Mulitple Servers

[ChePazzo]

I am sure this has been discussed, but I can't find it anywhere.

I have outgrown my single server and am wanting to put a tuner into a second PC. For that, I will need to just install the SageRecorder software on the second PC, right?

Now, what if I want to use the HDD on that second PC to populate the 'Media Library'? Without running MS sharing and mounting the second PC as a drive on my original PC, is there a way to do this?

[ke6guj]

You could, but the preferred way is to set up a second copy of SageTV as a "network encoder".

SageRecorder is not actively updated, so it cant control the newer tuner cards.

Info can be found here on the forum, or in the SageTV Manual in Appedinx G: network encoding.

[GKusnick]

Originally Posted by ChePazzo

I have outgrown my single server and am wanting to put a tuner into a second PC.

Outgrown in what sense? If it's just a question of running out of PCI slots, it might be simpler to add an external USB tuner to your existing server.

[blade]

If all you need are more tuners USB sounds like the easiest and cheapest route. If you don't want to do that you could get a pci expansion chassis. They're pricey, but you can pick them up on ebay pretty cheap from time to time. I've always wanted one for some reason. Just never had a need so I can't justify getting one.

If you go with a network encoder and use it for storage you might want to share the drives. My understanding is if you don't all traffic will be routed through the server. If the drives are shared on the network encoder the client can access the files directly from it without having to stream through the server.

[willgill]

I'm trying to do something similar.

I have two full SageTV computers:
One on my Desktop computer
One by my downstairs TV as an HTPC

The two computers are on the LAN but do not share SageTV recording directories. I do have the HTPC reading Music and Photos from the Desktop, though.

Both computers don't use capture cards, but instead use a firewire to the digital cable box for capture and channel changing.

I'd like both computer's "SageTV Recordings" section to be populated with it's own local recordings and the recordings of the other SageTV. Is that possible?

[scoful]

Originally Posted by willgill

Both computers don't use capture cards, but instead use a firewire to the digital cable box for capture and channel changing.

What model of cable box are you using??

[ChePazzo]

Originally Posted by GKusnick

Outgrown in what sense? If it's just a question of running out of PCI slots, it might be simpler to add an external USB tuner to your existing server.

Outgrown in both PCI slots as well as HDD space. Also, my ideal setup would include a video server farm tucked away in a basement with extenders or HTPCs next to the TVs. Each server in the farm would have tuners and ample HDD space.

[heffe2001]

That's pretty much what I do, I've got my main server PC running Sage under Win XP, with 3 tuners analog tuners (2 connected to cables boxes controlled via serial cables, one analog cable) and one firewire HD box (to a motorola HD cable box), and a seperate PC (last years model Dell 8400 3.4ghz PC) running 2 DVB-S cards with mytheater and the sage encoder plugin set up on it. I used to also have a third PC running a couple more analog tuners, but just didn't need them after adding the HD & DVB stuff.

You can basically run a full blown copy of Sage as a network encoder & a client, and put tuners in a remote PC as well, you just need to make sure you can map the drives to the same locations on the client machine (or use UNC path names on your Sage setup), or Sage will be confused as to where the physical files are located, and you'll have alot of problems...

[ChePazzo]

Originally Posted by heffe2001

That's pretty much what I do, I've got my main server PC running Sage under Win XP, with 3 tuners analog tuners (2 connected to cables boxes controlled via serial cables, one analog cable) and one firewire HD box (to a motorola HD cable box), and a seperate PC (last years model Dell 8400 3.4ghz PC) running 2 DVB-S cards with mytheater and the sage encoder plugin set up on it. I used to also have a third PC running a couple more analog tuners, but just didn't need them after adding the HD & DVB stuff.

You can basically run a full blown copy of Sage as a network encoder & a client, and put tuners in a remote PC as well, you just need to make sure you can map the drives to the same locations on the client machine (or use UNC path names on your Sage setup), or Sage will be confused as to where the physical files are located, and you'll have alot of problems...

So, I have to map drives between the 2 copies of Sage? I hope I misread that!

What if I want 5 machines? Would I need a full mesh of mapped drives? That's what I want to get away from.

I guess I imagined that the multiple servers would communicate with each other and serve as clients or placeshifters for each other and that my extender (or other clients) would see all and merge them together for a common display.

And what about the extender/placeshifter? Would I have to register it with both servers?

[stanger89]

Originally Posted by ChePazzo

So, I have to map drives between the 2 copies of Sage? I hope I misread that!

The storage on each server will need to be accessible to the main server in order to record to it. I would recommend UNC paths over mapped drives personally.

What if I want 5 machines? Would I need a full mesh of mapped drives? That's what I want to get away from.

You will need to have the drives for each of those machines specified in your recording directories list on the Sage server.

I guess I imagined that the multiple servers would communicate with each other and serve as clients or placeshifters for each other and that my extender (or other clients) would see all and merge them together for a common display.

All drives are managed on the server, the encoding servers don't magically make their storage part of the servers.

However, all your recordings will be displayed in a single list, regardless of where they are located.

And what about the extender/placeshifter? Would I have to register it with both servers?

Not sure what you mean by that one. What I think you might be missing is that everything is controlled/managed by the Sage server. The remote encoding servers are "dumb", there's no intelligence built into them. The Sage server controlls all the tuners, all the disk space, all the clients connect to it, everything. If you want to use space in a drive on a network encoder, you'll need to add it's drive to the Sage server's Video Recording Directories.

As far as end user experience goes, SageTV abstracts all that from the user, just like it abstracts multiple lineups, and control of multiple tuners.

[ChePazzo]

Ok, only 1 server. To expand my media library, I need to map drives to the server. If I have recorders on other machines, the sage server will find them on the network, but to get those recordings stored on the remote machine, I have to have a mapped drive.

It would be nice to be able to do that without the drive mapping.

For example (is Sage listening), if I install one copy of the main software on a single machine on my network, and there were a 'remote server' app that I could install on other machines, then on start, the remote server could annouce itself to the network, get seen by the main software which would register it. Any time something on the remote side changed, updates could be sent directly to the main server.

OR... just install server apps on remote boxes and have the clients and placeshifters discover them much like they discover the one server today.

I guess that sounds a bit convoluted, but I don't think it's really all that complicated. Then we could have something like this: http://www.iodata.com/usa/products/p...&pId=UHDL-300U
where the server is preconfigured the NAS.

[ChePazzo]

If I install 2 copies of the main software on my network, how would a placeshifter or client see that? Would they just pick the first one they see? or would they see both and sort of munge the data together?

[Opus4]

Originally Posted by ChePazzo

If I install 2 copies of the main software on my network, how would a placeshifter or client see that? Would they just pick the first one they see? or would they see both and sort of munge the data together?

Is the second one still a network encoder, or a server on its own? If a network encoder, then what stanger said holds:

Originally Posted by stanger89

Not sure what you mean by that one. What I think you might be missing is that everything is controlled/managed by the Sage server. The remote encoding servers are "dumb", there's no intelligence built into them. The Sage server controlls all the tuners, all the disk space, all the clients connect to it, everything.

You will only have a single server for _anything_ to connect to. If this is the case (using network encoders), then don't think of the network encoders as being servers. They are client recorders and have given up any responsibility for server duties.


If you mean 2 separate servers w/o one being a network/client encoder, then they don't talk to each other at all. They are distinct SageTV systems, and any type of client would connect to one or the other. A client only sees what the server it connects to will provide to it. The client would have a choice of which to connect to. And, in this case, you'll need a placeshifter license for each one in order to use Placeshifter w/both servers.

- Andy

[ChePazzo]

Originally Posted by Opus4

You will only have a single server for _anything_ to connect to. If this is the case (using network encoders), then don't think of the network encoders as being servers. They are client recorders and have given up any responsibility for server duties.

Ok, so I can extend the recording duties of my system to multiple machines on the network and anything connecting to the one server has access to them as long as the server machine has drives mapped to the client recorder machines?

I assume the drive mapping is required also to extend the media library to multiple machines?

Ok, so let's say I set this up with 1 server running the main software and a bunch of satelite machines running encoders as well as some media center stuff. Then, I goto my extender or placeshifter and select some video to watch that happens to reside on one of the encoder machines. It sounds like that stream would have to physically pass through the server machine. If so, would there be some minimal processing so that the placeshifter sees the stream as if it originated from the server?

I guess this is what I'm trying to avoid.

I'd like to see:
Placeshifter selects video. Sends signal to server. Server figures out where content is located and sends message to placshifter saying where the content is coming from and another message to the encoder instructing it to initiate a stream to said placeshifter.

This keeps the server as the central signaling point, but not neccesarily in the datapath.

or am I just asking for overkill?

[Opus4]

Originally Posted by ChePazzo

Ok, so I can extend the recording duties of my system to multiple machines on the network and anything connecting to the one server has access to them as long as the server machine has drives mapped to the client recorder machines?

I assume the drive mapping is required also to extend the media library to multiple machines?

You have to have some way for the server to acces network drives - mapped drives, UNC paths, whatever else there may be. Just remember that service mode can't see mapped drives at all, while for UNC paths, it needs to log in as a user with read/write permission to access those paths.

Ok, so let's say I set this up with 1 server running the main software and a bunch of satelite machines running encoders as well as some media center stuff. Then, I goto my extender or placeshifter and select some video to watch that happens to reside on one of the encoder machines. It sounds like that stream would have to physically pass through the server machine. If so, would there be some minimal processing so that the placeshifter sees the stream as if it originated from the server?

As far as I know, the placeshifter runs _everything_ through the server, since it is basically remote access to the server. I don't know how else it could possibly transcode the video to a remote location. (I'm not entirely sure if anything changes at all, in terms of streaming, if the Placeshifter is used on a LAN w/o transcoding instead of connecting from a remote location.)

SageTVClient is different & can stream directly from the media's loction, if it can see the file's location itself (again: via mapped drives or UNC paths).

- Andy

[GKusnick]

Originally Posted by ChePazzo

I'd like to see:
Placeshifter selects video. Sends signal to server. Server figures out where content is located and sends message to placshifter saying where the content is coming from and another message to the encoder instructing it to initiate a stream to said placeshifter.

I don't see how this can work unless all your encoders are connected directly to the Internet with their own global IP addresses. If they're on a LAN behind a NAT router (which is the normal and sensible way to set things up) then they're invisible to the net at large and the router is going to want you to designate one single machine as the server for incoming Placeshifter connections. That will be your SageTV server, and all Placeshifter network traffic will be routed through that server.

If you plan to connect only from within your LAN, and never from the Internet at large, then you don't want Placeshifter, you want SageTVClient.

[ChePazzo]

Ok, I'm not looking at the big picture, just my home LAN. Forgot that Placeshifter is primarily used for streaming out. I use an extender. However, if I had an HTPC running the client next to my TV, it would be able to access the content directly?

Of course, anything that needs to be transcoded would have to run through the server. Again, I forget that I am not the typical customer since 100% of my library is MPEG2. I figure I don't want to tax my Windows PC any more than I have to.

By the time I get around to having a videofarm, I'll have separated the sage server onto a dedicated machine so I won't have to worry about things like this.

thanks for the info, all!

[stanger89]

edit - FWIW, I typed this up and then got distracted, I see you've gotten stuff figured out a little better, now...

Originally Posted by ChePazzo

Ok, so I can extend the recording duties of my system to multiple machines on the network and anything connecting to the one server has access to them as long as the server machine has drives mapped to the client recorder machines?

Yes, that's a good way to put it. Encoding servers/network encoders, allow you to spread/expand your recording duties to over multiple boxen.

You don't actually have to map drives, in fact, I'd advise against it, IMO, UNC paths are a much better way to go.

Basically the server needs access to everything, so if you've got storage on your encoder boxen, you'll need to specify the UNC path (or map drives) to each storage location in your recording directories.

Likewise with library import paths.

I assume the drive mapping is required also to extend the media library to multiple machines?

The server needs to be able to see it for it to be made available to the clients. So yes, if you've got media on multiple PCs, you'll have to add the UNC paths to those to your import directories in Sage.

Ok, so let's say I set this up with 1 server running the main software and a bunch of satelite machines running encoders as well as some media center stuff.

By "media center stuff" I assume you mean media (pictures/videos/music) you want imported into and available in Sage?

Then, I goto my extender or placeshifter and select some video to watch that happens to reside on one of the encoder machines.

You say Placeshifter a lot. I want to clarify one thing, on a LAN, there's no reason to use the place shifter, in fact, I would advise against that as well. SageClient is what's meant for use on a local lan. And if you're running SageTV for your slave/encoder boxen, then it provides the client capabilities.

At this point, I think it would really help if you would lay out specifically what you are trying to do. I'm somewhat confused about what you're trying to do.

It sounds like that stream would have to physically pass through the server machine. If so, would there be some minimal processing so that the placeshifter sees the stream as if it originated from the server?

The Placeshifter and Extender "execute" on the server, everything they see is streamed from the server.

The Client, is it's own instance of Sage, which executes on a separate PC. I believe it has the capability to access files directly, and will try to do so, but will revert to the server if those aren't accessible.

I guess this is what I'm trying to avoid.

I'd like to see:
Placeshifter selects video. Sends signal to server. Server figures out where content is located and sends message to placshifter saying where the content is coming from

For already recorded content, I believe SageClient does this, and will fall back to streaming through the server if that location is inaccessible. For the placeshifter/extender, as above, everything is streamed through the server.

I'm not sure what happens for timeshifting, "Live", content WRT streaming.

and another message to the encoder instructing it to initiate a stream to said placeshifter.

This keeps the server as the central signaling point, but not neccesarily in the datapath.

or am I just asking for overkill?

Well, at this point, I can't quite visuallize your setup, and I'm getting somewhat thrown by your continued use of Placeshifter/Extender. As I said above, it seems like you've got a purely local/LAN setup, in which case there's no reason to run the Placeshifter, you'd use SageClient instead. Which works somewhat differently than the Placeshifter/Extender.

[ChePazzo]

Originally Posted by stanger89

edit - FWIW, I typed this up and then got distracted, I see you've gotten stuff figured out a little better, now...

getting there.

Originally Posted by stanger89

You don't actually have to map drives, in fact, I'd advise against it, IMO, UNC paths are a much better way to go.

Ok, so exactly what is UNC and how do I do that on Windows?

Originally Posted by stanger89

By "media center stuff" I assume you mean media (pictures/videos/music) you want imported into and available in Sage?

Yes

Originally Posted by stanger89

You say Placeshifter a lot. I want to clarify one thing, on a LAN, there's no reason to use the place shifter, in fact, I would advise against that as well. SageClient is what's meant for use on a local lan. And if you're running SageTV for your slave/encoder boxen, then it provides the client capabilities.

Ok, so I really only use the extender. I used 'Placeshifter' because (I believe) that the behavior is the same using the extender vs using a placeshifter on a PC. Most on these boards don't seem to have a lot of extender experience so I wanted to reference something equivilent.

Originally Posted by stanger89

At this point, I think it would really help if you would lay out specifically what you are trying to do. I'm somewhat confused about what you're trying to do.

I am trying to find out if it is possible for the extenders to access media that is not physically on the same machine as the server without requiring the stream to flow through the server machine.

It sounds like if instead of a placeshifter extender, I used a HTPC running the client software, that it may do what I want.

Of course, in my setup, there is no need for transcoding, which is why I was blind to the need for the stream to go through the server in the first place.

I think I am understanding, now. Unless there is a 'mini' or 'child' server (software doesn't exist) running on the recorder machines, any stream destined for an extender or placeshifter will have to pass through the server.

Originally Posted by stanger89

The Placeshifter and Extender "execute" on the server, everything they see is streamed from the server.

I guess that's what I was asking. If there was any way that they might be able to access the recorders directly

[GKusnick]

Originally Posted by ChePazzo

Ok, so exactly what is UNC and how do I do that on Windows?

A UNC path is one that looks like \\server\share\file. When you set up a mapped drive, you use a UNC path to specify the share being mapped. Instead of doing that, just enter the UNC path directly into Sage when configuring your import and recording directories. Then the files will be indexed in Wiz.bin using the UNC path, and SageTVClient will be able to see those files at that same path and access them directly instead of having to map the same drive letter on the client machine to make the paths match up.

For extender and Placeshifter clients, this is somewhat irrelevant, since regardless of where the files actually live, they're read by the server and streamed out from there to the extender or Placeshifter. So in that case all that matters is whether the server can see them.