Exploring Media Centers: Moovida

Moovida (formerly Elisa) is yet another open source media player that runs on both Windows and Linux. It ofers a decent menu, though a bit dark for my taste. It has all the features one expects from a media player: The ability to play video and audio, the ability to set up network players, etc. Moodia also comes with quite a few plugins to play content from Internet sites. These include Vimeo, YouTube, CNN news, TED talks,etc.

Unfortunately for Moovida, it exists in the same era as Boxee and XBMC. When compared with either, Moodiva pales in comparison both in features or in the number of plugins offered.

As one would expect, my verdict is: Stick with XBMC and/or Boxee.

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Boxee Beta: My official review

As my previous posts indicate, I am a Boxee and XBMC buff. On December 7th, CEO of Boxee, Avner Rosen unveiled the Beta version, to an impatient fan base. The alpha versions for Winodws 7, Mac OS and Linux, which are still available as downloads on the Boxee website, is one of the most stable of alpha software  that I have seen.

Avner said at the Boxee launch on Dec. 7th that the beta would be available for the general public, four weeks from the launch after it is officially released by CES. Soon, Lifehacker posted an entry in their blog that a leaked Beta Windows version of Boxee was available as a Bit Torrent download.
Before we get into the details of the Beta release,let us first look at Boxee and its offerings.So what can one do with Boxee? Why is it considered the breakthrough in Media Centers. Here are some of Boxee features.


 You can set up Boxee on a HTPC(Home Theater PC) hooked up to your TV and do the following:

•  Stream media from all the computers and Laptops on your home network into your TV. When all your videos, music and  photos are spread across one or more computers on shared drives, you can bring them all into your TV. Boxee can play several  formats of music and video files. If you have backed up your CD collections as mp3s on your hard drive and your DVDs as ISO files,  you could play these files via Boxee on your TV.
• Play internet media on your TV using Boxee add-ons. There are a number of custom add-ons included in the Beta release of Boxee. These include
• A YouTube plugin to search for and play You tube videos on your TV.
• Plugins for TV network sites like PBS, CNN, National Geographic and so on to play TV programs archived in such sites on your TV
• Plugins for several educational and informative sites like Flora TV, TED talks and Open Courseware. Open Courseware is a repository of educational content from soem of the world's leading universities like MIT, Stanford, etc.
• Rent movies from Netflix via Boxee.Boxee has a plugin for Netflix that allows you to login and access Netflicks content and have the content be streamed onto your TV
• Another plugin for Clicker.com to access NBC and ABC programs. (This plugin is yet to work for me.)

If you do not have an HTPC and choose not to buy one, you can still run Boxee on any recent laptop or desktop.

So, with Boxee, one may cut the cable once and for all. Lifehacker.com has several articles to install and customize Boxee on apple TV and dedicated Boxee boxes.  During the Beta release CEO Avner unveiled a Boxee Box which will be manufactured by DLink and available in stores in Q2 of 2010.One rant I have about the Beta is that, personally I liked the alpha's green look at feel a lot more. This beta one is a bit too flashy for my taste.

Secondly I could play CBS and Hulu feeds in the alpha version. Someone said that I could use clicker to access this content, but I have had little success so far.The beta version offers better navigation among menus and streaming is a lot faster.

One feature that is lacking is the the ability to watch and record live TV. Though I suspect that Boxee is not getting into this aspect of media, doing so would make the Boxee  the undisputed leader of home entertainment. For now we must stick to Tivo, the Windows media center, Sage or MythTv to record or watch live TV.

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Everything XBMC

Judging by the traffic on this blog, there seems to be a lot of interest in XBMC, the open source media center which was initially made for the XBox classic, but has now become a full fledged media center in its own right for many platforms. I have compiled a list of links below on XBMC that I found very helpful.

The XBMC site: This is the main XBMC site that has all the latest information and downloads for XMBC on Windows, Linux and Mac platforms.

XBMC for the XBox: For a number of reasons, the XBMC site does not include a donwload for the XBox. For the latest versions of XBMC for the XBox, this is where you go.

XBMC Plugins source tree: If you are familiar with checking out code with SVN, you can download most of the XBMC plugins at this URL. The plugins enable you to access online content from a multitude of sources like CBS, NBC universal, You Tube and so on. You can also access online music from sources like Last Fm.

Note: There is no XBMC plugin that I know that works with Hulu or Fancast as of this writing.

Getting XBMC on the XBox: (The old way) This article by Gina Trapani introduced the world of XBMC to me. I had little trouble getting it to run on the XBox. While it is an amazing feet getting an XBMC to run on a 64MB machine(XBox), people beginning their adventure with XBox are advised try to install it and test it out on a laptop or invest in a $200 nettop PC. (See below). Besides, Gamestop has stopped selling used XBoxes for $50. You'll have to get one off ebay if you do not have them already.
Running XBMC on a Net top PC: (the new way) This article by Adam Pash details how to install XBMC ona $200 nettop PC. The Acer Aspire Revo Nettop is a powerful nettop that comes with 1GB of memory and a powerful graphics card. This article leads you through a 'Live XBMC' install on the nettop.

Lifehacker offers numerous tips on customizing XBMC after you install it.

Hope you find these links useful for you.

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XBMC and Boxee

XBMC

It is almost 2 years since I hacked an old XBox to install XBMC the killer media center, at least at that time. With just a 133 mHz Pentium III and 64MB of RAM, the XBox could run an impressive array of games.

Open source XBMC took the XBox to a whole new level. It turned the XBox into a complete media center and gave it the ability to stream audio and video running on a file server anywhere in one's house into a television connected to the Xbox.

The plugins produced by a dedicated hacker community enabled one to stream video and audio available across the computer directly into the television. The arrival of XBMC accentuated proliferation of the television and the home computer.

XBMC has since grown out of the XBox and has become a killer media center for the PC, the MAC and Linux systems. There is even a 'live' version of XMBC that enables one to use a cheap computer like the Acer Aspire Revo as a dedicated XBMC box. Please visit xmbc.org to download a free version for your specific system.

Over the last year, website www.Lifehacker.com has featured numerous articles on XBMC.

Boxee

XBMC had and continues to have many offsprings. The most popular and impressive among these is undoubtedly Boxee. One website referred to Boxee as XBMX on steroids. Available at Boxee.tv, Boxee is another killer mediacenter available for PC,MAC and Linux. The alpha version of Boxee has a look and feel far more impressive than XBMC. Boxee is also a trifle more user friendly in giving the user the ability to add plugins, special add ons enabling the user access to numerous sources of media on the internet.
In addition to providing content from websites of popular TV stations like CBS and CNN, Boxee has plugins enabling one access to education and edutainment channels like OpenCourseware from universities, TED talks and Flora TV.
The arrival of Hulu, the second most popular website for streaming video brought with it the hope of getting quick access to popular TV shows and videos. Hulu's failed love affair with Boxee has been noteworthy and covered extensively on Lifehacker and Gizmodo.

The internet geeks have been critical of Hulu for bowing down to the demands of Media companies and not allowing its content to be made easily available to media centers like Boxee.

Business week and Gizmodo feature articles on how Hulu may charge for enabling users to acess its content. In fact Gizmodo suggests that users must abandon Hulu immediatedly to not get cornered by the media website and being presured to pay for watching its content.

In true Web 2.0 fashion, Boxee has a platform to allow its users watch, comment and recommend shows to others. At this stage Boxee is using the popular viral model to promote itself.

Boxee is planning a big release event for the 7th of December where it will unveil its Beta version. This version will be available to the public in January 2010. It promises to make this version more impressive than its alpha.I cannot wait to get my hands on that version.

Boxee has also hinted that it would release a dedicated Boxee box, a device that will only run Boxee and that one can include in her home theater setup. There is no word on pricing for this one yet.

About two years ago, Boxee and Apple TV seemed to make an impressive sleek and inexpensive media center. The Apple TV is a small computer with 250MB of RAM and priced around $200.

Today, one can build his own dedicated Boxeebox with a more powerful computer like the Acer Apspire Revo that costs around the same and has a great graphics card that allows watching of HD programming. Lifehacker carries a couple of great articles on how to build a dedicated Boxee or XBMC box using a cheap PC.

The big incentive with both these media centers, XBMC and Boxee is that one gets on-demand programming and can eliminate cable entirely. (A good HD antenna is another addition to one's home that will provide the ability to access real time news.)

If you have not tried out using any of these media centers, you owe it to yourself to check themout by just installing either or both of them on your laptop, for starters.
I was amazed I could get this kind of software for free. XBMC and Boxee are guaranteed to change the way you watch TV or listen to music.

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