[mythtv-users] How's this configuration look?

[Jeff Monks]

> I'm looking to use the backend for recording-only, all in MPEG2, with all 
> playback being done by one or more frontends.  I'm going to use two 
> PVR-250s so two programs can be recorded at the same time.  Is this a 
> realistic setup?  Thanks.
>
> Backend:
> P4 2.4C 800MHz FSB
> 1GB Dual Channel DDR
> 80GB or so of IDE storage
> 2xPVR-250 encoder boards

If all it's doing is MythTV, and you don't plan on transcoding the 
recorded MPEG-2 files, then it's overkill.  The PVR-250s require very 
little system resources for recording.  My backend is a PIII-600 with 
384MB of RAM, and it rarely ever jumps into double digits of CPU usage.  
Usually, recording from one PVR-250 takes about 5% of my CPU.

If you are going to do any transcoding, then the more CPU the better.

> Frontend:
> Celeron 700
> 128MB RAM
> Radeon 7500 Video Card

This should work okay.  I can't speak to the video card, but I've used 
Celeron 566s for frontends with the MPEG-2 recordings from the PVR cards 
and had good success.