mostlydave Posted August 10, 2015 Share Posted August 10, 2015 I have my server in a centralish location in my home I have 1 VM being accessed from a monitor and keyboard at a desk (hdmi and usb extension). Now I'd like to add another VM to act as a htpc, what is the best way to get video and usb to the TV room? I'm considering just ordering a long hdmi cable and another usb extension, is this how everyone else is doing it? Quote Link to comment
mr-hexen Posted August 10, 2015 Share Posted August 10, 2015 How long would the HDMI cable be? I have a thick one that runs 30-35ft no problems, but I wouldnt gamble on much further than that. You can use a HDMI to Cat5e to extend HDMI over greater distances. Quote Link to comment
mostlydave Posted August 10, 2015 Author Share Posted August 10, 2015 I was hoping there was a reasonably priced hdmi + usb over cat5 or 6 adapter but I haven't been able to find anything like that Quote Link to comment
Morpheus Posted August 10, 2015 Share Posted August 10, 2015 Would component be a possibility? Quote Link to comment
johnodon Posted August 10, 2015 Share Posted August 10, 2015 I have 3x OpenELEC VMs, all with their own dedicated vid cards pased through (all Radeon HD6450). Each also has a Flirc (USB passthrough) that I control with DirecTV RC65 remotes (just for consistency sake and they are dirt cheap on Ebay/Amazon). All 3 VMs are connected to TVs using 50ft HDMI runs. The Flircs are extended using USB over CAT5/6 extenders (again...~50ft). HDMI cables: http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00RYRJYDG?psc=1&redirect=true&ref_=oh_aui_detailpage_o02_s00 USB over CAT5/6: http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00HRH9H4E?psc=1&redirect=true&ref_=oh_aui_detailpage_o00_s00 Flirc: http://www.amazon.com/FLIRC-FL-09028-Universal-Receiver-Components/dp/B00BB0ETW8/ref=sr_1_1?s=electronics&ie=UTF8&qid=1439245193&sr=1-1&keywords=flirc Remote: http://www.amazon.com/DIRECTV-REMOTE-RC65RX-HR24-BATTERIES/dp/B00DC1YO1K/ref=sr_1_2?s=electronics&ie=UTF8&qid=1439245211&sr=1-2&keywords=rc65 John EDIT: I have a 1000ft spool of CAT6 so I can make my own patch cables. Quote Link to comment
mostlydave Posted August 11, 2015 Author Share Posted August 11, 2015 Ok, that's the kind of solution I was looking at, now figuring out how to fish the cable through the walls begins! Just in case anyone else is considering the same solution, the 30ft cables are actually cheaper in a 2 pack than a single cable! Quote Link to comment
landS Posted August 11, 2015 Share Posted August 11, 2015 Another Solution - Raspberry Pi 2 with OSMC (nee Raspbmc) makes for a fantastic HTPC. Either wired eithernet or wireless network bridges work great. If the signal is strong enough, certain wifi dongles are acceptable too. Beyond the Kodi add-ons (pandora, ted-tv), you can use a windows VM to host netlix/amazon prime/etc as well as moonlight/limelight game streaming (nvidia gpu only need apply).... and Retropie gaming is a good deal of fun too Quote Link to comment
jonp Posted August 12, 2015 Share Posted August 12, 2015 Another Solution - Raspberry Pi 2 with OSMC (nee Raspbmc) makes for a fantastic HTPC. Either wired eithernet or wireless network bridges work great. If the signal is strong enough, certain wifi dongles are acceptable too. Beyond the Kodi add-ons (pandora, ted-tv), you can use a windows VM to host netlix/amazon prime/etc as well as moonlight/limelight game streaming (nvidia gpu only need apply).... and Retropie gaming is a good deal of fun too 1 - with OE on unRAID, you get better performance and higher resolution support than a rasp pi. 2 - with the server and player on the same hardware, buffering just doesn't happen. 3 - because OE is just a VM on unRAID, you can actually use other VMs like SteamOS to those same displays Not discounting the value of a low-cost media player, but highlighting the strengths that make this solution worthwhile for those that are spending the time / money to accomplish it. Quote Link to comment
saarg Posted August 12, 2015 Share Posted August 12, 2015 2 - with the server and player on the same hardware, buffering just doesn't happen. Well... Unraid still have to spin up the drive when a file is accessed, so it will delay the playback if you already haven't accessed the disk. But your statement is correct, but it doesn't help that it's not buffering when the disk isn't spun up Quote Link to comment
Monkeyair Posted August 12, 2015 Share Posted August 12, 2015 You might want to take a look at this: https://www.pulse-eight.com/p/104/usb-hdmi-cec-adapter I use one of these to control my openelec HTPC and AVR with my TV remote through the HDMI cable (CEC HDMI). I'm hoping to pass this through to an Openelec VM in the future. Quote Link to comment
jonp Posted August 12, 2015 Share Posted August 12, 2015 2 - with the server and player on the same hardware, buffering just doesn't happen. Well... Unraid still have to spin up the drive when a file is accessed, so it will delay the playback if you already haven't accessed the disk. But your statement is correct, but it doesn't help that it's not buffering when the disk isn't spun up Ok, but that's not really "buffering" right? That's playback initialization. Once the disks are spinning, buffering can still be an issue for some networks/media players, but not when the player and the server are on the same device. Quote Link to comment
mostlydave Posted August 12, 2015 Author Share Posted August 12, 2015 The performance I've gotten with my gaming VM has gone way above my expectations! I have my VM on a SSD outside the array and it's crazy fast. It also means I can add another SSD and $100 video card and have 2 awesome gaming PCs so the wife and I can play games together. I could never have afforded to build 2 gaming pc's but a second video card is looking way more attractive than a gaming console and it will cost me far less for hardware and games. If you haven't played around with VMs yet you should take a look! Quote Link to comment
jonp Posted August 12, 2015 Share Posted August 12, 2015 The performance I've gotten with my gaming VM has gone way above my expectations! I have my VM on a SSD outside the array and it's crazy fast. It also means I can add another SSD and $100 video card and have 2 awesome gaming PCs so the wife and I can play games together. I could never have afforded to build 2 gaming pc's but a second video card is looking way more attractive than a gaming console and it will cost me far less for hardware and games. If you haven't played around with VMs yet you should take a look! Dave, can I put that second paragraph on our website as a customer testimonial? Quote Link to comment
mostlydave Posted August 12, 2015 Author Share Posted August 12, 2015 LOL! you sure can! Quote Link to comment
mr-hexen Posted August 12, 2015 Share Posted August 12, 2015 LOL virtualized lan parties.. thats a new one. Quote Link to comment
archedraft Posted August 12, 2015 Share Posted August 12, 2015 LOL virtualized lan parties.. thats a new one. Well that's an interesting idea, so I guess you make a single gaming VM and then copy the gaming.img multiple times and then assign each gaming VM its own GPU... It's a clever idea, although imagine the size of the tower you would need to house 4 GPU's! (LAN Parties need at least 4 people) Quote Link to comment
johnodon Posted August 12, 2015 Share Posted August 12, 2015 I stumbled across this months ago: https://www.pugetsystems.com/labs/articles/Multiheaded-NVIDIA-Gaming-using-Ubuntu-14-04-KVM-585/ Quote Link to comment
mr-hexen Posted August 12, 2015 Share Posted August 12, 2015 Sounds Sounds something jonp should try as a proof of concept! Lol Quote Link to comment
archedraft Posted August 13, 2015 Share Posted August 13, 2015 Sounds Sounds something jonp should try as a proof of concept! Lol "Who needs friends, when you can have a LAN party all by yourself" Quote Link to comment
Zan Posted August 13, 2015 Share Posted August 13, 2015 I've used an ATEN VE800 up until recently. Worked really well with low power consumption. Unfortunately my Samsung Series 6 TV was a little temperamental at times and would give a "Signal not detected" type error occasionally when I pulled out the HDMI cable from the VE800 and re-plugged it back in, but a power off of the TV or switch from antenna back to HDMI input resolved the issue. Quote Link to comment
MikeW Posted August 13, 2015 Share Posted August 13, 2015 I have 3x OpenELEC VMs, all with their own dedicated vid cards pased through (all Radeon HD6450). Each also has a Flirc (USB passthrough) that I control with DirecTV RC65 remotes (just for consistency sake and they are dirt cheap on Ebay/Amazon). All 3 VMs are connected to TVs using 50ft HDMI runs. The Flircs are extended using USB over CAT5/6 extenders (again...~50ft). HDMI cables: http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00RYRJYDG?psc=1&redirect=true&ref_=oh_aui_detailpage_o02_s00 USB over CAT5/6: http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00HRH9H4E?psc=1&redirect=true&ref_=oh_aui_detailpage_o00_s00 Flirc: http://www.amazon.com/FLIRC-FL-09028-Universal-Receiver-Components/dp/B00BB0ETW8/ref=sr_1_1?s=electronics&ie=UTF8&qid=1439245193&sr=1-1&keywords=flirc Remote: http://www.amazon.com/DIRECTV-REMOTE-RC65RX-HR24-BATTERIES/dp/B00DC1YO1K/ref=sr_1_2?s=electronics&ie=UTF8&qid=1439245211&sr=1-2&keywords=rc65 John EDIT: I have a 1000ft spool of CAT6 so I can make my own patch cables. I have a Flirc arriving today. Just wondering if it works with OE out of the box or if you need to run the setup program to configure it. Quote Link to comment
CHBMB Posted August 13, 2015 Share Posted August 13, 2015 I have 3x OpenELEC VMs, all with their own dedicated vid cards pased through (all Radeon HD6450). Each also has a Flirc (USB passthrough) that I control with DirecTV RC65 remotes (just for consistency sake and they are dirt cheap on Ebay/Amazon). All 3 VMs are connected to TVs using 50ft HDMI runs. The Flircs are extended using USB over CAT5/6 extenders (again...~50ft). HDMI cables: http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00RYRJYDG?psc=1&redirect=true&ref_=oh_aui_detailpage_o02_s00 USB over CAT5/6: http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00HRH9H4E?psc=1&redirect=true&ref_=oh_aui_detailpage_o00_s00 Flirc: http://www.amazon.com/FLIRC-FL-09028-Universal-Receiver-Components/dp/B00BB0ETW8/ref=sr_1_1?s=electronics&ie=UTF8&qid=1439245193&sr=1-1&keywords=flirc Remote: http://www.amazon.com/DIRECTV-REMOTE-RC65RX-HR24-BATTERIES/dp/B00DC1YO1K/ref=sr_1_2?s=electronics&ie=UTF8&qid=1439245211&sr=1-2&keywords=rc65 John EDIT: I have a 1000ft spool of CAT6 so I can make my own patch cables. I have a Flirc arriving today. Just wondering if it works with OE out of the box or if you need to run the setup program to configure it. Flircs need to be programmed. Essentially it's a USB keyboard and you use the setup program to configure it. You get a GUI of a keyboard in the setup program and you click the key you want to send then you press the button on the remote you want to assign. Eg in Openelec I have programmed X = Stop, Space=Pause, etc etc I think it does have a Kodi remote GUI to use too but the mechanics behind it are much the same. Without doubt the best IR receiver I have ever used. Quote Link to comment
johnodon Posted August 14, 2015 Share Posted August 14, 2015 I have a Flirc arriving today. Just wondering if it works with OE out of the box or if you need to run the setup program to configure it. I usually just plug it into my WIN8 laptop and configure it on there. When done, I move it to my unraid box and passthrough the USB port to my VM. As CHBMB said, think of it as a USB keyboard as it emulates keystrokes assigned to buttons on your remote. A word of advice...Flirc has a Kodi/XBMC template for assigning keys. While this is tempting, I always have better luck using the full keyboard template. The thing that is nice is that if you have multiple Flircs and multiple "like" remotes (as I do), you can export the config from the Flirc that you completed and import it to the others. EDIT: Here are the keyboard shortcuts for Kodi: http://kodi.wiki/view/Keyboard_controls John Quote Link to comment
MikeW Posted August 14, 2015 Share Posted August 14, 2015 Thanks for the tips regarding the Flirc device. Although I pre-wired my house myself 11 years ago and thought I future-proofed everything, I'm spending the day running 2" conduit in my attic to allow for a long HDMI run instead of the more expensive HDBase-T system I originally thought I was going to use. I purchased the USB over Cat5/6 device that John linked to and I tested it yesterday and it works great with the Flirc over Cat5e UTP at ~70 feet. Quote Link to comment
CHBMB Posted August 15, 2015 Share Posted August 15, 2015 I agree with John about using the keyboard method rather than the pre setup template. Far more flexible.. Search over at the flirc forums and there's a post from me with some links to downloads to templates to setu Flirc with a Harmony remote, but could be used to plan any remote mapping I suppose.. EDIT: Here's the post, may or may not be useful for you Quote Link to comment
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