1. Prior to starting up the AppleTV or even unboxing it, get your patchstick ready by following these instructions
2. Unbox and setup the AppleTV to your LAN.
3. Then, navigate to the setup->general->updates and make sure you STOP the update if you can. The update won’t technically break anything, but there are some problems with the newest firmware. If you can stop it it’s better
4. Insert your patchstick, and reboot the AppleTV
5. Once it’s done open up your favorite terminal, and get ready to ssh to make sure that AppleTV can run any updates. The password is **frontrow

     ssh frontrow@appletv
     sudo bash -c ‘echo "127.0.0.1 mesu.apple.com" >> /etc/hosts'
   

6. From the menu select ‘XBMC/Boxee’ → Updates and select the non-alpha boxee
7. Wait and wait some more
8. Download the darwinx86 iso from here you can get a free login for this by following the links
9. Mount it up on the loop back and scp the /usr/bin/vim and /sbin/mount_nfs to the AppleTV
10. You will need to make sure you nfs export has the option insecure or the AppleTV won’t be able to mount it
11. Reboot one last time. You can do this with sudo /sbin/reboot now
12. Choose boxee from the menu and launch it. There are a couple of known bugs with the latest firmware and boxee version.

• Boxee starts with a black screen. The only real ‘fix’ for that is to restart it a bunch until it starts up right.
• Boxee freezes on the menu. Remove the /Users/frontrow/Library/Application Support/BOXEE/UserData/ folder.

First, I know I’m going to hell for using Ubuntu. But, I’m too lazy to compile xbmc and boxee on Fedora. So, now that it’s out of the way. Here’s the step-by-step:

1. Install Ubuntu 10.4
2. Add the extra boxee repo based on the instructions on boxee.tv
3. Install mingetty and rcconf

     apt-get install mingetty rcconf
   

4. Disable gdm with rcconf
5. Add a boxee user with and add them to the “admin” and “audio” group

     useradd -G admin,audio -d /home/boxee boxee
   

6. Add a .bashrc to /home/boxee

     case "`tty`" in
    /dev/tty1) startx
     esac
   

7. Add .xinitrc to /home/boxee

     #!/bin/bash
     while [ 1 ]
     do
    exec /opt/boxee/Boxee --standalone
     done
   

8. Make it executable

     chmod a+x .xinitrc
   

9. Edit line in /etc/event.d/tty1

     #exec /sbin/getty 38400 tty1
     exec /sbin/mingetty --autologin boxee tty1
   

10. Reboot and pray