AtvCloner XBMC Linux Image 26 is now available for download via bittorent. This image is setup with XBMC 11.0 “Eden” and the latest Quartz 3.1.8 skin as default (this skin is about as close to the atv interface as you can find for xbmc and has much more to offer). As always this image is setup for the AppleTV 1 and works great with the Broadcom CrystalHD card for superb playback including full 1080p decoding as well as 1080p rendering to display. Apple File Protocol (AFP) networking as well as Airplay and Airtunes are also included! The image has a full build environment to compile and install XBMC right from the source code right on your AppleTV.
Quick list of features but there are plenty more:
- Linux 8.0.4 “Hardy” OS (until just recently the last linux distro that properly output audio over hdmi on the AppleTV 1) which uses very little ram on the AppleTV 1. Additionally the Linux install has a complete build environment so you can fairly easily compile and install future versions of xbmc (including the git trunk) right on your AppleTV 1.
- XBMC 11.0 “Eden”
- Quartz 3.1.8 as the default skin, the most “AppleTV like” skin to date with many more features than the stock OS. Very light and very customizable. Of course you can always add any skin you wish via the addons manager in xbmc.
- Apple File Protocol (AFP) networking. Preferred networking for your Mac especially since smb is broken on OS X Lion.
- Full Airplay and Airtunes support. Stream Audio and Video from any PC running iTunes or any IOS device (e.g. iPhone, iPad, iPod Touch …).
- 20GB Media partition on internal drive auto mounts on your mac desktop for very easy transfer of content to the AppleTV 1 local drive for local storage and playback.
- Full support for the AppleTV 1 usb port. Perfect for connecting a usb external drive for even more local media storage ( as of this time you can not do this with either the AppleTV 2 or 3 even if jailbroken). The port also supports a usb dvd optical media drive so you can run a dvd drive right from your AppleTV 1.
The new version of AtvCloner 0.2.0 is now available for download.
Changes are pretty much in the xbmc linux partitioning area where it will now actually add a set of default directories (Movies, TVShows, Pictures, Music and Storage) to the Media partition as well as set read/write permissions, which 0.1.9 was supposed to do but it didn’t work right.
Also a slight rearrangement of the Partition New Drive tab so hopefully it’s a bit more intuitive.
Notice: I noticed a slight issue with this image after offering it in that XBMC > Settings > System > Audio > Audio Output is not preset to hdmi audio as per previous images. This was an oversight. Instructions for setting audio output for both HDMI and Optical are posted here. Sorry for any inconvenience.
So, as XBMC goes into a “hard freeze” for 11.0 “Eden” it is also apparent that any dependencies are now pretty much frozen as well. Therefore I thought it might make sense to release a “beta” of AtvCloner XBMC Linux Image 25 which is probably the last image before XBMC releases an official public version 11.0. You can download it here.
This image has XBMCs git head (latest and greatest from the development repository) from literally this morning installed by default. This includes python 2.6, turbo jpeg (read: faster UI performance), AFP networking as well as NFS networking. Also … AirPlay and AirTunes (yes, your xbmc linux AppleTV 1 is now Airplay and Airtunes compatible!). Yes, it is kinda neat to send music or videos from iTunes, iPod, iPad or iPhone … via airplay/airtunes to your XBMC linux modded AppleTV 1.
Better yet, for advanced users … all of the dependencies and the build environment to compile and install XBMC up to and through the upcoming XBMC 11.0 code named “Eden” are in place. !
Why “beta”? Well because I intend to release a final Image 25 once the default skin Quartz has a new upcoming official release and once XBMC 11.0 is official. That said … this image has everything needed to run and/or compile the latest and greatest on your AppleTV 1.
Now, while I thought it might be prudent to wait for the official XBMC 11.0 public release … the improvements are just to hard to keep under wraps, as well there have been plenty of dependencies added since Image 24 … so, here is AtvCloner XBMC Linux Image 25 (beta) via bit torrent!
If you use XBMC as your media center you probably have noticed that once you setup your video or music libraries you have two choices to update those libraries as you add content to your source. You can manually tell xbmc to update either library and/or tell xbmc to update the libraries at startup. Now for a pc where you start xmbc every time you want to use it, update at startup is sufficient, however for a setup like the AppleTV 1 running xbmc where its always pretty much running, it can be frustrating to be adding content to your Video/Music sources then running to the atv constantly to tell xbmc to scan for new content so your latest and greatest is on tap.
Hence the XBMC Library Auto Update Addon. Now this was originally written for XBMC 10.0 and 10.1 Dharma by Rob Weber and was available in the official repo. Basically the Addon allows you to specify time intervals upon which XBMC will scan for new content in your Video or Music libraries. Very nice! However since I have updated to xbmc’s Pre 11.0 “Eden” source code I notice it was broken in the newer XBMC versions.
Now, I found this addon to provide the type of library auto updating I wanted on a system like the AppleTV running one of the AtvCloner XBMC linux images. So, what to do ? Well rewrite it to be compatible with newer version of Pre-Eden XBMC. So I did so and it works, I also added a check so that if there is already a scan occurring the Addon will cancel its scheduled scan and reset the timer. As well as it was originally written if either a movie or a song is playing it will cancel the scan and reset so you don’t have reduced performance while watching your content.
This addon is already installed on all AtvCloner XBMC Linux images since image 21 but I figured I’d offer it here for any other folks running XBMC since it works as far as I know on all XBMC supported platforms (tested here on linux and osx, not sure about windows but I can not see any reason it wouldn’t work there).
Please note: you need to be running XBMC as of this revision I also posted this on the XBMC developer forums where there is a bit more info.
if you want to try it out … download it here and install it via the XBMC addons manager with “Install from zip”.
NOTE: As was said above, this is already installed on AtvCloner XBMC linux images and as well will also NOT work on XBMC 10.1 Dharma ( the addon in its original form from Rob Weber is available via the xbmc Add ons Repo for that version).
A new AtvCloner XBMC (Linux) image 24 is now available for download! While XBMC is still between 10.1 (Dharma) and 11.0 (Eden) I have decided it makes sense to release a newer AtvCloner Linux image which can build current xbmc git head. The image includes a more capable build environment which includes newer dependencies than the previous image 21 (yes, images 22 and 23 were scrapped). Also of note … the default skin in image 24 is pecinko’s Quartz skin which is much like the stock atv os on steroids! As an added bonus I have added a newer udpated version of the XBMC Library Auto Update plugin which means that your xbmc install will attempt an update of your libraries at specified intervals (default is every 4 hrs.) . If however a movie or music is playing or a library scan is already in progress then the scheduled update will be bypassed and the timer rescheduled for the next interval. Also of note this is the first AtvCloner XBMC Linux image that comes default with a pre Eden (XBMC 11.0) build installed. Many enhancements and fixes have been made at the XBMC project since the last official 10.1 Dharma release.
Additonal information can also be found at the AtvCloner forums.
The new version of AtvCloner 0.1.9 is now available for download. Changes are pretty much in the xbmc linux partitioning area where it will now add a set of default directories to the Media partition and will properly set the permissions so that once you hook your drive back up to your AppleTV 1 the Media partition will have permissions properly set upon first boot. As well it sets up Movies, TVShows, Pictures, Music and Storage directories on the Media partition.
Also of note, AtvCloner 0.1.9 also fixes a bug where you had to select something in the “Boot Image Path” field even though you were doing an “ATV Linux XBMC w/ CHD support” partitioning scheme (which does not use a (boot.dmg) to enable the “Prepare New Drive ..” button.
This version of AtvCloner works with any previous AtvCloner Linux image as well as the normal stock AppleTV OS cloning.
AtvCloner 0.1.9 Change Log:
Partiton New Drive Tab:
- Fix issue where choosing “ATV Linux XBMC w / CHD support” checkbox still required choosing a source boot.dmg even though it was not required.
- Refactor the updateUI code to be a bit more intuitive.
- Set the widget sizes to mini and allow more room for the Activity Window.
XBMC Linux / CHD partitioning:
- Set permissions to read/write on the Media partition (fixes issue where after install of the drive to the atv perms had to be set via ssh).
- Create default directories on the Media partition which are: “Movies, TVShows, Music, Pictures, Storage”.
Miscellaneous:
- Add ” AtvCloner Forums” to the Help menu.