Beta Roundup: XBMC 12 Beta 3 and OpenELEC 3.0 Beta 4

The best part about beta software is getting access to exciting new features, even if they aren’t always ready for primetime. The worst part is trying to keep up as new releases get pushed out. The XBMC team dropped the first beta for XBMC 12 “Frodo” in mid-November, but over the last week-and-a-half, have moved through Beta 2 onto Beta 3. The Beta 2 release brought a bunch of fixes and the first Android APK release of XBMC, which immediately got me contemplating the future of an XBMC-enabled Ceton Echo. Beta 3 includes more fixes, particularly for the aforementioned Android release, and the inclusion of the new PVR addons. Documentation for XBMC 12 has also taken a giant leap forward in the last week, with new FAQs and support wiki pages coming online and getting fleshed out.

Hot on the heels of Beta 2, we are excited to release Beta 3. This release includes a number of fixes as we work to resolve issues that have cropped up since Beta 2 and also attempt to isolate some issues that still exist.

XBMC 

Running parallel with the XBMC team, the OpenELEC team has been working furiously on the release of the Frodo-powered OpenELEC 3.0. We commented on the rapid transition from OpenELEC 2.0 to OpenELEC 3.0 when the first beta release came out a few weeks ago, and the OpenELEC team isn’t showing any signs of slowing down as they have already advanced to Beta 4. The second beta release incorporated OpenELEC-specific bug fixes, while the two more recent beta release have included bug fixes and provided updates to new Linux kernel point releases and the latest beta releases of XBMC 12.

This Beta updates XBMC to XBMC Frodo Beta 3, the kernel to linux-3.6.9 and fixes some issues found in our Beta 3 release like Samba Windows filesharing issues and issues with ffmpeg which is now fixed after a closed cooperation with the ffmpeg developers upstream too. Many thanks for the help!

OpenELEC

It’s also worth noting that the OpenELEC team is promoting the Raspberry Pi support that comes with OpenELEC 3.0 by teaming up with The Pi Hut for a giveaway, so if you are interested in getting your diminutive DIY media streamer action on, be sure to throw your name in the social network hat.