bishop 12 Posted December 29, 2014 Posted December 29, 2014 Hello, Recent convert from Plex. Really really happy with how things work with MediaBrowser and XBMB3C! I ran a test run on my desktop and it loads faster and offers a better user experience than PleXBMC (which keeps breaking due to updates to PMS and Kodi). However, when I installed it on my FTV it takes it long time to load my (admittedly too large) library. Few changes are ever made beyond episodes being added. Is there any way to pre-cache the images and content for future loads so that it doesn't take 15-20 seconds to go from playback to the episodes list? Maybe integrate the media into the Kodi library the way that normal SMB shares do? How does SMB playback work? Everything fails to play unless I choose to stream it via HTTP. On my server it looks like it's actually using my WAN bandwidth (rather than LAN) with this option selected! This project is amazing and is going to make sharing my library much easier/better if I can get those two things figured out. Thank you.
xnappo 1611 Posted December 29, 2014 Posted December 29, 2014 (edited) Have you tried the beta repo and enabling 'Enable Fast Processing' under services? That is as fast as it is going to get with this addon... There is a native Android 10ft interface in the works as well. There is MASSIVE caching going on - the speed is all due to processing the datastructure in Python. As far as SMB - you probably need to set your username/password under settings, AND you MUST be using UNC paths to your library in the server (\\computer\drive\folder, NOT e:\folder). xnappo Edited December 29, 2014 by xnappo 1
bishop 12 Posted December 29, 2014 Author Posted December 29, 2014 (edited) Hi xnappo, A fellow Austinite! Here's hoping the weather forecast for NYE is completely wrong. I moved to the beta repo and enabled fast processing-- it's much more appealing! That takes care of that issue swimmingly for now; I'm excited for the native Android interface/setup. Is there anywhere that I can subscribe to updates about development on that front? The caching issue on my end might be that I have Samba shares set up on my FTV while I'm tinkering with MB3 locally. Mayhaps I need to delete all of the images to free up some room. I did notice that once the images are loaded they seem to be cached and it's the initial pull that's slow. My username and password are set in the options (Ubuntu admin user/pass) and I confirmed that they were entered correctly. My paths are all "/mnt/X/Finished/" and you're saying I need to edit them and change them to "\\SERVER_NAME\mnt\X\Finished\"? Thank you for your expedient reply. edit: fixed second path also: I used path substitution to get UNC names for SMB sharing. It worked! However it doesn't work as well as normal samba sharing through the network and causes artifacting when skipping forward. That's... weird? Any idea with that one? Edited December 30, 2014 by bishop
xnappo 1611 Posted December 30, 2014 Posted December 30, 2014 (edited) Probably need to see a log to understand what is going on... http://kodi.wiki/view/Log_file/Advanced#Location I was assuming you are using Windows - I haven't heard of path substitution causing any issues - maybe someone else will chime in. The Android 10ft interface.. Not sure - @@Luke is there a user thread for that yet? It is exciting that the fast data is making it more usable(it has been my pet project for the last 6 weeks). How much of an improvement are you seeing? Edited December 30, 2014 by xnappo
Luke 42077 Posted December 30, 2014 Posted December 30, 2014 Welcome. Glad to hear it's going well so far.
Luke 42077 Posted December 30, 2014 Posted December 30, 2014 Probably need to see a log to understand what is going on... http://kodi.wiki/view/Log_file/Advanced#Location I was assuming you are using Windows - if you are using Linux you might need some sort of path substitution - hopefully someone else will chime in. The Android 10ft interface.. Not sure - @@Luke is there a user thread for that yet? It is exciting that the fast data is making it more usable. How much of an improvement are you seeing? Only in private dev areas. It's not ready yet for public consumption, but we're working pretty hard on it. The blog is the best place to monitor.
im85288 1493 Posted December 30, 2014 Posted December 30, 2014 Hello, Recent convert from Plex. Really really happy with how things work with MediaBrowser and XBMB3C! I ran a test run on my desktop and it loads faster and offers a better user experience than PleXBMC (which keeps breaking due to updates to PMS and Kodi). However, when I installed it on my FTV it takes it long time to load my (admittedly too large) library. Few changes are ever made beyond episodes being added. Is there any way to pre-cache the images and content for future loads so that it doesn't take 15-20 seconds to go from playback to the episodes list? Maybe integrate the media into the Kodi library the way that normal SMB shares do? How does SMB playback work? Everything fails to play unless I choose to stream it via HTTP. On my server it looks like it's actually using my WAN bandwidth (rather than LAN) with this option selected! This project is amazing and is going to make sharing my library much easier/better if I can get those two things figured out. Thank you. Out of interest could you try out my skin http://mediabrowser.tv/community/index.php?/topic/10375-1080xf-mediabrowser-edition-helix-only/ In the "Netflix" view? This view loads everything in the background and makes everything accessible from the home screen. I am interested to see if it provides a faster browsing experience. Thanks.
bishop 12 Posted December 30, 2014 Author Posted December 30, 2014 The basic MB3 blog will have updates about the Android 10'? It was taking ~60 seconds to load 295 shows on the FTV interface whereas it's mostly instant on my desktop. I think it dropped down to about 10 seconds. If there would be a way to import the sources into the library so that they don't have to load every time that would be amazing. Even better is if it'd work in the background and not take focus and/or load progressively! I have path substitution set up and am able to play from Samba but the way that MB3 serves it is different than normal samba sharing. If I skip forward (right-right-right-right) I get artifacting and /r/brokengifs style images. I tested it compared to the normal SMB shares that I have had with Kodi on the same file and didn't experience it. Is MB3 doing anything to the files as they're passed through SMB? Thank for you the work that y'all do.
bishop 12 Posted December 30, 2014 Author Posted December 30, 2014 (edited) Out of interest could you try out my skin http://mediabrowser.tv/community/index.php?/topic/10375-1080xf-mediabrowser-edition-helix-only/ In the "Netflix" view? This view loads everything in the background and makes everything accessible from the home screen. I am interested to see if it provides a faster browsing experience. Thanks. Hi there, I was using 1080XF MB3 because that's the skin I was using before moving over to MB3! My last post (before I saw yours) actually voiced this as a desire! Trying now. Will edit! Edited December 30, 2014 by bishop
im85288 1493 Posted December 30, 2014 Posted December 30, 2014 (edited) posted to early! Edited December 30, 2014 by im85288
xnappo 1611 Posted December 30, 2014 Posted December 30, 2014 (edited) For the SMB issue - best thing to do is turn the log level to 1 and post a log. That will show the exact path it is trying to use. Syncing the MB3 database and Kodi database would be a different project - but it is something being investigated. Edited December 30, 2014 by xnappo
im85288 1493 Posted December 30, 2014 Posted December 30, 2014 Hi there, I was using 1080XF MB3 because that's the skin I was using before moving over to MB3! My last post (before I saw yours) actually voiced this as a desire! Trying now. Will edit! Awesome Yes please try the Netflix view as it may be quicker in overall usage on low power systems. 1
xnappo 1611 Posted December 30, 2014 Posted December 30, 2014 @@im85288 - I tried it on my Pi. It really struggles to get the data loaded initially, and then the images take a long time to get cached but... After that it is pretty damn good! @@steve1977 FYI 1
im85288 1493 Posted December 30, 2014 Posted December 30, 2014 Thanks @@xnappo - was just curious how it would perform using widgets for all the data. Hopefully the crucial stuff at the top (Next Up and In Progress) loaded fairly quickly? Then the rest on the lower rows happens in the background (that's the theory anyway!) 1
xnappo 1611 Posted December 30, 2014 Posted December 30, 2014 Well the Pi is so low power you just leave it on all the time . Anxious to see what some real users think!
xnappo 1611 Posted December 30, 2014 Posted December 30, 2014 @@im85288 - playing with this a bit more, I think you have cracked it. Worthy of a separate thread, or maybe a blog post. Nice work! Feels like Roku xnappo 1
Kent 92 Posted December 31, 2014 Posted December 31, 2014 (edited) Hi, for the netflix view, is there any way to collapse the episodes into series view (i guess like netflix does it)? Nevermind, all good! Really nice! Edited December 31, 2014 by Kent 1
im85288 1493 Posted December 31, 2014 Posted December 31, 2014 @@im85288 - playing with this a bit more, I think you have cracked it. Worthy of a separate thread, or maybe a blog post. Nice work! Feels like Roku xnappo Hi, for the netflix view, is there any way to collapse the episodes into series view (i guess like netflix does it)? Nevermind, all good! Really nice! Great! Good to hear it works well. I am useless at blogging but maybe @@Luke can help out?
Luke 42077 Posted December 31, 2014 Posted December 31, 2014 Sorry I need to catch up. What are we announcing?
xnappo 1611 Posted December 31, 2014 Posted December 31, 2014 (edited) That we have a skin that works well on the Pi. im85288's skin has a new 'Netflix' mode, that looks a lot like and acts a lot more like the Roku app. All the collections are loaded and maintained on the home screen. I would like @@steve1977 or some other 'real' Pi user to confirm they agree... @@w84no1 you still around? xnappo Edited December 31, 2014 by xnappo
Luke 42077 Posted December 31, 2014 Posted December 31, 2014 Awesome. I need 4-6 pretty screenshots, as well as installation instructions, then i'll be happy to
bishop 12 Posted December 31, 2014 Author Posted December 31, 2014 Great! Good to hear it works well. I am useless at blogging but maybe @@Luke can help out? Hey im85288, I got sidetracked with preparations yesterday. I tried out the Netflix view on both my desktop and on the FTV. On both the home screen menus are missing completely! On the desktop I was able to move around until the main menu to pop up but on the FTV no combination of buttons will cause the display to appear. Hooked up a usb keyboard and still couldn't get anything to appear. Why is the main menu offscreen or transparent? The only thing I was able to access in Netflix view was favorites. I actually had to shell in and delete the addon folder to make anything happen. I couldn't find skin settings in the addon_data folder but reinstalling 1080XF MB3 now causes my entire Kodi install to fail and have no options.
bishop 12 Posted December 31, 2014 Author Posted December 31, 2014 Right after I posted I threw a USB mouse onto the FTV and was able to get the menu to appear by hovering over favorites in the top right corner and then cautiously moving down and around until anything appeared. I was able to uninstall the skin! Why does it require mouse input to get everything to appear on both the desktop (Win8.1) and the FTV?
xnappo 1611 Posted December 31, 2014 Posted December 31, 2014 I actually think the concept is what is needed, but it is still a bit too heavy. The images, even when cached take a while. Again - want some input from more users.
Luke 42077 Posted December 31, 2014 Posted December 31, 2014 you should look at the Quality param for images for use with Pi. by default Quality = 100 which = original quality. At 80-90 you get a big savings in size and nobody ever notices the difference. For Pi you should use: Quality=80 for backdrops Quality=90 for everything else That will result in a massive reduction of downloaded image sizes, which should allow more images to remain cached locally.
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