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Actually, I hadn't thought about this. My uncle's in need for a media center (he's already got the home theatre and the forty-something-inches LED T.V. and I wa

Actually, I hadn't thought about this. My uncle's in need for a media center (he's already got the home theatre and the forty-something-inches LED T.V. and I was thinking of gettin'im a RPi with the rest of the fancy stuff but you totally would get waaaay better performance with a little bit more "expensive" board. The last time that I checked for this kind of solutions I was fancying some Zotac box but that one was ~US$350. Which $75, much nicer alternatives are you talking about here? :)

pmjordan 12y ago
The Intel NUCs are in a similar price range, especially once you take case, PSU, etc. into consideration. You can get them motherboard-only, but in the pre-built ones you just add RAM and Flash/HDD and you're done. The NUCs probably also win on overall power consumption, just check that you can use accelerated HD video decoding in the model you choose with the software you want to use.
- dwild 12y ago
  There's Intel NUC cheap than 350$? Also case and PSU aren't a problem, either you get a Pico PSU for 50$ with a cheap case, or you take a case that include a PSU. They are cheap and the fan are noisy but for under $60... http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16811154062 http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16811154...
  - pmjordan 12y ago
    The RRP of the Intel NUC Kit DN2820FYKH is $128: http://ark.intel.com/products/78953/Intel-NUC-Kit-DN2820FYK?ui=BIG http://ark.intel.com/products/78953/Intel-NUC-Kit-DN2820FYK?... I believe that includes the Wifi/Bluetooth module already, but not the DDR3L RAM module or an SSD/HDD. If that model is missing something you need you can of course opt for one of the more expensive ones - there is a reasonable range. I'm considering getting one to act as a router, DD-WRT/OpenWRT on consumer/SOHO router hardware is incredibly fiddly. The power consumption of some of these devices is comparable.
maratc 12y ago
For a media center, Raspberry Pi is great since it has hardware video decoding in GPU. The menus in XBMC use the CPU, so they are a bit sloppy, but overclocking it a bit is reported to help. Mali (A20's GPU) has no driver for hardware-accelerated decoding, so it's going to decode video on CPU, and will likely be even slower than RPi. Other boards, I'm not really know but XBMC site has a list of recommended hardware. On x86 front, if size matters, you can take a look at this: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813135368 http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813135... ($32 after rebate). It needs a stick of alaptop RAM and a laptop power brick. You can load XBMC from a USB stick. If size doesn't matter, look for AM1 CPU/motherboard. CPU will run you $31 (http://www.amazon.com/AMD-Sempron-2650-1-45Ghz-AD2650JAHMBOX/dp/B00IOMFFYM http://www.amazon.com/AMD-Sempron-2650-1-45Ghz-AD2650JAHMBOX...) and motherboard, $34 (http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813157489 http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813157...).

pmjordan 12y ago

The Intel NUCs are in a similar price range, especially once you take case, PSU, etc. into consideration. You can get them motherboard-only, but in the pre-built ones you just add RAM and Flash/HDD and you're done. The NUCs probably also win on overall power consumption, just check that you can use accelerated HD video decoding in the model you choose with the software you want to use.

dwild 12y ago
There's Intel NUC cheap than 350$? Also case and PSU aren't a problem, either you get a Pico PSU for 50$ with a cheap case, or you take a case that include a PSU. They are cheap and the fan are noisy but for under $60... http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16811154062 http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16811154...
- pmjordan 12y ago
  The RRP of the Intel NUC Kit DN2820FYKH is $128: http://ark.intel.com/products/78953/Intel-NUC-Kit-DN2820FYK?ui=BIG http://ark.intel.com/products/78953/Intel-NUC-Kit-DN2820FYK?... I believe that includes the Wifi/Bluetooth module already, but not the DDR3L RAM module or an SSD/HDD. If that model is missing something you need you can of course opt for one of the more expensive ones - there is a reasonable range. I'm considering getting one to act as a router, DD-WRT/OpenWRT on consumer/SOHO router hardware is incredibly fiddly. The power consumption of some of these devices is comparable.

maratc 12y ago

For a media center, Raspberry Pi is great since it has hardware video decoding in GPU. The menus in XBMC use the CPU, so they are a bit sloppy, but overclocking it a bit is reported to help. Mali (A20's GPU) has no driver for hardware-accelerated decoding, so it's going to decode video on CPU, and will likely be even slower than RPi. Other boards, I'm not really know but XBMC site has a list of recommended hardware. On x86 front, if size matters, you can take a look at this: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813135368 http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813135... ($32 after rebate). It needs a stick of alaptop RAM and a laptop power brick. You can load XBMC from a USB stick. If size doesn't matter, look for AM1 CPU/motherboard. CPU will run you $31 (http://www.amazon.com/AMD-Sempron-2650-1-45Ghz-AD2650JAHMBOX/dp/B00IOMFFYM http://www.amazon.com/AMD-Sempron-2650-1-45Ghz-AD2650JAHMBOX...) and motherboard, $34 (http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813157489 http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813157...).