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WeAreDevo posted:Of those of you that have an AD12, how loud is it? Mine is about as loud as a hairdryer on low... I have an AD12, and it is nowhere near that loud (unless you have some kind of ultra-quiet hairdryer). I honestly can't hear it unless I put my ear up to it. However, it does sound somewhat close to "hairdryer on low" during POST when it's testing the fan. Maybe your fans are just running at max? What OS do you have on it? (I'm using OpenELEC.) Maybe you're missing some drivers for temperature detection and the fan is running at full all the time. Note that I only tested this by turning it on. I didn't try to do anything heavy-duty with it. Avenging Dentist fucked around with this message at 20:45 on Mar 5, 2013 |
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Mar 5, 2013 20:42
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The Gunslinger posted:What are you doing with it by the way, just playing videos? If so, what are you using to play them and what's task manager showing your CPU usage at during playback? I'd start there. It should never be as loud as you're describing unless the CPU is pegged which should be rarely (windows updates, gaming, etc). Avenging Dentist posted:I have an AD12, and it is nowhere near that loud (unless you have some kind of ultra-quiet hairdryer). I honestly can't hear it unless I put my ear up to it. However, it does sound somewhat close to "hairdryer on low" during POST when it's testing the fan. Maybe your fans are just running at max? What OS do you have on it? (I'm using OpenELEC.) Maybe you're missing some drivers for temperature detection and the fan is running at full all the time. It runs Windows 8 64 bit, and it is loud for anything, including idling. Even if the PC is sitting in the BIOS before Windows 8 even loads up it is loud. It never runs slowly, it is always highly responsive, even when I load up 1080p videos and turn on a bunch of junk in the background. It has 8gb of ram (which windows picks up on correctly) and a solid state HD. I'm not home right now so I can't run any tests, but it is never quiet and always at 60 degrees C when in the Bios not doing anything at the default fan settings. It does sound as if the fan is running at max all the time, when I changed the fan thresholds in the BIOS so that the system would allow the computer to tolerate higher temperatures before kicking up the fans, it would just heat up until the fans would turn on at what sounded like full power fans. It would seem to me that this indicates faulty heat sinks or bad thermal paste application, I'll probably start an RMA.
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Mar 5, 2013 21:29
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It sounds like you are concerned about the hardware running hot, any reason? My ad10 runs pretty drat hot but I don't care because if it dies I will just RMA it. I think its 149F or something idle in openelec.
kri kri fucked around with this message at 21:40 on Mar 5, 2013 |
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Mar 5, 2013 21:37
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kri kri posted:It sounds like you are concerned about the hardware running hot, any reason? My ad10 runs pretty drat hot but I don't care because if it dies I will just RMA it. I think its 149F or something idle in openelec. My concern is that not just that it is running hot, but that it is running hotter than it is supposed to and isn't working as a dead silent, no hassle, tiny PC that it is supposed to be without any significant configuration on my part. I talked with a very helpful tech support guy at Zotac and it sounds like mine is defective, it is running at a higher temperature than it is supposed to. Mine runs at 60 degrees C when idle with fans blasting at max even when just sitting in the BIOS. The tech guy told me average idle temp, with fans not even blasting that 50 degrees C is expected. Our theory of a faulty heat sink or thermal paste application sounded reasonable to him. I'll try a "duty cycle" he suggested later but it's probably just defective.
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Mar 5, 2013 21:53
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Yeah mine's defective too in that case and I really wish I hadn't voided the warranty applying a new layer of thermal paste 
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Mar 5, 2013 22:00
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SurgicalOntologist posted:Yeah mine's defective too in that case and I really wish I hadn't voided the warranty applying a new layer of thermal paste Eh, you fixed it so what's it matter then.
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Mar 5, 2013 22:07
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Well, the thermal paste didn't make any difference. Disabling common plugin cache in OpenElec helped with the CPU always being at 100% but it made very little difference in the temps. The lowest I've ever seen it is 149 F (65 C). Playback is fine but whenever SAB or SickBeard is doing something (and sometimes when I have no idea what it's doing) it gets really loud. To the point where we'll have to turn the volume up if we're watching something, or if we're working we've had to turn it off a couple times. (Our living room is also two home offices - hooray for being broke)
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Mar 5, 2013 22:30
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Now you guys got me wondering if mine is okay. It's in the basement so I never heard it while it's going, but whenever I walk by it I hear it going. XBMC is usually on, but idle. Don't have anything else running on it (Windows 8 install) so there shouldn't be any background processes I should be aware of. What's the general process for an RMA? Pop the hard drive and RAM out, send it back, wait for new one and pop it all back in? I imagine that it should all work the same without any configuration, yes?
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Mar 5, 2013 22:58
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CPU usually runs at full clocks in the bios, don't take those temps as normal usage. Mine runs at like 80 degrees there but normal video usage is around 50.
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Mar 5, 2013 23:21
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The Gunslinger posted:CPU usually runs at full clocks in the bios, don't take those temps as normal usage. Mine runs at like 80 degrees there but normal video usage is around 50. I didn't know that, even though I'm sure you're right, there's no way to get my fan down, which from what I understand from talking with the tech, should not be happening, even in the bios. TraderStav posted:What's the general process for an RMA? Pop the hard drive and RAM out, send it back, wait for new one and pop it all back in? I imagine that it should all work the same without any configuration, yes? Yes, that's the process pretty much as what the tech told me. I didn't ask but I'd expect everything should all work the same without any configuration.
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Mar 5, 2013 23:46
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WeAreDevo posted:I didn't know that, even though I'm sure you're right, there's no way to get my fan down, which from what I understand from talking with the tech, should not be happening, even in the bios. I feel stupid now, but I'm fairly sure it was my NAS making all that noise.  I will jump on board if I detect unusual noise though.
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Mar 6, 2013 00:24
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This might be a stupid question but how can I tell what my computer's temperature is while in Windows 8? I can't find anything obvious to me on Zotac's page that would tell me this. Before I RMA I want to see if maybe the temp is low while in Windows 8 or if there is some additional Windows 8 software that can manage heat/fans and thus the noise.
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Mar 6, 2013 02:54
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I've been researching HTPC for the past week or so, and this seems like a good enough place to ask my questions. I am looking at the AD-12 for running: * XBMC * Sickbeard/Sabnzbd * Strictly wireless I would like to use the Openelec OS to avoid the cost of windows, but the caveat is that if it sucks getting that OS up and running on this device, I'll gladly spring for windows. I simply want to download and play TV, and I want that slick XBMC interface. So, HTPC + managing my downloads. My questions: 1) Since I want to install and run sickbeard/sabnzbd I think I will need a SSD drive, and cannot get away with running the OS just on USB stick. Sound correct? 2) Last time I tried to get wireless drivers to work in Linux was not ... fun. What's the experience like for configuring the AD-12 to work with OpenELEC? 3) For now, I was considering using this Seagate 3TB hard disk with a USB 3.0 enclosure. Sound reasonable for storage?
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Mar 6, 2013 03:08
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Trash Heap posted:2) Last time I tried to get wireless drivers to work in Linux was not ... fun. What's the experience like for configuring the AD-12 to work with OpenELEC? OpenELEC takes about 5 minutes to set up on an AD-12. I use a wired connection, but given that Zotac sponsors OpenELEC, I'd imagine everything is pretty well-supported. The only remotely tricky part was that I had to manually rename the USB stick with the installer to "OPENELEC". You may also have to futz with the boot order for the USB stick (mash the Delete key on startup to enter the BIOS settings).
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Mar 6, 2013 03:44
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My AD10 settings for the fan under HW Monitor are: Smart mode PWM/Temp Slope 5 Smartfan Off Temperature 50 Startup Temperature 55 Full on Temp 75 Startup Dutycycle 40% 100% CPU usage pegs the temps at 72 degrees and the fan becomes audible. Fan is basically silent otherwise, temps are normally 50-55 degrees depending on ambient during video playback. I also did a reapplication with better thermal compound but I know some people are wary of that. My PS3 is a jet engine by comparison, if you have problems with the CPU under light loads then its probably defective. The Gunslinger fucked around with this message at 04:54 on Mar 6, 2013 |
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Mar 6, 2013 04:52
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Trash Heap posted:
I've only ever used OpenELEC on an RPi but you should take a look at the Add-Ons. They might cover everything directly with OpenELEC/Add-Ons on the thumb drive. If not you'll need to run another OS, with XBMC, and then sickbeard/sabnzbd on your SSD.
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Mar 6, 2013 06:26
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Avenging Dentist posted:OpenELEC takes about 5 minutes to set up on an AD-12. I use a wired connection, but given that Zotac sponsors OpenELEC, I'd imagine everything is pretty well-supported. The only remotely tricky part was that I had to manually rename the USB stick with the installer to "OPENELEC". You may also have to futz with the boot order for the USB stick (mash the Delete key on startup to enter the BIOS settings). OK, it looks like OpenELEC is out of the equation since this openELEC forum post suggests the AD-12 wireless chip isn't really supported by that version of linux right now. Remember, I don't want to do too much configuration outside of installing a HDD, RAM and an OS. Here are my requirements again: Trash Heap posted:I've been researching HTPC for the past week or so, and this seems like a good enough place to ask my questions. So without doing any research here, is Win 8 the OS I should be going for? Any particular version I should focus on for purely HTPC purposes? I recall win 7 having a ridiculous number of versions. edit: It looks like windows 8 takes up 20GBs for an install. Guessing 64GB SSD is the right size to go for to support some other programs if need be. That being said, are there any deals right now for certain barebones HTPCs bundled with SSDs? Trash Heap fucked around with this message at 20:14 on Mar 6, 2013 |
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Mar 6, 2013 20:04
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Avenging Dentist posted:OpenELEC takes about 5 minutes to set up on an AD-12 ... Bullshit. I'm still loving with all the settings trying to get it to run smoothly on my AD-12 and I've had mine for a month now. Openelec is not plug and play as I was hoping. There is definitely some futzing to be done. That being said, once it's up and running, it's great. It runs off my 16GB USB stick and plays my movies off my 3TB USB 3.0 drive. What it still doesn't do: Boot from an SD card (don't care anymore since the USB stick works fine now) Boot from the USB stick while the 3TB drive is plugged in (still no fix I've found for this - can't get into the BIOS when the external drive is plugged in, and it won't recognize it if I plug it in after getting into the BIOS) This is an annoyance, so I just stopped shutting down/sleeping.
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Mar 6, 2013 20:16
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I just setup my AD-10 with XBMCbuntu, and it works fine. I dropped in my advancedsettings.xml from another HTPC and it's almost behaving exactly like that HTPC now. I just have to figure out how to set a static IP for the AD-10 and I'll be golden I believe.
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Mar 6, 2013 20:40
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Trash Heap posted:OK, it looks like OpenELEC is out of the equation since this openELEC forum post suggests the AD-12 wireless chip isn't really supported by that version of linux right now. Remember, I don't want to do too much configuration outside of installing a HDD, RAM and an OS. It sounds like the latest RC of OpenELEC 3.0 supports wifi on the AD12, so I'd recommend trying that. This guy says it works fine, provided he's on 2.4GHz N. Worst-case scenario is that it doesn't work and you've wasted a few minutes. Braincloud posted:What it still doesn't do: I've never had either of these issues, but that's probably because I boot from an internal SSD (and don't have an SD card). Avenging Dentist fucked around with this message at 21:33 on Mar 6, 2013 |
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Mar 6, 2013 21:30
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Openelec is great on the raspberry pi if you're really pining for openelec.
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Mar 6, 2013 21:38
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Avenging Dentist posted:It sounds like the latest RC of OpenELEC 3.0 supports wifi on the AD12, so I'd recommend trying that. This guy says it works fine, provided he's on 2.4GHz N. Worst-case scenario is that it doesn't work and you've wasted a few minutes. Wow, thank you for finding this. I will give this a shot. Also, is 8GB RAM overkill? I can find 8GB sticks for $50, but $30 for a 4GB. Trash Heap fucked around with this message at 22:38 on Mar 6, 2013 |
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Mar 6, 2013 22:35
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So the AD12 has CPU: AMD E2-1800 APU 1.7GHz, and Graphics: AMD Radeon HD 7340 which cooresponds to the Fusion build for "systems with an AMD Exxx series CPU and AMD (ATI) HD graphics." Since Avenging Dentist pointed out that wifi is supported on this device since RC3, then this code:
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Mar 7, 2013 02:31
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Yep, that is the build for you. Also, when did OpenELEC get a fancy new website?
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Mar 7, 2013 03:01
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Trash Heap posted:Wow, thank you for finding this. I will give this a shot. Yeah. gently caress it. 8GB man! Maybe it's a waste currently, but perhaps you will want to run some automation and move to windows eventually. My htpc uses an i5 and 8gb and 1000mbit wired lan, because when I use the thing and friends are playing with XBMC or it's acting as a Juke box I want the interface to be as smooth as a futuristic sci-fi movie like Minority Report or something.
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Mar 7, 2013 18:41
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I tried going the openelec + wireless route and ended up switching over to XBMCbuntu. One showstopper for me was that XMBC starts before the wireless adapter has a chance to connect so if you're using the centralized library it'll cause XBMC to freak out. XBMCbuntu is pretty painless
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Mar 7, 2013 21:36
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How well does the AD12 do with an HDHomerun and xbmc? I'm not even that concerned with PVR capability, just want to get my HD antenna over my plasma on the wall since I snapped off the coax hanging it up. (note: super slim mounts are only good if inputs are recessed and/or you cut out drywall to make room for them. On a other note, any good USB fm tuners? Replaced my kitchen under the counter lovely unit with a Logitech boombox that I plan to hook up to an old htpc and want to replicate the radio for the wife. I DID just realize that TuneIN could do that though....
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Mar 10, 2013 16:01
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TraderStav posted:How well does the AD12 do with an HDHomerun and xbmc? I'm not even that concerned with PVR capability, just want to get my HD antenna over my plasma on the wall since I snapped off the coax hanging it up. Works fine. I have no troubles with the one I set up a week ago to replace an aging Jetway mini-top and PVR services with my HDHR. In response to a couple previous questions - I tried the latest OpenElec RC on it, and it worked ok, even wireless - and certainly was quick and painless - but the wireless initilization issues drove me nuts. It takes a while to connect, and your choices are load XBMC with no network (bad for shared libraries, weather, and other stuff) or tell it to wait for network to load XBMC, which takes a while. I find XBMCBuntu to be a lot easier to deal with, though that may be because I have a lot of experience with Ubuntu in general. You'll need to remove the default XBMC install and install the XVBA branch to get full use out of the AD12, but that takes all of 5 minutes. Otherwise it works just great, remote and all.
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Mar 11, 2013 03:05
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I'm sure only old-school HTPC guys will even remember Meedio, but it's open source successor finally gave in and shut down today. The project is still on SourceForge, but the website is going to close. Meedio was the follow up to myHTPC, a very basic front-end that was very popular in the early 2000s. Back then there weren't a lot of options. I think MediaPortal was around, and XBMC was still confined to the original Xbox. JRMC was doing a music thing. myHTPC was written by two guys working for Enron at the time, and they had been promising a follow up software to it for months and months. When the big Enron controversy went down, they lost their jobs and decided to form a company and sell the expected follow up to myHTPC, now called Meedio. People were outraged, as you might expect when asked to pay for something. A new website and forums were launched, and people were actively watching as expected release dates were blown off and the project was delayed. Meedio was shockingly ahead of its time on release. A stand alone configuration app let you control almost every single piece of your front-end. Multiple libraries were not only supported, but actively encouraged. It used tags to store media, and you could literally filter and sort by any tag in the library, so the possibilities were endless. I helped one guy setup a very slick library for all his recorded UFC fights, searchable by fighter, year, etc. The actual GUI was completely configurable, and dropping new items in the menu was extremely simple, especially compared to the XML voodoo required to do something similar in XBMC. It had an add-on system that just simply didn't exist anywhere else at the time, and wasn't replicated until relatively recently. Unfortunately, all of this came at a price. There were no new setup wizards, very little documentation, and troubleshooting was very difficult. Importing media required creating your own tag strings (my TV show import looked like \<SeriesName>\Season <SeasonNumber>\<EpisodeNumber> - <Name> if I remember right), and the skin building was incredibly hard. Still, people really took to Meedio. I remember testing XBMC at the time (2005/6 maybe) and being very cramped by the limitations. Plug in authors really took to Meedio, and there were a wide variety of crazy poo poo you could add to the system. One guy write a scraper that cloned all of TV.com's data, and released an importer that allowed you to pull in all kinds of info your library. That was the very early beginning of TheTVDB.com (before the admins went power crazy). MovieDB got a start there as well. Eventually, the two man team started struggling. I don't know their financial status at the time, but I'm sure Meedio sales were never great. It was easy to pirate, and they gave away copies to their most loyal users who were beta testers. They were working on a PVR add-on which, looking back, was overly ambitious (and would cost users more money). They eventually did release it, but it didn't work for most people and folks vented a LOT if anger into the forums. For a long time after that, things were quiet. The community had pretty much worked around all the bugs and limitations it could, and some incredibly talented skinners came along and really lived up the feel. I should note that using Meedio was a breeze once everything was working. The skins didn't have much in the way of animations, but they were quick. It was my main front end for a LOOONG time. After an extended period of silence from the devs, a surprise announcement was made: Meedio was being purchased by Yahoo!. A final version was released, one that didn't require any sort of licensing, and Yahoo released an application based on the Meedio code that hooked into a bunch of Yahoo services (I can't for the life of me remember what it was called). As with most Yahoo stuff, support and updates never happened, and as far as I know the two original devs got sucked into the Yahoo black hole. Some of the plug in developers and Meedio enthusiasts soon started MeediOS, a completely rebuilt Meedio using the same concepts, but completely open source. From my understanding, in MeediOS everything was a plugin: skin engines, database types, input types, everything. This meant you could have a SQL and/or mySQL backend, based on the user's needs. They got far enough to release betas, although at this point XBMC had organized itself and had versions for multiple OS types already released (MeediOS was Widows only). I was still fairly active on the forums at the time, and participated in testing various things, but never felt comfortable enough to put it into active use. The next time I rebuilt my HTPC, I switched over to XBMC and never looked back. I'd look in on the forums from time to time, and although they were active, it seemed like the core app was in a holding pattern. This morning I received the email saying the site was shutting down for good. Sorry for the lengthy post, but I wanted to pour one out for ol' Meedio. RIP.
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Mar 11, 2013 14:47
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I remember buying Meedio for $50 and never actually getting it to work the way I wanted. Then I found it was bought by Yahoo! and released for free and I said "welp, there's $50 I wasted for no reason!"
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Mar 11, 2013 18:46
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I picked up a new Samsung TV this weekend that supports 1080p at 120Hz. When I'm going through the display options on my AD-10 the best it'll let me do is 60Hz. Should I be trying to figure out how to set it higher or is that the limit of the video card? Is it even worth my time?
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Mar 12, 2013 05:40
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iceslice posted:I picked up a new Samsung TV this weekend that supports 1080p at 120Hz. When I'm going through the display options on my AD-10 the best it'll let me do is 60Hz. Should I be trying to figure out how to set it higher or is that the limit of the video card? Is it even worth my time? If you bought a tv advertised as 120hz it does not mean it supports 120hz input. I don't even think one exists that does.
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Mar 12, 2013 13:43
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How in the world do you get into the BIOS of a Zotac AD12!? I could swear you are supposed to repeatedly hit the Delete button, but I always see the ZOTAC splash screen followed by a black screen with:code:edit: Man, you have to be REALLY FAST with that delete key to get into the BIOS. Took me 8 tries! edit #2: That was fairly painless to get openELEC going on the AD12. XBMC comes up, and the wireless is working just fine. XBMC can see my UpNP share, and I can actually select videos to watch, but now I need to figure out how to make XBMC recognize that share as my library. I'll take my XBMC related questions to the XBMC thread. Trash Heap fucked around with this message at 19:28 on Mar 12, 2013 |
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Mar 12, 2013 16:23
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Don Lapre posted:If you bought a tv advertised as 120hz it does not mean it supports 120hz input. I don't even think one exists that does. Correct. 60hz is the highest scan rate a consumer source will give you. Film, and as a result most blurays, are 24hz. Film is shown in the theaters as 24 images per second , with alternating black frames due to the shutter on the projector closing while the next frame moves into position. On digital projectors, each frame is shown twice as long, which eliminates the flicker caused by the shutter, and rear end a result increases apparent brightness. Modern TVs can refresh their image hundreds of times per second, hence the 120hz, 240hz specs. The benefit is that they're proper multiples of 24 and 60, so frames can be repeated without goofy frame interpolation.
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Mar 13, 2013 07:26
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Jerk McJerkface posted:Is there an Android apps that can be used as a virtual keyboard/mouse that supports the Windows 8 edge swipe gestures? There's a lot of virtual mouse/keyboard apps but none of them work like that. I asked this earlier and didn't get an answer, wanted to throw it out there again and see if I can get any tips.
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Mar 13, 2013 21:05
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To be picky, there are monitors which do 120hz input, with a computer being the only source which will output at that. They're beyond HDMI spec so they require a VGA connection I think. So for home theater, 120hz No. PC Gaming 120hz, Yes, but it'll cost you. A TV that operates at an internal refresh rate if 120 or 240 hz should be able to handle a source like that. I assume they don't simply because if firmware and maybe the connection.
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Mar 13, 2013 22:50
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3d computer monitors do it with dual link Dvi
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Mar 13, 2013 23:41
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How well does the AD-12 work with an XP setup? I don't have any spare 7 keys, and really don't want to spend any more money past the cost of the AD-12 and memory. I'd do the OpenElec option, but I'd like to be able to run emulators as well, but the emulator support seems kind of poor - am I correct in that assumption?
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Mar 15, 2013 18:20
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Yuck, XP. I would say that is terrible idea - Ubuntu is a much better option.
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Mar 15, 2013 19:11
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berzerkmonkey posted:How well does the AD-12 work with an XP setup? I don't have any spare 7 keys, and really don't want to spend any more money past the cost of the AD-12 and memory. I'd do the OpenElec option, but I'd like to be able to run emulators as well, but the emulator support seems kind of poor - am I correct in that assumption? I don't think so? It depends on how comfortable you are with linux. It doesn't include build tools so you can't install stuff from source, and it doesn't include a package manager so there isn't a clear way of managing packages. I don't understand what is really keeping people from installing software otherwise though - you'd just have to build it on a separate machine? And all the dependancies? They claim it doesn't work and at best it would be painful but whatever. It's too bad they didn't build it on top of 'a real' distro so they could leave a backdoor for portage or apt and let people take the basic build and expand it if they really have to. It looks like they are aiming for it to be 'an appliance' and you get what you pay for there It does what it does with minimal effort, but anything more is a herculean effort. If you are inexperienced with linux, I could not recommend this as a starting project as it would be frustrating as all hell.
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Mar 15, 2013 19:35
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