To have your own media center, just turn your raspberry Pi through OSMC in the finest and easiest way possible. OSMC is optimized in a way that it can turn Raspberry Pi into a media center very quickly.
OSMC is an operating system distribution that has an easy built-in Kodi functionality that can be installed in your Raspberry Pi with the best optimization.
Now, install Kodi on your Raspberry Pi as OSMC does not support Pi 4, or look for LibreELEC and XBian.
Pre-requisite
- Raspberry Pi
- Micro SD Card (8GB+)
- Ethernet Cord or Wifi dongle
- External Hard drive
- Raspberry Pi case (Optional)
- USB keyboard (Optional)
- USB mouse (Optional)
Steps to Follow
STEP-1 Installing OSMC on your Raspberry Pi
Install the OSMC in your SD card by following these steps-
- Go to the OSMC download page to get the image of it before installing it to the Pi.
- On the bottom of the page, you’ll see a disk images button, click on it and you will get a list of OSMC images with suitable versions of Raspberry Pi. Select the image on the top of the list and download it.
- Now, we require to install a tool to write the OSMC downloaded image on the SD card. We’ve used Etcher as this the best in the current times.
- After downloading & installing Etcher, click on the select image button and browse for the image you downloaded previously then select it.
- Tap on Select Drive and press Continue, ensure that you’re getting it into the SD card.
- Now, write OSMC to the Pi’s SD card and click on Flash, it will start the process of flashing.
- Once your software has finished writing the OSMC image to your SD card, take it out and insert it into your device.
STEP-2 Initial Setup of OSMC on Raspberry Pi
We’ll start with the initial setup of the OSMC, to do so follow the steps below-
- Click on the OSMC file and begin the process
- First, select your preferred language from the numerous options for your OSMC installation and select yes to continue with your option.
- Now, it’s time for you to select your timezone for the OSMC installation, select it based on the area you’re living at.
- In the steps later, you’ll have to name your device (if you want to) and the default name will be ‘OSMC’. If you want to go ahead with it, click on the Accept option to continue.
- Then, by default, the SSH will be enabled. Select Accept to proceed further with the installation.
- Now, you need to accept the terms & conditions of both, OSMC’s and Kodi’s if you’re good to go with the privacy and terms, tap on Continue on the left of the screen.
- It is your choice to set up the network now or later (we’ve explained it later so select later).
- Next is to set up the theme for OSMC and the default theme is the classic look of Kodi. Also, you can go through the guide for the other themes smoothly later.
- Now, the initial installation is done, select the exit option on the OSMC and come back to the main Kodi screen.
STEP-3 Configuring Network Settings in OSMC
In this column, we’ll see how to use the OSMC interface to configure network settings with your device.
- Go to the ‘My OSMC’ menu on the OSMC Config main screen.
- Now, in the same section select the icon on the bottom of the wheel i.e. the ‘Network Configuration’.
- Within the network configuration tool option, you can change the control settings for “Wired“, “Wireless“, and “Bluetooth” adapters.
STEP-4 Adding Videos for OSMC to Scrape
So, finally is the time to add your video folder for OSMC to scrape. We’ll learn here, how? It is easy and quick, is one of the key features of Kodi.
- Go to the videos menu
- Select ‘Files’ submenu
- Now, select the add videos option
- In the same menu, either select the Browse option or the Add option.
Note- for the browse option, you’ll be allowed to locate the folders through OSMC, and with the add option, you can enter the path to your directory manually. Also, make sure to split the folders of TV shows and movies as the Kodi Scraper cannot differentiate between the two if they are in the same folder.
- On this screen, you need to select the “This directory contains” option as this will allow us to choose what type of videos are in the directory.
- Then, you’ll be asked to select the type of video are there in this particular folder.
- OSMC split the videos into three categories i.e. Movies, Music, and TV shows.
- Select the most preferred option based on your video as it will affect how the OSMC scrapes the video for information.
- Once you’re done with the categorization, click on Ok.
Now OSMC will scan the videos and search their name database on the internet. This will retrive the data like posters, actors, etc. about the videos.
Tap on ok and the scraping process will start automatically. Woohoo! You can start watching your movies, shows that are added to the OSMC interface.
Now you can easily use the OSMC Kodi distribution on the Raspberry Pi, and can be expanded further by setting up Netflix.
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