blinkers run for say 10 seconds..unless your at a light and have your foot on the brake..the timer doesnt start running until your foot comes off the brake.

2: I would like to run my speedhut backlight dimmer off my headlight switch but the ohm ranges are completely different. I thought I could run the whole led pulsing through the pi.

Just a couple uses.

I worry about the car enviornment on the pi...vibrations and the strong possibility of it getting wet in the rain.

Holy overkill Batman! More like Ardueno if you're new school or some 555s if you're old school like me.

Mike