Kodi for watching TV; any advice/experience?

Cut the cord a while back and mostly am happy with the choice. Thinking about other ways to add a few more things; sports streams, etc. Anyone here use Kodi? Can you use Chromecast to play it on a TV? Interested in your experience.

Thanks,

Jeff

I have Kodi setup on a Raspberry Pi 2 hooked up to my projector.

Why not have whatever you are running Kodi on hooked up to the TV?

I've been using Kodi for about a year now. I found that it didn't play TV back very smoothly at all. I use Kodi for the addons and have tries quite a few DVR media players. Currently I use JRiver because of the audiophile capbilities.

Yep, Kodi running on several Raspberry Pi2 CPU's here at home.

I add generic Microsoft Media Center USB remote dongles so that I can have a IR remote.

I also add a USB wireless adapter and a wireless mini keyboard for the times when I need to search, etc.

I gave up on trying to watch TV through my HTPC devices and simply use them as the GRM version of a Roku or similar device. Works well with some limitations in the hardware, but I've not had any major issues.

Figure for about $60 (case, micro-SD card, wireless adapters, etc.) I can get one up and running in about 30 minutes and I can velcro it to the back of the TV. I can also grab one and carry it with me if I travel and I don't want to deal with their cable nonsense.

I've recently installed it on my Amazon Fire tv stick. Seems to work quite well.

For other users, any recommendations for addons/repositories?

We "cut the cord" ~6 years ago. I built a HTPC long ago, have been running some version of Linux on it since day one. I added XBMC and then went to Kodi about a year ago. Mainly as a last resort for college football after ESPN changed their streaming policy, and we are now constantly in a black out area for the teams we follow, unless we provide our cable/satellite provider's info, which we don't have.

Sports Devil is great if you want to watch soccer, but SEC College Football is pretty hit or miss, normally takes 5 or 6 attempts to find a stream that even works, let-alone one that isn't too pixilated to watch.

However, the Genesis add-on is phenomenal, I have a few other add-ons that I downloaded after reading some recommended/popular add-on lists on other sites, but in reality, I never use any others.

We have an antenna that gets ~12 OTA channels on a good day, Netflix, Prime, and Kodi, we're never lacking for something to watch.

genesis is "dead"

exodus is the replacement. i gather leviticus will be next?

i have the Sling beta 20 channel pack for my live sports needs(has both fox sports ohio channels), if something is on ESPN i can't miss i can add the other package with that network in seconds and then cancel it and only be prorated for the month. we have prime already, so it made sense to get the amazon boxes. kodi on both. cable was $95 a month for crap basic, our cable system is a joke/monopoly. sling for $20, netflix for $10(it is going up this month to 10 i think?) and i'm $65 less a month than cable. less than 2 months of the savings now pay for the prime membership. saving almost $800 a year.

Kodi + Exodus = everything you will ever need except for live TV.

If you miss having "channels" you can install PlutoTV, which has some live channels.

In reply to patgizz:

Didn't know that, finished watching Northern Exposure via Genesis maybe 3 weeks ago, have been watching Netflix and Prime since.

Got Orange Pi pc with case about year ago for $25, use cheap wireless mouse. No problem works great. Navi X , Youtube is all I watch.

Stefan (Not Bruce) wrote: Yep, Kodi running on several Raspberry Pi2 CPU's here at home. I add generic Microsoft Media Center USB remote dongles so that I can have a IR remote. I also add a USB wireless adapter and a wireless mini keyboard for the times when I need to search, etc. I gave up on trying to watch TV through my HTPC devices and simply use them as the GRM version of a Roku or similar device. Works well with some limitations in the hardware, but I've not had any major issues. Figure for about $60 (case, micro-SD card, wireless adapters, etc.) I can get one up and running in about 30 minutes and I can velcro it to the back of the TV. I can also grab one and carry it with me if I travel and I don't want to deal with their cable nonsense.

I want to do this but I know zero about it.

In reply to Nick (picaso) Comstock:

There's some great How-To's on YouTube as its pretty simple.

I can also walk you through it if you'd like.

Stefan (Not Bruce) wrote: In reply to Nick (picaso) Comstock: There's some great How-To's on YouTube as its pretty simple. I can also walk you through it if you'd like.

how-to post or ban

I loved Genesis. Exodus is lacking one major feature for me, that is Favorites. I basically build a netflix cue, both TV and movies. I haven't found an addon that has that yet. That sucks.

I've been running one for a while. I don't use any remote because HDMI-CEC.

I have some local content for which its great. Streams depend on the quality of the stream but I haven't had great luck. I have a smart tv for Netflix/Hulu/Amazon and Chromecast for most other stuff.

If you pair Kodi with EmulationStation you can play most arcade games and old console games as well.

Kodi question:

I have a Pi2 running Kodi. It works great... unless there is a power outage. I have to manually reset it every time.

If I don't turn the TV on to the Kodi input when I cycle the power, the Kodi won't display. If I let it reboot with the TV off, when I turn it on and select the Kodi input, it just says "waiting for signal".

Also: What does everyone prefer for managing their library? I know there were some 'apps' for this that let you remote manage from a browser, but looks like support for them died. The last one I used I can't recall the name of, but it would access the files directly and reorganize and write .nfo files when you were completed. Effective, but annoying because you have to update the library on Kodi every time.

We are 10 years cable free, almost 11.

We have Rokus on each TV and predominantly use Plex to stream from my NAS (about 11TB of media and counting) to each device. I use an old desktop to do my transcoding.

Someone told me about usenet+(nzbget or Sabnzbd)+sickbeard+couchpotato, but I'm sure Google could tell more more about that. ;)

That said, SuperNews is cheap. We also do Netflix and I pay for Pandora every month as well.

The only live sports that I can't get OTA is Kentucky Basketball/Football. Luckily the BBN is pretty tech savy and I can always find a good stream hidden on YouTube.

In reply to ProDarwin:

Yeah, they can be sensitive to brownouts. I have one connected to the USB port on my TV and it survives the power on/off just fine.

They automatically detect the video output upon boot. You can force this though by modifying a config file for the boot loader, I had to do this to force it to analog video out for an older TV I was using, but it works the same for HDMI.

You'll also want to get the MPG2 and WVC1 license keys from the Raspberry Pi Store to improve playback.

I've had good luck using SALTS (Stream All The Sources): https://www.tvaddons.ag/kodi-addons/show/plugin.video.salts/

They automatically detect the video output upon boot. You can force this though by modifying a config file for the boot loader, I had to do this to force it to analog video out for an older TV I was using, but it works the same for HDMI.

Doh! Forgot about that. I'll specify it in the boot/config.txt I'm 99% sure this is causing the issue.

Thanks.