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HTPC/media server backend....what parts to buy?

thespeakerbox

thespeakerbox

Platinum Member
I want to keep all my media files on another box, in another room, via my gigab. network. I was thinking that some sort of raid would be good, but dont know which one? Striping or Mirroring? I want to be able to steam movies in good quality from the server to my tv or projector.

I want to be able to stream dvds, music, etc. stored on the server through the network and to HTPC in the living room. What kind of hardware should i be looking at. I assume it wont be high end proc, motherboard, etc, and that the most important stuff will be the NIC, Harddrives, etc.

What hardware would suit my needs? Can someone recommend a setup? I'll post up a sketch of the place later today. Thanks.
 
Ripped DVDs left as MPEG2, or compressed into MPEG4? How many DVDs?

For raw DVDs you need 4-9 GB of space per disc, so one 750 GB drive for every 150 DVDs. In RAID-5 you lose 1 drive to error correction so for 300 DVDs you need 2+1 = 3 x 750 GB, for 450 DVDs you need 3+1 = 4 x 750 GB drives etc. plus you need a RAID-5 controller card.

If you only need 4 drives (+ OS drive) you can use an Antec SLK3000 for the case, for more drives you'll need a bigger case.
 
Lots of space for hard drives. Dual core for stutter free operation maybe? Raid 0 would be useless since dvd data rates are low. Windows media edition if you are going to use windows. Speed of drives and nic doesn't matter since dvd data rates are low.

What are you going to use as satellites? Are you going to be directly connecting the pc to the the tv?
 
I plan on having a front end HTPC under my tv. The htpc will have a small quiet boot drive with an OS. The plan is to keep it as quiet as possible in the living room. I'd also love to use the server to stream dvds , mp3 and other content to different pcs around the apartment.
 
Originally posted by: DaveSimmons
Ripped DVDs left as MPEG2, or compressed into MPEG4? How many DVDs?

For raw DVDs you need 4-9 GB of space per disc, so one 750 GB drive for every 150 DVDs. In RAID-5 you lose 1 drive to error correction so for 300 DVDs you need 2+1 = 3 x 750 GB, for 450 DVDs you need 3+1 = 4 x 750 GB drives etc. plus you need a RAID-5 controller card.

If you only need 4 drives (+ OS drive) you can use an Antec SLK3000 for the case, for more drives you'll need a bigger case.
Click to expand...

As usual, DaveSimmons offers technically correct and real world advice. :thumbsup:

I will ask the following as an "add on" to his reply.

In this day and age of really fast CPUs, you'd be fine with any "newer" CPU. Storage/disc subssystem is the real point of interest here, b/c it will determine your streaming rate as well as the security of your data.

How will you rip the DVDs? Dave asked this already; it's important b/c what file type you rip to determines your space requirements.

What kind of budget are you looking at?

I'm assuming you don't want to rip all your DVDs more than once, so redundancy/backup is important. RAID 5 is the best choice, but that will require an investment in hardware RAID card, whether it be SATA or SCSI.

At a minimum, you should go RAID1 (mirror) which will require an even number of drives. In my opinion, this is the best choice for home user, BUT your space requirements will come into play here, as well as your budget. If you're going to need more than four drives (of any size) you might as well spend the extra coin and go big (go big or stay home! 😉) and get a hardware RAID card...but that may mean stepping up to a workstation class motherboard. There's big costs associated with that too. Try and stick to RAID 1.

This should turn out to be an interesting thread. 🙂

FWIW, I have a "wanna be" HTPC. I have all my music and a few movies on there. I have no probs with anything. But storage space is non-existent as is data backup. 😱 That's why I've not ripped my 300+ DVD collection yet.

Specs:
Silverstone HTPC black case (can't remember the model#)
Antec SmartPower 350W PS
Epox 8RDA+ MB
1GB PC3200
AthlonXP Barton 1.8GHz
GeForce Ti4200
WD 120GB IDE HD
 
^ good advice/questions too.

Also, if the HTPC is only for playback and you'll use a cable/sat box DVR for recording, take a look at the Shuttle X100 (review at sudhian.com)

It's a bit pricey, starting at $750 with wifig (see us.shuttle.com or mwave.com), but is tiny, very quiet, and has optical digital out. I'm trying to talk myself into buying one for a music server but might wait for the Core 2 version later this year.

An intel mac mini might also work well for $600 but you either need to use OS X or add Boot Camp and Windows. I'm not sure if there are Windows drivers for digital out yet. The mini is freakishly tiny and just about silent.
 
To be honest I would get a very normal spec machine with a nice NIC in it and stick Linux on it. Do not much power for what is basically a one user file server. then run use a tiny mac, shuttle(bit loud), laptop can be hidden away use VLC player for video over mapped drives
 
I'm not too familar with the mpeg2 vs mpreg4 compression stuff. I would prefer something losless, but i can compress without losing quality, then id love to. I'll have to read up on that.

For streaming, if im running on a gigabit network, whats my limiting factor? Is it the hard drive itself (5400,7200, etc), the interface (sata II, sata , scsi), or the cpu ?
 
Streaming is under 12 mbit (peak) for DVD, = 1.2 MB, so neither the CPU nor the disk drives need to work hard. A Pentium 2 and 4200 RPM drives could easily supply that.

The only hard part for your server is managing huge amounts of storage. If you really want to store hundreds of DVDs then you will be needing terabytes of storage and spending $800 - $1,600+ just for the hard drives.

You still only need a Sempron and cheap socket 754 motherboard to use the array, plus a controller card. The only reason to buy a faster CPU is if you do want to try lossy MPEG4 compression to reduce the storage needed.
 
Originally posted by: DaveSimmons
Streaming is under 12 mbit (peak) for DVD, = 1.2 MB, so neither the CPU nor the disk drives need to work hard. A Pentium 2 and 4200 RPM drives could easily supply that.

The only hard part for your server is managing huge amounts of storage. If you really want to store hundreds of DVDs then you will be needing terabytes of storage and spending $800 - $1,600+ just for the hard drives.

You still only need a Sempron and cheap socket 754 motherboard to use the array, plus a controller card. The only reason to buy a faster CPU is if you do want to try lossy MPEG4 compression to reduce the storage needed.
Click to expand...

can you explain about the controller card? The controller card would only be in the server correct? The only thing on other pcs would be the network connection, correct?
 
If you're looking at HD-DVD or Blu-Ray, to give some perspective, you're looking at ca 30-45GB per movie assuming you're ripping the TS files to HDD (which is probably what you're saying). It's a rough time to start a media server due to the up-in-the-air format and Blu-Ray is so DRM'd out (just releasing the PC drives) it doesn't play well on the PC. You can understand in a way, poor movie companies and people with multi-TB storage solutions and a Blockbuster card. But HD is here, all the major titles are releasing and there are a fair number of HD-DVDs available. Plus STB technology is improving with the capabilities of better scaling options (just look at the Toshiba A1, which is basically an appliance computer).

Don't know if any of that helps, but I just felt the need to explain that before someone takes this opportunity to do a significant investment on what appears to be a soon defunct platform. We'll see how much the lawyers demand of our ability to manipulate digital media. The new techs are not CPU intensive, unlike current non-HD DVDs which are best run on as fast of a CPU as possible (with only some influences from video choice).

EDIT: Remeber HDCP compliance for all parts going into a media PC.
 
Originally posted by: Slammy1
If you're looking at HD-DVD or Blu-Ray, to give some perspective, you're looking at ca 30-45GB per movie assuming you're ripping the TS files to HDD (which is probably what you're saying). It's a rough time to start a media server due to the up-in-the-air format and Blu-Ray is so DRM'd out (just releasing the PC drives) it doesn't play well on the PC. You can understand in a way, poor movie companies and people with multi-TB storage solutions and a Blockbuster card. But HD is here, all the major titles are releasing and there are a fair number of HD-DVDs available. Plus STB technology is improving with the capabilities of better scaling options (just look at the Toshiba A1, which is basically an appliance computer).

Don't know if any of that helps, but I just felt the need to explain that before someone takes this opportunity to do a significant investment on what appears to be a soon defunct platform. We'll see how much the lawyers demand of our ability to manipulate digital media. The new techs are not CPU intensive, unlike current non-HD DVDs which are best run on as fast of a CPU as possible (with only some influences from video choice).

EDIT: Remeber HDCP compliance for all parts going into a media PC.
Click to expand...

I'm not sure about the user interface on the new toshiba players, but I think the htpc platform offers much more for my purposes. As far as i know, you cant game or surf the net using HDDVD players. I myself am not a cutting edge tech adopter , so worrying about HDDVD and Blueray would come at least a couple of months down the road, and hopefully by then the battle will be over. Another plus in my book is knowing that the HTPC can actually work well with a backend server. I'm not sure of the toshibas networking capability.

I dont know much about HDPC compliance, so im sure ill have to read up. lol 🙂
 
Originally posted by: thespeakerbox
Originally posted by: DaveSimmons
You still only need a Sempron and cheap socket 754 motherboard to use the array, plus a controller card. The only reason to buy a faster CPU is if you do want to try lossy MPEG4 compression to reduce the storage needed.
Click to expand...
can you explain about the controller card? The controller card would only be in the server correct? The only thing on other pcs would be the network connection, correct?
Click to expand...
Yes
my post was about the file server not the HTPC.

The file server needs only a cheap CPU, a modest amount of RAM, a RAID-5 controller, and massive amounts of disk storage.

The HTPC needs just a little 80GB hard drive if not recording, and also a low-end CPU if only playing back DVDs and not high-def content. High def needs a better CPU and if possible a video card with hardware assistance.
 
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