New Server Build

[bigo93bronco]

Building a new server for 7 extenders and 2 clients (eventually) and I though I'd run my parts list past you guys to make sure i'm not missing anything.

OS - XP Pro
OS HD - MOBI 2.5" 16Gb SSD HD
Tv Record Drive - 2X Western Digital Raptor 73Gb in RAID 0 (moatherboard)
Digital Media Storage Drive 8X Western Digital WD10EACS 1TB Green drives in RAID 5.
RAID 5 Controller - 3WARE 9500S-8 (with battery backup)
Motherboard core2 quad board/cpu combo from Fry's (haven't decided yet)
4 dish network HD STB's
4 hauppage HD PVR's
2 HD HOMERUNS (all 4 tuners for ATSC)
2 FM capable tuners (haven't decided yet)
?Dual ethernet? - one for the hd homeruns on small router and the other a Gb connection to the main swith for serving the home network?

[bigo93bronco]

Any suggestions?

[Apap]

Originally Posted by bigo93bronco

Any suggestions?

Looks pretty good to me.
I am curious as to why you are only dedicating 140Gig for TV recordings when you are going to have that many tuners and that much more storage in your raid 5 array.

[wayner]

Do you really need 4 HD-PVRs? Since you have 4 OTA tuners in addition, will there ever be that many good shows on at once? I would think that in addition to your HDHRs that 2 HD-PVRs plus one or two SD tuners would be more than sufficient. But I guess it all depends on what you like to record.

I have 2 HD-PVRs, a SD tuner (all 3 of these connected to cable boxes) plus an ATSC tuner and I rarely use them all at once.

If you record any SD content then you are likely better off having some SD tuners as MPEG-2 files are much better for many purposes (Comskip, Placeshifter, lower burden on clients, burning to DVD, etc.) than H.264 files.

[bigo93bronco]

I probably will just stick with 2 maybe 3 STB's. The two raptors should provide enough storage, without slowing down the rest of the system. I'm too lazy to edit and name stuff I record for archiving so it will just get watched and deleted off of there. I allready have 5tb worth of digital media so im upgrading to the 7tb raid array for the additional storage as much as data security and performance.

Thanks for the replies, I just want to make sure there isn't any known compatability issues or anything with the hardware I have in mind.

[bigo93bronco]

since this will be a headless server, an HDCP video card won't make any difference right?

The extenders recieve the H.264 from the server and decode it themselves right? What about client Pc's?

If it would help with recording or taking any work away from the processor i'd throw a 8600gt in there. Otherwise I'm jjust getting a board with integrated video. I'm planning to control the server with remote desktop so after inital setup I really don't even need a video card at all.

[ThePaladinTech]

Originally Posted by bigo93bronco

since this will be a headless server, an HDCP video card won't make any difference right?

The extenders recieve the H.264 from the server and decode it themselves right? What about client Pc's?

If it would help with recording or taking any work away from the processor i'd throw a 8600gt in there. Otherwise I'm jjust getting a board with integrated video. I'm planning to control the server with remote desktop so after inital setup I really don't even need a video card at all.

Video Card wont make a diffence for a headless server

Client PCs and Sage HD Extenders (100 & 200) decode it themselves. PCs using placeshifter client and mediaMVPs rely on the server to decode the video.

Integrated video should be fine

[wayner]

I agree that integrated video would be fine. I just set up a new server (on WHS). I do have a keyboard and monitor hooked up but I have an old ATI9250 PCI based video card. Sage does not want to play any videos for me and this is a bit of a pain as it is useful to be able to play back some videos when doing initial config.

You might want to consider having a monitor, keyboard and mouse at your PC for configuration. For example - I found that my two HD-PVRs were somehow crossed in the channel changing. In order to make sure everything is working 100% you will have to try to record on all tuners and then watch the video to make sure all is well - it is just easier to do all of that from in front of the server. I also want to change my STBs to output 720p to my HD-PVRs rather than 1080i and that will be a pain in the butt as I will have to run back and forth from my server room to my TV room for every button press in the video setup wizard for my SA3250HD cable boxes. Some of this you could likely do with a laptop beside your server running Remote Desktop and/or Placeshifter but not necessarily everything since Placeshifting doesn't work so well with the HD-PVR yet and you will have multiple HD-PVRs.

[bigo93bronco]

cool, thats what i thought.

[CollinR]

I would ditch the SSD and go with a smaller industrial CF solution as the speed and write cycle are basically a non-issue. I would also ditch the raptors and put the TV on the same array as your other digital media possibly expanding it. Really from the cost savings of the SSD and raptors you can add another couple TB which is far more realistic. Agreed on too many tuners just ditch the OTA stuff and use PVR sources that have everything available to them. Doesn't Dish integrate ATSC? I know DirectTV does.

I dunno if a PVR500 can do dual tune FM but f so it would be a wise addition.

[wayner]

Originally Posted by CollinR

Agreed on too many tuners just ditch the OTA stuff and use PVR sources that have everything available to them. Doesn't Dish integrate ATSC? I know DirectTV does.

I think it still makes sense to have maybe one OTA tuner, especially if you already own it. The advantage of OTA tuners is that MPEG-2 files are much easier to work with than H.264 files and using OTA tuners eliminates the sat box and channel tuning which is one potential point of failure.

[davephan]

Originally Posted by bigo93bronco

Building a new server for 7 extenders and 2 clients (eventually) and I though I'd run my parts list past you guys to make sure i'm not missing anything.

OS - XP Pro
OS HD - MOBI 2.5" 16Gb SSD HD
Tv Record Drive - 2X Western Digital Raptor 73Gb in RAID 0 (moatherboard)
Digital Media Storage Drive 8X Western Digital WD10EACS 1TB Green drives in RAID 5.
RAID 5 Controller - 3WARE 9500S-8 (with battery backup)
Motherboard core2 quad board/cpu combo from Fry's (haven't decided yet)
4 dish network HD STB's
4 hauppage HD PVR's
2 HD HOMERUNS (all 4 tuners for ATSC)
2 FM capable tuners (haven't decided yet)
?Dual ethernet? - one for the hd homeruns on small router and the other a Gb connection to the main swith for serving the home network?

I'm not sure how far you can push a SageTV server, 7 extenders and 2 clients seems like a high number.

I think XP Pro is a good choice. You can defrag 64K block drives with XP Pro, you can't with XP Home. If you want to put the OS on an SSD, I would go with larger than 16 GB, maybe 32 GB or 64 GB.

I'm not sure why you want to use RAID 0, the chance of a drive failure is doubled, unless you think you really need that much performance.

The RAID 5 video storage is a good idea. I heard that the green power drives work fine, but I avoid them because they spin slower than non-green drives.

I think it is a good idea to offload your OTA channels with HD Homerun units, especially with Dish Network which charges you extra for locals. The OTA channels will still give you TV during the 'rain fade' events, when you may need TV to see the weather radar. DirecTV might be a better choice. They do not charge extra for locals, and combine Starz and Encore movie channels as one package.

Dual Ethernet cards is a good idea to offload the HD Homerun traffic and avoid network Ethernet contention.

I assume you have a lot of people in your family that will be watching all the media. If your able to record 8 different programs at once, it will be tough to watch a lot of the content. I suspect you'll be deleting a lot of the recordings without watching them, since there isn't enough time to watch that many programs, unless there are a lot of people who like to watch different programs.

You should take periodic boot drive images with imaging software. If your SageTV server quits working, you'll want to be able to recover it quickly.

Dave

[bigo93bronco]

Are you sure the SSD is a waste? I'm not sure what the IO requirements of sagetv are, but I want to make sure that its very responsive. 16 gb should be plenty for the OS drive too because it won't be used for anything else.

The two raptors I have laying around anyways, my recordings are for watching and then deleting so the size should be ok. I didn't want to allways be writing and deleting stuff onto the RAID5 array with my precious collection on it. The two raptors in RAID0 should ensure that multiple extenders/clients should be able record, skip commercials, placeshift,ect at the same time.

I allready have several of the green drives, so I kind of have to stick with them. Actually I have several of the 750Gb non green drives and I haven't noticed any significant difference between the two.

My family watches local channels quite a bit so the homeruns will get a workout. I'll probably stick with two dishnetwork boxes, so I don't want them to be tied up with local channels. I was planning to connect an ATSC antenna up to the STB's too and allow them to tune locals if all the homeruns are occupied at the same time.

[bigo93bronco]

Thanks for the responses im not trying to disregard everything I've heard, just explaining my line of reasoning.

I also forgot to mentio that I have a 3rd 73gb raptor laying around that I could use as the OS drive or add into the RAID0 array for more recording storage(im not concerned about data loss with the tv recordings).

I ruled out the raptor for the OS originaly because I though the SSD would be significantly quicker as well as faster overall....no? (I just want all the interfaces to be very responsive)

I'm also hesitant to put a 3rd raptor in RAID0 because the read time increases only slightly, while the write time goes up significantly (my experience).

[CollinR]

Originally Posted by bigo93bronco

Are you sure the SSD is a waste? I'm not sure what the IO requirements of sagetv are, but I want to make sure that its very responsive. 16 gb should be plenty for the OS drive too because it won't be used for anything else.

Yes, Not only should your server be fixed and not subject to vibration but the bang:buck on those is horrid. You are better off just making a small partition and imaging it so if you ever need you can recover quickly and just use cheap HDDs. The IO requirements of the OS disk are very low, so much so I doubt you would tell any difference after boot even against the slowest of IDE drives.

I would plan on MUCH more TV storage space, definately use stuff you already have but over time you will find having options of what to watch is very nice and with only 73GB you won't be able to have very many especially with HD content. I have 700GB FREE almost all the time and I to watch and delete, I just like to have several hundred shows to pick from when I do watch.

[bigo93bronco]

ok i'll just use the third raptor as the os drive then since I have it. (sagetv might not use it but xp will still benefit some from it)

The tv record drive is going to be 2 raptors in raid0 so i'll have about 138 gb or so of space. I won't be saving any of that stuff just watch and delete and placeshifting so I think I'll be ok. If not I have some 320gb sata's i could wipe and put in raid0.

[bigo93bronco]

what about a sound card? I have an audigy2 sound blaster sitting on the shelf, would its processor help with any of the audio encoding/decoding in a headless system?

[Djc208]

Originally Posted by bigo93bronco

what about a sound card? I have an audigy2 sound blaster sitting on the shelf, would its processor help with any of the audio encoding/decoding in a headless system?

No, that will all be done at either the recording point (encoding) or the playback point (decoding). Leave the slot open for something more useful.

[bigo93bronco]

I appreciate all the advise, i've ordered the rest of what I need to get this thing started. It will be awhile before the new RAID5 array is up, but I can still use my current 4tb array connected through eSata.

I will be using HD Extenders and Client Pc's so I've lowered my system specs to an appropriete level.

XP PRO
Intel DG43NB Socket 775 Motherboard
Intel Pentium DC E2200 2.20GHz
2GB DDR2 6400 RAM (1024 X 2)
Integrated Video
Integrated INTEL Gb LAN
6 SATA2 ports
OS DRIVE - 2 73GB WD RAPTORS in RAID1 (onboard raid)
TV RECORD DRIVE - 2 SATA 320 WD CAVIERS in RAID0 (onboard raid)
8 generation I WD GREEN 1TB drives in RAID5.
3Ware 9500s-8 RAID5 card with BBU

[bigo93bronco]

I grabbed 2 new WinTV PVR 150 cards today that will work for now while i've still got SD boxes. I've looked everywhere though and can't seem to find out if the FM tuner can be used at the same time as the tv tuner?