Turn your Mac to a media center using Boxee I got a invite about a week ago to try the alpha software of Boxee. Just tried it the other day. Basically its an App when running will change the screen of your mac to one similar to Front Row or Apple TV. You may use the keyboard or your Apple Remote to navigate around . It has a good selection of Videos like CNN , Fox News , Cnet TV, You Tube , Movie Trailer , Music and it also runs media on your Mac, I am still exploring it... By the way its free For invites http://www.boxee.tv/index2.php . anyone else using this software?
i got suckered in by your thread title, which was um... misleading from the little that's on the web site, it's a social media center, which apple tv isn't. the main reason why i bought my apple tv is high def movie rentals. does boxee have that? am not even sure it'll run on the mac since it claims to be patterned after "the best media center", the xbox media center. so much for apple tv, huh. there's a tiny mention of mac mini, which guarantess nothing, especially since the download links do not make for easy downloads. just the same, curious to see where boxee goes from here. social media center sounds cool, but feels better in broadband markets like the u.s., korea, japan, etc. with our anemic bandwidth here, do you want friends to leech your bandwidth to a crawl? and for me (and this is just me), it's HD or nothing at all. i'll stick with the real apple tv.
Hi rbenzon, You really have to use the app itself , The site does not do it justice I for one thought that is was just a social media thing. But I was watching CNN news on the other night without the need of being connected to anyone (social network). The even have some classic TV shows on it (but I have not been there just catching the news) Yes it runs on Mac because like I said I had use it . I was able to click on shows that I saw on them. The quality was quite good. Even have movie trailers. No movies downloads or rentals but then again Apple TV cant do internet TV Shows. Remember it is currently free. Perhaps you are right its no apple TV but heck it s free PS I have free invites , pm your email add so you can try the actually software. and I changed my title fpr the post thanks for the feedback
thanks for offering invites, dasaint. will tell the wife, who is the tv junkie. and thanks for pointing out the differences. good to lay down the facts for everyone's consumption. no sense comparing apples and oranges. neither of us gets sales commission, anyway. since not all of us have the luxury of trying it out, let me ask you: was the cnn news show you watched live, or video on demand? how different is it from joost (which i tried, but lost interest waiting for the software and content update)? there is another similar service in the u.s., i think. i tried it during my last trip there, but it's restricted to u.s. ip addresses only. i forgot the name/url. btw, apple tv does not do live tv shows, but you can subscribe to video podcasts, including "internet shows". i especially like hd video podcasts. keep us posted. we're tuned in.
can you record the videos as you watch? does the app have a record feature, or this is purely a viewing site/app?
Hi theelhombre , Currently it seems to be a viewing site , but it can play downloaded media. It works with flickr and piacasa online . I still exploring the software.
You might also want to look at these: http://www.itheaterproject.com/ http://centerstageproject.com/the-future.php http://xbmc.org/
http://www.itheaterproject.com/ The iTheater Project was founded on January 12, 2005 by Ed Wolf (digitalducktape) and Greg Jurman (mahi). The goal of this project is to create an application that acts a media center for any Macintosh computer. iTheater is an aesthetically pleasing way to manage, play and share your photos, movies and music. Thanks to many dedicated developers and organizations, the iTheater Project is able to deliver FREE, open source software. http://centerstageproject.com/the-future.php CenterStage is the Media Center Application that will allow you to use the digital content stored on your Apple Macintosh computer & play it in a more comfortable enviroment such as your living room using any standard Televison set. http://xbmc.org/ XBMC media center is an award winning free and open source media-player jukebox and entertainment hub for all your digital media. XBMC is a cross-platform software available for Linux, Mac OS X, Microsoft Windows operating-system, as well as the original Xbox game-console. With translations to over 30 languages. All versions of course completely free of any adware or spyware.
rbenzon is right. Its high definition rentals or nothing. its nice if boxee can mimic the interface of ATV but if it doesn't do high def content????!!!.......free/open source is fine but where the quality content??????? Its like a horse without a cart........ @rbenzon.....tried Tedtalks on HD podcasts from ATV that you posted a few weeks ago. damn good program! I specially enjoyed the one with former VP and nobel laureate Al Gore! his opening spiel was damn funny. Only problem is lack of resumable downloading when there's a download error message on ATV.
sure thing chito...am trying it on the mbp and get the streaming going with lots of tv shows on tap...
I'm using boxee now since I somehow lost my Plex. Easier to use since I just pointed to it where all my vids and media were at (even those in my Time Machine) and it automatically filled in info, posters and everything. Had trouble with this when on Plex. Worked also with my Remote Buddy app no probs. One prob which seems to be with all XBMC ports, this app also doesn't give you as much volume boost as VLC. Very nice, even swapped out that kooky boxee icon with an ATV icon.
