[mythtv-users] Proposed future power saving networked configuration (0.22 in mind)

[Mike Perkins]

Ben Coleman wrote:
> You must be doing a lot more than just running two frontends to demand 
> such a setup?
> 
> I run 1 dedicated backend with 6 SATA drives, 2 dual HD tuners and 1 
> Gbit nic. It's my fileserver, adsl gateway, FTP server, HTTP server, 
> DHCP/DNS server, MySQL Server, Squeezebox Server,  X10 home automation 
> ... feeding two frontends, a Squeezebox and a desktop and laptop. And 
> this is on a P4 w512MB RAM. This thing isn't running out of grunt 
> (memory is close), although I am in the process of upgrading it because 
> the mobo can't remember its settings (tried battery replacement). I'm 
> refreshing it with a quad core intel in the hope it lasts as long as my 
> P4 did and can take more functions on if I need it.
> 
> I 'hear' that analog tuners chew up CPU .. I say hear as I've never had 
> analogue tuners but the digital tuners appear chew up little CPU as they 
> do a striaght dump essentially to the disk (less than technical 
> observation). As for power draw.. well .. I might go plug in my power 
> meter one day and see what's really going on.
> 
> Do you have special circumstances that drive you to separate all these 
> functions?
> 
> My theory is less boxes = less power, which I'm happy to be proven 
> wrong. If you can squeeze more functions out of an existing setup, one 
> less footprint is a difference, and there are less boxes to maintain 
> when something goes wrong. Setting up a VM is great when you want to 
> recover somewhere else, but you do pay for the overhead to run VM.
> 
He's a developer, he needs to be able to change things on a day-to-day basis to 
be able to test things out. You wouldn't want to put your own 'production' 
server anywhere near that mix. That's the reason my master backend is in a 
seperate box, so that when I'm tinkering with the other stuff I know that at 
least my recording facilities can carry on immune to any 
(changes|improvements|cockups|disasters) that might happen.

-- 

Mike Perkins