HTPC - WindowsXp or Linux?

[The Dad Fisherman]

Which O/S would you go with?

Windows i know and can probably set it up in no time. Linux i'm a novice and don't want to spend an inordinate amount of time getting this thing to work...but if it is the better choice I'd be willing to make the Sacrifice

Any Pros vs Cons on the the two that you can think of?

What are your thoughts...let keep it Civil

[kenyee]

Download mythdora, mythbuntu, or knoppmyth. Install it to your hard drive (it's a simple install) and give it a try for a weekend to see if the hardware you bought has any issues. If it's not your bag, format the drive and install XP.

The main issue will be playback. nVidia and ATI drivers only support HD-DVD playback in their Windows drivers AFAIK...

[The Dad Fisherman]

I just downloaded Ubuntu and MythTV so these are already to go in an all in one package...interesting

[MrHunters]

this is interesting. last i played with myth was on fedora core 3 and it was a big pain to get things all working properly if you don't know what your doing.

im interested.

[The Dad Fisherman]

Its looking like the Tuner card I got might not be too Linux Friendly....still gonna try the MythBuntu and see what happens though.....I'm all about free

[kenyee]

Originally Posted by MrHunters

this is interesting. last i played with myth was on fedora core 3 and it was a big pain to get things all working properly if you don't know what your doing.

That's what these distributions are about...they have preinstalled myth setups, so they essentially copy themselves to your hard drive all set up already. Even doing it in a raw Debian install is fairly easy now...point at the debian-multimedia repo that a nice guy maintains myth on, install it and you're pretty much set, though it still uses MySQL instead of PostgreSQL which I think is a mistake

The main issue is getting a tuner card that works...that's why I suggested two specific tuners (fusionhdtv and hdhomerun) to TDF in the previous thread...I know those work because I'm using them...

[basswipe]

TDF wait on Ubuntu till the 30th of this month.The latest version,8.10 will be released.Many major improvements over Hardy Heron(8.04).

I post this at my own peril considering how I was so badly bashed by some last time I posted something about Linux.