On Fri, Feb 8, 2013 at 7:53 AM, Torgeir Veimo torgeir@pobox.com wrote:
Which devices are you thinking about, that can be had for $35, uses less than 5w power and which can do accelerated playback of mpeg2/h.264 with open source software?
If you want a low-power device for $35 that does hw-accel decoding of h264, and additionally mpeg2 if you purchase the codec, then you should buy a Raspberry Pi. If you want a device with sata, a faster cpu, hw-accel h264 & mpeg2 standard, dedicated ethernet that doesn't piggyback the usb bus, run linux (ubuntu, debian, and arch seems to be common) or android, don't have issues with Netflix, etc... then look into all the alternatives available now. Most are in a similar price range or ball park. Some are more expensive like the Minix NEO-G4-108A ($61.99 at newegg) but you also get more for your money; hdmi adapter, usb cable, power adapter, remote control, 8gb storage..
There's nothing special about the Raspberry Pi. It was somewhat unique when it first came out but there are several (most are ARM/Mali400) boards out. Of all these types of devices that have hit the market recently, the Raspberry Pi is probably the least powerful of them all. Some people even refer to it as crippled because of design choices. BTW, you should remember that the $35 Raspberry Pi isn't usable out-of-the-box. It doesn't come with any cables, any storage, any power source, nothing but the board itself. You aren't paying $35 for a usable device -- it's $35 + $sd card + $cables (usb/hdmi) + $power supply at a minimum.