Smart Home Blog

XBMC just released the first update for AppleTV2 and iPhone/iPad port of its excellent software. The Changelog includes following:

• GUI speedup
• Webserver enabled
• RTMP support
• AC3/DTS Audio Dialogs
• Rotating for the iPhone and iPad
• Black and Dim screensavers working
• Bluetooth Support
• SMB shares with Windows Live Essentials should work.
• Sleep timer works
• Add-on updates now working
• Decrypted ISO playback works
• Thumbnail creation fixed

To get that upgrade on your AppleTV2 just run following commands in the console:
apt-get update && apt-get install org.xbmc.xbmc-atv2
Also the question about output 1080p video was clarified. XBMC can decode 1080p video. But AppleTV2 has either hardware or software restrictions to 720p only.

Leader of the project GeeXboX which offers a Linux-based media distribution, Benjamin Zores wrote in the his blog about new strategy of the GeeXboX. It’ll focus most of its efforts to support ARM devices. Especially OMAP3-based ones. That choice is conditioned by its rich media features – OpenGL compatible GPU and a 720p H.264 hardware capable decoding DSP, mature of SoC and big community.

Current development tree of GeeXboX is running fine on OMAP3 hardware. But there is a lot of improvements should be done to offer a full-features software for that platform. Moreover, it’s planning to design GeeXboX oriented board (based on ARM SoC, of course) and have a support of OMAP4 with architecture with 1080p-capable DSP.

Priority of GeeXboX to support of ARM architecture is a smart decision in my opinion. It’ll allow to build compact, quiet and inexpensive HTPC with 1080p compatibility using open platform and open source software.