I had never given this HTPC software a try before but I decided to do it yesterday night. Moovida is another interesting project but it never quite got the traction of many other HTPC software. The Linux platform is still heavily dominated by MythTV although I think that it is a little dated by now. I decided to give Moovida a spin on my new LCD TV and pulled the packages from the experimental Debian repository.

It was the first time that I had pulled anything in from experimental and I had to learn how to do it. At first, I merely did a apt-get -t experimental install moovida but it kept complaining about dependency issues. Then, I looked around and found out that experimental does not have a complete set of packages and I needed to add in unstable packages too. After doing that, I got Moovida to install easily. Then, it was merely a process of configuration and playing around with it.

I immediately tested out its online streaming capabilities. I managed to pull in music from various online services and also from my own local iTunes server. One thing that I noticed immediately was that Moovida automagically pulls in album covers and all from the Internet. So, the playlist had nice little pictures attached to them.

Then, I decided to test out video streaming and visited TED instead. I managed to watch the latest TED video on development around the world. On my 512k ADSL connection, it was mostly watchable. It had a discernible lag about once a minute when it was busy buffering but it was otherwise enjoyable. Again, Moovida would pull in thumbnails from the Internet when browsing for videos where available. I guess that it is time to upgrade my line to 1Mbps.

So far so good.

Then, I faced some problems. I have yet to figure out how to configure the local media. While it could pick up my daap music files, it had trouble connecting to my upnp media server. So, it was not able to pick out local videos and images that I shared. There are some error messages on the console so I think that this is merely a configuration problem. I might try mounting them as NFS/CIFS and see if that will work, tonight.

All in all, I think that Moovida is an excellent media player application, even if it lacks the powerful PVR capabilities of MythTV or Freevo. However, the VIA platform that I had it running on was a little slow. Even at 800×600, there was some jerkiness in the TED video. I guess that a combination of live streaming and playback is a little too taxing for the little bugger. I will probably migrate it over to an old AMD laptop of mine to see if that helps matters.

Anyhow, this is just a little thing because I fully intend to purchase a PS3 soon. Once that is done, the PS3 will probably play the role of a HTPC instead. But temporarily, I will have Moovida to play around with. Then again, Moovida/XBMC might still have a role to play at home simply because they can support more video formats and various nifty online streaming capabilities.

I am re-evaluating the possibility of using an Apple-TV for my HTPC. The advantage is that this is a device that was designed to be a HTPC from day one. It has all the right connections and is also low-powered. Furthermore, it turns out that XBMC is supported on the Apple-TV. The Apple-TV can be had for about RM1250 (GBP 216) from certain re-sellers in Malaysia (it is listed at RM1450 at the Apple store).

The only potential disadvantage is the lack of support for full-HD content. All references point to the fact that the Apple-TV is only able to decode HD-ready (720p) content but will upscale it to full-HD (1080p). This is not a serious problem at the moment for all of my available media are mainly SD content. Furthermore, I don’t see this situation changing anytime soon simply because there isn’t that much full-HD content available anyway.

Another difficulty may be with the ability to integrate the Apple-TV onto my home network. If I were to get the Apple-TV, I would be getting the 40GB one, which severely limits the amount of media it can store. So, the Apple-TV would need to stream the data off the network. It has got both wired and wireless network connections. However, it would need the correct software to be running on the network in order to work properly. Firefly doesn’t seem to support streaming videos at the moment.

This may be solved by installing XBMC on the Apple-TV. It is certainly capable of running as a standalone application.

Certainly something to consider. It would be easier to get this than some of the other options.

I’m starting to think that our selection of computer goods in Malaysia is severely restricted to the gaming variety. I had the chance to visit Digital Mall, PJ last weekend and spent a while perusing the 4 storeys of shops selling mainly gadgets, phones and computer products. Unfortunately, I failed to find any place that sold anything suitable for my HTPC.

You can see that the local computer retail industry seems to be driven by games. You can see the retail stores pushing high end processors, motherboards and graphics cards. Supposedly, these are needed by the gamers to experience the best and greatest in state-of-the-art games. Unfortunately, gamers are a dumb bunch and end up shelling out a fortune to build a gaming rig that doesn’t perform as well for games as they thought it would have.

Unfortunately for my purposes, I’m going after low power, low profile and low cost systems for my HTPC rig. Seems that my tastes run counter to the main stream. So, trying to get stuff off-the-shelf is not as easy as I had hoped. I was planning to just pick up a suitable e-machines computer or similar for my HTPC rig. Unfortunately, there were none to be found in the whole building. There was only one e-machine model being sold in one-store but it was not suitable for my rig.

Seems that I might actually have to travel down to Low-Yat to have a look, this weekend. I hate having to go down there. Parking is a pain and the crowd is just crazy. Maybe I should take an LRT down instead. I’ve got a new book to read with me and this might be a good time to start. I really need to get my HTPC rig built. Otherwise, my new HDTV is being wasted.

My requirements are really simple – a quiet system that is capable of full-HD output and 5.1 sound. If I had to assemble one myself, at least give me the option of buying the component parts. Otherwise, I would be willing to pay for a ready-made machine at the right price.

I finally took the plunge today. I bought myself a 1080p capable HDTV. It was the model that I had been eyeing for a while – the 32LG53FR. This model has a RRP of about RM2,300 but most outlets have sold it for just under RM2,000 – making it the cheapest 1080p HDTV in the market. I had been waiting for the price to drop a little more before making the purchase.

I went shopping today and I checked out the recent prices. Carrefour was doing it for RM1,900. I then went to Harvey Norman who told me that they were all sold out and that the line had be discontinued. There weren’t any new units coming in. So, I went to Best, who were selling it at RM1,850. I got them to lower the price a little and settled at just under RM1,800. That was the price-point I was happy with.

So, I am now happily watching a DVD on my new HDTV.

Now, the next thing to do would be to buy myself a suitable HTPC platform. I had already tried out XBMC the other day and it seems to work okay. Obviously, it was slick as well. However, getting a suitable HTPC platform has not been as easy. I would preferably like to purchase it from a store that accepts credit card purchases without a surcharge. Not many of those around in Malaysia!

Intel is at it again. They are going to copy another thing from AMD and make the Atom more accessible to both hardware vendors and consumers. They are planning to combine the graphics core, memory controller and the Atom core into one. That is just a splendid idea.

AMD has had the same feature with their Geode processor for a long time. Incidentally, the Geode processor is also AMD’s offering at the low-power and low-performance end of the spectrum. It is usually used in embedded applications. Technically, NS did most of the work as AMD bought the entire Geode line off them.

Regardless, it is nice to know that Intel is going to do something to get rid of the 945GC chip once and for all. It must know that there is no point in pairing up a 2W CPU with a 25W north-bridge chip. Marketing can glaze over this fact but the numbers will speak for themselves.

Here is me hoping that Intel will combine it with some decent graphics chip. Then, the platform would make for a very snazzy media machine – great on performance and low on power consumption. Man, with this kind of developments in the industry, I wonder if I’ll ever get my HTPC built!

I should really just stick to the Sempron + NVidia system and wait 3 years before upgrading it to some other platform.

The new XBMC is out and it comes with a host of new features. The most interesting feature is the native support for VDPAU, which is a hardware acceleration technology for NVIDIA graphics chips. This will change the balance in the selection of hardware for my future HTPC.

You see, I have always been partial towards using a pure AMD/ATi hardware combo. However, with better hardware support for NVIDIA, playback of high-def videos would be smoother. Therefore, it brings new boards into the picture. There are entry-level NVIDIA based motherboards with the NF8200 chipset and then there is the new and exciting ION platform form NVIDIA.

I am likely to go for the regular NF8200 based chipset as that is the lowest possible chipset that supports VDPAU technology. It is far cheaper than the ION platform and it us more readily available in the market. I can get an ECS black motherboard with this chipset and HDMI for RM 265 (EUR 55). It can be cheaply coupled with a low-power AMD Sempron processor for another RM115 (EUR 25).

This combination, along with a decent amount of memory, should be able to produce stellar graphics performance for playing back almost any sort of video content. Of course, the features of the new XBMC do not end here. It also comes with a bunch of new codecs and other improvements. The full list is detailed here.

PS: Now, if only the prices for the 32LG53 TV would come down a notch. I’m all ready to jump onto the high-def band wagon!

It was a spur of the moment decision but I ended up installing and setting up a home NAS server using FreeNAS and one of the low-power VIA Eden systems that I had at my place. There was a hack involved in getting it to work but nothing major was broken.

The VIA Eden system has a small form factor and is not big enough to fit a desktop drive in it. Therefore, I had to fashion a frame for the hard disk from an older computer’s floppy disk holder. Then, I removed the rear cover of the VIA computer to pass through the PATA cable from the computer to the hard disk.

I removed a 125W ATX power supply from another old computer and hacked it so that it would power the hard disk externally. However, the VIA system does have a on-board power supply for hard disks. However, due to its location, I’m going to have to hack it a little. I might try it later.

The latest FreeNAS software was then installed onto a compact flash card and inserted into the VIA system. The VIA system has a built-in CF card slot, which is directly connected to the second PATA channel. Once everything was connected and wired up, I turned it on and voila – everything worked.

Okay, I fib. It wasn’t so simple and I had to fix a few problems:

1. The compact flash card that I had initially used turned out to be a little flaky. So, I had to replace it with another compact flash card. Good thing that I have about half a dozen of these lying around.
2. The ATX power supply had to be hacked so that it would turn on without having a power switch on it. So, it now functions like any other regular power supply and turns on when the mains power is applied.
3. FreeNAS had to be reconfigured to obtain its network settings from my DD-WRT router. This involved plugging in a monitor and keyboard into the machine for some initial configuration.
4. The shoe rack that I am using to house everything ran out of space. So, I had to fashion a hack for the system. I’m still not quite happy with it and I may redo everything over the weekend.
5. Turned out that I was only using about 80Gb of space on my 250Gb backup hard disk. So, I moved that data into a smaller hard disk and used the 250Gb hard disk as my NAS hard disk instead. It should take me at least a year to fill it up.

In the end, it turned out to be a fairly simple NAS to set up. I have already tested it out by mounting an NFS share and it works. I could create directories, move files and what not. So, it is working!

However, I won’t be bench-marking this system as it is seriously under powered. It runs on a 533MHz VIA processor with only 256Mb of memory. So, I don’t expect it to have a stellar performance. Nonetheless, it is a working NAS system and perfectly suitable for low-power home use.

Oh, I fib again. It would be interesting to see how under-powered it really is. So, I will probably benchmark it at some point to see if it performs well enough for video streaming to my future HTPC.

PS: I love that they labeled the latest version of FreeNAS as the Kwisatz Haderach – “the one who can be many places at once”!

Recently, I have ‘dug’ up a lot of old computers. Then, this evening, I was describing my home network to another geek friend of mine and he asked me, how many computers do I have in my house at this very moment. While trying to list down the machines that I have, I came to realise that I have a lot of them. So, I thought that I’d list them down just for fun, in functional order:

Server

• One Dell server that I bought a long time ago to run some Windows server software. I keep it around because it is the only Windows machine that I have. It is a dual-processor P3 class machine with SCSI disks. I once lent it to a friend for some 3DS rendering work.
• Two VIA based machines that were also bought ages ago. Both have C3 1GHz processors but are now dead. They’ve got working 125W ATX power supplies though.

Desktop

• One Celeron 1.8GHz machine that my dad uses as his main desktop computer. It currently runs Debian Lenny with XFCE and OpenOffice.
• Seven VIA based machines ranging from Eden 533MHz to C3 1.0GHz machines. These are physically small machines that are re-purposed for different functions. I used one as my HTPC prototype and am currently using another one as a development server. I like them because they draw very little power.

Laptop

• One old Gateway laptop around the class of a P3 600MHz. Retired due to age. I might just turn it back on again at some point.
• One Fujitsu laptop around the class of a AthlonXP 1.5GHz. Has thermal problems but works fine when under-clocked to 500MHz. I am using it as a electronic testing platform.
• One HP laptop that I am presently using as my main work machine. It is a Athlon X2 2.0GHz class machine.

Non-Functional

• One 386 class machine that was my first computer. My dad bought it for my sister. It now lives as a board in a box.
• One 486 class machine that I bought off auction. It now lives also as a board in a box.
• One Cyrix 586 class machine that was my second desktop when I was a kid. It was the first computer that I bought myself.
• Two Pentium class machines that are no longer working either.
• One Duron 1.3GHz machine that served as my trusty desktop at university. It was still working when I left for my PhD but it refuses to start now. I wonder what happened to my Athlon 500MHz machine?

Microprocessors

• One Motorola 68K processor that was part of an abandoned SBC project.
• Dozens of PIC processors that have found life and death in various random hobby projects.

Man, that is a lot of computers. Taking away the broken ones and the microprocessor parts, that’s still 12 working machines in total. The thing is, I plan to buy a couple more in the near future – my NAS and HTPC projects, remember? LOL!

To network them all up, I have a 11b access point and 11g router running at home. I also have eight 11b USB dongles that I use to connect the machines to the home network. In addition, I have many metres of Cat5e cables and half a dozen ethernet cards at home too. The only thing that I’m short of at home is power points.

Maybe I can one day build my own mini-computer museum at home. Maybe I should do it today! I managed to clear out one display-case during my spring cleaning. I could possibly fashion some labels and display boxes out of the other junk that I’ve uncovered. At the very least, I should preserve the microprocessors since that is my field of interest.

I’ve just recently (I’m very blur when it comes to certain things) noticed a pricing issue that makes it possible to build a 2TB NAS at under RM1000 (£190). The thing is, the price of a 1TB drive is actually cheaper than that of two 500GB drives. So, it would be possible to only use 2x1TB drives instead of 4x500GB drives!

This would make it possible to install the drives in a small ATOM based system, which only has two SATA ports. In addition, the system would only need a 1GB memory module. I’ve already got everything else necessary.

I have recently salvaged two 125W ATX power supplies from two older mini-itx systems (along with the chasis). I also have a dozen Compact Flash cards and half a dozen CF-IDE converters. So, I can easily install the OS on the CF card, attached to the single IDE drive on the D945GCLF board. The whole system will definitely fall within the power envelope of the supply.

The only mod that I would need to make is to the power supply. These 125W ones do not come with the required P4 connectors on newer supplies. However, they do come with enough drive power connectors to fashion my own hack. All it needs is a plastic connector connected to the right wires anyway – trivial.

In fact, I’m currently playing around with a bunch of old VIA systems that I used to sell. The systems come with a 36W peak power demand. I’m planning to turn a Eden based system into a machine for doing hardware debugging and possibly another one into a home development server.

I’ve also got two other systems with TV outputs a 800MHz and 1GHz C3 system. However, they can only output standard-def NTSC/PAL signals. So, they would not be suitable for the new LCD-TV that I plan to get for my HTPC system and I won’t be using them.

So, looks like my plan to set up a wicked development environment for my self is on-track. All I need now are some killer screens. Besides the TV that I plan to get, I also plan to get some 23″ monitors for my development machine. Small screens are making me hunch at the desk a lot.

I was shopping around IOI Mall today when I came across a computer shop selling the Shuttle SG33G5M (D’VO) small form factor bare-bones PC. Shuttle has always been a market leader in the realm of custom designed PCs. The D’VO is their foray into the realm of home entertainment PCs.

At first glance, there are several disadvantages to using the system: (1) It comes with an Intel G33 chip-set with a GMA 3100 graphics processor, which is just varely capable of playing 1080p high-definition video. (2) It does not come with anything other than the casing, power supply and motherboard for RM1380 (£260).

However, its disadvantages are also an advantage. It is fully customisable and expandable. The procesor, RAM, drives are all up to the user. There is also an extra PCI and PCI/E slot in the device. So, it is possible to upgrade the machine as we move from playing DVDs to Blue-Ray films.

The PCI/E slot can be used to upgrade the graphics capabilities with an NVIDIA/ATI card. The PCI slot can be used to expand the capabilities with a TV tuner and video capture card. The processor and RAM can be upgraded when needed. The optical drive can be upgraded from a DVD drive to a Blue-Ray one in the future.

In addition, it also comes with a superb water cooling system with a magnetically levitated fan. This makes the machine extremely quiet. It also comes with a MCE2 remote control and a front LCD panel like some HTS systems.

The only catch is the price. However, I did not try to bargain for the price. It may be possible to drive the price down by quite a bit. It is possible to buy one under $300 (RM1100) on-line. It would make a fairly compelling product at that price.

Its main advantage against the ASUS PX24 is the expandability. It’s main disadvantage is the looks, size and weight of the machine.

PS: With this machine, it would be possible to kill two birds with one stone. It can also double as a NAS machine.