Linux server with Vista/Extender Clients

[Compulov]

I've been poking through the forums here for a bit, researching my plan and I think this should work, but I wanted to make absolutely sure it sounds kosher to everyone before I take the plunge.

I currently have an HDHomeRun and it works beautifully with SageTV (trial) on my Vista laptop. I currently have an Ubuntu Linux server that runs 24/7 at home and really doesn't do all that much for what it is (P4 2.53ghz) -- it doesn't even run X any more. I'd like to give it a task. I think it'd be ideal if it could act as a server for my media, including being responsible for the PVR functions of SageTV (scheduling, recording, etc..). Am I correct in assuming the Linux server can do all that, and that I'd be fine with just using my laptop (and sooner or later, an HD200 extender) as the front end to this server? Does the server need lots of CPU and memory, or can it just take the raw MPEG2 stream from the HDHomeRun and dump it to disk as is, no transcoding necessary? Since I'd technically only being using half of SageTV on Linux and half on Windows, do I need multiple licenses, or can they share a single license key?

Thanks a bunch!
-Comp

[dgeezer]

I am not a linux user but I have considered it.

The server doesn't really need much horsepower if it remains a backend only machine, ie no playback. I use a single core athlon64 running XP pro as a server with a HDhomerun and 2 PVR-150 analogue cards and it works great.

You would need a linux license for your server and a client or placeshifter license for your laptop if you wanted to run the full SageTV GUI and watch recordings and browse other media on it. You could schedule recordings and do most maintenance type things from your laptop using nielm's webserver without any license on the laptop.

If you buy the HD200 it comes with it's own license, therefore you would only need to buy it and the linux license for your server.

[MrD]

there is a trick to makes dvds work with vista but they dont work with xp unless you use a placeshifter

[bcjenkins]

DVD Playback from Vista needs symlinks.

http://forums.sagetv.com/forums/show...78&postcount=5

B

[Compulov]

Originally Posted by dgeezer

The server doesn't really need much horsepower if it remains a backend only machine, ie no playback. I use a single core athlon64 running XP pro as a server with a HDhomerun and 2 PVR-150 analogue cards and it works great.

You would need a linux license for your server and a client or placeshifter license for your laptop if you wanted to run the full SageTV GUI and watch recordings and browse other media on it. You could schedule recordings and do most maintenance type things from your laptop using nielm's webserver without any license on the laptop.

Excellent! Thanks for the reply. Now to decide if I want to go with placeshifter or just a client license. But there's plenty of threads here explaining the difference and pros/cons, so I'll do a bit more research.

Originally Posted by bcjenkins

DVD Playback from Vista needs symlinks.

I stumbled across that thread in my searches, I'll keep it in mind.

[bcjenkins]

I should clarify my comment. Without symlinks everything will have to be proxied by the server and the client will not have direct access to the files. This pertains to comskip, dvd playback, etc.

B