What About the ASUS EEE Box?

[mikesm]

Originally Posted by autoboy

Eee PC can handle a R5000 HBO recording at 1080i. This was confirmed by Mike Chin at SPCR here: http://www.silentpcreview.com/forums...ic.php?t=50021

I sent Mike a file and he says it plays just fine on his EEE Box, though there was not much discussion about the CPU load. It was a short file so your results may vary...

I would be surprised if it could do 1080i de-interlacing effectively. I have had low end laptops with this chipset, and can just play 1080i, but with just awful de-interlacing. And this is with R5000 1080i recordings.

Note that the data rates you see with programs sent on premium channels even with mpeg2 vary quite a bit. I have been able to play 480i upconverted to 1080i occasionally, but any real native 1080i would crap out...

[soulprops77]

I've been thinking bout an EEE Box as a server. Any thoughts? Right now I have a HDHR and will be getting an HD-PVR soon.

No real lifting from the server with these tuners, right?

[mikesm]

Originally Posted by soulprops77

I've been thinking bout an EEE Box as a server. Any thoughts? Right now I have a HDHR and will be getting an HD-PVR soon.

No real lifting from the server with these tuners, right?

Does it come with a gigabit ethernet?

You should be able to build a NAS around a conventional CPU and system cheaper than one of these. What's the fascination with these EEE's anyway?

[Djc208]

Part of the reason for going with the 965 chipsets was cost and continued use. They're not very good from a power usage/size standpoint. Intel's chipset group hasn't been keeping up with their CPU people lately however and the chipset they were going for is not available. That said it may be another generation before Intel puts a X45 class IGP into an Atom chipset, but I do see it as a when, not if.

As for using an atom for a server, the big advantage would be power consumption. Even at full bore they use very little power. The chipset is a disadvantage again however in that it doesn't support much in the way of new tech and is limited on expansion. The biggest problem you would have in a smaller/simpler server would be that transcoding would be off limits, and comskip would be pretty slow and bog down the CPU for a while.

I think you may be better off buying a good MB with plenty of connections for SATA, IDE, PCIe, PCI, USB, Gb Ethernet (dual possibly), and then pair it with a low end or even mobil dual core CPU. AMD has a 45w dual core, and a few of the newer Core based Pentium or E4xxx processors should have enough HP for most work and still use relativly little power, especially if you make the power settings fairly agressive. You could even fool with undervolting if you really wanted to save a few watts.

[autoboy]

I just got my Eee 1000H and it can handle 1080i mpeg2 from a R5000 just fine. In fact, the CPU was only hitting 45%. Doing anything else on the system though caused the system to stutter. On the 1024x600 screen the picture looked great and I didn't ever see any issues with deinterlacing during the show.

Note, I was using PowerDVD because I only had placeshifter installed on it. Placeshifter was able to play but the CPU was pegged at 85% and stuttered at times. The deinterlacing was also really weird. Never seen anything like that before. Since placeshifter runs in overlay I would imagine that a SageTV client with DxVA enabled would be able to function as a mpeg2 HD client. If you want to watch h.264 I would stay away.

[wayner]

Originally Posted by Djc208

I think you may be better off buying a good MB with plenty of connections for SATA, IDE, PCIe, PCI, USB, Gb Ethernet (dual possibly), and then pair it with a low end or even mobil dual core CPU. AMD has a 45w dual core, and a few of the newer Core based Pentium or E4xxx processors should have enough HP for most work and still use relativly little power, especially if you make the power settings fairly agressive. You could even fool with undervolting if you really wanted to save a few watts.

I am thinking of building a new server based on WHS and I am wondering what processor to use - which of the AMD processors are 45w dual cores that you mention (sorry but I am not as familiar with AMD CPUs)?

The only thing that makes me want a more powerful CPU is the thought that when you are able to Placeshift H.264 content then you will likely need a stronger CPU. Therefore is it worth buying a faster CPU now or buy a lower end CPU now (for Intel something like an E7200) and upgrade the CPU in the future?

[autoboy]

Buy a budget CPU on a upgradable platform. Stick with intel unless you really want AMD because the Intel CPUs are ultimately much faster than the AMD ones. Especially when you factor in overclocking. For instance, my Intel Q6600 runs a 2.4ghz stock but a bump in the FSB to 1333 mhz allows me to run at 3ghz at stock voltage. It even still underclocks itself to 2.0ghz and 1.1 V when idle which is awesome.

The 7200 or 5200 Intel chips are where it is at right now IMO.

[Djc208]

The Athlon X2 4450e and 4850e are both 45W CPUs.

Intel is at the top right now, but the gulf isn't so huge I wouldn't look at an AMD if it fit your needs. I would probably start by looking at the MBs and see what gives you the best bang for your dollar. If it's an Intel board fine, if it's and AMD I buy it.

You usually want all the high end features like extra SATA ports (maybe a eSATA port or two), lots of MB slots for add-on cards, firewire, and lots of USB ports on a server MB for expandability. The dual GB ethernet ports on some that allow port sharing are probably overkill but you'll never be bandwith limited. I think the newer AMD chipsets have integrated graphics on all MB levels, which is great for a server.

Neither one is so much better you'd notice in a server, and both are only going to be good for another year or so anyhow as Intel is going to an integrated memory controler like AMD, and AMD will be moving to DDR3 which means a new socket.