[mythtv-users] most energy efficient myth frontend?

[Raymond Wagner]

Yan Seiner wrote:
> Energy consumption is a huge concern.  I'm looking for something that 
> can play back HD on composite output and use < 2A @ 12VDC.  And of 
> course cost is a big concern as well.
How important is that limit?  Are you trying to run this off your 12VDC 
lighting system?  That seems rather restrictive considering your TV is 
probably a CRT, and almost certainly running off AC.  Getting under 25W 
for the system is rather difficult, and will likely mean you end up 
buying a laptop to do this.

If you can lighten your restrictions to say 50W AC, a lot more will open 
up.  You can get an ION system and do hardware decoding for your HD 
content, however none of them come with svideo outputs, and you will 
have to buy a VGA->svideo converter.  Similarly any VDPAU capable 
motherboard is going to have the same limitation.  You can get an older 
7-series motherboard, or a discrete video card that has svideo output. 

The ION systems are probably going to run around 30W.  A relatively 
basic system with a standard desktop processor is going to idle around 
50W.  If you undervolt and underclock, you can drop that considerably.

Now about the hard drive... using an SSD is an outright mistake.  You 
just can't buy them large enough to be worthwhile, and power consumption 
during reading is no better than that of a laptop drive.  A laptop drive 
will pull ~2W, and can be had in respectable sizes.  If you're worried 
about ruggedness while on the road, go to a fabric store and buy some 
elastic to suspend the drive.  Don't use rubber as that will dry up and 
crack in a warm computer case.  My suggestion is to just buy one of the 
low power WD Greens, and a hotswap bay.  While you're on the move, 
remove the drive and secure it somewhere padded.  If you want to 
continue using a computer for mapping/GPS, have a separate suspended 
laptop drive as the system disk.