On top of the many bug fixes though, we are pleased to officially announce the first beta of XBMCbuntu. With this beta release, we have chosen to slightly shift the focus of the pre-built XBMC Live install. In the past, XBMC Live was optimized for a pure set-top box experience. In the switch to XBMCbuntu, we are pushing to a more traditional ‘buntu approach that emphasizes first trying and then ultimately installing XBMC onto the local machine.

There are many benefits to this approach. In particular, XBMC is now built upon a full LXDE desktop environment, which has a web browser (Chromium) with a fully updated (and updatable) version of Flash built-in and a GUI package manager ready to install and update all of the normal Ubuntu programs a typical Linux user might use. The user may now toggle between XBMC, which auto-starts, and a normal desktop if he or she chooses. And, perhaps most exciting for many users, XBMC will now be upgradeable, both from command line and from the GUI package manager, without fear of crashing the XBMC experience.

Naturally, those users who do not want to see the desktop will never need to. When you boot your computer, you will be booted directly into the XBMC homescreen, just as you are right now. The only clear difference is the new power underneath the hood.

For those users experienced in installing XBMC Live, be prepared for a newer, easier graphical installer. Your downloadable Disc Image may be found here. The installer still needs a bit of polish, most notably the slideshow panels, but we will be sure to brush up the cosmetics in time for final release.

And for those users of Eden Beta1 and Beta2, as always, your downloads may be found here. Once again, remember this is Beta software, and bugs are likely to appear. Feel free to let us know how your experience is going in the comments below.

Update:

With Beta 2, XBMC has begun automatically scanning for Movie Collections when using the default movie scraper. With Beta 3, XBMC continues to scan for those collections, but no longer displays Collections by default. To enable Movie Collections, visit System -> Video -> Library, and enable “Group movies in sets.”

The same warnings from beta1 still apply. Eden is quite stable already, but don’t forget that it is in beta. Builds for all platforms except XBMCBuntu are uploaded and ready to go. Download the latest in mediacenter goodness right here.

Translators and addon developers, please be sure to send your final pull requests for translations for XBMC and Addons for Eden.

XBMC prefers to avoid political activism. It is our opinion that we are builders of software. Awesome software, to be precise. And we, as a group, do not care one bit how our users choose to use that software, nor do we have any interest in standing in our users way.

However, under provisions granted by SOPA/PIPA, if a copyright holder believes that any piece of our website violates their copyright, whether it be a picture in our forum, an item on our blog, or a single addon in one of our mirrors, they could use unprecedented measures to deny access to xbmc’s website and services  without due process. (see EFF Report for a better and more thorough explanation)

In essence, we’d have to make a choice. Do we want to keep building awesome software and in so doing waste 75% of our coding time acting as the police officers of our users trying to find and delete every single piece of content that might potentially have copyright issues, or do we want to give up this project entirely?

We, the developers of XBMC, believe this “choice” is not a choice at all, and as such, we oppose this Bill.

We recognize that many disagree with our stance on this subject, and invite all to examine the text of the SOPA Bill, the coverage of the SOPA bill performed by the Electronic Frontier Foundation and whatever sources you trust on this topic, before coming to your own conclusions.

It is for all these reasons and more that, on January 18th, we will be joining reddit, Raspberry Pi, XDA Developers, The Linux Forum, and numerous others by blacking out our website for the day. We invite you to educate yourself and then, if you live in America, contact your local congressman and senator to further this discussion.

If you’d like to make the trip, SCALE is happening January 20th through the 22nd (about two weeks from now) at the Hilton LAX Airport hotel. Our booth will be up on the 21st and 22nd, and you might be able to sneak a peak at us setting up on the 20th. Our Meet Up last year was, perhaps, not the rousing success that we might have hoped for, but if anyone expresses interest in the comments, we’d love to do another one. This time, we might even try to go somewhere slightly closer to the Expo area!

Ladies and Gentlemen, XBMC 11.0 Eden: Beta 1 is available to download.

The sheer number of new features, platforms, and improvements to nearly every facet of the XBMC experience found within Eden are nearly too numerous to count.

Milestones include Addon Rollbacks, vast improvements in Confluence (the default skin), massive speed increases via features like Dirty-region rendering and the new JPEG decoder, a simpler, better library, additional protocol handling, better networking support, better handling of unencrypted BluRay content and structures, adjustable display refresh rate in OSX (to match the already available feature in Windows and Linux), AirPlay support, an upgraded weather service, and much more. Check out the highlights in the summarized changelog.

In addition to our many software improvements, we’ve increased our reach in the realm of hardware support since Dharma was released. Eden marks the first in-sync stable release for the Apple TV2, iPad, and other iOS devices. We’ve vastly improved the method by which we handle input, including heavily upgrading JSON-RPC support, making remote control support much, MUCH simpler in Windows, and enabling unique methods of device communication with hardware like the HDMI-CEC Adapter. And now even AMD devices are supported for GPU video decoding in Linux to some extent, thanks to the inclusion of VAAPI.

We are also in the process of drastically altering XBMC Live to make it more like a full “*Buntu” version of XBMC with massive changes to the boot and install process. That alteration is not quite ready for prime time (and, thus, is not available at this time), but our devs are working on it round the clock. Keep an eye out for a more in-depth article on this in the next week or so. The XBMC Linux PPA is also not immediately available, but check back a few days after Christmas. It should be online at that time.

Because this is Beta software, you can likely expect minor issues over the course of the next few weeks. For example, you may discover issues with playing movie trailers that may require a manual install of the Youtube addon. If, after asking in the forum and updating to the most recently available Beta, your issue is not solved, feel free to follow the above link to the Trac service and create a ticket with the issue.  As always, when troubleshooting, providing a debug log will be essential to resolving issues.

And with that, we invite users one and all to backup your userdata folder (which is always a good idea)(also, iOS users, you should follow this link for info on your slightly different backup process), and get to downloading!

Downloads may be found here.

Let us know what you think in the comments. Spread the word. XBMC Eden Beta is finally available!

"Please return your trays and seatbacks to upright position and prepare for Eden."

XBMC 11.0 Eden represents the first update to the addon repository since Dharma was released and a number of API changes have occurred in between these two releases. First off, our thanks to all the authors who have been keeping on top of API changes. You are doing a great job. The Team would like to recommend that those authors who have not yet upgraded to Eden do so now.

For more specifics on skinning, scripting, json, Python calls, and similar addon API updates, please visit:

http://wiki.xbmc.org/index.php?title=Eden_API_Changes

Thank you for flying Air XBMC. We are nearing the runway.

Nevertheless, rules are rules, and a winner must be selected. First, I’d like to toss up some honorable mentions, who almost certainly would win on any other given day.

First up: The XBMC Table by Oscar. Here we have a table that totally folds up so that you might assume it was nothing more than your traditional living room coffee table. But then, when it unfolds, BOOM: XBMC. Inside the table are a projector, a subwoofer, and a screen. An additional screen pulls down from across the room.  (Note: This table was absolutely awesome, but somewhat unqualified for either award. The ATV2 can’t accept the HDMI-CEC Adapter, and the ATV2 is built into the table (and no TV exists), so there’s be no real use for a TotalMount. Nevertheless, we wanted to highlight the amount of craftmanship and ingenuity involved in designing so awesome a table.)

Next, the XBMC Subwoofer. One of these subwoofers doesn’t put out any sound, but it does have a tiny HTPC surprise for those willing to check it out!

Finally, we actually do have XBMC on the PS3… sort of. Martin decided he could fit a Gigabyte mini-ITX motherboard, an SSD, a core i3-530 CPU, and a picoPSU into an old PS3 case. So he did! This may just be my opinion, but the back of his PS3 looks so much better now!

The rest of the entries can be found at the end of this post in our gallery. Pretty much ever single one of them was absolutely fantastic (and occasionally pretty funny).

Now, last but obviously not least, we’d like to congratulate our two winners.

Jonas (user name jolid in the forums) is the winner of the Pulse Eight USB-CEC Adapter for both cleverly hiding his HTPC as well as cleverly displaying it proudly. Jonas took an old Luxor radio, yanked out the innards, and replaced them with an MSI 760GM board, an AMD athlon x2 260 CPU, 3 TBs of harddrive space stuck to the ceiling of the radio using rubber from an old bicycle tire, and two PVR cards hooked to the live-tv plugin in XBMC. To top it all off (and the reason we ultimately decided to give Jonas’s entry first place), the radio still plays music! The PC is hooked to an internal T-Amp, which is, in turn, hooked to the original Luxor radio speaker. And while there’s no way to change the station, the volume dial works.

Nice computer, Jonas!

Congrats Jonas!

Renato is the winner of the Pulse-Eight TotalMount, though to be fair, it’s quite possible that he may not actually need it, based on his setup. If you can see it on first glance, you are a better person than me. (Hint, look closely at the receiver.) In addition to his ATV, Renato has a Kenwood 5.1 KRF-V5070D receiver, a Philips LCD 9830/10 TV, and a Netgear ReadyNAS 2×2TB NAS in the basement.

Thanks to everyone else who submitted. A few submissions have been left out, either because it was difficult to grab them from their hosting site, because they didn’t quite match the rules, because they were similar to ones already included, or because they were of the htpc in the room, htpc behind the monitor, or htpc directly behind the wall variety (all of which are awesome, but not necessarily unique. My personal apologies for not including every single submission.) For everyone who did not make a submission, take a look through some of the following gallery. I feel like I’ve been inspired to take on about 20 new projects. Anybody have several thousand dollars they can lend me?

Feel free to talk about your favorite setups in the comments and definitely let us know just how stupid we were in picking one winner over another. Believe us, this one is guaranteed to leave us second guessing ourselves over and over again. They really all were that good.

Stay tuned next week for a new (non-contest) Feature Friday.

And remember to keep submitting your setups to natethomas AT xbmc DOT org!

We’d just like to update with the announcement that now we can confirm the addition of a prize for the winner of the challenge!

The nice folks at Pulse Eight have agreed to to give a USB-CEC Adapter to our Challenge winner. To refresh your memories, here’s the review we did of that Adapter. Safe to say, we think the Adapter is pretty awesome, and, as we keep inching closer to Eden being released, this adapter should just continue to be more and more amazing.

Unfortunately, the single easiest device to hide that also runs XBMC is the Apple TV 2, which can’t use the USB-CEC Adapter, so Pulse Eight suggested their ATV2 TotalMount as a second award for the best hidden ATV2. Since it wasn’t costing us anything, we said that sounded fantastic!

Now, for a refresh of the rule:

• Email a link to a picture of your elegantly hidden HTPC. (Alternatively, a link to a picture of your elegantly displayed HTPC, if you are displaying it in an unusual way.)
• Feel free to upload the pic to the site of your choice, so long as it’s possible to download that picture. (For example, we recommend tinypic.com.)
• If you have a good story to go with the picture, include that in the email.
• Send your link to natethomas AT xbmc DOT org with the subject: Hidden XBMC.
• Submissions will not be accepted after 1AM, Eastern Standard Time, Friday morning. (the 25th of November)

The person with the best, most creative method of hiding/displaying his or her HTPC (based on our subjective opinions) will win the Pulse Eight USB-CEC Adapter. The person with the best, most creative method of hiding his or her Apple TV 2 will win a Pulse Eight TotalMount. We’ll announce the winners and display the best pictures Friday night.

If you want to thank Pulse Eight for helping us give away stuff (or want to find out about how things like the USB CEC Adapter are progressing), feel free to give them the thumbs up on their Facebook page. And keep sending in your awesome pics; we’re really enjoying them!

This week, we turn to Matt, who successfully managed to buy his massive collection of harddrives before hard drive prices went crazy. Like all good enthusiasts should, he’s hidden his server running Ubuntu in a back closet, where his 12 TB of harddrive space can spin quietly, away from earshot.

When Matt designed his entertainment center, he decided that visible wires were for crazy folk. The problem was, he didn’t have an entirely new room to work with when building, and he didn’t want ugly speakers hanging out of the walls. So, he did this:

That’s right, Matt skipped the walls entirely and stuck the speakers directly into his ceiling. Specifically, Matt stuck four Polk Audio 620-RT speakers in the ceiling. Those, combined with the Polk Audio TL3 center channel in his entertainment cabinet, provide for full surround without any clutter. Here’s a view of one of the 620-RTs without its cover.

With the cover in place, as you can see below, the speakers blend almost seamlessly with the ceiling and other ceiling pieces.

Next, to crank up the bass, Matt hid his Polk Audio DSW Pro 660wi 12 inch subwoofer almost in plain sight. Can you see it in the above picture? (No, it’s not the dog.)

How about now?

Because Matt went with a wireless subwoofer, he was able to place his sub anywhere he wanted to in the room, so long as it was relatively close to a power outlet. Even if he hadn’t though, as you can see from the above picture, Matt has done an excellent job managing cables without tearing out walls.

Finally, we turn to my favorite part of this entertainment center. Most enthusiasts, when setting up their rooms, hang their TVs on their walls using the VESA mount. The thing is, if you’ve got a perfectly acceptable entertainment center cabinet to rest your TV on, there’s almost no reason to hang the TV on the wall. So what do you do with that free VESA mount?

Matt choose to use the VESA mount to hang his XBMC-running Zotac ND22 HTPC directly onto his Sharp 42″ Aquous LCD.

Zotac, meet Sharp. You’ll be spending some time together.

And so Matt’s setup is complete. Let’s take one last look at how it all fits together.

Not bad at all. And not a wire in sight. (Though a ridiculously adorable dog is still very much in sight.) Good job, Matt!

Photo Challenge:

Next week, I’d like to change Feature Friday up a bit. Instead of highlighting one individual’s home, I’d like to set a challenge in honor of Matt’s setup. Send us a link to a picture of how you hide (or elegantly display) your HTPC. Feel free to upload the picture to your picture hosting site of choice. (I personally prefer tinypic.com, but any one that allows downloading will work.) If you’ve got a cool story to go along with the picture, send that along too. The challenge will end at 1AM, Easter Standard Time, Thursday night/ Friday morning.  A few of us Team members will then select our favorites, and we’ll present as many as seems reasonable on the blog next Friday. The winner of the challenge will earn the respect and admiration of the Team and of your fellow users. I suppose we could see if we can come up with a prize that’s a little more tangible, but no promises.

Send your links to natethomas AT xbmc DOT org with the subject: Hidden XBMC, and good luck!