That's it, I'm sick of leopard frontrow!

[Midgetinabikini]

I'm running Leopard on my MacMini Intel 2.0 and using iTunes to organize my library (TV shows, music, movies, podcasts) and using FrontRow to display it nice and easy on my old 25" tv screen (CRT)

But after I organized more then 500 movies, i just can't use it anymore. the list is lllloooooonnnnnnngggggggg, i can't browse by genre nor alphabetic order.

For the past few weeks I have tried few replacements, but none of them seem to work or i just can't set them up correctly. Just now i installed BackRow for Mac 1.1, but it done nothing and my system still running that crappy FrontRow.

Plex: nice, Really nice. but I cant read my iTunes library, so I can't tell if i watched an episode of my favorite transformers, beside that I could not find a way to run it on full screen. other then that, perfect.

Boxee: well...just crashed, and can't read my iTunes library.

MediaCentral: might be my only chance, but from the 5 minutes demo, i could not tell if I can browse alphabetically or by genre. It read my iTunes library, but it was too heavy and when i wanted to browse my 5 minutes were gone.

I really really really need help. I just can't continue browsing over 500 files to watch the latest X-Files movie, or even 28 later (it's only the fifth on the list...but you know...)
Please, help me. my next option is to just delete that crappy Leopard and install Tiger back. help

 

[marklight]

I am in the same position as you.

Media Central is a horrible program. Don't waste your time.

Boxee is ok, but it is a bit buggy, and there's not a lot you can do to customize the interface.

Plex has a lot of customization (not sure why you're having problems with the full screen) but the thing I hate about it is that it doesn't read your iTunes library, and it doesn't use the metadata that's already on your files. Instead it goes and looks for crappy metadata from imdb or wherever.

Why can't apple just release an update for Front Row that puts it in the same league as apple TV... not like it would be difficult.

 

[millar876]

100% solution?

You may not like this, BUT it works AND it lets you use formats that dont work in iTunes.

Remove the movies from iTunes altogether and but them into the movies folder.

You can also put them onto an external HD and put an alias of the HD intop the Movies folder.

Either of these will allow you to arrange the files however you want in folders, and to get to them in FR you go into movies, movies Folder and select what you want

I have a 1TB WD MyBook on my mini and do it this way, works great. I have loads on it a file structure similar to the following

MyBook-Movies-Genre-Movie.avi (ect)
MyBook-TV-TV Shof folder-season-episode.m4v (in the format SEE i.e. 101 for season 1 episode 01)

You get the picture, not quite sure how it works with downloaded iTMS content though

 

[marklight]

You may not like this, BUT it works AND it lets you use formats that dont work in iTunes.

Remove the movies from iTunes altogether and but them into the movies folder.

You can also put them onto an external HD and put an alias of the HD intop the Movies folder.

Either of these will allow you to arrange the files however you want in folders, and to get to them in FR you go into movies, movies Folder and select what you want

I have a 1TB WD MyBook on my mini and do it this way, works great. I have loads on it a file structure similar to the following

MyBook-Movies-Genre-Movie.avi (ect)
MyBook-TV-TV Shof folder-season-episode.m4v (in the format SEE i.e. 101 for season 1 episode 01)

You get the picture, not quite sure how it works with downloaded iTMS content though

What about metadata and album artwork with this method? from my experiences, media that is browsed in the MOVIES folder doesn't show artwork.

 

[millar876]

on my mini it dosn't show the artwork but it will show a prieview of the movies. As for metadata, if its already there it will show it, otherwise i just name the files creativly, i.e. smallville Series 1 episode 1 will be in the path; front-row/movies/Mybook/TV/Smallville/Season 1/101 - Pilot. so i know where all my stuff is.

If i want to watch starwars E-IV, I'll go to; front-row/movies/mybook/movies folder/movies/sci-fi/Starwars HD/EP-IV - A New Hope HD

d'ya get the idea. This also helps with browsing on my PS3, to watch on my 40" Sony 1080/24p TV

 

[RedTomato]

What about one of the other WAG-friendly media organisers like Delicious Library or DVDPedia?

I'm very tempted to get one of them, and wouldn't mind knowing what you think of them.

 

[Midgetinabikini]

What about one of the other WAG-friendly media organisers like Delicious Library or DVDPedia?

I'm very tempted to get one of them, and wouldn't mind knowing what you think of them.

Problems with these too, the iTunes is also used to sync my iPhone.... That's why i need good replacement to frontrow, nothing else...

 

[robotica]

Xbmc

 

[Midgetinabikini]

Xbmc

can it use itunes library or its just like Plex?

 

[Tara Davis]

I've been playing around with Plex, and I like it a lot.

My solution for iTMS videos?

I added iTunes to the app launcher of Plex. For nearly everything I use Plex's library, but for the few things I downloaded from iTMS, I flip over to iTunes to watch it.

A pain for now, but if they managed to integrate the audio library I bet they can do the same with videos before long.

Quicktime/Perian tends to result in far more frequent mangled frames for me than the latest VLC or Plex does. YMMV

I've pretty much had it with trying to get FrontRow to work with all my media files. When they broke AC-3 surround in m4v containers (back in QuickTime 7.4 or so), that was the last straw for me, and I had been looking for alternatives ever since.

Plex looks like the big winner, at least for me.

 

[Idgit]

I use the Sapphire plugin for Front Row. It's easier to configure than Boxee or Plex and it works alongside Front Row (appears as a menu within Front Row).

It organizes movies by file, by genre, by cast, by IMDB Top 250, and by Academy Award Winners.