Popcorn hour media tank
-
Wow, I was asking here the other day about a way to play video and audio content from my PC to my TV and after digging about and looking at MythTV and other stuff for PC's I came across this thing today: PopCorn Hour Media Tank[^] This is surely the wave of the future, I can't imagine bothering to build a media pc of some kind when you can just buy this thing down for 200 bucks and simply plug it in and go. It even has a Bittorrent client built in and you can view media direct off the interent.
"It's so simple to be wise. Just think of something stupid to say and then don't say it." -Sam Levenson
Your $200 doesn't include the HD, so figure an extra $50-150ish there. Questions I have from looking at the marketing: What OS does it use. How do you update it for new net media codecs? For new retail DRM plots? Does it's hardware have the additional headroom for more CPU intensive versions of the above, or will you need to replace the entire box to use newer codecs in a year or two?
Today's lesson is brought to you by the word "niggardly". Remember kids, don't attribute to racism what can be explained by Scandinavian language roots. -- Robert Royall
-
Your $200 doesn't include the HD, so figure an extra $50-150ish there. Questions I have from looking at the marketing: What OS does it use. How do you update it for new net media codecs? For new retail DRM plots? Does it's hardware have the additional headroom for more CPU intensive versions of the above, or will you need to replace the entire box to use newer codecs in a year or two?
Today's lesson is brought to you by the word "niggardly". Remember kids, don't attribute to racism what can be explained by Scandinavian language roots. -- Robert Royall
dan neely wrote:
Your $200 doesn't include the HD
I don't understand, it *is* HD right out of the box, it has an HDMI interface built in.
dan neely wrote:
What OS does it use.
Linux from what I've seen.
dan neely wrote:
Does it's hardware have the additional headroom for more CPU intensive versions of the above, or will you need to replace the entire box to use newer codecs in a year or two?
It's 200 bucks, who cares? :) It supports *all* current major codecs now, h.264 and even the latest envelopes like Matroska and many that a lot of main stream commercial devices do not yet support. It's got to be good for at least 3 years going forward and they do have updates regularly, they even sell the main board separately so you can roll your own solutions, it's all open. You pop in your own hard drive, if you have to update later on to new hardware you just take out the drive and put it in a new one. Frankly I just don't see a down side to this product other than it's limited availability.
"It's so simple to be wise. Just think of something stupid to say and then don't say it." -Sam Levenson
-
dan neely wrote:
Your $200 doesn't include the HD
I don't understand, it *is* HD right out of the box, it has an HDMI interface built in.
dan neely wrote:
What OS does it use.
Linux from what I've seen.
dan neely wrote:
Does it's hardware have the additional headroom for more CPU intensive versions of the above, or will you need to replace the entire box to use newer codecs in a year or two?
It's 200 bucks, who cares? :) It supports *all* current major codecs now, h.264 and even the latest envelopes like Matroska and many that a lot of main stream commercial devices do not yet support. It's got to be good for at least 3 years going forward and they do have updates regularly, they even sell the main board separately so you can roll your own solutions, it's all open. You pop in your own hard drive, if you have to update later on to new hardware you just take out the drive and put it in a new one. Frankly I just don't see a down side to this product other than it's limited availability.
"It's so simple to be wise. Just think of something stupid to say and then don't say it." -Sam Levenson
-
Ahhh! Of course. Hard drives are cheap these days and I like a product that let's you pick any hard drive and plug it right in. Our satellite receiver has a pvr and built in hard drive and it's all *very* proprietary. Thanks for the clarification.
"It's so simple to be wise. Just think of something stupid to say and then don't say it." -Sam Levenson
-
dan neely wrote:
Your $200 doesn't include the HD
I don't understand, it *is* HD right out of the box, it has an HDMI interface built in.
dan neely wrote:
What OS does it use.
Linux from what I've seen.
dan neely wrote:
Does it's hardware have the additional headroom for more CPU intensive versions of the above, or will you need to replace the entire box to use newer codecs in a year or two?
It's 200 bucks, who cares? :) It supports *all* current major codecs now, h.264 and even the latest envelopes like Matroska and many that a lot of main stream commercial devices do not yet support. It's got to be good for at least 3 years going forward and they do have updates regularly, they even sell the main board separately so you can roll your own solutions, it's all open. You pop in your own hard drive, if you have to update later on to new hardware you just take out the drive and put it in a new one. Frankly I just don't see a down side to this product other than it's limited availability.
"It's so simple to be wise. Just think of something stupid to say and then don't say it." -Sam Levenson
-
As scorch guessed I was referring to the lack of a hard drive.
Today's lesson is brought to you by the word "niggardly". Remember kids, don't attribute to racism what can be explained by Scandinavian language roots. -- Robert Royall
Wont you just want to stream the data from your PC or networked storage system anyways?
Todd Smith
-
Wow, I was asking here the other day about a way to play video and audio content from my PC to my TV and after digging about and looking at MythTV and other stuff for PC's I came across this thing today: PopCorn Hour Media Tank[^] This is surely the wave of the future, I can't imagine bothering to build a media pc of some kind when you can just buy this thing down for 200 bucks and simply plug it in and go. It even has a Bittorrent client built in and you can view media direct off the interent.
"It's so simple to be wise. Just think of something stupid to say and then don't say it." -Sam Levenson
-
Looks very interesting, especially as it features DLNA - the coming standard for networked media systems. I'll look out for reviews. Elaine :rose:
Visit http://www.notreadytogiveup.com/[^] and do something special today.
I pre-ordered one today. I hear they're harder to get than a WII was at release so it's probably going to be October before I see it. Aside from it's media uses I have a real business need for a stonking big hard drive on NAS here so I'm going to use it for that as well conveniently making it truly a business expense item! :)
"It's so simple to be wise. Just think of something stupid to say and then don't say it." -Sam Levenson
-
Your $200 doesn't include the HD, so figure an extra $50-150ish there. Questions I have from looking at the marketing: What OS does it use. How do you update it for new net media codecs? For new retail DRM plots? Does it's hardware have the additional headroom for more CPU intensive versions of the above, or will you need to replace the entire box to use newer codecs in a year or two?
Today's lesson is brought to you by the word "niggardly". Remember kids, don't attribute to racism what can be explained by Scandinavian language roots. -- Robert Royall
This might not be the correct answer but: "The A-110 firmware is upgradeable to support future media containers, codecs and features."
I've heard more said about less.
-
Ahhh! Of course. Hard drives are cheap these days and I like a product that let's you pick any hard drive and plug it right in. Our satellite receiver has a pvr and built in hard drive and it's all *very* proprietary. Thanks for the clarification.
"It's so simple to be wise. Just think of something stupid to say and then don't say it." -Sam Levenson
-
Wont you just want to stream the data from your PC or networked storage system anyways?
Todd Smith
Yes mostly, but if you add a hard drive it can act as a NAS which is useful to me, as well it can cache stuff better when watching it offline, also it has a built in bittorrent clients so if you're into that kind of thing you can use the HD as well.
"It's so simple to be wise. Just think of something stupid to say and then don't say it." -Sam Levenson