I have setup and run what are basically HTPC’s for decades now. Kodi running on a Debian based Linux distribution or just Debian is a solid recommendation and has lots of support for infrared remotes, but kodi can be very fiddly to setup properly. It will work, but don’t expect it to work “out of the box”. You’ll probably still need a mouse and keyboard for anything outside Kodi. You’ll have to read a bunch of documentation and do some customizing to get the most out of Kodi. It’s still easier than most other setups, but it will feel very frustrating if it’s your introduction to Linux too.

I’ve moved to using my HTPC primarily as a server. Once you get comfortable with linux and docker, setting up new server services like Jellyfish, Plex, and and *ARR stack is relatively trivial. The advantage here being that you can serve your media to any device that can connect to your server. For me that means one library of media to share with any TV in my house, any mobile device I own, and any friends and family computer savvy enough to download the right apps and setup an account. If your network (and your Internet connection) isn’t reliable this kind of setup may not work very well for you at all. For example, Plex account authentication will fail is you don’t have Internet. Jellyfin and Kodi fair better when Internet is only available occasionally or is unreliable.

My least favorite part of using Kodi was setting up the remote. Even worse was trying to configure controllers for retro gaming. The situation is MUCH better than it was, but is still far from easy. I was kind of able to side step the remote problem because now I can just use the remote for the TV (if it supports the Plex or Jellyfin apps) or another streaming stick like fire stick, Nvidia shield, or Roku. My Nvidia shield can pair with any Bluetooth controller and runs RetroArch so that problem was side stepped too. ROMs can be copied via samba shares or loaded directly by a USB drive.

TLDR: Kodi has built-in support for IR, but streaming sticks are cheap, and in the long run I found setting up a server was more versatile, more reliable, and less stressful. I know, I also hate it when people ask for a specific solution and others recommend asking a different question. But in this case, my experience is that IR remotes suck, are flaky, and not worth it if there is any other option.

Do you mind sharing what brand retail UPS weren’t lasting a year?

I’m dealing with similar brownouts and also an area with lots of lightning. I got about 5 years out of my UPS batteries. Wondering if I’ve just been lucky.

They generally don’t breed in large bodies of water where the water is flowing. They moatly breed in the little stagnant pools of water that collect in other spots because of poor drainage or things like tires, empty pots, and other trash being left out in the rain. There exist these little pellets that poison those stagnant puddles for the mosquito, but not your pets. That and proper drainage around your house will do wonders to reduce the excess population. Pointing a fan to blow out at any open window can help too, but proper screens (with a fine enough mesh) would help more. Mosquitoes don’t like a stiff breeze.

Don Glover

This is like a Far Side comic in that I’m sure it’s actually funny, but I have no idea why.

I’ve fallen asleep during the third act extended fight scene of the last 5 Marvel movies I’ve been too that weren’t Deadpool. Same vibes. But, I still wouldn’t use them to try to sleep.

But if you’re looking for relaxing, echo-y, and resonant check out Brian Eno’s ambient stuff. Start with “Music for Airports” and go on from there to some of the others if you like it.

If you’re stuck on opera, maybe you’ll have interesting dreams trying to fall asleep to The Magic Flute. I’d probably just get the tunes stuck in my head.

Also, the genre of modal jazz is rather slower and more resonant than its more hip and excitable cousins. Might be worth exploring. Syncopation would keep my mind to active though.

My insurance seemed to go down about as fast as inflation, so it feels like I’ve been paying about the same for decades. I didn’t really realize how much lower my rates were until I talked to some kids young adults.

That makes sense, but it’s going to confuse anyone that grew up with the many varieties of magnetic tape available. Look on YouTube for Techmoan if you want to go on a charming deep dive into archaic and niche media formats.

What are MCs? Do you mean cassettes? No body ever really called them micro-cassettes, (those were the thing you used to record messages on an answering machine or dictation) so that doesn’t really fit. Certainly not mini discs?

Sounds like an interesting premise for a musical.

This “clarification” is just even more confusing. Like do you mean, “What would be the effect on history if we could all see into the future, but only through song?” I guess I’d hope that we’d try better to stop 9/11, COVID, and Trump.

Pay attention this time. Nobody said they weren’t different. I just said you seem to only like one aspect of the many varied aspects of the many varied Zelda games. Your reading comprehension skills are trash or you’re just burning straw men to make yourself feel better. Stop being a troll.

Since you haven’t played them,

So wrong there. I’ve played nearly every title. My favorite has been A Link to the Past. But, there will always be a place in my heart for the original. The N64 games were okay, but don’t hold the same childhood nostalgia. There’s a good chance I’ve been playing Zelda longer than you’ve been alive. You don’t know what you’re talking about.

If those are your complaints, I’m genuinely confused about what you think “real” Zelda games are. Zelda has always been so much more than dungeon crawling, but it seems like that’s all you care about. Plenty of other Zelda games had things that weren’t just dungeons (like horse riding, fishing, mini games, talking to characters, shopping, mini puzzles, etc.) and involved a fair bit of wandering and searching. Once you actually play BOTW and TOTK you don’t even really need to bother looking for arrows anymore, they’re fucking everywhere and you can buy them all over the place.

Sounds like you just aren’t a fan of Zelda, which is fine. But your claim that the recent games destroyed anything is just plain silly.

“You’ve got to be seen to get noticed.” -Trip Tucker

Congratulations on having a normal sized head. NONE of their eyeglasses are big enough to fit around my melon. And no, it’s not fat getting in the way, just my skull. Tall people have large skulls, go figure. You’d think that an online store would be able to stock more variety in sizing. Overall, I wanted to like them, but I cannot where anything they sell except sunglasses, which oddly enough come in larger sizes. At least the optometrist can put regular lens in sunglasses frames to accommodate my apparently freakish proportions, but neither Zenni nor that other one will.

You know what’s also good “built in AV”? Good design with code that’s open to review. There’s not nearly as much performance cost to good security if you start from a good foundation. Saying windows is slower because it’s doing more security and more anti-virus is like saying I only run slow because I trip over my own feet. Like, no shit, but that’s no excuse.

And singing the praises of updates and rollback systems that are like a decade behind everything else and still a consistent pain point for users is a little bit of weird fanboyism too.

Yeah, that sounds less than ideal.

Have you tried or already had trouble using plexamp with downloaded content so that you can keep a local copy of some subset of your music library on your device? I only ask because I’ve used plexamp without issue for streaming, but haven’t really felt a need to do the local sync yet for music, just Movies and TV through the regular Plex app.