Lindows Media Computer: Power to Strike Microsoft?

Augustus writes "LinuxHardware.org has just published the first review of the Lindows Media Computer from iDOTpc.com. The review covers the hardware behind the machine but also goes through all of the machine's claimed functionality: "After looking over all the media hype, I went searching for one of these little machines. Could the Lindows Media Computer really pull off meeting the new Windows machine in a pitched battle? It did boast "Instant on" DVD, CD, MP3, and VCD playback as one of the prime features. And, it was only a fraction of the price for a Windows Media Center system. At the time, only one vendor had them available, iDOTpc.com. After some communication, the folks at iDOTpc.com were kind enough to loan me one of the units to take for a spin." You can find the full review over at LinuxHardware.org."

DVD?

[chrisseaton]

How did it do DVD? Did it have a propeitary software or hardware decoder?

hrm

[jesperht]

Sounds interesting...hopefully it will stand a better chance than that old lindows laptop they tried selling...

Ugh, Lindows

[ransom2003]

Lindows would be great if it WASN'T AS BAD AS WINDOWS! If only they would open up the source on that killer version of WINE they have to other distro's.

Curious about the time shifting

[t0qer]

And going off just what I saw in the slash post, there's no mention of it. Since I can't read the article (slashdotted) I can only go on what is availiable to me.

So since time shifting wasn't mentioned about windows media center or linux, I can only assume since the author is trying to compare lindows to media center that it must have time shifting capabilities.

So how is the time shifting on linux? Could someone from linuxhardware.com please either provide another mirror to the article, or just answer my reply? I'm just really curious to know if it's working well in lindows.

Yours Truly
Toq

Wake me when it does HDTV

[YetAnotherName]

Call me spoiled. I watch Alias, The Practice, and even Fraser in HDTV every week. HDNet's sports are outstanding. And the recent Olympic games awe-inspiring. Guests to my home are blown away when I fire up PBS's continually-playing demo loop.

Despite the many many nay-sayers, HDTV is here, now.

Yet I keep seeing product announcements (Lindows Media, Mystro, Dish's 721 etc.) boasting competition to the Tivo, yet not a one is capable of handling HTDV. Tivo can't yet either.

I'm having to build my own digital recorder on an PC running (shudder) Windows XP with a MyHD [digitalconnection.com] card. The data rate of HDTV is high, but not unmanageable. MyHD records and displays a live program using less than 10% of the processor (1.8GHz P4, I'll grant).

I'm frankly tired of viewing programs with non-square pixels, incomplete color gamuts, and a mere 480 lines of (interlaced) resolution. Wake me when one of these companies does HDTV.

Re:Microsoft-killer? AHAHAHAHAHAHA yeah maybe

[mrscott]

I probably shouldn't admit this in a forum of people who obviously despise Lindows, but I have tried it and I did like it. I think I have a pretty good handle on OSs having used NetWare, Windows, UNIX, Linux, VMS, etc and I found Lindows very easy to install, very easy to navigate and -- more importantly -- very easy to get working on my Windows network.

Lindows isn't necessarily here for the hard core Linux user. It's for the masses. For similar reasons that hard core Linux/Unix folks hate Windows, they will hate Lindows.

I commend them for trying. Before version 3, I didn't think it would go anywhere, but after actually using it for a while, my opinion has changed.

Quite possible

[ramzak2k]

If Lindows Media computer is able to create an interface where the user finds absolutely
nothing lacking in comparison to Windows media Computer & is cheaper - why not ?

The only reason linux is losing out on the desktop is because of the inability to execute applications (without struggling with wine).
With all-in-a-box system like a media computer that wouldnt require specific applications to perform tasks there is a good chance that windows will lose out.

Usage...

[rf0]

As far as I understand from the review. It doesn't do what its meant to do (DVD etc) very well and it can't display on a TV. No pardon me if I wrong but I would want something like this to show stuff on my TV. So basically I can spend £250 on this or £99 on a DVD player than can do the same thing? I know where I'm putting my money

Rus

I have a computer alot like this.

[Gyorg_Lavode]

I actually have a computer alot like this. I have a via 733 w/ 512pc133 ram in the original shuttle case. (I have 200gb of hdd space so slightly more than thiers.) The one thing I have that they don't is the hardware decoder card. Honestly, you need one if your going to be decoding dvd's. A via isn't going to handle dvd decoding by it's self. That's just silly.

Comparing these to a windows media computer isn't even fair. They are 2 different beasts. A windows media computer is built around high end hardware capable of doing PVR duties. This little box is a dvd player w/ a hard drive, (as is mine). It was silly of them to sell this without a hardware decoder.

But with a hardware decoder it should do fine. (I run mine under windows because I haven't been able to get the drivers for the hardware video decoder working under linux. Also, I want a dvd player that works with my remote control and that I can pop the dvd in and have the menu come up, not something I have to work at the keyboard for. I know these features are available, but I haven't seen a simple package that combines these 3 things without me having to hack things up.) I get almost no cpu utilization under windows. When I do get jumps in the video/audio, it's caused by the isa bus (and I have bus mastering, it just sucks), not by the hardware. The box works well for what I wanted when I bought it: A dvd player that is small and trendy looking, but is updatable with standard pc parts and can take a LOT of storage for my music, (I have ALOT of music. I have ripped my hundred's of CD's to the computer to make them all portable at once).

But a media center? That it is not. The system reviewed should be compared to a set-top box that has a dvd player and can access mp3's, ogg's, and such. I'm thinking about building a new box to work as a media center, but I'll use a bigger case, MUCH stronger hardware so I can use PVR capabilities, and probably a package like the PVR ones that have been discussed here before. Either that or a windows media center computer.

720p progressive scan

[Delirium Tremens]

The important questions when it comes to modern DVD playback are:

Can this box upscale DVD resolution to 720p? And if so, through what kind of output? DVI? Components?