No disrespect to the Popcorn Hour, as it's definitely in a niche of their own with the low price point and feature set, but it's seriously lacking in presentation in their user interface among other issues. Even the build quality on the thing screams of cheap "Made in China" plastics, as the remote looks like some generic remote mold from some odd-end factory. That being said, it is very affordable and does the job admirably, but the presentation is lacking enough for me to just stick with XBMC.
What I'm hoping that Kodak can figure out though, is to not just stream media but also how they present it. Will it be able to scrape film or television information? Can I add playlists? It supports HD, but does the menu do its best to exemplify this?
That's my gripe with many of the players I have seen so far. What would make me want to spend $150+ or way more than that while a refurbished Microsoft Xbox w/ Xbox Media Center might be able to offer a better experience? I'm not suggesting that Xbox Media Center doesn't have its fair share of problems - because it does.. But I feel many of the commercial products need to take some of the things that have made it a success and up the ante and make something better for a overall better product.
I agree, popcornhour all the way. And for your argument Danny, check out their forums, there are tons of skins to make the interface very slick even looking like xbmc. You can do all kinds of mods to the popcorn hour to make it work just like you want. I doubt this machine will give you any type of control like that.
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Hmm... my Popcorn Hour can do all of that (literally) along with having internal storage and being able to process 1080P content
No funky remote though
No disrespect to the Popcorn Hour, as it's definitely in a niche of their own with the low price point and feature set, but it's seriously lacking in presentation in their user interface among other issues. Even the build quality on the thing screams of cheap "Made in China" plastics, as the remote looks like some generic remote mold from some odd-end factory. That being said, it is very affordable and does the job admirably, but the presentation is lacking enough for me to just stick with XBMC.
What I'm hoping that Kodak can figure out though, is to not just stream media but also how they present it. Will it be able to scrape film or television information? Can I add playlists? It supports HD, but does the menu do its best to exemplify this?
That's my gripe with many of the players I have seen so far. What would make me want to spend $150+ or way more than that while a refurbished Microsoft Xbox w/ Xbox Media Center might be able to offer a better experience? I'm not suggesting that Xbox Media Center doesn't have its fair share of problems - because it does.. But I feel many of the commercial products need to take some of the things that have made it a success and up the ante and make something better for a overall better product.
I agree, popcornhour all the way. And for your argument Danny, check out their forums, there are tons of skins to make the interface very slick even looking like xbmc. You can do all kinds of mods to the popcorn hour to make it work just like you want. I doubt this machine will give you any type of control like that.
just make one with a cheap desktop. damn.