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All users of HTPC based on Atom processor and nVidia Ion graphics should know the GPU acceleration works pretty well for HD movies and doesn’t work for Flash video at all. That’s really bad because more and more online services stream 1080p video. But likely situation is changed and Linux users can utilize GPU power for Flash video decoding with new Adobe Flash Player 10.2. Just download and install it. Firefox should start using it immediately. Chrome users should do a simple manual configuration – type about:plugins in the address bar to open config page, press button Details, find option Flash, disable stock player version and enable new one. That’s it. Now you may enjoy HD video from Youtube or some other online strimming service.

[via Aleutia Blog]

This brief howto explains clearly how to install XBMC on Ubuntu 9.10 Karmic with supporting of hardware acceleration VDPAU and integrate it with Video Disk Recorder (VDR) – popular software to build receiver for digital TV. All installations are done using packages which is much simpler that build everything from the sources. The integration between XBMC and VDR is done via VDR streamdev-server (there is an another approach based on scripts to switch between XBMC and VDR).

Except installation instructions that howto contains very useful diagram of XBMC LIRC remote action mapping (see it below). As you may see setup of LIRC remote control under XBMC is not so easy task as for the rest HTPC software. Many thanks to author for clarification of that important aspect!

If you have some troubles with VDR installation here is another howto which might help you to setup VDR with VDPAU support under Ubuntu Karmic.

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The VDPAU is packaged as standalone library. It’ll be still included into proprietary nVidia drivers to avoid additional installations. As I understand it’s done to provide some generic way for communications between OS and hardware for Linux. Something similar to DirectX. Good idea in my mind but I suspect that the other producers of video adapters will promote their solutions instead of using and improving of VDPAU.

In any case, nVidia video cards is still the best option for Linux users. Especially with supporting of VDPAU which allows to play HD content even on Atom processor.