[mythtv-users] Backend server setup/architecture advice

[Andrew Burgess]

>I've gotten a new harddrive (only have 4 sata ports) AND am planning to add
>a DVB-S card to the system very soon.  I know that I COULD add a PCI sata
>card to add my new harddrive, but I'd rather not as I'll likely be running
>into issues if I have all 3 tuners recording at once AND am pulling stuff
>off the PCI-connected sata controller (I've had issues like that in the
>past).

There are SATA port expanders that turn one connection into
5 for about $80. There are apparently some issues, they
aren't always interoperable with all SATA controllers. That
would keep the traffic off the PCI bus although it may not
matter depending on how your motherboard is actually
designed. lspci can probably tell you if your SATA ports
might conflict with the PCI but I don't know how to read it.
I could never find an application that would show this, like
usbview does for usb. pciview and pcitree both exist for
windows.

HTH