[mythtv-users] Backend with really crappy hardware

Maarten mythtv at ultratux.org
Fri Oct 22 12:18:43 UTC 2004


On Friday 22 October 2004 12:17, Kalle Pokki wrote:
> I just realised I have an old 66 MHz 486 machine with 64 MB memory in my
> storage room. Has anyone successfully run the backend with such a slow
> machine? I don't intend to run an X server or really anything else than
> what is absolutely necessary with that box. I do have two DVB tuners but
> just writing the data streams to disk shouldn't take too much cpu.
>
> What do you think, does mythbackend and mysql require more than 64 MB
> memory or would that just result in excessive swapping?

It's not even the memory, I reckon.  The PCI bus on that early a machine had 
so much troubles / design flaws that you will have difficulty getting 
something simple as a 100Mbit NIC working.  This obviously means that more 
exotic demanding hardware will not work.

And besides, I had a single bttv card system, and the 256 MB therein was 
almost fully used up. Thus, running with one quarter that amount will swap 
like hell.  And on another note, you may not realize it, but what would be 
the biggest harddisk such a 486 will accomodate ?  540MB ? 8GB ? 32GB ?
You can almost certainly be sure it's game over beyond 8GB, or even lower.

Build a smallish firewall out of it, but none other than that...

Maarten 



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