New to Media Portal, quick question regarding multiple outputs (1 Viewer)

[Nifield]

can media portal support multiple audio video streams that are different media at the same time? For instance, im looking for software to help me with a home system that will serve mutliple locations such as bedroom, mediaroom, living room, kitchen, all with seperate feeds so they can be watching different items, i also would like to have other rooms setup with only audio to be served as well simultaneously with seperate mp3 audio.. can media portal achieve this? or would i have to have a seperate computer running media portal for each instance i wish to have running simultaneously?

is there any software around that will allow me to achieve this from a single machine?

thanks for any help you can offer.

Reilly

 

[flintstone99]

AW: New to Media Portal, quick question regarding multiple outputs

Hi,

with MePo you can set up a client server environment. One server serves multiple clients. The clients can do different things at the same time, e.g. looking different TV channels, listening music, watching DVD.

regards
flintstone

 

[Nifield]

so would i have to have a client setup on other machines to serve other tvs? say for instance i want to watch one movie on the harddrive from one tv, and then while doing that my daughter wants to look through the movies on her tv, and watch some other movie from the harddrive on her tv.. and then lets say my wife wants to use a touchscreen setup in the kitchen to select an mp3 to listen to in the kitchen at the same time as well.. can i get away with one media portal server for all of this? or do i have to have seperate machines running clients for each?

 

[mastyman]

yes you need seperate machines for each locations/room where you want to use it, but you would have 1 "server" type machine (which can also be a client) where you could put in your tv tuner cards, movies, mp3s etc and then the clients would just play those from your main "server"

 

[joz]

Hmm, if you really badly want only one machine you might be able to get away with virtualization and thin clients.
I do not really recommend this and do not have experience with these sort of things but technically it can be achieved. Will probably take an intel I7 or something to power it all Together with a couple of atom based thin clients booting from that I7 server.

But what I get from your story is that you actually want to store all your metadata in one place. Sadly this is not really supported by most of the MP plugins, there are some ways around it but they are not ideal.

 

[Nifield]

hmm can anyone point me in the direction of any software/hardware that would be able to give me this capability? yes your right i do want to store all my media on a single server and have access to it from all of the areas in my house where i want to listen/watch it.

yet with that i want to have a polished gui like media portal or xbmc..

 

[Smeulf]

Hi,

I'll make comments for many points of the discution :

- Media portal needs Windows to run. Unless you have a computer running windows on every places, you won't achive what you want with MediaPortal

- Thin client is not a good idea (in my point of view) : usualy they don't have enough capacity to display videos with a good quality.

Any solutions : Maybe "DNLA". It's now a big standard, implemented by many manufacturers. What you need : hardware or software compilent.

You could have a DNLA Multimedia Hard Drive (NAS) containing your media library, always up, connected to network, and to a WiFi access point. Your TV will have to be DNLA compilent (or you can use a HTPC with any software supporting DNLA). Same with your daughter's TV. Remains the MP3, with must be compilent too.

But definitely, you won't achive this with a single computer, or a single software, specialy with the "TouchScreen Tablet" And it could need some money...

Hope it helps.

Smeulf.

Question for everyone : XBMC is DLNA compilent as far as I know, but what about MP1/2 ?

 

[Nifield]

i looked into DLNA tvs with NAS but i dont think that will offer the user friendly eye candy interface im looking for including box covers and descriptions.. am i worng?

 

[mbuzina]

Nifield: if you want eye candy interface in each room, plan an htpc for each room. Currently you can use centralized media with some tricks (search the forums, there are ways to do this) and there will still be some limitations.

But I know of no current solution that will deliver what MP can do (plan to be twiddeling around for a longer time!).

MP 2 is planned to ease that. MP 2 will allow centralized database access for all your media, even if the media is decentralized (your doughter has music on her PC, but you can still access it from the living room). MP 2 will also be based on uPNP technology, allowing integration of other devices (then with less eye candy), even if this is not a goal for the initial releases (the DLNA spec costs 50 K$ so it is out of reach for most free SW). There is an active community on MP which provides intersting solutions (e.g. have a look at iPiMP, you can use it to stream TV and other media to smartphones and tablets).

As for DLNA NAS boxes: That is quite limiting your capability. No live TV streaming, no recording from a central point, no nifty interface (not many players can access the covers, but some do like WMP), issues with the database (e.g. I have issues with compilation albums showing up as many albums, one for each artist) and so on.

So if you want to be on the front line of home media entertainment & sharing: Set up a central server with TV cards and storage, install MP TV server and iPiMP (maybe add a seperate music streaming server for the meantime), set up client machines in each room / connect your ipad using iPiMP / music streaming solution. Than you can migrate to MP 2 later on.

 

[Nifield]

thanks for the input mbuzina, i think i will continue searching though. right now im thinking about maybe just having my cable box, MP server, and a few other devices in a central location with a 4X4 True Matrix HDMI 1.3a Powered Switch, and then just distribute it that way. although i still wont be able to watch multiple things off the MP server at the same time, im thinking ill have to figure soemthing else out for the whole house audio as well. MP doesnt offer multiple outputs of sound at the same time does it?

anyone have any suggestions for a good whole house audio setup?

im also looking at voice control by running ir transmitters/receivers and mics in each room with voice recognition setup with girder pro.. any thoughts on that?