OpenELEC vs Raspbmc?

[7ewis]

I know this has been asked many times, but I can't find any recent comparisons. And the developers are updating them all the time.

So, what are you using now?

[PhillyNJ]

All I can say is RaspBmc is slow. I mean painfully slow. I know that its pretty remarkable that you can have a media center for $35, but its just too slow.

[alexeames]

All I can say is RaspBmc is slow. I mean painfully slow. I know that its pretty remarkable that you can have a media center for $35, but its just too slow.

Slow compared to what? Another device or OpenELEC?

I just tried out the latest Raspbmc which I happily won in a Farnell online competition this week. They provided the SD card (but that just skips one easy step) and, although it reboot about three times during the setup process, it took only 8 minutes from power up to usable system.

Once that had all occurred I couldn't really see any significant speed difference between it and OpenELEC, which I am used to. (I'm not using advanced features and this is a vanilla install.)

[PhillyNJ]

Slow compared to what? Another device or OpenELEC?

Slow in terms of how long it takes for a 22 minute video to load.

[alexeames]

Slow compared to what? Another device or OpenELEC?

Slow in terms of how long it takes for a 22 minute video to load.

Do you find OpenELEC loads this 22 minute video faster?

[PhillyNJ]

Do you find OpenELEC loads this 22 minute video faster?

No, I mean slow in general; not compared to another device. When it takes several minutes for the video to load, thats slow in todays world, no matter what device.

Dont get me wrong, I love my Pi(s). But IMO Ithink a media center is just too much for the Pi (rev b). I have 2 Apple TV's which cost $99 (US). The apple TV is a better value simple because its so much faster. Thats all I am saying.

[teeth_03]

Well, you always have the option of throwing money at Apple for something that "just works", but the Pi is so much of a more flexible system than the ATV.

[alexeames]

Apple TV isn't another device?

I agree that several minutes to "load" a 22 minute film doesn't sound right. Neither my OpenELEC nor my Raspbmc editions have this problem, so is it possible you are doing something wrong or different?

When you say "load" are you talking about transferring files to the Pi or time taken for it to start playing on the screen?

[goujam]

I think something is wrong if it takes minutes to start a film. My pi running raspbmc takes maybe 5 seconds to start a film in fact I can stream films over the internet and it starts to play in under 15 seconds

[Thaddy]

Yes, you must definitely do something wrong. Actually there is not much speed difference between the XBMC derived flavors in the sense that it infuences usability. (I am not saying there isn't)
They all start even very large movies within 5 seconds.

Compared to my dedicated Dane-Elec SO Speaky PVR mediacenter the Pi is a speedfreak

[PhillyNJ]

Apple TV isn't another device?

Since slow is a relative term and you asked "compared to what" -

When you say "load" are you talking about transferring files to the Pi or time taken for it to start playing on the screen?

My files (e.g movies) are on my network connected to the pi via ethernet. So I would assume the delay is in the transfer time and how Raspbmc streams the videos. Not sure what I could be doing wrong as these movies stream fast with other media 'devices' (e.g. PS3, AppleTV). I flashed Raspbmc on to my SD, boot the pi, pointed my videos to my share, choose a video and wait....

[alexeames]

Apple TV isn't another device?

Since slow is a relative term and you asked "compared to what" -

This thread is about comparing OpenELEC to Raspbmc. I was merely trying to draw the information out of you whether you had compared them to each other or another device. Now you have answered that - thank you.

I flashed Raspbmc on to my SD, boot the pi, pointed my videos to my share, choose a video and wait....

You could try that with OpenELEC and see if it's any faster, then you'll be able to answer the OP's question.

[jamesh]

Apple TV isn't another device?

Since slow is a relative term and you asked "compared to what" -

When you say "load" are you talking about transferring files to the Pi or time taken for it to start playing on the screen?

My files (e.g movies) are on my network connected to the pi via ethernet. So I would assume the delay is in the transfer time and how Raspbmc streams the videos. Not sure what I could be doing wrong as these movies stream fast with other media 'devices' (e.g. PS3, AppleTV). I flashed Raspbmc on to my SD, boot the pi, pointed my videos to my share, choose a video and wait....

Wierd. When streaming whether from my PVR or my desktop computer (both DNLA/uPNP connected), or from USB attached HD, all files start within a few seconds.

[Thaddy]

Very wierd indeed.
Even with my entry level PVR from my previous post, the Pi is much, much faster - stable - with streaming over our (complex, multiple routers) " home" network.
I get the same results as Alex, just a few seconds for the pi, sometimes a little bit more for the Dane-Elec.
Try changing the network cable or the wifi dongle: CAT4 is known to often cause a fall back to 10Mbit; use CAT6 for 100Mbit. If you use a wifi dongle it might have a sub par antenna or other issues. It is definitely your setup, not the Raspberry Pi.

Can you provide some more elaborate info so we can try to help?

[7ewis]

Using OpenELEC videos play almost instantly from a USB, and even if I stream over Wi-Fi it still takes seconds rather than minutes!

Maybe a new flashed SD would solve it?

[nadnerb]

Apple TV isn't another device?

Since slow is a relative term and you asked "compared to what" -

When you say "load" are you talking about transferring files to the Pi or time taken for it to start playing on the screen?

My files (e.g movies) are on my network connected to the pi via ethernet. So I would assume the delay is in the transfer time and how Raspbmc streams the videos. Not sure what I could be doing wrong as these movies stream fast with other media 'devices' (e.g. PS3, AppleTV). I flashed Raspbmc on to my SD, boot the pi, pointed my videos to my share, choose a video and wait....

To say raspbmc is slow is completely unfair and simply untrue.
Sounds like your setup has issues somewhere as that's not normal.

My videos stream from a NAS and they all load within seconds. The same if I stream from my laptop via wifi or the SD card.
Not only can my pi play 1080p video, it also simultaneously runs a 50 LED boblight system, a web server and still has CPU cycles spare. So the pi is a perfectly capable media player, a pretty great one too.

[seymour1]

I chose OpenELEC- Not because it's any faster (it doesn't seem to be), but because I'm berrybooting into both it and retropie, and I wanted to conserve space.

[zephura]

Here is an different aspect of this "question of life" :

here are my hypotheses :
1/ the user is a newbie but not a complete noob (I mean, he can RTFM,LoTW, GIYF)
2/ new user to RPi,
3/ install from a windows PC
4/ know HOW to install on a SD-card from a M$-win PC using "Win32 Disk-imager"

Openelec :
1/ I find it hard to find/download an openelec .img file (thanks google is my friend) :
install A - NOT using .img files but using files on http://openelec.tv/ here are the main files (this need some manual installation)
install B - using .img files on http://openelec.thestateofme.com/ here are the .img files
2/ when 1st booting:
install A - DO NOT FORGET TO CREATE THE cmdline.txt FILE !!!
install B - the size of the partition is written on the .img file
3/ when using xbmc : no comment,
when using command line (via ssh)
- impossible to update : apt-get does NOT work : I don't pretend this is good or bad, this is a fact, it simply does not work
- an other keyboard-layout than QWERTY will NOT WORK (it seems to be a running issue from several months
- no FTP server (for uploading media files), as apt-get does not work...
I have stopped my investigation here, don't know if any ftp server is preinstalled and not activate, I quickly look for a ftp addons on xbmc but failed....
4/ using XBMC : ONLY ONE BIG BOLD COMMENT : IMPOSSIBLE TO USE XBMC WITH AN OTHER LAYOUT THAN QWERTY

Raspbmc:
1/ .img files are on rasbmc website
choosing between network .img or standalone .img is quite... disappointing (for immediate use, both are working fine)
2/ when 1st booting
A-network img will download and install the last standalone img

with the standalone img installed : resize the partition to fill the sd-card
3/ when using xbmc : no comment,
when using command line (via ssh) : 1st connection
choose locales, keyboard-layout, timezone, etc...
not easy, but not impossible to configure an AZERTY layout on XBMC using the command "dpkg-reconfigure keyboard-configuration"
4/ using XBMC:
AZERTY layout is working (after the dpkg-.... command),
ftp server is by default running
apt-get is working (neither good nor bad, use this command with great care)

Once again, this post is about "user-friendly customization fonctions", even in openelec it is possible to define the .xml file which define a new layout, but this is an advanced feature.

My opinion, I don't see major differences between XBMC-openelec and XBMC-raspbmc (as my RPi is running 24/24, the booting-delay is not very relevant)
Even if I use a smartphone-app to lead my XBMC (thus keyboard layout is not a major issue), I see a HUGE difference in internationalization of XBMC.

PS : I didn't try to look for sqlite3 command and other internal programs in openelec, but it works is raspbmc
PPS : I didn't try to configure a WIFI-stick in openelec, but ...
with raspbmc, I have this working configuration :
- wifi access point
- dhcp server
with this configuration in my car, I can play movie on the "children-screen" and use my smartphone-app to choose what is being watched (without looking the screen!!!)
this configuration require to install a dhcp server (impossible on openelec) and install wifi-AccessPoint (impossible on openelec)

[ChaosAffect]

I chose OpenELEC- Not because it's any faster (it doesn't seem to be), but because I'm berrybooting into both it and retropie, and I wanted to conserve space.

I've been struggling with this setup for a couple of days... can you give us a rundown on how you managed to get the BerryBoot with OpenELEC and RetroPie to work?

[JoeDaStudd]

I picked Raspbmc mainly due to my past experience with the original builds of both.
OpenELEC was was more of a hassle to update as its one image per build and they flung out about a build a day. It was also much more restrictive in terms of adding extras.
Raspbmc while the it took a little longer to hit the sweet spot, once it got going there was little reason to go back to OpenELEC.

I'll admit OpenELEC could have a whole host of super amazing functions or be quicker, but Raspbmc just works for me and I can't see myself changing without it stops getting developed or something major happens.

[bmonster]

I was a raspbmc user for about a year, but as my library got bigger, raspbmc slower.
So i thought id try openelec, and overall it feels faster and smoother, loads up a lot quicker.
Definitely better in my opinion.