[mythtv-users] Anyone running a diskless frontend?

[Ben Brown]

Yeah your looking at about $60 for this way, but you do get much quicker
boot time, and no moving parts.  I'm really want to give this direction
a try once I get my main mythbox up and running.  Does anyone know of a
good small distro?

Ben

-----Original Message-----
From: usenet at zzz.wingert.org [mailto:usenet at zzz.wingert.org] 
Sent: Thursday, February 13, 2003 4:10 PM
To: ben at handcoder.com
Cc: 'Discussion about mythtv'
Subject: Re: [mythtv-users] Anyone running a diskless frontend?


Unfortunately, this is a real expensive way to go.  I've looked at this
already.  Reader + Card > Low GB Harddrive

One option is to boot off the HD and then turn it off.  

Another is to boot off a CDROM.  You would need either two CDROMs or
have to 
swap out the boot CDROM to play a DVD.

I think turning off the HD is the way to go.


> 
> Also, has anyone looked at using a very small distro and booting off a

> CF card.  It's pretty easy to attach a CF card to an IDE slot and have

> the computer think it is a disk. http://www.pcengines.ch/cflash.htm  
> You can get a 128M cf card for less then $40 
> http://store.yahoo.com/digi4me/12commemcart.html.
> 
> I want to do this, but I have a long way to go before I can get all 
> this figured out.
> 
> Ben
> 
> 
> -----Original Message-----
> From: mythtv-users-bounces at snowman.net 
> [mailto:mythtv-users-bounces at snowman.net] On Behalf Of 
> usenet at wingert.org
> Sent: Thursday, February 13, 2003 3:14 PM
> To: mythtv-users at snowman.net
> Subject: Re: [mythtv-users] Anyone running a diskless frontend?
> 
> 
> One more thing.
> 
> There are X procotol compressors available (in ssh for example).
> However, these usually do gzip/bzip type compression as opposed to the
> DCT type compression (yielding worse results).
> 
> 
> > 
> > Personally, I would not run X over ethernet.  I would export the 
> > root
> > of a filesystem and run X locally on the diskless machine (much less

> > bandwith given the raw bulk of video).  Although I export mythtv 
> > sessions all the time from one of PVRs for testing purposes, 
> > performance is fine.
> > 
> > If you are exporting the streams as opposed to X, the following 
> > should yield your performance.
> > 
> > I haven't had much experience with the codec that MythTV uses (I am
> > using TiVos for recording devices).  If I remember correctly 1 hour
is
> around 2 GBs.
> > This is about 582 kB/s.
> > 
> > A good 100BT connection can sustain about 90 Mb/s (11 MB/s), in an
> > optimal
> > environment.
> > 
> > Given this performance 100BT should be able to sustain approximately
> > 19 streams.  This does not include the disk bottleneck though.
> > 
> > Since X exports images in a more raw format, you essentially lose 
> > your
> 
> > codec compression rate.  So you could divide the number of streams 
> > by
> > your compression rate to achive the number of X streams.
> > 
> > BTW - 100BT has a lot of bandwidth.
> > 
> > HTH
> > 
> > > 
> > > Further to this discussion, I have been thinking about this.
> > > <Disclaimer>
> > > this is a question, not a suggestion.  I haven't tried it and
doubt
> it will
> > > be very efficient.</Disclaimer>
> > > 
> > > How about running the backend *and* frontend somewhere in a 
> > > storage
> > > room or
> > > whereever you can't hear it.  Then next to your TV you have a
> Pentium 200 or
> > > some such just running X -query mythserver?  Vanilla pentiums used
> to be
> > > quiter than a mouse.  Double that with a nfs-root and you have a
> dead silent
> > > "frontend" that only has a network card and a TV-out PCI card.  
> > > The
> video
> > > card of course must have xv support.  You have to take care of
> audio.  How
> > > about nas?
> > > 
> > > Would the traffic choke a 100MB switch?  Is this even feasable to
> > > attempt?
> > > 
> > > Thanks,
> > > IvanK.
> > > 
> > > On Thursday 13 February 2003 04:09 am, Bruce Markey wrote:
> > > > Aaron Stewart wrote:
> > > > > I dunno.. It seems like network transfer of data is adding
> > > > > another level of complexity that could be avoided, but if
sound 
> > > > > dampening is necessary, then it's a necessary evil :).
> > > > >
> > > > > My understanding was that an uncompressed mpeg2 stream ran at
> > > > > 18mbits/sec, which translates to:
> > > > >
> > > > > send->18mbit
> > > > > recv<-18mbit
> > > > > buffer->18mbit (for delayed playback)
> > > 
> > > _______________________________________________
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> > > mythtv-users at snowman.net
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> > > 
> > > 
> > 
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