[mythtv-users] MytthTV system: ATX vs mATX motherboard?

Stroller linux.luser at myrealbox.com
Mon Jan 1 12:53:07 UTC 2007


On 31 Dec 2006, at 21:05, Ben Dash wrote:
>> In short: get an ATX board with 5 PCI slots, and
>> put it in a case
>> where you can fit three or four drives (or more)
>
> It all depends on what your needs are...
> I have just bought the parts for my new Myth Backend...
> The eventual goal is to reduce the whole house down to
> just one central fileserver where all the other PCs
> boot from the Lan, using solid state eBox 3800
> diskless workstations...

The difference is that you already know what you want, because you  
already have a MythTV installation.

You snipped Mr Smolka's posting quite heavily, as I have snipped  
yours - it does indeed depend upon what your needs are, but Mr Smolka  
quite clearly stated that his recommendation was intended for a new  
MythTV user and his belief that many users like to upgrade their  
MythTV installations from their initial configuration (as you appear  
to have done).

He explained his rationale and that it is surely economically safer  
to have a large board with unused slots than to throw away a small  
board because it will not take the one additional PCI card one wishes  
to add.

> I'm planning on consolidating 3 PCs into 1:
>
> 1 - MythBackend
> 2 - Lan Gateway/Firewall/Fileserver/Printserver
> 3 - My Desktop PC - web browsing, light development,
> word processing

I religiously separate machines 2 & 3; it doesn't matter how large  
the server is as it gets tucked away in the cupboard under the  
stairs, where it bothers nobody.

As I read your post you have a NIC & a capture card in two of your  
PCI slots, and may later put an EIDE controller card in the last one.  
Yet Myth alone is quite easily capable of utilising 3 capture cards -  
record one channel, watch another, channel-hop a third picture-in- 
picture - this does not even account for the recordings of a spouse  
or children!

> I got fed up
> with having half a dozen PCI cards to obscure the
> airflow in my PCs so I've decided to go with onboard
> everything, wherever I can.

I have to say I find this a bit of a surprising statement. PCI slots  
are at the opposite end of the board from the component most in need  
of cooling, the CPU; you have already added two PCI cards to your  
board, yet were one to purchase a board with 2 additional slots then  
cards fitted in those would be located in "dead air" and not directly  
blocking airflow to anything important.

Stroller.




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