Sold my C-200 for Asrock 330HT and Boxee

[fredphoesh]

Hi guys,

I wanted to post this to help others like me to buy the right thing first time! Of course for some the C-200 is exactly what they want, and thats great, but for me, it was one PITA nightmare trying to figure it all out - between this forum, and helpful guys like Chris47 and the wiki, but always struggling.

I had never even heard of HTPCs before a couple of months ago as I had my heart set on a PCH from about a year ago, and didn't do much other researching. Also I didn't have a clue as to how difficult I would find configuring the PCH and getting it to do what I wanted.

My experience of Boxee running on Win7 has been an absolute pleasure by comparison. REALLY attractive and powerful interface, with integrated Apps like YouTube, TED, Vimeo, Shoutcast, Revision, Facebook (where you can slideshow your friend's albums or get an automatic feed of the video links they post on facebook) etc etc... I am stunned by how good Boxee is.

There is one area where PCH is better, and that is playback of HD files I store on BR data disks. But I have been able to play 720p movies over my wifi with no stuttering at all.

Anyhow, thanks to you who gave me support, and to those wanting an incredibly versatile web/media/music (!) player that is easy to set up and use, try the Asrock ION 330HT, Ive just bought a second one for my bedroom.

Cheers guys,
Mark.

[krazypoloc]

(04-16-2010 06:08 PM)fredphoesh Wrote:  Hi guys,

I wanted to post this to help others like me to buy the right thing first time! Of course for some the C-200 is exactly what they want, and thats great, but for me, it was one PITA nightmare trying to figure it all out - between this forum, and helpful guys like Chris47 and the wiki, but always struggling.

I had never even heard of HTPCs before a couple of months ago as I had my heart set on a PCH from about a year ago, and didn't do much other researching. Also I didn't have a clue as to how difficult I would find configuring the PCH and getting it to do what I wanted.

My experience of Boxee running on Win7 has been an absolute pleasure by comparison. REALLY attractive and powerful interface, with integrated Apps like YouTube, TED, Vimeo, Shoutcast, Revision, Facebook (where you can slideshow your friend's albums or get an automatic feed of the video links they post on facebook) etc etc... I am stunned by how good Boxee is.

There is one area where PCH is better, and that is playback of HD files I store on BR data disks. But I have been able to play 720p movies over my wifi with no stuttering at all.

Anyhow, thanks to you who gave me support, and to those wanting an incredibly versatile web/media/music (!) player that is easy to set up and use, try the Asrock ION 330HT, Ive just bought a second one for my bedroom.

Cheers guys,
Mark.

I run both a C-200 and Boxee for my main Home Theater and Boxee is good at some things, and the C-200 is good at others. The only reason I have boxee in that setup is I use the PC for gaming as I don't have and will not buy any consoles and figured I would try it out. I have to say the C-200 still wins hands down when used in conjunction with a jukebox. C-200 combined with YAMJ+Aeon is impossible to beat right now. It wins over any other box for playback quality and formats supported and IMO overall experience.

However the C-200 is an epic fail in ease of setup and configuration. EPIC FAIL!! When compared to Boxee or XBMC that is.

[h2ofun]

My must is to be able to play my BR videos I make from my family HDV tapes. C-200 works perfect! Full menus and all.

(04-16-2010 06:08 PM)fredphoesh Wrote:  Hi guys,

I wanted to post this to help others like me to buy the right thing first time! Of course for some the C-200 is exactly what they want, and thats great, but for me, it was one PITA nightmare trying to figure it all out - between this forum, and helpful guys like Chris47 and the wiki, but always struggling.

I had never even heard of HTPCs before a couple of months ago as I had my heart set on a PCH from about a year ago, and didn't do much other researching. Also I didn't have a clue as to how difficult I would find configuring the PCH and getting it to do what I wanted.

My experience of Boxee running on Win7 has been an absolute pleasure by comparison. REALLY attractive and powerful interface, with integrated Apps like YouTube, TED, Vimeo, Shoutcast, Revision, Facebook (where you can slideshow your friend's albums or get an automatic feed of the video links they post on facebook) etc etc... I am stunned by how good Boxee is.

There is one area where PCH is better, and that is playback of HD files I store on BR data disks. But I have been able to play 720p movies over my wifi with no stuttering at all.

Anyhow, thanks to you who gave me support, and to those wanting an incredibly versatile web/media/music (!) player that is easy to set up and use, try the Asrock ION 330HT, Ive just bought a second one for my bedroom.

Cheers guys,
Mark.

[Drowsy]

Sounds like there might be multiple C-200's versions out there.

Mine has a network setup, sound/video setup and thats it. With maybe 5-6 options each where pending on your audio/video receiver u can't really go wrong. I haven't met anyone to this day that has 500$ tires under a 150$ car

That Boxee thingy is for a whole different user group (mind you perfect for that user group)

HTPC are awesome!, (YAMJ and whatever skin is great, but XBMC beats the crap out of it) untill some new codec comes along.

[Spannerhead]

Yup - have to agree here too, just bought an ASRock and it was a doddle to set up, and with COREAVC 2 loaded in there's perfect playback for HD .mkv files with full DTS out. AND I can browse the web, do all my Torrent downloading MUCH more simply than with the PCH and anything else a regular PC can do, all for £300. And it has an off button!!!!!

The PCH A100 was a good intermediate bit of kit, but WAY too complicated for a non-techie to set up without endless hours on here (with the very helpful people like Chris, thank you) and on the Wiki.

My A-100 will be on Ebay next week and to be honest I won't miss it, even though I spent very many happy hours watch HD movies through it..

Bring on the new age of the HTPC

[krazypoloc]

(04-16-2010 09:11 PM)Drowsy Wrote:  Sounds like there might be multiple C-200's versions out there.

Mine has a network setup, sound/video setup and thats it. With maybe 5-6 options each where pending on your audio/video receiver u can't really go wrong. I haven't met anyone to this day that has 500$ tires under a 150$ car

That Boxee thingy is for a whole different user group (mind you perfect for that user group)

HTPC are awesome!, (YAMJ and whatever skin is great, but XBMC beats the crap out of it) untill some new codec comes along.

I have no idea what you talking about.....from your statements you obviously never used YAMJ+Aeon....so how can you say that XBMC "beats the crap out of it"? I'm running the latest versions of both XBMC and Boxee at home and while they are nice....they are not as easy to use as Aeon. Note I say use not configure. The PCH's are for a much more advanced group of people than the average consumer.

(04-17-2010 03:32 PM)Spannerhead Wrote:  Yup - have to agree here too, just bought an ASRock and it was a doddle to set up, and with COREAVC 2 loaded in there's perfect playback for HD .mkv files with full DTS out. AND I can browse the web, do all my Torrent downloading MUCH more simply than with the PCH and anything else a regular PC can do, all for £300. And it has an off button!!!!!

The PCH A100 was a good intermediate bit of kit, but WAY too complicated for a non-techie to set up without endless hours on here (with the very helpful people like Chris, thank you) and on the Wiki.

My A-100 will be on Ebay next week and to be honest I won't miss it, even though I spent very many happy hours watch HD movies through it..

Bring on the new age of the HTPC

I'm glad you tried out the Popcorn Hour device....as you learned its not for everyone. Good luck with your HTPC.

[fredphoesh]

(04-19-2010 04:56 PM)krazypoloc Wrote:  I have no idea what you talking about.....from your statements you obviously never used YAMJ+Aeon....so how can you say that XBMC "beats the crap out of it"?

I think popcorn hour with yamj is good for someone who has their VIDEOs on a network and wants to play have a library to play them. For that it is great. For music library, pch is terrible. For web apps, the way boxee aggregates stuff without need for any technical know how, and the sheer volume of fantastic channels (including youtube of course and your friend's facebook video feeds or facebook photo albums) the htpc's are way ahead. But yeah, for video files stored on an HD, id say pch plays back better than anything I have seen.

Till later
Mark.

[Spannerhead]

(04-19-2010 05:09 PM)fredphoesh Wrote:  But yeah, for video files stored on an HD, id say pch plays back better than anything I have seen.

Till later
Mark.

I have to disagree, the ASRock plays back via Media Centre beautifully with the new codecs and drivers for NVidia, I cannot see any difference in the HD quality, and, finally, you can rewind movies, and skip through them easily.

'I'm glad you tried out the Popcorn Hour device....as you learned its not for everyone. Good luck with your HTPC. '

Yes, well it filled a whole till a decent solution came along, and no, pch is defintiely not for everyone, while HTPC's are: easy to use, MUCH more functionality (full PC on you flat screen TV), almost no difference in price, MUCH nicer interface, infact, every aspect of it is just so much better, I can't understand why anybody would now buy a new C-200. Good luck with your pch!!!

[fredphoesh]

(04-20-2010 11:45 AM)Spannerhead Wrote:  I have to disagree, the ASRock plays back via Media Centre beautifully with the new codecs and drivers for NVidia

Hi
Erm
I have TWO Asrock ION 330HT (with dual core and BR drives).
They play back everything perfectly, but where PCH actually DOES have an edge (whether you like it or not, and I wish the Asrock was as good) is in the very specific area of playing back 1080p files which are burned to BR optical DATA disks (not bluray movies, but bluray data disks!)
Playing off that the PCH is a bit better, my guess is it has nothing to do with codecs, speed of processors or graphics cards etc, but purely the BR Drive hardware in the PCH being a full-sized LG (mine was) vs a much smaller, compact laptop-type drive in the Asrock.
But I absolutely love my Asrocks and in my experience they are FAR more powerful/versatile/future proof than PCH... so I think you mistook me for someone else.
Mark.
PS
I have just bought the CoreAVC codec. Using that with Media Player Classic is absolutely amazing... so much better than VLC.

[Spannerhead]

Ahhh - yes, well I only play to 720p and don't use BR disks at all, so that's probably why I don't notice the difference, and yes, the CoreAVC codec is excellent, seems to play everthing that VLC will play, but through the WMC. I have Media Browser installed too, so get a lovely browsing experince showing all the artwork, movie info, actor details etc etc, it's a real joy to use after the PCH.

I know it's sounds like I'm knocking the PCH, but for a few years there there didn't seem to be anything else that did the job, and the PCH, complicated as it was to set up and get working, did do the job and I'm grateful for that. But for a non-techie like me, the PCH was a pain when it wasn't working, I never did get Torrents working on it, and it just seemed like a bit of kit designed for techies only, where as the ASRock is no harder to set up than any old PC, and does everything I want, very quietly, without getting hot, with an on-off button etc etc etc.

And as it's PC based, the upgrades for codecs and drivers for the graphics card are likely to develope MUCH quickier than the OS for the PCH.

[krazypoloc]

(04-19-2010 05:09 PM)fredphoesh Wrote:  

(04-19-2010 04:56 PM)krazypoloc Wrote:  I have no idea what you talking about.....from your statements you obviously never used YAMJ+Aeon....so how can you say that XBMC "beats the crap out of it"?

I think popcorn hour with yamj is good for someone who has their VIDEOs on a network and wants to play have a library to play them. For that it is great. For music library, pch is terrible. For web apps, the way boxee aggregates stuff without need for any technical know how, and the sheer volume of fantastic channels (including youtube of course and your friend's facebook video feeds or facebook photo albums) the htpc's are way ahead. But yeah, for video files stored on an HD, id say pch plays back better than anything I have seen.

Till later
Mark.

YAMJ is awesome whether the files are stored locally or remote...it doesn't really matter as it is exactly the same for functionality.

I would completely agree that the functionality of music playback is complete rubbish and always has been with the default GUI. I have even tried music jukebox and its terrible for playback. Now the actual quality is very good....just the functionality thats lacking.

(04-20-2010 11:45 AM)Spannerhead Wrote:  

(04-19-2010 05:09 PM)fredphoesh Wrote:  But yeah, for video files stored on an HD, id say pch plays back better than anything I have seen.

Till later
Mark.

I have to disagree, the ASRock plays back via Media Centre beautifully with the new codecs and drivers for NVidia, I cannot see any difference in the HD quality, and, finally, you can rewind movies, and skip through them easily.

'I'm glad you tried out the Popcorn Hour device....as you learned its not for everyone. Good luck with your HTPC. '

Yes, well it filled a whole till a decent solution came along, and no, pch is defintiely not for everyone, while HTPC's are: easy to use, MUCH more functionality (full PC on you flat screen TV), almost no difference in price, MUCH nicer interface, infact, every aspect of it is just so much better, I can't understand why anybody would now buy a new C-200. Good luck with your pch!!!

Again...if you haven't tried some of the 3rd party and open source projects like YAMJ then you cannot attest to its quality over boxee of XBMC. Sure it might be hard to configure but you can't say something is better than something else without ever trying it yourself. Also whether you admit it or not boxee has playback issues with high bitrate content. I don't care how powerful your hardware is and what codecs/drivers you are running. Also it is incapable of HD audio playback which is a huge issue for people like me that have 150+ movies that have HD audio.

Again each has their place.....as a multimedia portal for using internet sourced content boxee wins hands down.....but if you are playing the content locally or from a local network source then PCH is hard to beat if you invest the time to configure a jukebox for the front end.

[FLACulty]

(04-20-2010 04:25 PM)krazypoloc Wrote:  I think popcorn hour with yamj is good for someone who has their VIDEOs on a network and wants to play have a library to play them. For that it is great. For music library, pch is terrible. For web apps, the way boxee aggregates stuff without need for any technical know how, and the sheer volume of fantastic channels (including youtube of course and your friend's facebook video feeds or facebook photo albums) the htpc's are way ahead. But yeah, for video files stored on an HD, id say pch plays back better than anything I have seen.

Till later
Mark.

YAMJ is awesome whether the files are stored locally or remote...it doesn't really matter as it is exactly the same for functionality.

I would completely agree that the functionality of music playback is complete rubbish and always has been with the default GUI. I have even tried music jukebox and its terrible for playback. Now the actual quality is very good....just the functionality thats lacking.

(04-20-2010 11:45 AM)Spannerhead Wrote:  I have to disagree, the ASRock plays back via Media Centre beautifully with the new codecs and drivers for NVidia, I cannot see any difference in the HD quality, and, finally, you can rewind movies, and skip through them easily.

'I'm glad you tried out the Popcorn Hour device....as you learned its not for everyone. Good luck with your HTPC. '

Yes, well it filled a whole till a decent solution came along, and no, pch is defintiely not for everyone, while HTPC's are: easy to use, MUCH more functionality (full PC on you flat screen TV), almost no difference in price, MUCH nicer interface, infact, every aspect of it is just so much better, I can't understand why anybody would now buy a new C-200. Good luck with your pch!!!

Again...if you haven't tried some of the 3rd party and open source projects like YAMJ then you cannot attest to its quality over boxee of XBMC. Sure it might be hard to configure but you can't say something is better than something else without ever trying it yourself. Also whether you admit it or not boxee has playback issues with high bitrate content. I don't care how powerful your hardware is and what codecs/drivers you are running. Also it is incapable of HD audio playback which is a huge issue for people like me that have 150+ movies that have HD audio.

Again each has their place.....as a multimedia portal for using internet sourced content boxee wins hands down.....but if you are playing the content locally or from a local network source then PCH is hard to beat if you invest the time to configure a jukebox for the front end.
[/quote]

both are great but pch is a nice thing to easily take with you and watch movies at your friends place.

HTPC is great but its too large to just take with you.

small devices have more limits then a large htpc but thats very logical.

i go for both devices

[spawn]

(04-16-2010 06:08 PM)fredphoesh Wrote:  I wanted to post this to help others like me to buy the right thing first time!

Thanks for the input of the reasons you changed to an Asrock, but if your purpose of this post is to "help people buy the right thing first time", and if by that you mean the Asrock instead of an NMT, then your posting in the wrong forum.

After all this is an NMT user community / support forum, not a general forum to campaign for alternative sollutions instead of NMT's - these kinds of threads are not really welcome.
Youve had your say, but now I beleive that the marketing for the Asrock or HTPC's in general has reached its limit in this thread.

And since we allready have been through extensive comparisons with the ION and other HTPC systems before and there debated the advantages that still exist in getting an NMT over an ION/HTPC, I wont get into that debate again but simply close this thread now.