Saturday, September 28, 2013

Good Bye Mythfrontend..Hello Plex!

It has been about 4 years since I last contributed to the MythTv Project. I think its a great project. But recently I've started using Plex. First to watch TED Talks and NPR Internet Channel, but now, with this [simple patch from alewando's github fork of Mythtv](https://github.com/MythTV/mythtv/pull/32) , I can now get Plex to show all my Mythtv Recordings.

So its bye, bye MythFrontend. I love how Plex organizes shows, and now I can view my TV recordings on multiple platforms with ease. My home has both Android and Apple products. 

I've never much liked the UPNP feature in Mythtv, so now that I use Plex, I am happier.




Monday, September 16, 2013

Lenovo S431 - Ubuntu 12.04

My Lenovo S431 has the following specifications:

*Component Description*
---------------------------------

* Processor: Intel Corporation Intel(R) Core(TM) i7-3226 CPU @ 1.9GHz
* Bios: Lenovo HFEET30WW (1.07 )
* Memory: 4GB Output of ``lspci ``

```
00:00.0 Host bridge: Intel Corporation 3rd Gen Core processor DRAM Controller (rev 09)
00:02.0 VGA compatible controller: Intel Corporation 3rd Gen Core processor Graphics Controller (rev 09)
00:14.0 USB controller: Intel Corporation 7 Series/C210 Series Chipset Family USB xHCI Host Controller (rev 04)
00:16.0 Communication controller: Intel Corporation 7 Series/C210 Series Chipset Family MEI Controller #1 (rev 04)
00:1a.0 USB controller: Intel Corporation 7 Series/C210 Series Chipset Family USB Enhanced Host Controller #2 (rev 04)
00:1b.0 Audio device: Intel Corporation 7 Series/C210 Series Chipset Family High Definition Audio Controller (rev 04)
00:1c.0 PCI bridge: Intel Corporation 7 Series/C210 Series Chipset Family PCI Express Root Port 1 (rev c4)
00:1c.1 PCI bridge: Intel Corporation 7 Series/C210 Series Chipset Family PCI Express Root Port 2 (rev c4)
00:1c.3 PCI bridge: Intel Corporation 7 Series/C210 Series Chipset Family PCI Express Root Port 4 (rev c4)
00:1d.0 USB controller: Intel Corporation 7 Series/C210 Series Chipset Family USB Enhanced Host Controller #1 (rev 04)
00:1f.0 ISA bridge: Intel Corporation HM76 Express Chipset LPC Controller (rev 04)
00:1f.2 SATA controller: Intel Corporation 7 Series Chipset Family 6-port SATA Controller [AHCI mode] (rev 04)
00:1f.3 SMBus: Intel Corporation 7 Series/C210 Series Chipset Family SMBus Controller (rev 04)
02:00.0 Unassigned class [ff00]: Realtek Semiconductor Co., Ltd. RTS5229 PCI Express Card Reader (rev 01)
03:00.0 Network controller: Intel Corporation Centrino Wireless-N 2230 (rev c4)
04:00.0 Ethernet controller: Realtek Semiconductor Co., Ltd. RTL8111/8168/8411 PCI Express Gigabit Ethernet Controller (rev 07)

```

Ubuntu 12.04.3 works for most components, out of the box.

I haven't played around with tweaking the mousepad. It just feels weird using it. Definitely need to do more research there.

Battery life is pathetic. Only get 3 hours of battery time on it. Not sure why yet. I hope to improve on this and update this blog post.

 Check out my [ansible playbook for restoring my lenovo ideapad](http://github.com/skamithi/restore_pc)