Im currently putting together a simple PC to connect to the TV and play movies stored on the HDD (Xvid etc). I need a nice front end that can be used with or without a remote but displays the filename and maybe a picture/DVD cover. Is there anything out there that will tick my boxes?
look at xlobby its meant to be hard to learn but rather good and free. Failing that the yahoo/meedio product might be what your looking for.
some good options for this. Linux Myth Tv Freevo Windows Mediaportal - free SageTV - Commercial Beyond TV - Commercial I have used both media portal and sage tv and prefer sage tv i find it alot easier to setup and more stable. about the only thing it can do is play iso images but it can play dvds on a hard drive if it's the the TS_Audio / TS_Video
I'm using mediaportal on an HTPC I'm making for my mrs. Does seem prone to crashing occasionally when doing things like fast forwarding but pretty easy to set up and configure tbh.
then i take it you haven't looked at the advanced options then eh i would give sage tv a shot (you can get a 15 day trial) it's pretty sweet. Not to mention it can use the tv out option on my tv tuner card
have you tired road runner? Its free and has a tv and everything you can want. Aslo you can cutomize it to your own use.
When you say connect to the TV, do you mean that you are having a TV tuner, or that it will physically connect to the TV and only be used for your Xvids?? If its the latter i still think that the MyHTPC (old meedio) is fantastic. Plently of options, and very customisable. The main snag is that you have to manually create info files for movies if you wish to see a synopsis. The auto grabber for IMDB hasn't worked for me for ages. It will handle Movies with whatever codec you have installed. Photos, Music, file exploing and anything else you can find a plug in for. I'm having to move away from it because of the synopsis issue. Go to the meedio website and then check out the MyHTPC forum.
It may cost a bit, IMO though Windows MCE is superb. Very easy to operate and the remote control is awesome. However their is a cost involved. I think its worth it though. its pretty stable these days to boot!
which is why i got sage tv since it was less then mce, came with a remote (with my tv card) and i already had a copy of xp pro
Another vote for MCE2005 - easy to use, professional and generally 'nice' all-round. The only thing irksome about it is that I cannot seem to set-up video playlists the way I can in the normal media player... also no support for displays with rectangular pixels...
