Mythbuntu 8.04 Configuration & Review

For the past 16 months I have been using a simple home theater PC as a podcast aggregator, bittorrent client, and media center. The system consists of the following:

• Shuttle SN21G5 barebones kit
• AMD Athlon64 3200+ CPU
• 512MB DDR400 RAM
• 500GB SATA HD
• nVidia 7600GS GPU (w/heatsink only for silent operation)
• 8x DVD Burner
• Sharp 720p HDTV
  

Running Ubuntu, this system has performed admirably and despite the humble specs can play anything I have thrown at it. As an interface I used the Avant Window Navigator (think OSX dock) to simplify the GUI and help me get around the overscan that is unavoidable on my HDTV. This still left me using a wireless mouse and Apple wireless keyboard to manage and play my media.

I explored using my PS3 as a media center and using my HTPC as a DLNA server; but the PS3's codec support is abysmal, especially when trying to stream content to it. Giving up on that option, I found some info about Mythbuntu and decided to try it out with my existing setup.

Mythbuntu is based on the Xubuntu, but all the superfluous parts (OpenOffice, GIMP, etc) have been removed and MythTV added; a customized installer and configuration editor round out the experience. The big advantage of Mythbuntu is that it handles a lot of the backend configuration on its own and provides a solid base for your HTPC experience.

After installing Mythbuntu I set about achieving the following objectives:

1. enable SPDIF sound output
2. connect to Apple wireless keyboard
3. correct overscan issues
4. configure remote control interface to work with Logitech Harmony 520
   

SPDIF
I wanted to use SPDIF because it is digital and allows for multichannel audio. Xubuntu's built-in audio mixer, while providing the correct options for SPDIF operation, did not function properly. To resolve this I installed the gnome-media package from the repository; this includes the Gnome audio mixer and sound recorder among other handy plug-ins. After installation I was able to use my SPDIF output by checking the IEC958 box and setting the IEC958 slider to 0 in the gnome-volume-control.

Apple Wireless Keyboard
One of the downsides to Mythbuntu's minimalist installation is its lack of many common software utilities. In this case the absence of any bluetooth related applications prevented me from following my own tutorial for syncing my keyboard to my HTPC. In order to get around this I installed Blueman. It is a very solid bluetooth manager and I successfully connected my keyboard without issue.

Overscan
Probably everyone who has ever connected their computer to a television has had to deal with overscan. This annoying feature that cuts off the outside edges of the screen can be turned off on some HDTVs. Unfortunately mine does not offer this feature and so I have had to find other ways of getting around this.

The first fix involves setting screen margins in the Workspaces and Margins utility. This restricts window sizes so that full screened windows do not extend out of view. I set my left and right margins to 32 pixels and my top and bottom margins to 16 pixels.

The second and more important fix sets similar margins within the MythTV application itself. Inside the Utilities/Setup-Setup-Appearance menu there is are options for GUI width & height sizes as well as GUI X & Y offsets. I used the following settings to compensate for my HDTV's overscan:

• GUI width = 1220px
• GUI height = 690px
• GUI X offset = 30px
• GUI Y offset = 15px

Remote Control
According to the Mythbuntu website regarding recommended remote controls, "I recommend the Windows Media Center (MCEUSB2) remote. It is a great remote and if you don't have one, then get one." Based on this I determined that a WMC remote was the way to go. Browsing around Newegg I found one that looked promising with multiple customer reviews stating its compatibility with MythTV. Using the Mythbuntu Control Center I checked the Enable a Remote Control box and selected the Windows Media Center remotes (new version) option from the drop-down box.

Once I had the Anyware GP-IR02BK remote working I set about configuring my Logitech Harmony 520 to match. In the Harmony software I performed the following, Add Device-Computer-Media Center PC-Anyware GP-IR02BK. Then I added this device to my existing HTPC activity (which sets my HDTV & Receiver to the correct inputs) and customized the buttons to match the Anyware remote as much as possible. The only issue I ran into was that the Back button does not work, however the Stop button performs the same functionality so I just modified my Harmony configuration. Now I can control my whole setup with one remote.

Review
Thus far I have been very impressed with Mythbuntu's capabilities as a media center. The installer is well designed and does its job quickly. The interface is snappy and very usable. The Video & Music Players are decent, but I wish the browser tree was a little more customizable. My only major criticism is that the file browser does not automatically update when files are moved, deleted, or added. Overall Mythbuntu is a vast improvement over my previous setup and I am pleased with my decision to switch.

OpenSUSE 11.0 Impressions

OpenSUSE 11.0 was released last week and I have been trying it out on my Dell XPS m1330 using the Gnome & KDE LiveCDs as well as installing it on my Athlon64 based desktop. As far as features go I really like openSUSE. The DVD installer is particularly good, allowing the user to pick exactly which packages they wish to install. This is something I wish Ubuntu did as well. I also liked openSUSE's implementation of Compiz-Fusion desktop effects. Instead of relying solely on the comprehensive but confusing Advanced Compiz Configuration application like Ubuntu, openSUSE has another much simpler Desktop Effects application that provides simple check boxes and drop down menus to configure the most commonly used options.

Aside from these high points I was fairly disappointed with openSUSE. The navigation menus in both Gnome & KDE are overly cluttered, confusing, and often redundant. Why have a menu item for Internet with a sub-menu labeled Web Browser that only contains one entry for Firefox? If the distribution had multiple browsers installed I could understand their reasoning; but why not leave this sort of configuration to the user as Ubuntu does? The KDE interface is especially clunky, to the point of being almost unusable. I have never been a fan of KDE and I realize that KDE 4 is far from finished but nothing I have seen has come close to swaying my view that Gnome is still the best GUI for Linux. Similar to my views on Gnome vs KDE, my opinion of non Debian based distributions of Linux has also not changed. The combined benefits of broad support and flexibility are unsurpassed as evidenced in the absence of very common software packages from the openSUSE repositories. OpenSUSE also did not resolve any of the issues I had with Ubuntu 8.04, namely the CPU scaling issue. While the suspend-resume worked fine, the second CPU core still runs at full speed when the system is resumed.

While openSUSE 11.0 is certainly not a bad distribution of Linux, it just isn't for me. The quality and level of detail afforded by the installer make this a better choice for a more customized application, such as a server, than for a desktop. The DVD installer includes whole sections of server software for just such a task. The hardware support was very good and was at least comparable to Ubuntu 8.04.

Rockbox Video Playback

I have been running the Rockbox firmware on my Sansa e280 for almost a year now and I like it a lot. Recently I was finally able to get the video playback feature to work and the following is a brief summary of how I accomplished this.

The Rockbox MPEG Player Plugin page describes how to use the cross platform program WinFF to encode files not only for the Sansa but also some of the other players that Rockbox supports. It warns, however, that depending on your Linux distribution the version of FFMPEG installed may not support MP3 audio and that you have to compile your own version that does support MP3 in order for WinFF to function properly. This can be an enormous pain to do. Luckily there is a much easier way to get around this. The FFMPEG Wiki has a repository listing for an alternate version of FFMPEG with MP3 support already built-in.

After adding this listing to my APT repository I installed FFMPEG and WinFF and have been successfully converting files to play on my Sansa ever since. WinFF is a nice little program. It has preset encoding settings for use with Rockbox and the Sansa (presets are also included for other players) as well as support for batch conversions, so you can tell it to convert several videos and come back later when they're done.