First- My current setup:
1. FE/MBE - AVBox3
a) 1- 30GB PATA HD for /, 1-750Gb PATA for /myth (only 15% remaining)
b) 4- PVR-150 Tuners, 1 connected to digital STB, 3 connected to cable coax
c) 1Gb ram
d) generic AGP video card connected to 15" CRT
e) Sempron 2500 CPU
f) This machine currently serves all FE machines, but very rarely does live TV watching. Shows are recorded, transcoded to save space, and watched later. This machine can record 4 shows simultaneously with no problems in it's current configuration. The FE portion of this machine is used for maintenance/scheduling tasks only.
2) FE 1 - AVBox1
a) 1- 40GB PATA HD for / and /myth
b) 512Mb Ram
c) Geforce FX5600 256Mb AGP 8X connected via s-video to SDTV.
d) Sempron 2400 CPU
f) Currently used for viewing previously recorded shows, no live TV use.
3) FE 2 - AVBox3
a) 1- 80Gb PATA HD for / and /myth
b) 512Mb Ram
c) GeForce FX5200 128Mb AGP 8X connected via s-video to SDTV.
d) Sempron 2400 CPU
e) Currently used for viewing previously recorded shows, no live TV use.
4) FE 3 - AVBox4
a) 1 - 10GB PATA HD for / and /myth
b) 512Mb ram
c) GeForce MX440SE 64Mb PCI connected via composite to SDTV.
d) 800Mhz Celeron CPU
e) Currently used for viewing previously recorded shows, no live TV use.
Now - the proposed changes
1. FE/MBE - AVBox3
a) new 1TB SATA HD for / and /myth2 , existing 750Gb PATA HD *with existing data* for /myth, add storage groups
b) 2- PVR-150 Tuners, 1 connected to digital STB, 1 connected to cable coax, 1 framegrabber for misc video dubs
c) 1Gb ram
d) Geforce MX440 64Mb AGP connected to 15" CRT
e) Athlon XP 2800 CPU
f) As before this machine would be used primarily for recording shows, transcoding, and serving them up for later viewing. FE only for maintenance/scheduling tasks
2) FE/SBE 1 - AVBox1
a) 1- 200GB PATA HD for / and /myth
b) 512Mb Ram
c) 1- PVR-150 to cable coax
d) Geforce FX5600 256Mb AGP 8X connected via s-video to SDTV.
e) Sempron 2400 CPU
f) This machine would still function primarily for viewing previously recorded shows, but would also record, transcode, and store for later viewing.
3) FE/SBE 2 - AVBox3
a) 1- 300Gb PATA HD for / and /myth
b) 512Mb Ram
c) 1- PVR-150 to cable coax
d) 1- ATI HDTV Wonder for tuning unencrypted QAM 256 channels
e) ATI Radeon 9250 256Mb AGP 8X connected via DVI to widescreen LCD
f) Sempron 2500 CPU
g) Both tuners for this machine to be used primarily for live TV on this machine, with ability to record/trancode for later viewing when live TV is not in use.
4) FE 3 - AVBox4
a) 1 - 10GB PATA HD for / and /myth
b) 512Mb ram
c) GeForce MX440SE 64Mb PCI connected via D-sub to 14' LCD.
d) 800Mhz Celeron CPU
e) To be used for viewing previously recorded shows, no live TV use.
5) SBE - AVBox5
a) 1 - 300GB PATA HD for / and /myth
b) 512Mb ram
c) 2- PVR-150 and 1 framegrabbber to cable coax
d) generic AGP video card connected to 15" CRT *will run headless once configured*
e) Sempron 3000 CPU
f) This machine would be used primarily for recording shows, transcoding, and serving them up for later viewing.
Now, the questions?
1) Is there a way to do a fresh install of R5.5 on all machines, and somehow just add the existing 750Gb with all of it's recordings from the existing R5F27 MBE into the new storage groups setup?
2) What are the latest procedures for setting up multiple SBE's for R5.5?
3) Will the storage capacity of the various SBE's be added to the overall system capacity with the proper configuration of storage groups?
4) Will the SBE's use local storage first, or will they select storage on the MBE unit? *this is sort of related to #3 above*
5) Will the proposed configuration of FE/SBE 2 - AVBox3 (2500 Sempron, 512Mb ram, Radeon 9250 256Mb AGP 8X, DVI to widescreen LCD) be able to handle unecrypted QAM 256 for live TV? Will it also be able to record/transcode from the PVR-150 at the same time as viewing QAM256 live?
6) The current setup also has NFS mounts for a NAS device on each of the FE & MBE for video and music files. Will these still have to be mounted on each machine under R5.5, or will the R5.5 MBE map them back out to the the various FE machines?
Any advice or suggestions on how to best proceed with this admittedly major overhaul of my LinHES *without losing existing recordings* would be gratefully appreciated.
DaveJ45
PS Yes, I know that 10 tuners and 2.5TB of storage seems excessive, feel sorry for me that I live in a household with two TV addicted females!
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