User:Jamo

Hey-ho, here I am at last. Have had LinuxMCE on my to-do list for a long time and I'm finally getting it off the ground.

Hope to use this page to show my setup with plenty of detail and comments in case anyone would want to duplicate/ learn from it.

Current Setup

Core/Hybrid

• Chassis: FOXCONN TSAA-426 300WATT ATX
• PSU: incl in Chassis: 300w
• Mobo: FOXCONN H61MX-V DDR3 LGA1155
• CPU: INTEL CORE I5 2400 3.1GHZ
• GPU: onboard Intel Sandy Bridge chipset
• RAM: 8Gb (2x KINGSTON DDR3 4GB 1333)
• Cooling: CPU cooler, PSU cooler
• HDD: SEAGATE 32Gb SATA
• DVD: SONY +/- DVD WRITER 24+R,SATA

LMCE:

• 10.04
• UI1

Cost:

Issues:

• Presently, I seem to have a problem if I switch to the KDE desktop from the UI... desktop works fine but switching back to UI seems to hang up the MD or possibly the orbiter or both. I think the core is still working but haven't confirmed that.
• Sandy bridge graphics chipset not supported out of the box in 10.04: see Sandy_Bridge

Media Director 1: Lounge

• Chassis: HP6710b notebook
• PSU: integrated
• Mobo: ? Chipset: Mobile™ Intel® 965GM Express
• CPU: Intel Core™2 Duo Processor T7500 @ 2.2Ghz
• RAM: 2Gb
• Cooling: ?
• HDD: WD2500BEVT - SATA 232Gb
• DVD: MATSHITA DVD
• WLAN: 802.11b/g
• NIC1: Broadcom Netlink Gigabit Ethernet
• Bluetooth: Yes

Cost: ?

Issues: None as yet, just set up and haven't enabled bluetooth yet.

AV Equipment

AV Receiver - Onkyo TX-7440 [[1]]

• Connection: 3.5mm stereo jack from MD to L/R RCA on CD input of receiver
• Remote: None
• Controlled by LinuxMCE: No

Media Director 2: Kitchen

• Chassis: IBM Thinkpad T30 notebook
• PSU: integrated
• Mobo: ? Chipset: ?
• CPU: ?
• RAM: ?
• Cooling: ?
• HDD: ?
• DVD: ?
• WLAN: none
• NIC1: ?
• Bluetooth: No

Cost: ?

Issues: Failed to Setup X on first boot (see Troubleshooting tips below)

Media Director 3: Study

• Chassis: Dell Optiplex ???
• PSU: ???
• Mobo: ? Chipset: ?
• CPU: Intel Core™2 Duo Processor ????
• RAM: 2Gb
• Cooling: ?
• HDD: SATA 2Tb
• DVD: ?
• WLAN: none
• NIC1: ?
• NIC2: ?
• Bluetooth: No

Cost: ?

Issues: None as yet.

A/V equipment

• Amplifier: Onkyo TX-7440

Network Hub

x Port generic 10/100 hub

Security Cameras

El-cheapo IR camera: RMI-550WF sourced from: http://www.securitycameras.co.za/shop/product_info.php?cPath=32&products_id=253

Installation notes:

• technical issue - the camera has a thick cable that comes out of the back plate which then splits into various connectors - s-video, RCA, A reset switch, 12v supply socket and RJ-45 female port. I installed the camera on an external wall of the house and drilled a hole through the double-skin brick wall in order to push the cable through neatly.... problem was the cable (specifically because of the RJ-45 jack) would require a HUGE diameter hole to go through... probably around 40mm. That is a big hole to put in the wall of your house in order to neatly install a camera. I experimented with a number of options but ended up cutting the cable *gasp* and re-soldering and heat-shrinking the individual copper wires on the inside of the wall. Not a great solution but it was done neatly and it works.
• 12v power supply: the camera comes with a transformer to take 230v AC down to the 12V DC supply required by the camera. I had to install a 230V AC wall socket in my ceiling area in order to plug in the transformer.
• Wall bracket supplied is not particularly solid, nor or the wall plugs and screws to mount it. Be gentle and careful... it's easier to over-tighten and strip. So far it is still pointing in the right direction despite a few large storms.

Setup:

• Video stream URL: http://cameraIP:webserverport/videostream.cgi
• Followed IP Cameras wiki and it worked flawlessly

Overall:

• Good for the price- about ZAR1600 delivered. Very cheap for IP camera
• Support / manual is horrendous - translation from mandarin or something and no website/forum/tech-support evident
• web-based setup works OK but lots of features that are probably intended for other models not supported by this one (switch on/off, zoom etc)

Next step(s)

• Enable bluetooth on MD1 and try to use mobile orbiter on Nokia 5800
  • No dice: 5800 uses Symbian S60 version 5 which is not supported. Trying to recompile app for this release....
• Upload and organise existing media
  • Purchase and install dedicated hdd in core. Size? 500Gb?
  • May have to format...?
  • Use LINUX MCE directory structure= YES when prompted - this should craete the basic folders
  • [NOTE: need to do a folder lock when copying media en-masse or else the LMCE tries to autosync/tag. See wiki/forums for this ] Copy media into folders using network share from desktop computer ## Only copy media that is good to go, not intermediate rubbish, eg:
    • Music: id3 tag sorted out, no glitches in file, no duplicates- best of breed.
    • Photos: The keepers. Generally photos in the prints folder on gallery. Maybe we should have an additional "keep" folder or something
    • Videos: Dunno

Proposed Setup

still under construction....

Troubleshooting and tips

Troubleshooting

• Failed to setup X: IBM Thinkpad T30 MD CReation

At the "failed to setup X" stage of MD creation, drop to tty2 (ctrl-alt-f2 on md), log in, become root and do the following: [code] sudo apt-get remove --purge xorg-driver-fglrx sudo apt-get install --reinstall libgl1-mesa-glx libgl1-mesa-dri sudo reboot [/code] Should get to AVWiz. Background is that the fglrx (proprietory ati driver doesn't support the older radeon cards) and also inteferes with the open-source driver so must be removed and some of the open source drivers refreshed. See [url]http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=815355[/url]

• MDs hanging / freezing
• Fix networking after motherboard swap

Had to get my motherboard replaced under warranty. Eth0 was an onboard NIC so that was effectively replaced as well. When I brought up the system again, Eth0 (which was the external NIC that connected to my ADSL router and received config by DHCP) wasn't picking up an address - ie I couldn't get to the machine from outside. I could connect via Eth1 - 192.168.80.1, the internal NIC dhcp server. So I ssh in and ifconfig doesn't even show the second NIC (onboard). lspci shows it, though. So I ran ifconfig -a and that shows a new interface- Eth2! So I edit /etc/network/interfaces and change the settings from Eth0 to Eth2 and hey presto, it works after reboot.

Tips

• Nvidia card needs to be 6200 or better
• Sound on media directors: Look for cards/chips that deliver:
  • 16-bit 96KHz sample rates. This is the level of audio used for the 5.1 surround sound channels on DVD movies (or better).
• If you rip media to Private it won't show up in default Movies/Audio etc list - default options are to filter on Public. Find what you ripped by hitting "Options" on the file list

when looking for the media and then include your username. You'll have to hit a pin to play the media, though. If you want to move it from private to public, physically move the file(s) to the public folder.

• To rip commercial dvds you may need to install libdvdcss2. Ensure this complies legally and with your conscience. It complies with my conscience

because while I don't believe in copy protection, I will not rip a DVD that I do not own. As follows: On the MD (or better still the core prior to diskless creation step): sudo apt-get install libdvdcss2 w32codecs

---

last edit: 18/04/2012