[mythtv-users] Moving MythTV backend to another computer

[jedi]

On Wed, Apr 02, 2014 at 10:17:33AM -0400, Michael T. Dean wrote:
> On 04/02/2014 09:42 AM, Sam Jacobs wrote:
> >On 2 April 2014 at 14:23:22, Michael T. Dean wrote:
> >>On 04/02/2014 08:51 AM, Sam Jacobs wrote:
> >>>On 2 April 2014 at 11:44:11, Michael T. Dean wrote:
> >>>>mythmediaserver is for systems that have content (Videos, etc.) to serve
> >>>>but no tuners.
> >>>>
> >>>>And, FWIW, mythjobqueue is for systems that run jobs but have no tuners.
> >>>How would one go about setting up a MythTV system that way?
> >>>
> >>>What about scheduling recordings, editing rules, etc.?
> >>>
> >>>
> >>
> >>You still need a master backend somewhere on the network. This is just
> >>for the "extra" computers that do things for MythTV but don't have
> >>tuners. They needn't be remote backends (and all the tons of extra
> >>resources running one requires -
> >>http://www.gossamer-threads.com/lists/mythtv/users/365270#365270 ),
> >>especially since running a backend without tuners breaks some parts of
> >>MythTV.
> >Yeah, but the tunerless machine is the only reasonable candidate for the master backend role.
> 
> The only way that could be true is if it's because you are trying to
> avoid running cables.  Running 2 backends is actually a waste if you
> don't need them, and I can't think of any reason you'd need more
> than one backend except for scalability reasons--i.e. you have more

   Let's see. There's the situation where you have to use analog tuners
because there's no other alternative (US Satellite). This requires a
complete combination of a cable reciever and a bulky external box. Putting
all of these in one place may be impractical. Dispersing them around the
house where your TV's happen to sit would probably be a likely option.
That limits what the backends can do because they are everywhere under
foot. You can't exactly light them up and let them run so hard that they
sound like an Osprey taking off because they are running full bore. That's
even assuming that your recording slaves have the horsepower.

   It's very easy to split things up and distribute them around a network,
so it's an obvious and likely use case. Not everyone has a dedicated server
room they can allocate to this kind of thing.

[deletia]

    As far as power goes, a box that only has what it needs to do it's particular
narrowly defined job is probably going to draw less power than some monster that 
needs to be built to handle everything. A PI could be a slave backend and it doesn't
get much more efficient than that.