[mythtv-users] FE/BE on AppleTV

Raymond Wagner raymond at wagnerrp.com
Sun Oct 3 03:01:22 UTC 2010


  On 10/2/2010 22:21, david.w.smiley at gmail.com wrote:
> I bought an AppleTV with the intention of using it for MythTV (and
> Boxee), though I've been charmed by the native capabilities of the
> devise, so I'm not loving the idea of replacing it with a linux
> distro.

The original AppleTV was a 1GHz Pentium M, with XvMC capable nVidia 
graphics, and 256MB of memory.  It really didn't have enough memory to 
run a high resolution frontend, so the UI was slow.  Even with XvMC, it 
was only capable of moderate bitrate MPEG2, so it failed on most HD ATSC 
content.  It made a pretty mediocre frontend.

The current AppleTV is a 1GHz ARM, with PowerVR graphics, and 256MB of 
memory.  Just as before, the CPU is really incapable of handling any HD 
content.  Just as before, there really isn't even enough memory to run a 
frontend, much less a frontend AND backend.  To top it off, it no longer 
has a hard drive, nor does it have any connections you could use to 
attach a hard drive.  You're stuck with network-based storage.  Boxee is 
going to be an equally poor prospect for that device, and if you want an 
example of the kind of performance you could expect, check out VLC for 
the iPad.

The ATV has some form of hardware decoder, but it is undocumented, and 
unusable by MythTV or any other third party media player.  Your best bet 
is to use the official software, use it as a UPnP frontend, and have 
some other backend in a closet.  Even then, the hardware decoder is 
designed for content available through the iTunes media store, and will 
be incapable of handling any of the digital recordings you may make with 
your HDHomeRun.  You will have to transcode that content to a format the 
ATV can handle before being able to play it.


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