Qs re new SageTV build (server only)

[psklenar]

Planning to go with the GIGABYTE GA-EP45-UD3P mobo. No on-board video, but it does have:

+ Two gigabit NICs on-board (I could hook an HDHR directly to it via crossover cable),
+ Eight SATA II drives,
+ Twelve USB 2.0 (eight on rear panel, four on mobo),
+ Three firewire (two on rear panel, one on mobo),
+ Two PCI-E 2.0 x16 (one is x8 electrically),
+ Three PCI-E x1,
+ Two PCI (legacy),

pat----

[CollinR]

Originally Posted by psklenar

iSo. What's more important - number of cores or clock speed? Would a 2.5GHz quad core be more suited than a dual core 3GHz? Or visa versa? Or does it really not matter?

Today it's the fastest single core you can get, that why I have a P4D @3.4ghz, however the newer betas have multithreaded transcoding which will flip this back to a combined number of cycles.

2500*4 = 10000
vs.
3400*2 = 6800

That and the Q6600 has great bang:buck and better all arounf effiecentcy.

[S_M_E]

Originally Posted by psklenar

Planning to go with the GIGABYTE GA-EP45-UD3P mobo. No on-board video, but it does have:

+ Two gigabit NICs on-board (I could hook an HDHR directly to it via crossover cable),

Nice mobo but WHS doesn't support multi-homing nor teamed network ports. That said, there's a lot that WHS doesn't support that it, technically, can do anyway. You can always try it and see if it causes issues. Add a cheap 4 or 8 port gigabit switch and I think you'll be happy with the performance even using just 1 NIC.

[CollinR]

Just a guess but I'm thinking that would be used to bridge the media network with the data network so PC issues cannot effect the media services.

[Djc208]

I just upgraded my desktop with that board so obviously I like it. Eventually I'll move it into my Sage machine when I upgrade my desktop again but I think it would make a great server board.

Only problem I've had is that while it has all kinds of software for overclocking and power savings my XP Pro install didn't like most of it. I tried the "automatic" overclocking program just to see and it locked up the computer.

[S_M_E]

I'm not a fan of overclocking, at all. It tends to cause issues, I'd rather buy faster HW if I need more speed. Stability is more important to me, especially for servers.

[psklenar]

CollinR, Thank you. Since I have the HD200's and, according to the included data sheet in the box, I'm supposed to go with the "newest beta" of SageTV ... it sounds like the multi-threading *IS* in my future and therefore a quad core makes sense.

S_M_E & CollinR, The initial plan was to use the 2nd NIC to connect the HDHR directly to the server via cross over cable and static IP, basically to do just what Collin suggests; separate the network traffic. If I end up going with an HVR-2250 instead of the HDHR (in order to have available NTCS tuners as well as Clear QAM since my CATV provider hasn't mentioned going 100% digital any time soon yet) ... then the 2nd NIC is a "spare" for future use.

Djc208, Excellent news to hear of someone with this board and that your satisfied with it. Thanks!

S_M_E, Since this will be used purely as a server, and therefore stability is my number one priority ... I have NO intention of playing around with overclocking.

pat----

[S_M_E]

By all means, try the multi-homed configuration, it might be trouble free. However, if you do have issues with connectivity, stability or other "weirdness," consider removing the 2nd NIC for testing. I don't remember why it's not supported only that it isn't. I don't know if it causes issues or if the WHS team just don't want to support it. You might also search the WHS forums to check if other people have had issues using 2 NICs on WHS.

[Djc208]

Originally Posted by S_M_E

I'm not a fan of overclocking, at all. It tends to cause issues, I'd rather buy faster HW if I need more speed. Stability is more important to me, especially for servers.

I am usually the same way especially for a server, like I said I was playing around with the software to see what it allowed.

Now I do have a mild overclock on the server, but that's because I ran it much faster when it was my desktop setup with no problems for the last year. So I know it's stable, and while it's not a huge difference it doesn't hurt either.

Interestingly enough Intel is starting to build this kind of stuff into it's chips anyway. The Core i7 will overclock one or two cores by up to two speed steps if the others are idle.

[S_M_E]

I'm that way with servers and workstations. A lot of overclockers claim their systems are stable and some might actually be stable but overclocking (mild or otherwise) *can* cause "weirdness" in ways that aren't always obvious and that go away when the overclocking is removed. You see it on support forums all of the time, somebody has an issue, they're told to not OC and the problem goes away.

Evidently the i7 may be different than other processors but that's still something it was designed to do not forced to do. I am considering an i7 for my next workstation upgrade; I'm not upgrading my Sage/WHS server until I switch to HD.

[psklenar]

Again, thanks to all of you who have answered all of my questions in this and other threads. My new (and first) SageTV system is now up and running ...

• PLink USA IPC-4098 chassis
• GIGABYTE GA-EP45-UD3P
• Intel Core2Quad (2.4GHz)
• OCZ 4GB DDR2 1066 (2 x 2GB)
• Sapphire HD3650 (just a basic low-end vid card)
• USR 5670 (intended for caller-id on Extenders via SageInfoPopup)
• WD 500GB (x1 for system drive; C: & D: both w/4K clusters)
• WD 1TB (x3 for "pool" drive; all with 64K clusters)
• Windows Home Server
• SageTV 6.5.5 RC
• HDHR with two feeds from CATV (configured, tested and working)
• HD-PVR (still to be set up, need to move COX STB)
• HD200's (x3: 2 are in place, 1 more to set up after I move STB)

pat----

[waynedunham]

Pat, and I got everything finished up late last night. The server was physically built and WHS installed by Pat and I just helped him get his HDHR and HD-PVR/STB set up and working in SageTV. I also helped him install his last HD200 on his downstairs TV and do very basic setup of his extenders in SageTV mode.

The only big issue we had was we couldn't get the HD-PVR's irblaster to work at all. We got to the point of SageTV giving us that as an option in setting up the HD-PVR as a source, but the ability to set up the blaster never appeared in SageTV setup so there was no way to tell it which STB he was using, or set the delays, etc.
We could not get the main setup to run in WHS off the driver Cd that came with the HD-PVR so we had to go into the individual applications and install TME, but could not get the blaster software to install fully. It would keep throwing an error dialog complaining about 2 missing DLL's it was looking for.

Has anyone gotten the HD-PVR blaster to work in WHS? My only other guess is that it was because he wasn't given the option of the Hauppauge remote installation in the WHS install so that part was missing from SageTV.

Luckily for Pat my HD-PVR unit which was one of the first batch started exhibiting the overheating problems and I had to RMA it with Hauppauge so I had taken my USBUIRT over just in case. We installed it and now had the ability to control his STB for the HD-PVR.
Now unless he can get the HD-PVR blaster working this weekend he'll have to purchase a USB-UIRT or maybe even try setting up for firewire channel changing. Because once my swapped out HD-PVR comes home from Hauppauge I *WILL* be taking my USB-UIRT back. The built in blaster isn't an option for me since I have other Hauppauge tuner cards in my server and the blaster won't work.

Sad and amusing at the same time is that when we got everything working "on the bench" we shut everything down and moved/arranged everything in his rack in the basement. Once we got everything hooked up the HDHR worked fine, but the HD-PVR had no audio. Since we used a shorter SPDIF cable for the final installation we suspected possibly a bad cable and swapped it out for the one we used during setup. Still no audio. Hmmm, could it be because we hooked things up in a different USB port? (used the front ports for the setup and rear ports to tidy things up for the final install)
Tried switching them around and even back to the front ports and same thing, video but no audio.
It turned out to be MY bad. When I plugged the SPDIF into the HD-PVR I plugged it into the OUT instead of the IN. When Pat swapped the cables he simply plugged the replacement into the same port he pulled the old one out of on the HD-PVR. So there was about a half hour or so of scratching our heads, uninstalling and re-installing drivers. Then I remembered that there was an in and an out SPDIF and checked with a flashlight and sure enough I had put it in the wrong one. D'oooooh!!

Another friend was over for a while and Pat was showing off the HD200 extender in stand-alone mode. The guy was impressed with the ability view his stored pictures and videos as well as recorded TV shows.

Once we get a chance to show him the full SageTV experience I'm guessing that Pat and I may have another installation to assist with.
This guy is completely resisting the migration to HD so he is fully SD right now. That may give a new home to a lot of my old SD equipment like my MediaMVP, possibly the guts of my existing SageTV server (planning on building using almost identical hardware that Pat used) and at least one of my old SD Hauppauge PVR cards.

[S_M_E]

Did you try running the irblaster installer in compatibility mode?

[psklenar]

Originally Posted by S_M_E

Did you try running the irblaster installer in compatibility mode?

Was way too tired to think of that Thursday night and I'm just as tired, if not more so right now ... will try that tomorrow. Thanks!

had a group of guys over for the day today ... besides the one friend that Wayne mentioned above, another one sent me an email after he got home this evening saying how impressed he was with the demo this afternoon and asking me to provide a break down of hardware/software I'm using to put this central media center together.

pat----

[CollinR]

Just get a USBUIRT the haupauge blaster is rather limited and the USBUIRT is rather cheap.

[psklenar]

Originally Posted by CollinR

Just get a USBUIRT the haupauge blaster is rather limited and the USBUIRT is rather cheap.

Actually, I'm going to go downstairs in a bit and try setting up firewire channel changing. If I'm unsuccessful, I'll probably order a USB-UIRT because I expect to end up with a 2nd STB and HD-PVR down there eventually.

pat----

[waynedunham]

Originally Posted by CollinR

Just get a USBUIRT the haupauge blaster is rather limited and the USBUIRT is rather cheap.

Pat's using mine right now, but you and I definitely have a different idea of "rather cheap" when it comes to the USBUIRT. I wouldn't consider $50 + $8 S&H "rather cheap", however it does exactly what I want so bargain or not it was purchased.

[CollinR]

Well run a time clock on this firewire challenge and pay Pat minimum wage and we'll see which one really is cheaper.

[waynedunham]

Originally Posted by CollinR

Well run a time clock on this firewire challenge and pay Pat minimum wage and we'll see which one really is cheaper.

Ahh, but Pat's time doesn't cost *ME* anything! (woohoo free labor!)

I will freely admit I looked at the firewire option, but at the time the instructions looked daunting. Pulling code from a few locations, an instruction set that seemed confusing (if using this hardware do this), my mobo only having one firewire port, etc.

So for *me* the cost of the USBUIRT was justifiable when considering the time and frustration of trying to get firewire set up. Sure I read some people had it up and running in no time, but others were still struggling weeks later and with my luck I'd fall into the latter group.

[psklenar]

Originally Posted by waynedunham

Ahh, but Pat's time doesn't cost *ME* anything! (woohoo free labor!)

hmmm ... remember that sledge hammer and knee we were discussing the other day Wayne?

I hope to try the firewire at lunch today.

pat---