Boxee

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Winnow
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Boxee

Post by Winnow »

I tried the unofficial alpha for Boxee awhiel back and was impressed. This is looking to be a very nice media box for HTPCs. Worth a look:

http://news.cnet.com/8301-17939_109-10272129-2.html

Boxee Home:

http://app.boxee.tv/homepage/
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Re: Boxee

Post by valryte »

Hmm, smells a bit like XBMC, but with more web integration. The video and music features are pretty much the same.
From: XBMC Project Manager

XBMC will still continue as its own project, some things might be shared with projects that fork XBMC (like Boxee or Plex) while other things will not. Team-XBMC has its own vision and XBMC as a product is still evolving:
http://xbmc.org/about/vision/

Team-XBMC consists of many more active developers than all forks of XBMC combined:
http://xbmc.org/about/team/

...so a fork definitely does not mean that the original project dies:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fork_(soft ... velopment)
Quote:
In software engineering, a project fork happens when developers take a copy of source code from one software package and start independent development on it, creating a distinct piece of software.
PS! Off-topic; know that you can always use third-party content media servers such as PlayOn or TVersity Pro to get Hulu, Joost, Netflix and Amazon VOD, etc. into XBMC:
http://www.themediamall.com/playon
http://tversity.com
Yup, as soon as I saw that demo video on their home page I knew it had to be releated to XBMC.
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Re: Boxee

Post by Winnow »

XBMC rocked on the original XBOX
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Re: Boxee

Post by Winnow »

OK, I'm liking this Boxee already. It's going through all of my random newsgroup movie downloads and importing the covers for them. Nice! I haven't even looked to see how some of this stuff is named.

Very Impressive. It's even finding the prereleased stuff (Like new Star Trek movie) Allows you to see prview, read summary, rating, genre, change if mislabled, etc. This is great for newsgroup movie downloaders. Does same for music, etc.

Impressed so far.
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Re: Boxee

Post by Xouqoa »

The Boxee interface is neat. I'm not really sure what to do with it, though. I mean, it runs on my PC and I can already watch Hulu and all that on my PC.

If my Xbox or PS3 could connect to it and use the same interface, that would be hot.

Edit: OH. I see. You are supposed to run it on a PC and connect that to your TV. Hmm. I do have a spare in the closet that I could probably run it on. I might have to give that a shot.
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Re: Boxee

Post by Winnow »

Xouqoa wrote:The Boxee interface is neat. I'm not really sure what to do with it, though. I mean, it runs on my PC and I can already watch Hulu and all that on my PC.

If my Xbox or PS3 could connect to it and use the same interface, that would be hot.

Edit: OH. I see. You are supposed to run it on a PC and connect that to your TV. Hmm. I do have a spare in the closet that I could probably run it on. I might have to give that a shot.

Yeah, in my case, I use my 46" Samsung LCD as both my 2nd PC Monitor and my Monitor and for watching movies, etc. Boxee's great if you have HTPC (Home Theater PC setup) Im impressed with it's movie indexing/tagging so far. It looks like MLB taking advantage of BOxee so you can sub and see live baseball games etc.

It's still in its infancy and may not be perfect but with XBMC team behind it, it should do well.
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Re: Boxee

Post by valryte »

XBMC rocked on the original XBOX
And it still rocks in Windows, Linux, Mac, etc....
OK, I'm liking this Boxee already. It's going through all of my random newsgroup movie downloads and importing the covers for them. Nice! I haven't even looked to see how some of this stuff is named.
Again, this is an XBMC feature, not Boxee. So if you want to go praise it, go praise the "real" developers, not the hacks that forked it and slapped their own name on it.

If my Xbox or PS3 could connect to it and use the same interface, that would be hot.

Edit: OH. I see. You are supposed to run it on a PC and connect that to your TV. Hmm. I do have a spare in the closet that I could probably run it on. I might have to give that a shot.
bleh, go read my HTPC post. It's all in there. I should emphasize the XBMC part a little more.
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Re: Boxee

Post by Aardor »

Play-on just came out with a new release, as well as half price offer (coupon PLAYON1999) till June 31st. It's pretty nice, if you don't want to configure anything/have it work right after the install. http://www.themediamall.com/blog/local- ... wsing-here
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Re: Boxee

Post by Winnow »

valryte wrote: Again, this is an XBMC feature, not Boxee. So if you want to go praise it, go praise the "real" developers, not the hacks that forked it and slapped their own name on it.
Um, I get that it was the original XBMC peeps that designed these features. I used XBMC for years before the 360 came out. Why not do a search and find my comments about it from 4 years ago?

Jan 5, 2005:
Winnow wrote:There are receivers out that have ethernet connections now. Your wireless requirement aside, a modded X-Box including X-Box Media Center (XBMC) is the best for playing music and videos from your computer through your home entertainment center..
also from Jan 5, 2005:
Winnow wrote: The only problem I have with that is the cheapest one is 200.00 and you still don't get the outstanding free XBMC interface for playing and organizing your music/movies.

BTW, there's a PC version of XBMC that's great if you do like I do and run directly from PC to receiver:

Media Portal: (Free open source)

http://mediaportal.sourceforge.net/
December 29, 2005:
Winnow wrote:It comes down to what you use your Xbox for. If you transfer games from your PC using a network or like to play around with other apps like XBMC for watching movies, playing movies or accessing 300 shoutcast stations from your Xbox, I'd get Avalaunch/Qwix
Also Dec 29, 2005:
Winnow wrote: Do you have a recent version of XBMC? I only ask because I'm amazed at how much it improves each time I grab the latest version every few months. The latest UI is the most professional/useable interface I've seen on any media application for any system. I don't play DVD movies from my Xbox (those I use my PC for) but it now has a built in DVD player. I like the shoutcast top 300 that's included with XBMC as well. DirecTV has XM satellite stations now but I find myself using the shoutcast off my Xbox more often.
August 6, 2006:
Winnow wrote: I'm hoping for a real hack for the 360 so some sort of way to use 500GB HDs on the 360 will work. That, along with an old school XBMC type player would make the 360 outstanding as a Home Theater addition.
August 14, 2006:
Winnow wrote: If someone can eventually come up with a 360 XBMC I'll like it.
September 9, 2006
Winnow wrote:XBMC is the best homebrew app ever made...although that required hacks.
May 17, 2007
Winnow wrote:Their goal is to get Microsoft to split security so hackers can use home brew without compromising Live. Xbox 360 would rock if XBMC can be ported over. Best Media center going = the homebrew XBMC. Better than MCE for sure.
June 8, 2009
valryte wrote: Media Player - XBMC
As for the media software I'm using something called XBMC.

It's a 3rd party media center that was created back in the days of the original xbox (well a hacked one that is). Since then they've ported it to Windows, Linux, and Mac to run as a standalone media center. Let me tell you it runs awesome. The thing can play anything you throw at it except for an actual Bluray disc as there aren't any open source Bluray C++ libraries available yet, but I believe people have it opening using a commercial software Bluray player for windows. I have a standalone BD player so it's a none issue for me.
Well what do you know....valryte a little late to the party? I know a little something about XBMC. Yes, I'm aware of it. I think I've praised it enough over the years.


Here's a 10 min review of both XBMC and Boxee:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r1JwI0dhpAg

That's before the PC version was released. For those with iPhone/Touches, you can use iPhone app to control Boxee.

Boxee is still in beta. I'm already impressed with it's ability to identify movies. It also has Hulu and Pandora support. I loved XBMC back in the day but Boxee appears to be the more polished app for the mainstream user, especially once it's out of beta on the PC.

That said, I may still go back to XBMC. It's more polished and I'm old school. You can also use TVersity with XBMC to get some of the features that might be missing from XBMC (Hulu) http://tversity.com/

I found Boxee to be more hassle free than XBMC while XBMC looks and is very polished. Boxee's interface is also outstanding and will improved before release. Movie scanning/cover/metadata processing was much more transparent and hassle free with Boxee.
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Re: Boxee

Post by valryte »

Um, I get that it was the original XBMC peeps that designed these features. I used XBMC for years before the 360 came out. Why not do a search and find my comments about it from 4 years ago?
Because you've obviously haven't looked at XBMC since 4 years ago. You keep talking about Boxee's movie scanning feature as if it only exists in it.
Well what do you know....valryte a little late to the party? I know a little something about XBMC. Yes, I'm aware of it. I think I've praised it enough over the years.
Yeah, cause of course Winnow knows I don't have a hacked Xbox or have never used XBMC either right?...now you're bordering jackass territory.
Winnow wrote:XBMC rocked on the original XBOX
You're statement only referenced the original XBOX, you've clearly been out of touch with it since the xbox was retired and didn't know that they've continued development on it and it runs on multiple OS's, otherwise as such a "hardcore" xbmc follower as yourself, you would have mentioned it before boxee.
Winnow wrote:It's going through all of my random newsgroup movie downloads and importing the covers for them.
Allows you to see prview, read summary, rating, genre, change if mislabled, etc.
Winnow wrote: Boxee's great if you have HTPC (Home Theater PC setup) Im impressed with it's movie indexing/tagging so far.
Then even after I bring xmbc up again, you still keep going about it's movie content downloading/importing.

Winnow wrote: Here's a 10 min review of both XBMC and Boxee:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r1JwI0dhpAg
Yay, sounds like you've FINALLY looked at XBMC again. Welcome to the party :) That's all I was trying to get you to do. I know you were into XBMC before. But seriously look at your posts here. They really look as even after I brought up XBMC after your Boxee post that you quite just didn't understand that I was talking about a current version of XBMC that had all those movie scanning features that you were so impressed with and not your memories of an old xbmc version back with it was for hacked xboxes.
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Re: Boxee

Post by Winnow »

Dude, a ton of apps automatically search for metadata. I'm impressed with how well Boxee does it. In fact, it does it better than XBMC.

I have XBMC for PC. It looks the same as it did 4 years ago with a more polished UI.

My original statement still stands. I'm impressed with how well Boxee generates the covers and data for movies. I tried both Boxee and the latest release of XBMC (June 09 release) and Boxee impressed me more with the results and ease of use. I could give a flying shit if XBMC did it first.

Whenever I'm impressed with a new GUI or windows, do you want me to go back and praise Xerox for introducing the concept?
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Re: Boxee

Post by Winnow »

I've been spending some time with XBMC again.

First: Both Boxee and XBMC don't do a good enough job downloading the right metadata for movies and TV shows but XBMC is easier to work with for fixing all the problems....and there are a ton of problems.

XBMC isn't ready for the general consumer but I've got it tweaked enough that I think I'l stick with it at my media hub.

Some things XBMC sucks at:

1. It sucks for dual monitor usage

I don't get how an app that's specifically designed for HTPC is such crap when it comes to dual monitors. You have to get a third party app, UltraMon to get XBMC to open to your secondary monitor. How completely retarded is that? This app should be designed to wrk on secondary monitors in an HTPC environment. Very very lame. On top of that, if you have XBMC running full screen, it studders if you are working on other monitor...now my system is "hella" fast. Above average everything and XBMC is poorly coded or something and screws up in full screen. I have to run it in window mode at less than max screen size and then drag the window over to my 46" LCD screen in order to watch while I do stuff on the other monitor. Lame lame lame.

2. You can't use a mouse to directly click on progress bar to jump to point in video

Again, completely retarded. I searched the forums for XBMC and all I saw were some jackasses saying "you shouldn't be using such an archaic input device for this app"....huh? It's a fucking media center app made for the PC. I don't give a shit about its origins. You have a mouse on a PC...and, yes, clicking to a point in a visual progression bar is a lot better than skip jumping either 10 seconds or 10 minutes. XBMC doesn't have good mouse support because the development team are wankers and have some sort of anal aversion to mice.

3. Very quirky Library maintenance

Gotta admit, having all of my TV series and movies presented in such a cool way, with thumbnails, episode descriptions, casts lists with thumbs of the cast, ratings for he episodes, etc is super cool...no, it's hella cool. But once you get the majority of the movie and TV shows imported, you'll spend a lot of time...a LOT of time, getting those last few problem shows and specials formatted and imported into XBMC. And then you'll run into issues with XBMC still changing things on you if you accidentally rescan things you've modified etc.

The good stuff:

It's truly impressive how many nice UI's have been developed for XBMC. The fanart backrounds for Movies and TV series are great. For all of the movies that didnt have fan art, I was quickly able to jump into the movie, take a screenshot and then make that my fan art background.

Thumbnails are presented in various ways and sizes. If you switch between banner and normal icon views, be prepared to switch all of your thumbs.

Aeon is one of the newer skins and is very cool but it also requires a different thumbnail setup. I also found that even after adding my movies manually that weren't found, when i switched o Library mode, they weren't there and I had to go back and rescan them. I also tried using a third party app to ID all of my movies with .nfo files but that didn't go too well.

XBMC is pretty cool, but it's also a pain in the ass. I spent more than an hour trying to figure out why Tin Man (the Three Part Oz TV series) Thumbnail was showing up on every fucking TV series that I had more than one season. It would show up as the generic Icon when neither season was selected but you were inside the TV series container. I eventually had to manually search through all the folders of thumbnails and found two Tin man thumbs that I deleted and resolved the problem.

Anyway, XBMC is pretty cool, but in a pain in the fucking ass kinda way. Don't expect to install it, scan your directories and have it all work. Your movies, and TV series especially have to be named in the right format and also in the right folder structure.

Battlestar Galactica was a major pain in the ass. It recognized the four seasons OK...well not really, it thought the first season was the 1978 seriest but after I manually ID'd the first season, it detected and structured the other three seasons correctly...but then Getting the mini Series and Razor stand alone movie to be properly recognized was a major pain in the ass...eventually you find out how to name your special editions for them to be recognized properly and review TVDB to see how people have named the episodes so they'll be recognized.

The free app "flexible renamer" that I pimped in the comics forum is an excellent help in renaming your TV series to the proper format.

I've been using XBMC to watch the second season of Breaking Bad and loving it. I'm on episode 9....er make that S02E09. Great great series.
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Re: Boxee

Post by valryte »

I'm going to go off on you a bit, but keep reading, I'll actually provide some help further down :)
I don't get how an app that's specifically designed for HTPC is such crap when it comes to dual monitors. You have to get a third party app, UltraMon to get XBMC to open to your secondary monitor. How completely retarded is that? This app should be designed to wrk on secondary monitors in an HTPC environment.
Well that's simply because you fail to comprehend the HT part of HTPC. It's for a home theater which for normal people consists of a TV or Projector as a display device. How completely retarded are you?
Above average everything and XBMC is poorly coded or something and screws up in full screen.
No you really are fucking retarded :)
You can't use a mouse to directly click on progress bar to jump to point in video

Again, completely retarded. I searched the forums for XBMC and all I saw were some jackasses saying "you shouldn't be using such an archaic input device for this app"....huh? It's a fucking media center app made for the PC.
It's a fucking media center app that RUNS on a PC for your fucking home theater. I seriously hope you can comprehend the difference. A remote control is still the #1 method for working with HT equipment. Are you going to bitch next about not being able to use your mouse in a cable or satellite DVR? Why not? It's an app running on linux.

Before you keep thinking what XBMC is, try reading what the XBMC teams says it is.
XBMC as a whole must…
* First and foremost be aimed at a large-screen (28″ or larger) 10-foot GUI (graphical user interface) for the living-room experience.
o Large menus, text/fonts and buttons that is before anything designed to be navigated by a hand-held remote-control as the single input device capable of performing everything in the GUI.
But once you get the majority of the movie and TV shows imported, you'll spend a lot of time...a LOT of time, getting those last few problem shows and specials formatted and imported into XBMC. And then you'll run into issues with XBMC still changing things on you if you accidentally rescan things you've modified etc.
That you've modified? Are you like renaming them in XBMC? Don't do that. Fix the problem. If it's a movie and it can't find it, check the name of the folder/file. Check if there is an NFO file in there. If there is, verify the IMBD URL that it has to make sure it's correct. If it's not, then put the right one. If there isn't an NFO then just make one and put the IMDB url to the movie in there. When it rescans, it will use the NFO if it's present. This is the easiest way to deal with fkd up movies. Alternately, you could use one of the third party library managers that do better jobs at scraping and managing your library. Even lets you enter things into the library that aren't even in IMDB or THETVDB.
Aeon is one of the newer skins and is very cool but it also requires a different thumbnail setup.
Yes, Aeon is very nice, but it's also a bit more complex than most of the other ones. What issue with the thumbnails are you having? All my thumbnails and arts is downloaded through the scraper so I haven't seen any issues. Are you talking about manually storing the thumbnails with your movies and shows?
I also found that even after adding my movies manually that weren't found, when i switched o Library mode, they weren't there and I had to go back and rescan them. I also tried using a third party app to ID all of my movies with .nfo files but that didn't go too well.
You shouldn't ever need to add a movie manually if your are scraping. I've always found solutions for scraping movies correctly. Rare TV shows and specials are more of a problem. I have also noticed some quirkiness with updating the library with a new skin vs the default skin. The skin I'm currently using that I like very much is Media Stream. It follows a bit closer to Project Mayhem, but with nicer graphics. The author was working on another skin, but has recently jumped back on Media Stream to add new functionality and fix bugs. Please rememeber, that the skins are a lot more than just graphics. There's actual code driving them so functionality is really up to the developer of the skin. I can tell you that with the default skin I've had very little issues finding movies and tv shows once they were properly stored. All my movies and shows are kept within a folder named using the movie or tv show name regardless of file format. Within the folder will be the video file and the NFO with the IMBD or THETVDB url if I have one for it or if I created one to deal with a movie or show that wasn't being picked up. One thing I really wished it did was show you something in the library for movies and shows it could not scrape. That way you could easily know what is missing.
I spent more than an hour trying to figure out why Tin Man (the Three Part Oz TV series) Thumbnail was showing up on every fucking TV series that I had more than one season. It would show up as the generic Icon when neither season was selected but you were inside the TV series container. I eventually had to manually search through all the folders of thumbnails and found two Tin man thumbs that I deleted and resolved the problem
Well that's more your fault for not understanding or reading how it works. Certain artwork in the folders will be picked up and shown depending on their names.
Anyway, XBMC is pretty cool, but in a pain in the fucking ass kinda way. Don't expect to install it, scan your directories and have it all work. Your movies, and TV series especially have to be named in the right format and also in the right folder structure.
You definitely should read a little about how it works before trying to use it. Dealing with an infinite combination of files formats, naming conventions, folder structure is unfortunately not as simple as you would hope and expect. So reading a bit ahead of time will save you a lot of headaches and frustrations later on. I'm so glad I'm way past all that.

Anyways, yes I believe XBMC is still way off for the average person. Contrary to what their vision statement says, if you're not technically able, you're going to have issues. Using it properly does require considerable reading and searching. It's an open source project worked on for free by people on their free time. As a developer myself I do see a lot of room for improvement in the usability area. The library needs improvement (the main developer in this area is working on a considerable overhaul and additional features). Besides better filtering capabilities, it really needs to handle scheduled library updates as well as some sort of notification of anything it could not find. The plugin installer should be more streamlined and easily accessible. You can clearly tell it's more of a hack that was slapped on. But overall, once you get past all it's issues, it really kicks ass.
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Re: Boxee

Post by Winnow »

Boxee rulez!

Here's the Boxee Blog revealing the new Boxee beta:

http://blog.boxee.tv/

The actual "box" itself looks funky. Not sure how many people would want to place an odd shaped box on their AV rack. The rest looks better than XBMC as usual!

I still use XBMC even though it sucks. Waiting for beta invite to Boxee, my alpha login doesn't get me it yet.

Image

Image

Think they said box was designed by the same people that designed the xbox 360, which I don't like either. It looks like you could grab it by the cords and use it like some sort of flail to beat your spouse or kids. Looks dumb, but as with the Xbox, even a lame look, still produces the best gaming experience!
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Re: Boxee

Post by Aslanna »

Plex > Boxee !
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Re: Boxee

Post by Winnow »

They're all crap!

I find them cumbersome. I prefer a straight forward access to my PC's directories and it's easy enough for me to organize my movies and TV series making it easy to find them.

I don't like the way PLEX indexes. I did buy the iOS PLEX app to try it out and it's not bad. I think I was trying it out because Plex can index images as well but I have way too many for it to handle well.
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Re: Boxee

Post by Aslanna »

Winnow wrote:I find them cumbersome. I prefer a straight forward access to my PC's directories and it's easy enough for me to organize my movies and TV series making it easy to find them.
How is it not straight forward? Have TV Shows as being in one directory, movies another, etc then define that in Plex in the library settings. It can't get more straight forward! Unless you're working on the PC directly then sure. But don't even need Plex, or any media center software, in that case. Just double-click on the file!
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