Installation Guide

Links

• AV Wizard
• General Installation Tutorials

About Installation

This page covers what we'll call mainstream installation. It shows how to get a LinuxMCE hybrid running with minimum bells and whistles. Once the basic installation is complete, users can check the other sections of the wiki to learn how to add more advanced features. The basic hardware consists of the computer (with two network ports), display, and speakers. It the user's option whether to install additional PCI cards (TV capture, serial, etc), An incompatible card could cause problems, but this is rare (fyi, I load up all the slots before running the install). Look at the "Core & Hybrid" section of the wiki for hardware selection articles.

• The computer must be connected to the internet for a successful installation.
• The display can be a TV or monitor. Use a VGA connection if one is available. You can use a DVI cable, but you'll get a black screen 45 minutes into the installation process when the LMCE wizard defaults back to VGA. This is easily solved by pressing the number "1" on your keyboard, but its a bit disconcerting. I'd advise against using an HDMI cable connected to a monitor or TV with built-in speakers.
• For sound, you can use computer speakers, or use an spdif connection to an external AV receiver.

Caveats

• LinuxMCE is an extremely powerful, fantastic piece of software; have no doubt about that. But, please bear in mind that it is a project, not a product.

• LinuxMCE 0810 is based on Ubuntu 8.10, which means that brand new hardware might not work out of the box. For this reason, if you are buying hardware specifically for your home automation system, you might want to use hardware that is a little older and save yourself some money at the same time. That said, in nearly all cases you will be able to get through any issues with a little patience and some help from the community. Unrecognised NICs is the most common issue.

• Please please please be patient. Some parts of the installation can sometimes take hours. If in doubt, leave it overnight.

Installing 0810 Final

Caution: Installing LinuxMCE 0810 Final will wipe your entire drive! It is not designed to be dual-booted!

If you just want to quickly try LinuxMCE, then consider setting it up temporarily as a virtual machine on your Linux, Mac, or Windows box. VirtualBox will allow you to do this

1. Download the LinuxMCE 0810 Final ISO from here. Note: Always burn at your DVD drive's lowest speed to reduce the chance of errors.
2. Boot from the DVD.
3. Select your language
4. Select the top option "LinuxMCE"
5. Wait until the installer loads, and then...
   1. Welcome - Select your language.
   2. Where are you? - Select your location and time zone.
   3. Keyboard layout - Select your keyboard layout.
   4. Prepare disk space - Set up your partitions as you wish, but the second option "Guided - use entire disk" is perfectly OK.
   5. Who are you? - Set up your username, password and the system name (call it whatever you want). This username/password is specifically for the underlying system i.e. Kubuntu, it is NOT for LinuxMCE; this is handled separately.
   6. Ready to install - Check everything is as it should be, and press "Install".
6. Let installation run through, and then remove disk and press enter when instructed to do so.
7. Once the new Kubuntu installation has finished booting back up, click the "LinuxMCE" icon on the desktop. This will start the LinuxMCE installation. You may need to enter your Kubuntu password.
8. Wait until the LinuxMCE installation has finished running through, and reboot the system. You will see the following message when the installation is complete:

The first phase of the install process is completed
Reboot the system to start the final process.

Done!

Once the system has rebooted, the AV Wizard will start, followed by the House Setup Wizard and Media Setup Wizard.