I have a DirecTV DVR which is a pretty slow, stupid box, but is linked to their web site, and I can download what they have on offer. I've messed with mediatomb, and so far the ratio is about three hours futzing with the setup for each three minutes of music/video I want to play, to be repeated next time because the working setup inexplicably broke.
I'd like to have an option to pipe an audio stream from a cental PC to various non-digital audio systems around the house. My first guess would be an FM transmitter plugged directly into the output jack of the sound card. Every FM transmitter I've tried, though, has been barely capable of transmitting to a receiver 18" away, let alone through the steel siding to the detatched garage.
I could build a full-fledged MythTV box to go beside the DirecTV box - who knows, it might even replace it - but that may be overkill, and doesn't cover listening in the garage.
So what do you think I should do? I could shop around for old laptops, and put one at each listening point - I can handle setting up streaming from there. I could grab two or three $150 netbooks, and use them - they'd probably burn less electricity. I could go exotic, get some microatx or PC104 hardware and build from there. What's the best solution?