Until recently (end of 2009) I used an old Xbox together with the multimediaplayer software XBMC to view movies and listen to music. I had been using this setup for years now and with great pleasure. But now that HD movies have become widely available and because the old Xbox can’t handle this resource intensive high quality media it was time for a change.

My research focused on the Popcorn Hour C-200 at first which was just announced at that time. The C-200 is a digital media player that will play almost any kind of media and that allows a harddrive and/or BluRay player to be added to the setup. The hardware looked perfect but I read a lot of negative reviews about the firmware and software. Also the screenshots of the software did not look very nice as I was used to XBMC by now. In the end I could not image not having XBMC to control my media as this is just the perfect software for the job. Not only does it look good, it’s open source and freely available as well. So I looked for another solution for my home theater setup. It didn’t take me long to find the ION-330 mini-pc serie from ASRock. This system, and especially the HT serie that come with a remote, is the perfect hardware in co-operation with XBMC as multimedia software to serve as HTPC.

My XBMC Installation Guide for ION-330HT

I had to do quite some reading to get the perfect setup. I decided to gather all this information and make my own installation guide. This installation guide can be useful to get you up and running in no time and it’s pretty dummy proof. But some of these steps can be quite challenging if you are inexperienced with Linux, SSH and computers in general. If this is the case, please ask someone with more experience to perform these actions for you. Although it’s not very likely that it will happen, I’m in no way responsible for damaging your system.

Setup

This guide will create the following setup:

• Yes: ASRock ION330-HT with XBMC Live 9.11 Camelot installed on the HDD
• Yes: Driver for internal IR receiver installed and the remote is working.
• Yes: Wake up from power-down by remote
• Yes: Video and audio through HDMI
• Yes: Navigation sounds within XBMC
• No: Wake up from suspend by remote, this is a common issue
• Uncertain: Wireless internet, I don’t use it myself and havent tested it

Before you can start the installation you will have to hook up the ION-330HT to your television by HDMI and connect a keyboard to one of the USB ports of the ION-330HT. For a complete installation you will also need to have network access so please connect your system to your network using an ethernet cable.

Installation of XBMC

1. Download the XBMC Live version, extract the iso file from the archive and burn the image to a CD-RW or DVD.
2. Insert the burned disc in the disc drive and boot from CD. You might need to change the boot order in the BIOS and select the disc drive as first boot device. You can enter the BIOS by pressing F2 at startup.
3. After booting the XBMC Live CD select the option ‘Install XBMC Live to the hard drive’
4. Follow the installation steps. There is no real need to change any of the default installation settings. I decided to create a separate /home partition in the harddisk manager but this is not really needed if you don’t know what you are doing. As username and password set them both to: xbmc (even though the installer thinks this password is to short).
5. After the installation is finished remove the disc and restart the system. XBMC will be started up automatically. Once started up you can walk through the configuration settings menu of XBMC using your keyboard to configure everything to your own preferences. Best is to jump ahead and install the drivers for the internal IR receiver so you can use the remote to configure everything from your couch.

Installing the driver for the internal IR receiver

Out of the box the internal IR receiver does not work because the drivers are not included within the underlaying operating system of XBMC Live version 9.11, this OS is a Linux distribution called Ubuntu version 9.10. If you want the remote to work without the use of an external USB receiver you will need to install these drivers by hand. This however can be tricky for inexperienced users so beware. This step requires the ION-330HT to be connected to your home network so it can be accessed using your computer.

1. To install the driver we need to access the underlaying operating system. This is done using a protocol called SSH. A good and free SSH client is called Putty and can be found here. Download and install it.
2. In Putty you will need to create a new session using the host address (IP address) and the username and password you entered during installation (both xbmc if you followed this guide). If you don’t know the IP address of your ION-330HT, it can be found within XBMC. Press right when standing on the system settings and select system information. Under network you will see your IP address.
3. When you open the connection you will need to enter your username and password again. When logged in enter the following commands to download and install the driver:
   sudo –s
   Enter your password again and continue with the following commands.
   apt-get install wget
wget http://tinyurl.com/cir-driver-ion330ht
dpkg -i ir-driver-ion330ht.deb
4. Agree with the installation of the new package. On the first screen of the installer select the option ‘Nuvoton Transceivers/Remotes’ and on the second screen keep the setting on ‘None’.
5. After the installation is finished you must reboot your ION-330HT to load the driver. You can do this by typing the command: reboot

Your connection will be broken as the system reboots. After reboot the driver for the IR receiver (version 1.01) is loaded and you can start using the supplied remote. Wake up after power-down will also work now. This is the default shutdown setting in XBMC. Changing this suspend unfortunately doesnt work. Your remote wont respond after waking up, this is a common issue. Check back here from time to time, I’ll post a solution if it becomes available.

Fixing audio over HDMI for playback

Out of the box the audio playback does not work over HDMI. For this to work we need to change the audio settings in XBMC. Go the the settings menu and the audio settings and set these to the following:

Audio output 				= Digital
AC3 compatible receiver 		= Unchecked
DTS compatibe receiver 			= Unchecked
Audio output device 			= hdmi
Passthrough output device 		= hdmi
Downmix multichannel audio to stereo 	= Checked

With the settings above the audio is being output through HDMI. If you use an audio-video receiver you might want to check to test with the checkbox a little but the settings above should be your starting point.

Fixing navigation sound in XBMC

The fix described above will ensure audio playback over HDMI for movies, music, etc. but there still aren’t any navigation sounds in XBMC. For this to work a configuration file has to be added to the installation of XBMC. Again open an SSH session as described in step 1 and 2 of installing the driver for the IR receiver. Once connected enter the following commands:
sudo -s
Enter your password and continue with the following commands:
nano /etc/asound.conf
This will open a text editor where you need to type in the following text:

pcm.!default {
  type plug
   slave {
       pcm "hdmi"
   }
}

Then hit ctrl + x and confirm saving the file. Once done you should reboot for the changes to take effect. You can do this by typing the command: reboot Your connection will be broken as the system reboots. After reboot the navigation sounds in XBMC should be working.

Your ASrock ION-330HT with XBMC is now ready to be used. There is still a lot to configure within XBMC itself. Please refer the XBMC Wiki for more information. If you have any questions about this guide please use the comment system. I’ll do my best to help you out.