Using a virtulization server for multiroom HTPC possible ?

RimBlock

RimBlock

RimBlock

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Hi,

I will be starting a renovation of my new apartment soon and have been using a WD HD Live TV for streaming media to my main TV (SD and HD). I am finding the 5Ghz Wireless is not up to the job for large files from my NAS (10+GB) so I was thinking of putting in cat6.

I have also been playing with an older (C2D 2.5 or there abouts) second PC as a virtulization server (Win 2008 or CentOS using OpenVZ) and the though struck me... is it possible to have virtual environments on the virtual server playing movies to different TV's in the house at the same time ?

Would I need multiple video cards (one for each tv) and then find a way for separate rooms to control the individual virt sessions on the server or would I need dumb terminals (maybe atom PC's) ?.

Thoughts / suggestion most welcome for this twinkling idea...

Thanks
RB
 
Illusion said:
I'm not fully understanding this idea.

If you don't mind buying Atom based machines you could just get one for each room (an ION based one for VDPAU / off loading to the GFX card) and have all the media files on your server, no need for multiple virtual machines in that scenario.
Click to expand...

Yep, this is what I have with my WD HD Live TV's.

Illusion said:
If you were meaning for actual TV through the HTPC this would get more complicated, it is still very possible using MythTV with your server as a backend and multiple front end clients.
Click to expand...

This would be the sort of thing I would be looking to move towards where one machine (server) plays multiple movies at the same time and outputs the video of each for each movie to different TVs.

I can see the server being able to play multiple movies (one per virtual session) and maybe even output the video to different video cards HDMI connections.

Bit like this quick visio...

vitualhtpcserver.png


Any ideas / suggestions ?
RB
 
Thanks both of you.

I already have a DNS-323 Nas box which shares to the network and works fine with the WD player.

I may well have a look at the playon box though. Any models in particular ?

I guess I was really trying to find out if I could run multiple virtual machines on a host server, each independantly being controlled via a tv and input device(s) (wireless keyboard/mouse) without the need for a machine in each of the rooms.

If not then I will have to stick to the NAS and multiple players.

RB
 
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