Journal chill's Journal: OpenELEC 1
OpenELEC exemplifies one of the reasons I really like Linux and FOSS. It takes an already excellent product, XBMC, and pares it down to a nub.
In case you're unfamiliar with it, XBMC is a software media player and entertainment hub for digital media. It is available for Linux, OSX, and Windows. In short, it plays damn near anything and has a fantastic interface.
OpenELEC takes nothing away from XBMC except the fat. That is, there is no functionality at all. What it does is pare the OS down to the absolute bare minimum needed to run the hardware and software. Nothing extra.
XBMC has a "live" version based off of Ubuntu-minimal. While small, there is still unneeded cruft. OpenELEC is designed for embedded devices, so there is no Windows or OS-X version. It is designed for OEMs to put on base hardware and deliver media center appliances.
In short, it takes about 105 Mb fully installed on my Zotac HD11, ION-2 based terminal. I have it installed on an SD Flash card and it boots from cold to ready-to-rock in 15 seconds. That is using the ION-optimized build.
If you're looking for decent media center software, do yourself a favor and look at XBMC. If you like it, and are planning on building a media center PC for convenience or technology-challenged relatives, look at OpenELEC.
Thanks (Score:2)