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PART 4 - Software
There is no use having all this fancy hardware in a cool case if there is no software
installed! My HTPC is Windows XP based simply because thats where I get things working.
I am no Linux expert and I simply dont have the time to start learning every tweak and
trying to find some obscure driver here and there. If you are an enthusiast on a budget,
then by all means go get Linux, but if you already have fleshed out the cash for a rig
like the one I am building, a few extra dollars (or NOK in my case) wont set you back
much to get that dream htpc up and running.
Rather than describing each piece of software I will just list them in a table here
with a simple comment on them.
| Software | Comment |
| Windows XP Home | Pure vanilla XP will work fine for this setup. No real need for Pro features and MCE is definitely not needed since no feature of MCE will be used. |
| Meedio Pro | A highly configurable HTPC frontend that supports all the features I need. Also has a community of plugin creators and an enthusiasts forum with support. |
| Nvidia PureVideo Codec | The best quality codec you can get for your PC. Exist in different versions depending on what sound decoder you need. I will use free AC3 codec. |
| AC3Filter Codec | Free Sourceforge version that can be used as decoder for several types of sound output and works fine with DVD playback. |
| AnyDVD | A piece of software that lets me configure DVD spin speed to reduce noise when playing back music CDs and DVDs |
| ??? | Software that lets me undervolt the Pentium M to make it run cooler |
| MediaPlayer | For the moment the software I use to rip CDs to the harddrive in WMA format (192 kbit/s) - hope this can be integrated in Meedio some way |
| MediaPortal | Another frontend that is an open source project. Works fine, but lacks some of the plugins Id like to make. Also pretty buggy in its current state, but also very rich in functionality as well as looking better than Meedio in many ways. |
For Meedio I will use a number of plugins:
| Add-in | Comment |
| HDeeTV | Meedio Theme for widescreen televisions - nice and clean layout |
| PlayMee | Media player enhancer that e.g. can automount a DVD iso for playback. |
| Internet Browser | Adds fullscreen web browsing in a simple to use interface |
| Meedio Helper | Addin that is used by several other addins |
| meeNorway | A nice addin to be able to view NRK television programs streamed from their web pages + from other sites as well |
To use Nvidia Codec for video and AC3Filter for sound I asked on the Meedio forums and got a very
friendly reply from one user who could provide me with his .meegraph file which needs to be copied
into the codec/video directory:
nvidia-ac3filter-vmr9.meegraph
>> Next Part
Written by John Christian Lønningdal - March 2006
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