A small media center Linux live CD distribution, can run from any small device, such as a USB disk or a wallet CD-R, and can play both disk-based media like DVDs and online media like Icecast streams. The project has been in development for several years and. I fed it every kind of media file I could lay my hands on -- Ogg, MP3, MP4, AVI, DVDs, VCDs, and their ripped versions -- and it played them all without a hiccup.

But what makes GeeXBoX a fantastic distribution is its ease of use and malleability. GeeXBoX 1.1 is a mere 8.9MB ISO download.

GeeXboX is a free and open source Live USB/Live CD based Linux distribution providing an HTPC software suite for personal computers and ARM-devices that since version 2.0 comes with a pre-configured version of Kodi media center as its media player and GUI.

Its hardware requirements are minimal -- a Pentium II 400MHz processor and 64MB of RAM are enough to power GeeXBoX -- and of course you'll need a CD/DVD drive to play your media. GeeXBoX ejects its CD boot media after copying itself into memory and booting the computer. If you don't want to bother with the GeeXBoX CD every time you want to power up your media center, you can onto a hard drive as well. To install GeeXBoX you need only an 8MB partition, and it can install in a Windows FAT partition as well as Linux ext2/3 partitions.

If you don't have a hard disk on the computer you want to run GeeXBoX on, you can install the distribution onto a USB disk. GeeXBoX boots quickly into a simple graphical environment. The first screen displays controls to open and play media files, change preferences (for audio/video playback, displaying subtitles, and so on), and configure some options (such as a sleep timer and autoplay mode). The developers have done a good job of making the distribution as easy to use as a regular DVD player.

Unless you're really picky about the font size of your subtitles, you'll be happy with the default settings. Good hardware support GeeXBoX, in essence, is wrapped around the. Using MPlayer allows GeeXBoX to play files on local hard drives and USB disks or from over the network through Samba and NFS shares, and it can also stream content from over the Internet. GeeXBoX also has. The distribution is based on Linux kernel 2.6.21.3 and claims to bundle drivers for nearly all video, sound, network, and Wi-Fi cards. Arduino duemilanove pinout. GeeXBoX had no trouble detecting any of the sound, video, and network devices on any of my desktops and laptops.

It worked with PC Card wireless adapters as well as older 802.11b PCI desktop cards via. GeeXBoX also supports lots of TV tuner cards.

If your card is supported, you can use GeeXBoX to watch TV. Additionally, the distribution uses the (Linux Infrared Remote Control) package and supports its more than 2,000 infrared receivers and remote controls. The only drawback here is that GeeXBoX developers provide for only a handful of popular remote controls. If you don't have one of these remotes, you'll have to figure out the keybindings on your own. One thing I miss is support for Bluetooth controllers.

Customizing GeeXBoX If you download and use the official GeeXBoX 1.1 ISO, you'll be unable to play Internet radio and video or detect a wireless adapter that has proprietary firmware. This is to keep the distribution GPL-compliant.

But the project offers a simple graphical utility to generate customized GeeXBoX spins. The is available in a 10.9MB package that has executables for Linux, Windows, and Mac OS X.

Using the generator, you can make cosmetic changes to GeeXBoX's interface, select themes and menu language, and set audio and video parameters such as resolution and number of audio channels (stereo, 5.1 surround). GeeXBoX 1.1 defaults to an ATI remote, but with the generator you can choose your own remote controller and receiver devices. The fugees blunted on reality zip download. One aspect of the generator I like is that it allows you to define your network settings. You can either let GeeXBoX autodetect and autoconfigure your network hardware and settings, or you can enter them through the generator. This is useful if you want to give the media center machine a fixed IP address and set its wireless SSID and encryption key beforehand to avoid entering them every time GeeXBoX boots.