Multimedia computer with Myth TV, audio problems

[plonka2000]

Hi there People. :)

Here is the situation:
I have an Asus Pundit, find info on the link below.
http://www.asus.com/products/desktop/pundit/overview.htm

I have great plans for this machine, and I intend to use Linux for that.
I would like to use this machine for:

FTP server for external file access.
NAT server for internal LAN internet sharing (2 more PCs).
I want to be able to run my game emulators which I currently run under Window$:
-MAME, EPSXE, NES, SNES, CPS-2, Neo-Geo, N64, etc...

This is intended to go onto my TV in my living room also, so I want to use samba to share internal network drives for movies that I can watch on my TV.

*I WOULD LIKE TO STRESS THAT ALL MY EMULATORS USE LEGAL ROMS (I own all the aformentioned consoles) AND MOVIES THAT I WATCH ARE LEGALLY FREE DOWNLOADED*

in particular I want to watch my collection of Blood Gulch Chronicles from www.redvsblue.com (I'm not promoting btw, just saying how great it is).
These are DivX encoded.

I am considering using Madrake 10 official, as I use this already on my main machine and am very pleased with it, but i'm very open to suggestion from anyone else.

Also, I am not running the Hard drive from the onboard controller: I am using a Silicon Image 3010 SATA controller, which I initially tested on MDK10 Community on another PC (It worked fine).

Also, I'm running this on a 2.4GHz Celeron and 256MB PC2700 DDR RAM in case it means anything. The HDD is a 160GB Maxtor DiamondMAX9 (SATA of course!).

I am using a DVD drive int here at the moment to watch DVDs also, but I may remove that as the drive I have makes the machine VERY warm. I'll replace it with a 52x Asus CDRW, which I had in there before.

I have WinXP on there at the moment and I am growing increasingly irritated with it. It just never works properly. :(

Please, ANY help would be much appreciated. :D

Is this even in the right section? Any comments from an Admin?

[hard candy]

On a round machine, how do you keep it from rolling off the table? :D
I would stick with Mandrake if it works with your SATA controller. Other distros would be OK, but the installation on SATA may be a chore if they do not support it from the get go.

[plonka2000]

Originally posted by hard candy
On a round machine, how do you keep it from rolling off the table? :D
I would stick with Mandrake if it works with your SATA controller. Other distros would be OK, but the installation on SATA may be a chore if they do not support it from the get go.

Yeah, I was was thinking that too. Please bear in mind that this machine has no floppy drive, so it adds a whole new dimention to installing certain things.

Just to get XP on it, I had to install it onto the drive via another computer and transplant it in with the SATA controller.

[Dark Ninja]

*I WOULD LIKE TO STRESS THAT ALL MY EMULATORS USE LEGAL ROMS (I own all the aformentioned consoles) AND MOVIES THAT I WATCH ARE LEGALLY FREE DOWNLOADED*

For some reason, this really made me laugh. I'm not saying I don't believe you, but, it's just funny that people feel like they need to say this. Haha.

[plonka2000]

Originally posted by Dark Ninja
For some reason, this really made me laugh. I'm not saying I don't believe you, but, it's just funny that people feel like they need to say this. Haha.

I know what you mean.
In a 'free world', its amazing how people are so afraid to admit that something is free.

Regardless, I actually do have each of the consoles mentioned. I've even got an old capcom CPS-2 arcade machine at my parents house which I own. :)

Also, I use a XBOXpad-to-USB converter which I have a Window$ driver for, however, I need to know if I can obtain a linux driver for it. Any ideas anyone?

[hard candy]

There's a xbox gamepad driver in the newer kernels now.

[plonka2000]

Originally posted by hard candy
There's a xbox gamepad driver in the newer kernels now.

WOOT!!! 2.6 here i come!!! :D

[thaddaeus]

I would recomend Slackware for SambaFS. It works better on slack then mdk, and for easy config from shell, uses the same GUI loaders as mdk just not the same gui configuration utils, but for a network server type machine as it seems your wanting go with slackware, from http://www.slackware.com. I see the pundit has tv out that you want to use, I think mandrake would be better in this case, as it is updated more with some of that stuff, slack would be tougher to set that up. Think about invsting in a new cheap machine for the server and run slack on that, then use your pundit for media and run mdk, that might be a better soulution for preformance. The emu stuff, might be hard to find all those emu's but use wine (Wine Is Not an Emulator) a little tricky to set up but works wonders to let you use win progs. hope some of this helps

[plonka2000]

Originally posted by thaddaeus
I would recomend Slackware for SambaFS. It works better on slack then mdk, and for easy config from shell, uses the same GUI loaders as mdk just not the same gui configuration utils, but for a network server type machine as it seems your wanting go with slackware, from http://www.slackware.com. I see the pundit has tv out that you want to use, I think mandrake would be better in this case, as it is updated more with some of that stuff, slack would be tougher to set that up. Think about invsting in a new cheap machine for the server and run slack on that, then use your pundit for media and run mdk, that might be a better soulution for preformance. The emu stuff, might be hard to find all those emu's but use wine (Wine Is Not an Emulator) a little tricky to set up but works wonders to let you use win progs. hope some of this helps

Thanks, thats great. I'll have a good mess about with Slackware as well.
I currently use slackware 9.1 on my laptop, however, I want to set this up and just use and update it without much fuss.

Regarding the graphics card (Sorry I didnt mention this earlier!), I'm running it currently through an ATi 9200 PCI card. I understand ATi cards are a nightmare to get working, as all my graphics cards are nVidia.

Anyone had any experience using Xbox pads in Linux?

[mdwatts]

Originally posted by plonka2000
WOOT!!! 2.6 here i come!!! :D

You'll find it here.

#
# USB HID Boot Protocol drivers
#
.
.
.
CONFIG_USB_XPAD=m

The 2.6 kernel source documentation may contain something on the xpad.

[hard candy]

Also, you can use the jstest command to test it. And there is jscal. So you may need to enable the joystick option and the usb joystick also. Mine were enabled by default and I didn't change anything.
Here is the text Readme for the driver:
http://www.ibiblio.org/peanut/Kernel-2.6.5/input/xpad.txt
And "man jstest":
SYNOPSIS

jstest [--normal] [--old] [--event] [--nonblock] [--select] <device-
name>


DESCRIPTION

jstest can be used to test all the features of the Linux joystick API,
including non-blocking and select(2) access, as well as version 0.x
compatibility mode.

It is also intended to serve as an example implementation for those who
wish to learn how to write their own joystick using applications.



OPTIONS

--normal
One-line mode showing immediate status.

--old Same as --normal, using 0.x interface.

--event
Prints events as they come in.

--nonblock
Same as --event, in nonblocking mode.

--select
Same as --event, using select(2) call.



SEE ALSO

jscal(1), jsattach(1), select(2).

[plonka2000]

Thanks for that help guys.
Any idea what the earliest kernel version is that has the driver already i it?

That would broaden my options a little if its in the later 2.4 kernels.

By the way, I'm gonna wipe XP off it and try Slackware tonight if I can.

[XiaoKJ]

Gentoo for ANYTHING!

But I seriously recommend against FTP -- a pitiful guy just got hcked and were hot on it a few days ago...
Originally posted by hlrguy

SSH, I don't remote without it
Try searching...:D

[plonka2000]

Originally posted by XiaoKJ
Gentoo for ANYTHING!

But I seriously recommend against FTP -- a pitiful guy just got hcked and were hot on it a few days ago...

Try searching...:D

What would you recommed otherwise?

I want to use FTP so I can access my files when I'm elsewhere... Like work, friends houses, Moms house, etc...

Is there an alternative that I'm not seeing?

[XiaoKJ]

Debian...stable...

I told you to avoid FTP -- you can always do an sFTP with OpenSSH -- and use SSH instead of telnet...

But on such a new(and probably high-end) computer with good internet access(to use it from internet), its better to use gentoo!

Just a stage 3 on anaconda would do nicely.

Source Mage? Debian? Slackware? Arch?

[plonka2000]

Originally posted by XiaoKJ
Debian...stable...

I told you to avoid FTP -- you can always do an sFTP with OpenSSH -- and use SSH instead of telnet...

But on such a new(and probably high-end) computer with good internet access(to use it from internet), its better to use gentoo!

Just a stage 3 on anaconda would do nicely.

Source Mage? Debian? Slackware? Arch?

With sFTP, can I access that from any machine with a web browser like a standard FTP server or is there something special I need to do?

I have used Debian, and I understand its easy to update with apt-get, but when it comes to installing it will it give me hell with my SATA controller and HDD?

Same question with any of the other Distros...?

[plonka2000]

Ok, there is a new problem with the machine.
I was up most of last night trying to get Slackware 9.1 onto the Pundit.

The problem is with the Sil 3112 SATA Controller. :(

I read a lot of guides on how to make an iso image but it doesnt help if you dont have a working linux install. My laptop is leant to my friend so I cant use that, and my Main PC is in flux at the moment.

[plonka2000]

Hi All,

Rather than start a new thread, I thought I'd try and ressurect the old one...

Anyway, I've been working on this machine with the goals I set out to do since this original thread.

I've been using Gentoo and its come along a long way... I've got the apache server up and it hosts my site now instead of my Window$ box and I'm actively moving my music oiver to it as a music server also.

Just to re-iterate, the job of this machine is to:
-Play movies on my TV via mythtv.
--mythtv will play my emulated games.
--the emulated games will work with my XBOXpad-to-USB converter.
--mythtv will work with my Winfast TV2000XP (Expert) TV card)
--mythtv will be controlled by the remote contol supplied with the TV2000XP.
-Host my Website via Apache2/PHP/MySQL.
-share files (music) on my internal network using samba and host my music server via the PHP script zina (http://www.pancake.org/zina/index.html) and also access my DivX and XviD movie files on my Window$ machine using samba (Or is it 'lisa'?).
-Host my FTP server (I've since chosen glftpd).

However, not everything works right yet.

1st, for some reason my ALSA sound system works when I boot KDE (I use KDE as root user and I've setup a 'mythtv' user to do my mythtv stuff) but when I fire up xmms or KMPlayer/KPlayer (Both based on MPlayer) there is no audio. In fact XMMS completely freezes.
I've tried to switch it from OSS to ALSA but it tells me that I need to make sure something else isnt using the sound card...:confused:
NOTE: I get all the KDE sounds when opening things, switching tasks etc but no sound in music player programs... I suspect the OSS sound driver is not working...

2nd, I've been trauling the net to find some sort of help with getting my TV2000XP card to work with mythtv... There has been a lot of info on other tvcards but none on this one... Most forums seem to have the odd bit of info here and there but nothing solid...

3rd, mythtv wont start as my mythtv user... I havnt tried it as another user but I suspect its something to do with privelidges as when I'm logged in as the mythtv user I get an 'Access Denied' error when trying to 'su'. Also, I can use 'startx' as mythtv user but when I try 'mythtv' or '/usr/bin/mythsetup' I get the error 'mythtv: cannot connect to X server'

Thats about it really... The rest I can (maybe) figure out as I have most other stuff... but I need help with this stuff! :(

NOTE: Also I have since dropped the PCI SATA controller in favor of the simpler option of the onboard IDE controller. :rolleyes: Its much easier...

Please help!
Please let me know of all and any config files you would like to see... I can host copies on my apache server for you to access.

Thanks all for any help.

[hard candy]

As far as XMMS goes, there is a plugin available for aRts to work with XMMS. There is an ebuild for it in the Portage listing.
http://www.gentoo-portage.com/media-plugins/xmms-arts
Try that and see if it will help with the freeze up.
And as an aside, not to get away from your goals, I use a Xbox with a modchip to do all that. It has a 160 GB HD, is connected wirelessly to my netork, has a ftp server, plays on my HDTV, and although I use the native Xbox OS, you can install Gentoox on it (a gentoo distro made for the Xbox). It's cheap, around $250 for the box, HD, and modchip, and works well. Check out www.xbox-scene.com

[plonka2000]

Originally posted by hard candy
As far as XMMS goes, there is a plugin available for aRts to work with XMMS. There is an ebuild for it in the Portage listing.
http://www.gentoo-portage.com/media-plugins/xmms-arts
Try that and see if it will help with the freeze up.
And as an aside, not to get away from your goals, I use a Xbox with a modchip to do all that. It has a 160 GB HD, is connected wirelessly to my netork, has a ftp server, plays on my HDTV, and although I use the native Xbox OS, you can install Gentoox on it (a gentoo distro made for the Xbox). It's cheap, around $250 for the box, HD, and modchip, and works well. Check out www.xbox-scene.com

Thanks for that.
I've emerged the ebuild of that and it works great.
Although the OSS issue is bugging me. Will I need it for anything else?

Anything on the other issues?

Thanks for your help. :)

[hard candy]

I do not have a TV card so I'm no help with MythTV. If you are using a 2.6 kernel and as long as you have the alsa-oss emulation enabled you should not have any problems with OSS not being used. I believe just about all the programs I use now are using alsa.