I ordered the parts for a media box last week from newegg and eagerly waited all weekend for the parts to show up. So after checking the status of my tracking numbers about 50 times for each package over the course of 4 days, my parts got here! Here’s what I ordered:
I had a spare DVD-ROM drive lying around along with some 100GB Hard drives. While I knew that I would be buying a larger hard drive for the box later this summer or in the fall, I figured I could get by for now with a regular ATA hard drive.
Some quick things I wanted to highlight about the motherboard - one of the best features was that it supported three different video output settings (VGA, DVI, and HDMI) leaving lots of room to grow. Another big selling point for me was that it supported Optical SPDIF audio output - which is the easiest way for me to get Dolby 5.1 into my sound system. One problem, that you’ll read on about later, was that I don’t have a TV that supports any of those output settings. I can handle S-VIDEO, RCA, or Component - so I figured that I could get by with something like this:
Yeah - I know - it’s a longshot… but I figured that an nVidia 7100 graphics chipset could handle the TV-Out features required for the conversion. After all - the first high end graphics card I ever purchased was an nVidia GeForce 7800 GTX - and I found that the 7*** series was both extremely reliable and versatile. This was definitely not the case - but that can wait for later.
— The Build —
I’ve never worked with any smaller form-factor than ATX - So I was at least a bit ready to have some hard-to-manage cables and whatnot… But I was nonetheless excited that I would have a fully featured and expandable media box for around $225. I’ve built plenty of computers before so this whole process went quickly with a few exceptions. First - the motherboard didn’t come with any standoffs nor did the case exactly fit the motherboard. There were two mounting points for the motherboard that did not have a hole to screw into, one of them being a grounding point. Not good. In any case, I figured that with a $60 motherboard I could always just buy a new one and not be an idiot if it did break. Also - I’ve never had one of the LGA775 socket processors from Intel before, so I was surpised to see how the heatsink attached to the motheboard. I was impressed, to say the least. 
I did have some issues with cable management, that being, there is absolutely no cable management. There was simply not enough room to even fit the extra ribbon cables and whatnot. Also - I found out the hard way that the single IDE ATA port on the motherboard wouldn’t easily (read: not in any way) attach both a DVD drive and hard drive. So, I went out and bought my first SATA 3GB/s drive (1 TB for about $100). Needless to say, I won’t need a new hard drive any time soon. After all of that, everything was in and together well enough, and I booted up the machine to install Ubuntu 9.04.
— O.S. Installation & Configuration —
I love Linux. Absolutely love it. I firmly believe that Linux will eventually be the primary O.S. on most personal computers and servers and that it will make all of our lives easier. Believe me, the only reason I stopped using Linux was because I bought a macbook. At the time, for the money I spent, there was absolutely no better computer I could buy that had all of the specs that I needed in the same form factor. Unfortunately, I had planned to use Ubuntu on my macbook - but the hardware support (specifically the mouse and IR port) would not work easily. I resolved to use Mac OS because it is a great build of *nix with an even better GUI - I could deal with not having an apt-get (though not easily).
Put simply - Ubuntu installed flawlessly. All of my devices were detected, including the HDMI and Optical audio outputs - something that I was certainly preparing to compile drivers for. Furthermore - I had heard rumors that HFS+ partitions were not handled well by Linux. Instead, I simply installed the hfs packages in the repositories and when I plugged in my external hard drive - everything mounted and opened perfectly. I was able to easily transfer all of my files over to a separate partition on my 1TB drive for Boxee to use.
Overall - Absolutely wonderful hardware support. Ubuntu has always been a wonderful Linux distribution, and has grown much more mature over the last year and a half.
— Video Output —
This is where my troubles began. As I said earlier, I gambled with the crappiest and most ridiculous VGA -> S-Video converter ever created in the history of mankind. I hardly expected it to work, but every time I used Boxee I became more and more excited to see everything work. I sort of tricked myself into believing that there was a good chance everything would just work. Well - it didn’t. And after multiple xorg.conf configurations using varying options for TVOut, I decided to try the same on Windows. That is when my faith in nVidia began to decrease.
Of course, the same converter did not work in Windows 7 nor Windows XP. I read on the forums that most nVidia users are finding the drivers crippled of features, specifically related to TV output, for any of the more recent builds. One user suggested that I revert to version 169 and attempt to get it working. Still no luck. At this point I was getting thoroughly frustrated - my DVI port didn’t seem to be working either and I was beginning to think that I should have purchased a cheaper motherboard and a separate graphics card. At that point my one saving grace arrived - an email from someone on craigslist selling a VGA signal converter box. For $30 I picked up an amazing signal converter that provides S-Video, RCA, RGB, and Component output. Awesome! I quickly threw Ubuntu back on the box, booted up and was pleasantly surprised to find the Ubuntu desktop on my roommates LCD HDTV.
I should note that during my testing of the video output, I tried a friend’s HDMI cable and was awesomely surprised to find it worked perfectly for Ubuntu! Now I know you’re all asking, why didn’t I just purchase an HDMI cable and be done with it. Well, my own TV only supports RCA, S-Video, and Component inputs - no HDMI. It was in my best interest for the future to provide a more flexible solution.
— Boxee —
Boxee is amazing. I think it will revolutionize what we understand to be television - specifically regarding television programs and internet video. Networks are going the way of the dinosaur in terms of cable and satellite services. I love that I can listen to my favorite Pandora channels, pick up my favorite NPR radio programs, and catalog television programs to watch on my TV, rather than my computer. Boxee can be a bit frustrating with getting it to recognize certain television series, especially if you are seemingly matching the naming criteria spelled out in the forums, when they have passed incorrect naming conventions to their end users. Also - the most recent alpha release tends to crash frequently when playing Pandora radio. They’re aware of the, and I hope that they fix it for the next release.
— Last Thoughts —
Overall, I am thoroughly impressed with the software and hardware for this box. Realistically, I could have built the complete box for just under $300 if I didn’t already have drives sitting around and had a television that supported all of the output standards. I still need to investigate purchasing a remote control, as the keyboard with a 3 foot cord is getting a bit old. I have an idea to use a gamepad, and think I might go ahead with it after my next paycheck. While it’s only $10, the gamepad would provide all of the features I need for boxee, as well as a great interface for me to plug ZSNES into through the media box. Software programs and forward thinking regarding media excite me very much, and seeing Boxee come to fruition is a very telling sign of a new wave of technology regarding in-home entertainment and idea collaboration. I’m glad that when I have kids some day, I can put them on a TED channel through my media-box rather than just having them watch cartoons all day, so that they can share and enjoy the ideas of great minds rather than just mindless babble.
