Raspberry Pi OS For Media Server
Raspberry Pi is a low power and compact computer board that gained a lot of attention for numerous creative applications at very low power consumption. While it could be used for common PC applications, what makes it exciting for home server enthusiasts is the possibility of using it as a compact media player to play 1080p videos. While there are several different operating systems, including Arch Linux and Pidora (based on Fedora), currently there are 3 media center software for Raspberry Pi.
OpenELEC is a lightweight operating system that can support high-definition content on machines with low-powered processors. OpenELEC based Pis become silent machines for a media center. OpenELEC is built from the ground up specifically for one task, to run XBMC. Other operating systems are designed to be multi-purpose, so they include all kinds of software to run services and programs that won't be used. OpenELEC, however, only includes software required to run XBMC. Because of that it's tiny (100MB) and boots extremely quickly. OpenELEC not based on any Linux distribution and has been built from scratch specifically to act as a media center. It is designed to be managed as an appliance. It can automatically update itself and can be managed entirely from within the graphical interface. Even though it runs on Linux, you will never have to hav Linux knowledge to use it.
Raspbmc is a minimal Linux distribution based on Debian that brings XBMC to Raspberry Pi. Raspbmc is brought to you by the developer of the Crystalbuntu Linux Distribution, which gave us XBMC and 1080p decoding to the 1st generation Apple TV. It supports both wired and WiFi out of the box. It supports multiple languages. It allows you to share content from PCs ove NFS, SMB, FTP and HTTP. It fully supports AirPlay and AirTunes allowing you you send content from your Apple devices.
GeeXboX is a free and Open Source Media-Center purposed Linux distribution for embedded devices and desktop computers. GeeXboX is not an application, it’s a full OS, that one can boot as a LiveCD, from a USB key, an SD/MMC card or install on its regular HDD. The GeeXboX distribution is lightweight and designed to embed all major multimedia applications. GeeXbox supports Open GL acceleration. It can also pump out full 1080p resolution. It supports HD audio along with DTS-MA and Dolby True-HD. It can also work for Live TV and as a DVR.