Raspberry Pi Forums

Hi,

Have been searching around for a solution but haven't found anything so thought I would ask here.

My grandfather is 97 years old, doesn't have any friends left and days are going by pretty slowly for him. Especially now in Corona times when there's barely anyone ever visiting.

He's from Finland but we live in Sweden and his swedish isn't fantastic so he doesn't watch much TV.

So I thought I would get him some movies, with finnish subtitles, or finnish movies, so that he could enjoy watching them.
Problem is, he doesn't have a dvd player and he's not great with tech.

So the perfect solution I thought would be a raspberry pi connected to the TV. And when he chooses that input on the TV, it justs jumps to a view of all the movies he can watch.

Is there anything like that already that I've been missing in my searches? Or any other ideas?

In short, I want him to be able to start watching a movie from a raspberry pi in as few button presses as possible, with no OS or anything standing in the way.

Thanks in advance,
Oddjob

Kodi. LibreElec is an image with it all build in to start on boot.

https://libreelec.tv/

jamesh wrote: ↑

Sat May 16, 2020 9:43 pm

Kodi. LibreElec is an image with it all build in to start on boot.

https://libreelec.tv/

...and a compatible IR remote control

If he has a reasonably recent TV, it will have the inbuilt function “HDMI-CEC” and that means the TV remote will control the Pi running Libreelec+Kodi already.

It really does make a neat and cheap media player, that is easy to setup and use.

Sounds good, will look into that one. Thanks!

KODI / Libreelec is a media centre, not a simple plug-and-play device ... so might be overly complex for your grandfather. If you already have a RasPi, download Libreelec and try it Also check out the add-ons.

If you want ultra simple, have you considered playing movies from a USB stick plugged directly into the TV (assuming his TV has a USB port) ? It would mean you ripping movies he'd like and giving him the USB stick, and probably doing the same every couple of months.

The language difference is a big consideration. Another option might be to get Finnish TV and/or Netflix (there is again a legal Netflix add-on for KODI) - but they will probably be geoblocked; in which case look into Smart DNS service as an alternative to VPN.

Cheers, Don