Media Server.

BoomAM

BoomAM

BoomAM

Soldato
Joined
5 Jul 2003
Posts
16,206
Location
Atlanta, USA
Hi.
Im thinking of building a media server and sticking it in the spare room.
What im wondering is, is it feasible?

I plan to stick as many HDDs in it as i can, meaning i can cut down on the number in my current system.
I want it so i can store all my music, video, documents and whatnot on it, but so that speed of loading of said items isnt an issue. I plan to have everything on gigabit.

Is gigabit fast enough for video? particularly HD stuff?

What about OS. Server 2003? Linux? Or WHS?
The latter seems like the best option considering its very easy (supposidly) to manage remotely and very 'brainless' (just what i need at home! :p).

I did a quick spec up, and heres what im thinking of:
Intel C2D E2140 (1.6Ghz) Retail
1Gb (1x1Gb) PC5400 DDR2 RAM.
Gigabyte GA G33M-S2
DVDRW Drive
500Gb HDD
Antec MATX case
Comes to just under £300.

Add to that 2x250Gb drives from my current PC and there will be 1Tb of space on the 'server'.

Ideas, thoughts and input? :).

Thanks. :).
 
Gigabit is very fast. The only issue you might have is if you had 10+ clients connected. Take a look at the bitrate of some videos in your collection and see what they require.

I'd use a minimal Linux setup so to save paying another £50 for a license. It's pretty trivial to install Ubuntu Server and Samba then configure the shares. You'd access it just like a Windows shared folder.
 
BillytheImpaler said:
Gigabit is very fast. The only issue you might have is if you had 10+ clients connected. Take a look at the bitrate of some videos in your collection and see what they require.
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99% of the time there will be 1 client, me. The other system in the house, an iBook, will probably very rarely use it.

I'd use a minimal Linux setup so to save paying another £50 for a license. It's pretty trivial to install Ubuntu Server and Samba then configure the shares. You'd access it just like a Windows shared folder.
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Licencing costs for 2k3 isnt an issue, im licenced through work to use it at home. :).
What about WHS?
 
I haven't used WHS personally but a friend was on the beta team and he was pretty happy with it. For this project I think that a full-on server like W2k3 is overkill, same too for WHS since all you really described was file serving. A minimal OS will take up little disk space (~300 MiB last time I tried) and will consume fewer resources. As for the actual hardware you could get away with a lot less. A 200 MHz PII would be up for the task. I suppose that means you should buy that which is cheap and will last.
 
BillytheImpaler said:
I haven't used WHS personally but a friend was on the beta team and he was pretty happy with it. For this project I think that a full-on server like W2k3 is overkill, same too for WHS since all you really described was file serving. A minimal OS will take up little disk space (~300 MiB last time I tried) and will consume fewer resources. As for the actual hardware you could get away with a lot less. A 200 MHz PII would be up for the task.
Click to expand...
Hmm.
The problem is that i'd have to RDP into a linux system. Where as WHS, which has caught my eye, allows it all to be done through a web interface, along with a few nifty backup/disk features.
Im looking for ease of management tbh, and Linux, unless you can suggest a distro, doesnt offer that afaik.

What would you change the specs to then? Lets asume buying new. :).
 
It sounds like WHS would be a good fit for you then.

I'll have a go at a spec. OcUK's offerings aren't so great on the low end so I'll shop around a bit just to give you an idea of what's possible. You might even look into a Via C7-based machine, though I don't know how well Windows gets along with these. It'd really save on electricity.

Off speccing...
 

Think of it as a VERY rough idea of what can be done. That's a hair less than half of what your rig cost and it'd do the same job just as well, for the most part. You might even want to consider a full used system.
 
I currently have a box running the RC of WHS and its been pretty good.

The "connector" software that does the backups etc will not run on vista 64, although the 5 other machines in my house are all getting backed up automaticallly every night :)
Very easy setup, has been stable as a rock and only gets rebooted when it needs to for updates. Also accessing it over the lan with my MBP to stream video and my music library is also mirrored on it for my Sonos system to access. Also have uTorrent installed on it to do schedualed downloads overnight.

Spec is an old AMD3000, 1GB Ram, 4x 500GB SATA Drives.

The same machine was previously running Ubuntu Server setup as LAMP and had Webmin installed for doing configuration tasks. Didnt get as much drive space as I was running the disks in Raid5, whereas WHS I am trying it just relying on the OS's redundancy features and sofar its been all good.


You could just install webmin on a linux box if you wanted a gui, or learn to use SSH and bash commands! :p
 
BillytheImpaler said:

Think of it as a VERY rough idea of what can be done. That's a hair less than half of what your rig cost and it'd do the same job just as well, for the most part. You might even want to consider a full used system.
Click to expand...
Whats that in quid?
The case is a bit on the big side also.

BillytheImpaler said:
You might even look into a Via C7-based machine, though I don't know how well Windows gets along with these. It'd really save on electricity.
Click to expand...
C7 stuff is good, but still expensive unfortunatelly.:(

wij said:
...snip...
Click to expand...
What exactely is your WHS backing up? Just your my documents?

And what sort of freedom does Webmin allow?
 
Google tells me that it equates to £133.93 before shipping. Expect to pay more, of course, since tax in the UK is so high comparatively. I just put it out there as an idea of what's possible.
 
Hmm.
A quick re-jig gets me near to my spec at about £280. Which isnt bad for a dual core, low power/low heat system imo.
I could go AMD, but i think the X2s put out more heat than a C2D dont they?

Im certain i want a dual core in it, along with a gig of memory. Overkill? Probably, but its good to have the extra power there if needed.

Only problem is finding a good case that'll do at least 4 HDDs and isnt big, MATX size, but still had good cooling. :p.

Whens WHS out anyway?
 
BoomAM said:
I could go AMD, but i think the X2s put out more heat than a C2D dont they??
Click to expand...
The 35W AMDs consume less power than the Intels. The one to get is the ADD3800CUBOX, the X2 3800+ 35W edition. It dissipates less power at idle and at full load than the Intel desktop chips. I know this because i just bought one for my MythTV box. :p
 
Does it put out less heat than a 1.6ghz C2D though? (baring in mind that the 1.6 C2D is very lower power for a C2D).

Plus, do OCUK sell this 35W version, as i cant see it on the website?:confused:.
 
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