XBMC ARM port teased, will manage HD playback from pocket-sized Beagleboard (video)

There was a time when the X in XBMC stood for Xbox, but now just look at it. The open source project is showing up on everything from MIDs to Apple TVs and soon will be in the wild running on ARM-powered devices, with the development team posting a teaser video of the software running quite well on a tiny 600MHz Beagleboard. It's a fraction of the size of most HTPCs and, at $150, a fraction of their cost, too. Right now the software seems to be struggling a bit with what looks to be 480p wide content, but the devs promise proper HD playback in the full release -- though they're not saying when that full release will be.

[Via Hack A Day]

[glennS Posted Nov 2nd 2009 11:35AM]

XBMC rocks. A shining star of what open source can do.

[(Unverified) Posted Nov 2nd 2009 2:11PM]

this would be so awesome even if they could lock it in at 720p i'd be happy as hell...

but begs the question of why, when an acer revo with single core and ion with 1gb ram and 120 drive is only 200$ (god i wish the dual core was that cheap so it could do HD Flash as well, if it was i'd buy it in a second for a xbmc MC) all you'd need is a remote control.

[(Unverified) Posted Nov 2nd 2009 2:46PM]

What does "full HD" mean? Most likely just 720p. It's certainly a commendable step, but 1080p is where the world is headed (if not already reached), so 720p doesn't make nearly as much sense as targeting 1080p.

-Pie

[(Unverified) Posted Nov 3rd 2009 2:03AM]

That would make sense if you're going to pair the puny processor on a 1080p screen, wich is not likely soon, seeing that most screens are 800x480. Targeting now 720p and leaving for the future -when 1-2ghz ARM processors will be more common- the 1080p.

Keep in mind that SuperUltraFull HD software decoding usually it is not possible without a powerful processor or some kind of dedicated acceleration. Beagleboard's OMAP 3530 lacks both.