XBMC on a Raspberry Pi

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1

In response to LG's smart TVs that monitor what you watch, Wendell suggested putting XBMC on a Raspberry Pi. I am trying to do basically the same thing on the $40 Model B. The goals are:

- Stream YouTube, Netflix, Hulu, and Amazon

- Play 1080P 5.1 videos

- Controllable by TV remote

- External 500GB or 1TB laptop drive (cheaper is better)

- 8GB SD card (speed is more important than price)

- PiHUB ($38)

- Case for da Pi ($10)

- MAME

In order to accomplish this, I have been considering using Raspbmc for the Audio/Video content and PIMAME for game emulation with BerryBoot as the bootloader. My primary concerns with Raspbmc are that it might not be able to stream those services and not be able to play 1080P 5.1. As far as PIMAME goes, I would like to be able to connect two USB controllers to play, and thus would be using a PiHUB for more USB ports. Do you think a PiHUB is necessary, or could I use the GPIO for the drive?

How much of this is possible, and what would it cost?

2

Do you mean using the GPIO for extra USB? I would get a powered-USB hub and connect that to the USB ports already on the thing. Not sure about the HDMI specs for the Raspberry Pi though. I'm not sure about using the GPIO as extra USB ports, you would have to do some fancy wiring, but getting a powered-USB hub shouldn't cost too much. I don't have any numbers to give you, sorry.

3

No, I meant using the GPIO to connect to the hard drive.