Met my expectations and more. I bought this device mainly to test out using it as a home theater before dropping hundreds on a new computer to do just that. I figured that if this failed at what I needed it for in regards to the home theater, that I'd be able to find use for it in a number of other areas given it's flexibility and ease of programming.
Installed the Raspberry Pi XBMC version and started messing with the config, themes & plug-ins and realized that it does amazing work with all my video files. 1080p MKV? Worked for me. Paid for the decoder licenses (like $6) for WMV & MPG files. Those also work awesome. The HDMI out is more crisp & clear than the WDTV Live box I was using. It is almost like having a new TV.
For this setup I have a NAS with all my video files, which stream to the Pi on my big screen. There is no stutter & all video files I've tried to stream have streamed no problem. I haven't watched all 700 movies in my library, but I'm going to assume that they will all work out just fine. I have not tested a DVD ISO yet, so I can't speak to how well those work, but I have used AVI, MKV, MPG, WMV, etc. All with success.
After that exceeded my expectations, I went out and bought a second microSD card and loaded up the retro video game emulator on that. It was able to play all my NES & SNES ROM files without a problem. The only hangup was getting my USB Xbox 360 controller to work how I wanted while in game, but that's not the Raspberry Pi's fault. Once that was completed though, I was playing NES games on my big screen in a way I would have loved to do as a kid. Crisp clear HDMI graphics despite the simpleness of the NES games. SNES work great. Up next will be the N64.
This device with both it's cost & ease of use make it worth much more than what you have to pay for it. If you have a little bit of technical knowledge and a go-getter attitude you can make this little machine do just about anything you want it to.
Anytime I need a standalone machine for a future task, I will be looking at one of these first.
** 2015 update **
I now have 2 of these. Kodi (XBMC was rebranded) wasn't bad, but it was a bit of a pain in terms of features (not marking off TV shows you had watched so that you can go to the next episode for example), so I started evaluating more options. Plesk is the OS I decided to go with. My wife loves the UI, it has an On Deck feature that puts the next episode of a TV show on the screen to select, so I can't complain.
It also supports CEC functionality, so I don't need a keyboard or mouse for the Pi, the TV remote does the trick. Also makes it so you don't have to try and get an IR receiver to work. I did try to do just that at one point, but the documentation and functionality of those add-ons are not quality and so it was a waste of money.
I still highly recommend a Pi as the core of your home theater. I will be ordering another one in the next month or so.
| RAM | 512 MB DDR |
|---|---|
| Memory Speed | 700 MHz |
| Chipset Brand | AMD |
| Graphics Card Ram Size | 512 MB |
| Wireless Type | Bluetooth |
| Number of USB 2.0 Ports | 4 |
