[mythtv-users] 1.6GHz Intel Atom as a SD-only backend?

[Mark Knecht]

On Wed, Sep 1, 2010 at 8:19 AM, Brian Wood <beww at beww.org> wrote:
> On Wednesday, September 01, 2010 09:07:29 am Mark Knecht wrote:
>> Hi,
>>    I'm wondering if anyone has experience using an Intel Atom as a
>> backend for standard definition only. Any problems?
>>
>>    I've mostly shifted to DirercTV and just use their recorder for the
>> house but I don't have access to that in my office. I was thinking
>> about setting up Myth to use my HDHR which still gets local channels
>> off the cable. It's only going to record a few shows a night, mostly
>> Letterman, Ferguson and maybe 1 or 2 network shows. I'll use external
>> USB storage for the video.
>>
>>    This machine will not be used as a frontend. Backend _only_.
>>
>>    I had an old PowerPC-based Mac Mini which worked fine but may have
>> bot the dust so if I cannot get it working I wanted to buy something
>> _really_ cheap. I suspect this will work and am just looking for
>> anyone who knows differently.
>
> The only backend activities that require much CPU horsepower are commercial flagging and transcoding. Other than that it's
> pretty much just a disk I/O machine. This assumes you are using capture devices that output an already-encoded stream,
> which the HDHR does.
>
> If you are not commflagging/transcoding, or are doing so and are not in any hurry for the results, just about anything
> should work. You might even look for an older P4 or even a 1Ghz. P3 machine, though if power consumption is an issue an
> Atom might be better at that.
>
> Backends just don't need much CPU.
>
> USB storage can be slow, but unless you are doing multiple HD streams at the same time you should be OK. eSATA is faster,
> and would give you some headroom on disk I/O. Older P4 class machines could do IDE or SATA (perhaps needing a PCI
> adapter), which would save the external cases, power bricks etc. involved with multiple external USB drives.

Thanks Brian. You confirm pretty much what I thought.

Commercial flagging speed isn't much of an issue. Programs get
recorded in the evening and I watch them the next day. I don't
intentionally transcode. I've just used Myth in whatever state it
comes in as default, record from the HDHR, and then stream the HDHR
recordings to my office in another part of the house the next day
while I'm working.

Most important to me, by far, is silence followed by power
consumption. I think this little Atom box probably is pretty quiet (I
hope) and almost certainly won't consume a lot of power.

Thanks for the insights.

Cheers,
Mark