[mythtv-users] Any comments about stability of MythTV for mission critical application

Steven Adeff adeffs.mythtv at gmail.com
Thu Apr 6 13:28:16 UTC 2006


On 4/6/06, Paul Wheeler <paulrwheeler at gmail.com> wrote:
> >I'm new to Linux, but did manage to configure a working MythTV (Myth
> 0.19 w/ Fedora Core 4) box >using the guide at www.wilsonet.com. My
> interest was sparked while researching a computer >based digital
> recording solution for a computer customer of mine. He has a media
> archive >business and records the local news morning, noon and night.
> He is currently using DVD >recorders, but would like to do storage and
> editing on his computer. For testing purposes, I have >setup a MythTV
> backend and networked it into my home network. I can open the video
> storage >directory on the MythTV box from my windows XP computer and
> copy, play and edit the videos. >Would like to build a machine with
> three (3) tuner cards. Is MythTV stable enough to use for an
> >application that must work every day?
> >Thanks
>  >
> >Aaron P. Uhrig
>
> The main instability will be hard drive failure (or any other bit of
> hardware but the hard drives always seem to go first :-( ). Assuming
> you have suitable methods to deal with this and keep the machine going
> then the backend will go on for ever I think, Mine has been going for
> months without the need for a restart of either the comp or just the
> backend process. It would need monitoring that there arent any small
> memory leaks in any of the software used but apart from that i dont
> see why not.
>
> Paul

easily solved with a RAID5 array. As well, 500GB SATA drives can now
be had around the $250 range during a good sale. For Mr Uhrig's needs,
assuming he only needs the SD version of the news (ie not the HD
feed), buying 5 of these will net him 1500GB of storage space and a
reserve drive in case of failure. He could also have Myth transcode
the recordings to mpg4 for longer term storage.

My thoughts for such a system:
ECS KN1 Extreme
 - 6 SATA ports, 2 ATA133 ports.
 - NForce4 chipset
 - Socket939
 - Gigabit Ethernet
5x 500GB SATA
512MB RAM
Athlon64 3000+
2x PVR-500, 4 tuners total
~550W PS
Video card, keyboard, case
~$2,500-3,000

and your good to go

--
Steve


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