MythDora — MythTV 0.2 In a Box

peterdaly writes "MythDora 3 is the first MythTV 'in-a-box' style distribution to include MythTV 0.20. Based on Fedora Core 5, MythDora 3 is designed to format your hard drive then install everything needed for a fully functional MythTV System. Here is a walkthrough of the entire MythDora installation process, including screenshots and a screencast."

Comments

Re:Um...KnoppMyth?

[rGauntlet]

Well, right now MythDora using Myth 0.20 and KnoppMyth (Which I use, and prefer) is on 0.19. Aside from the Debian vs Fedora, that's the main difference I think. The issue I had with MythDora was that it ships with a single-processor kernel, SMP disabled. KnoppMyth worked with my simple SMP rig right outta the box, no recompilation required. If you care and find yourself with nothing better to do, and trust me there are far better things to do, my read on it is on my website.

Re:Why does Myth think it's an OS

[LordSnooty]

There are many dependencies needed to provide a fully-functional set-top box affair - video codecs, players, DVD apps, games, tuner card drivers, version of X, fonts issues etc. Even an educated linux user can find a mythtv install daunting, so packages like this are a godsend.

Also I'd imagine that most mythtv installs are deployed on single-use machines - the set-top box that does TV and nothing else. Thus Knoppmyth or this example are very much useful. Just slap it on and go.

Re:Why does Myth think it's an OS

[Dynedain]

Because there are so many extra components you need. Outside media players, codec libraries, driver packages, various MPEG decoding/encoding libraries, etc, etc.

I tried getting MythTV installed from the Knoppix disc. Plenty of things didn't work. It took me a few days to track down DVD playback problems. I then had to mess with getting the NVIDIA binary drivers installed and xconf configured properly. And then after that I still didn't have sound support (lack of drivers for my onboard soundcard). Oh, and I still had to deal with subscribing to a program guide service (with a one month renewal process). It got to the point where it was no longer worth my time. $150 for Windows MCE, and $40 for the NVIDIA mpeg encoder and I was up and running with everything working within a few hours.

People who want to use MythTV or Windows MCE, for the most part want it run as a dedicated Tivo-like appliance. They are going to be doing little if any desktop computing on it. For that reason, it makes perfect sense to have a full OS configured specifically for it, with default large fonts and display in the GUI, drivers and codecs pre-installed for most media types, auto-boot directly into the TV/Media interface, etc.

Sure, it's nice to be able to install something like this on top of your pre-existing, pre-configured OS. But for most people who want to use this technology, they'd rather wipe the machine and start clean.

Re:Um...KnoppMyth?

[Abcd1234]

For a backend machine that will be performing recording, commercial detection, and transcoding, possibly of one or even multiple HD streams simultaneously?

Re:Now I wish I could get my Torrent Shows on Myth

[businessnerd]

YOU CAN! Here's how I do it. Every Myth setup has a Video section. This is a file browser that will launch mplayer or your media player of choice. In the Video Setup secion, it will ask you to define the directory for video (this is separate from your Myth recorded TV shows). Specify a directory (mine is /video/movies). Then all you have to do is just place some media in that folder. If you're downloading a DVD rip of a tv show from BitTorrent, you will be downloading a folder containing mulitiple mpeg's or avi's. Simply tell bittorrent to save the files to your MythTV video directory and the files will automagically appear in the Video browser.

In my apartment, the MythTV system acts as my file server. The /video partition (where all of the mythv media sits) is shared out to the rest of my computers via NFS. Using the computer in my office, I can browse for torrents and download them directly to the shared folder and then enjoy them from the living room couch. This is also great for my mp3's and oggs. All downloaded or ripped music goes to the Myth box and then you can listen to music either at my desk with xmms, in the living room through the stereo system and MythMusic, or from the laptop in any room (or even outside while in range of my router). The great thing about Myth is that it is a server for ALL of your media.