(Part 2) Best products from r/kodi

Raspberry Pi 2 Model B

Supports CEC. Comes with 4x USB 2.0 slots, an HDMI, quad core ARM A7 processor, 1 GB RAM, and an ethernet port. Also has GPIO pins but I don't know of any Kodi related uses for them. It is an extremely low power device (uses about $3 worth of electricity per year) and requires nothing to keep it cool (e.g., no fans blaring in the middle of your favorite movie).

Base cost is $35. Requires a microSD card, an HDMI cable, and a microUSB charger, all of which can be purchased for approximately $5 each. An existing microUSB charger, such as from your cell phone or a device like a Kindle or Chromecast can be used, of course. Optional components include a case ($10-$20 or 3D print your own), USB wifi dongle ($10+), and an external hard drive ($50+). A few companies put out bundles that include a Raspberry Pi board and various components such as this basic one and this more complete one. A wireless keyboard ($20+) can also be handy. Product links are provided as examples; there may be better deals or smarter purchases to be had.

You'll then want to use a minimalistic Linux distro such as OpenELEC or OSMC, both of which are designed specifically to run Kodi and have optimized builds for a Raspberry Pi. OpenELEC seems to be more popular and is what I use myself. Installation is easy -- you just download and write to your SD card (oh yeah, you might need an SD card reader, $5). If you'd like you can also install a "real" Linux distro and install Kodi in that as you would on a regular desktop computer. You can either store your media on an external hard drive connected to the Raspberry Pi or on a separate computer or NAS and share your files over your LAN.

Pros:

• Cheap base cost
  
• Low power
  
• Very hands off after initial setup
  
• CEC! Use your TV remote to control Kodi
  
• Hardware decoding for h264
  
• As it is full-fledged computer you can easily add in additional software such as emulators, a web browser, etc.
  
• More of a DIY solution (may be a con)
  
  Cons:
  
  
• A few plugins (typically they are Windows dependent) and more computationally intensive skins may not work
  
• May get pricey if you need to buy all the separate components
  
• Can not handle 10-bit x264 (aka Hi10p; rare outside of anime fansubs) or HEVC (aka h265) files.
  
• No 4K output, max resolution is 1920x1200
  
• More of a DIY solution (may be a pro)
  

I think you're going to want to look for something that doesn't require a consistent internet connection, so FireTV and the like is probably out. Raspberry PI is not a bad choice but, you might want something a little bit simpler and more straightforward.

You want it to boot straight to Kodi and I'm guessing we won't really have a tremendous amount of use for android apps (because of lack of internet). So, I would recommend something linux based and, of course we're probably going to need something that can easily accept a USB connected hard drive. I imagine as a hospital you probably have a ton of thumbdrives that vendors have given you somewhere to act as the hard drive, if not, you should be able to get a 64GB one off amazon for under $20, type mostly doesn't matter.

For the power issue, you might want to add a small UPS system, like this one: http://www.amazon.com/dp/B00NTQYUA8 it should power most small devices for a good long while (rated for 4.5 hours, for just a media player, it should last considerably longer). I'm guessing you might have a standard power outlet available for charging in the ambulance? The one I linked is around $40 now but, it frequently goes on sale for $20.

For the actual box, I would recommend one of these, these all run linux, boot straight to kodi and should accept a USB hard drive (update the firmware when you get them, pivos devices have a linux and an android version available, i would recommend linux):

• OpenELEC Box: http://openelec.tv/openelec-box
  
  
• Xios XS: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16815645005 (Hard to find but, this is actually my top pick, should be a new one coming at a similar price point with better specs in a month or two if you can wait).
  
  
• Xios DS: http://www.amazon.com/XIOS-Streaming-Media-Player-capability/dp/B0088IGPM8/ (If money is an issue, this one is pretty cheap and comes with everything you need, will be somewhat sluggish when navigating menus though, playback should be fine.)
  
  
  

I would recommend a player from Western Digital. But I see they gave up building media players as of 2016.

This was the player my late mother used for over 2 years from 2012 - 2014. She actually learned to operate and use it without assistance in her last year before passing away.

https://www.amazon.com/Western-Digital-1080p-Media-Player/dp/B001ILFDCK/ref=sr_1_11?ie=UTF8&qid=1483048182&sr=8-11&keywords=wd+tv+media+player

This upgraded player had a much better remote if I had purchased the upgraded player for her.

https://www.amazon.com/Western-Digital-WDBHG70000NBK-HESN-RECERTIFIED-Streaming/dp/B00D79AQ14/ref=sr_1_14?ie=UTF8&qid=1483048182&sr=8-14&keywords=wd+tv+media+player

People mocked Western Digital towards the end for not including streaming services like Netflix with their players. But they made some of the best offline media players available when they built and sold them.

Best of luck finding an usb remote for your raspberry pi.

Logitech media keyboards have worked best for myself. But I certainly wouldn't recommend it for someone with Alzheimer's. My late mother struggled allot with Dementia with the WD TV player remote. As my 1st cousin just passed away with Alzheimer's. I don't know what success you'll have with your father in law.

You might want to look into getting some sort of breakout from your HDMI output from your Kodi source for the audio portion, so that you're feeding 5.1 audio to your amp. Right now, your amp and speakers are only being fed 2.0 stereo audio in analog (basically the lowest common denominator of multi-channel audio).

Something like this would allow you to pipe 5.1 audio to your amp, provided it has an HDMI or optical S/PDIF input. Then again, if your TV has HDMI or (more likely) optical (or RCA digital) S/PDIF audio output, you could feed that into your amp for the cost of the cable alone. This all assumes that your amp is capable of accepting some sort of digital audio at all.

All that to say, however, if your amp is HDMI-enabled, you're probably better off configuring it the way it was intended, and use your amp as a signal selector, and run it as Kodi device > amplifier > TV over the best signal type your devices support (HDMI would be best, followed by YPbPr analog RCA connectors, S-Video, and then composite RCA video. For audio, the hierarchy would be HDMI, S/PDIF [Digital RCA or Optical], 6-channel RCA analog, and finally RCA 2-channel analog)]

Based on what you're saying here, I am guessing your amp is only capable of 2-channel RCA audio, in which case, get yourself a new amp, son! (As you, to your credit, say you plan to do.) If that's the case, save up for a nice HDMI-enabled amp (they basically all have HDMI nowadays). I'm partial to Denon, myself, but they can be on the pricey end of the spectrum.

Edit: And to actually answer your question: until you upgrade your granddaddy of an amplifier, you want to set Kodi to 2.0 audio. Also, consider sending the audio straight from the Kodi device straight to the amp. You'd introduce fewer points of failure/interference that way, and perhaps even lower latency; so it'll be easier to keep the audio and video in sync without fiddling with the settings in Kodi (if that's an issue for you, of course).

Yes. The HDHomeRun is the best device for the purpose, just be sure you get a model for over-the-air channels and not the one for cable channels. The older model HDHomeRun DUAL (model HDHR3-US) works well and is a little less expensive than the HDHomeRun CONNECT, though either should work. Amazon links are:

https://www.amazon.com/SiliconDust-HDHomeRun-Definition-Digital-HDHR3-US/dp/B004HO58SO

https://www.amazon.com/SiliconDust-HDHomeRun-CONNECT-broadcast-2-Tuner/dp/B00GY0UB54

Both models have dual tuners so you can watch programs from two different channels at once, or if you have PVR backend software such as Tvheadend, MythTV, MediaPortal, NextPVR, etc. installed on a computer, you can record from one channel while watching another, or record from two channels at the same time. If you have any experience at all with Linux then I recommend Tvheaded, but that's a personal preference.

On your computer (or home theater PC, if you ever want to watch using a TV) you would run Kodi (please be sure you get the official Kodi from https://kodi.tv/download and not from some sleazy third party site that might contain malware), or you could even view the stream in VLC or possibly your operating system's media player, if that's your preference. Kodi just makes it a little easier.

The nice thing about the HDHomeRun device is it does not have to be connected to a computer; it streams directly through your network to whatever computer is requesting the stream. With a USB tuner stick you'd need to have it plugged into a computer somewhere to work. Also, you can locate the HDHomeRun wherever your antenna cable enters your house, as long as there's also a local network connection available. So if your antenna wire comes into the basement you can put the HDHomeRun there and still watch it on a computer in an upstairs bedroom, as long as there is a network (LAN) connection at both places, and electric power of course.

Yes you can but the drawback is you will get a mirror of the video output of the one device. Growing up we had two TVs and one VCR. We got a RCA wireless transmitter and hooked it up to the VCR and second TV. My dad could watch the news on one TV and I could watch a movie on the VCR in the other room.

I did a search and found there are newer versions of what I used like this for composite - Nyrius Transmitter $50

and HDMI which is over double that - SainSonic Transmitter $118

Keep in mind the other drawback, you have to get the video signal out of the device you are using now to the transmitter. My VCR setup was easy. The VCR was hooked up to the TV by coaxial cable, I ran composite cables to the transmitter. You would either need to split the the signal from your current Kodi box to the transmitter and TV it's on now. Or you could plug your Kodi box into the transmitter and purchase a second receiver. And this isn't even factoring in if there DRM concerns, or 4K (if that matters to you.)

Just to give you an idea of what this kind of setup looks like in action - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=48F5Ur0mlII

Just get a second box, much cheaper and easier to setup.

This is the easiest way and works great. I used flirc for mine and they are very easy to setup. For my technology impaired mother I used an flirc dongle paired with an apple TV remote , very few buttons and super easy to use.

Best is going to be a product that fits your description but a small form/factor PC is always a good option. Here is my set up.

Quantum Byte

2TB Hard Drive holds around 1000 movies ($70)

Blu Ray and DVD /r/rw drive

I use this keyboard

This suits my needs perfectly, hope I at least gave you some ideas.

I see. Not sure if it matters, but I bought this one last year and it's still going strong. I use it maybe once a month to troubleshoot my Nexus Player which runs Kodi whenever there's a problem and I use a Harmony Remote the rest of the time, so I don't give it heavy use. But all things considered, I am pretty impressed with how it's held up, mainly in regards to the battery still holding its charge.

I did this on the new firestick with Alexa and put it on the TV at my sweetheart's house. It works wonderfully for streaming apps but there is not much memory for media to be stored on the device or any way to add local storage. I haven't connected any network storage at her house to see how well that works but I imagine it is fine. The firestick runs KODI like a champ. It also has Netflix and Amazon apps.

To be honest, a router is a router when it comes to what you're trying to do.

that said, this is the one i have :

https://www.amazon.co.uk/TP-LINK-TL-WR1043ND-Wireless-Gigabit-Printers/dp/B002YLAUU8

I've flashed it with DD-WRT and it's now a much more capable router with QOS, VPN, Bandwidth Monitoring etc.

It's cheap and cheerful, and once flashed, very capable.

Gigabit ports and a USB port for your USB drive or printer are nice features.

Have honestly have had really good luck with the Comcast Remotes paired with a Flirc.

https://www.amazon.com/DEVICE-UNIVERSAL-COMCAST-XFINITY-CONTROL/dp/B00P83IS5S?keywords=Comcast+Remote&qid=1539118146&s=Electronics&sr=1-4&ref=sr_1_4

The X1 remote doesn't work though, sadly. Because that thing is actually a really nice remote IMO.

I'll try, though this is a good place to start

Fyi OpenElec (OE) is a turnkey kodi & os package so once written to a sd card the RPi will boot directly into kodi.
Kodi has built in support for a number of USB OTA tuners so picking one of them will "just work". I'm in the UK so I went with 3 of these Freeview HD tuners
fyi more tuners = more simultaneous multiplexes watched = more simultaneous recordings & viewings. YMMV if not in the UK.

Hopefully you'll find something suitable here

I can't remember if the TVHeadend (TVH) server package is included but it's easy to install from within OE (see links below)

You can obviously skip kodi and just install a base os and just the TVH server but life's too short, hence why I went with OE ;-)
It's also what they recommend

Anyway once up & running you can configure TVH via a web page, basically you tell it where you are and it scans the channels. They then get broadcast over your network. The kodi clients can point to the TVH server and all the channels will be available, along with scheduled recording if you've enough space (I'm using a portable USB drive). You can also schedule recordings and watch live tv via apps - on iOS I personally use TvhClient

According to my bookmarks (and fading memory) these are what I used to get going...

http://kodi.wiki/view/Tvheadend

https://blog.kingj.net/2014/03/16/how-to/streaming-live-tv-using-tvheadend-and-xbmc-on-raspberry-pis/

http://www.vennercorp.com/blog/2013/05/19/how-do-i-setup-live-tv-on-openelec/

http://www.htpcguides.com/configure-pctv-triplestick-292e-tvheadend-on-raspberry-pi/

Anyway, sorry there's no 1 page guide. TBH my knowledge has evolved with experience.

Hope this helps, or at the very least gets you started!

Raspberry Pi 3, running Openelec, runs pretty flawlessly, and you only need to supply a power supply [(2.5 amp version)] (http://www.amazon.com/CanaKit-Raspberry-Supply-Adapter-Charger/dp/B00MARDJZ4/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1458053068&sr=8-1&keywords=raspberry+pi+power+supply), and a microsdhc card. The Raspberry Pi 3 can use your tv remote with HDMI-CEC, so you don't even need a secondary remote control for it.

the most important thing is the SD card. I use this one: https://www.amazon.com/Samsung-Class-Micro-Adapter-MB-MC32DA/dp/B00WR4IJBE/ref=sr_1_6?s=electronics&ie=UTF8&qid=1495118025&sr=1-6&keywords=Samsung+Micro+SD+EVO%2B also a proper power supply: https://www.amazon.com/CanaKit-Raspberry-Supply-Adapter-Charger/dp/B00MARDJZ4/ref=sr_1_3?s=electronics&ie=UTF8&qid=1495118069&sr=1-3&keywords=pi+power+supply

http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00GY0UB54

Does this work on the new Firestick

How would you put it on using a Mac?