Wake On Lan (WOL) how to?

[bjkiller]

I have Lime Tech Unraid Server that able to support WOL.

I use server via Shares (with Microsoft network client) from different Windows and non Windows computers(SageTV Server, and many others Notebooks, and destop's).
There anyway to configure when desktop that access by share "unable to connect" to send WOL magic package automatically to server(to wakeup) and re-connect?

[Mark SS]

It should be possible to wake without requiring a magic packet. On my previous Sage server (WinXP), I was able to wake via RDP, fileshare, Placeshifter etc. Now the server is Win7 its a bit more complicated as MS have meddled with WOL "features".

[bjkiller]

Mark SS,
how to configure Windows XP computer that on access via share to wake up the NAS server?

[Fuzzy]

I think it's more a function of the BIOS/network adapter vice an OS issue. Some adapters will only issue the wake signal on a magic packet, some will work with any directed traffic. There are also methods that might be able to be run on your router. If you have a router that can use DD-WRT, I believe I've seen scripts that can watch for directed traffic to a server, and when it sees it, the router can send a magic-packet to the server to wake it. Never tried it myself though.

[bjkiller]

Originally Posted by Fuzzy

I think it's more a function of the BIOS/network adapter vice an OS issue. Some adapters will only issue the wake signal on a magic packet, some will work with any directed traffic. There are also methods that might be able to be run on your router. If you have a router that can use DD-WRT, I believe I've seen scripts that can watch for directed traffic to a server, and when it sees it, the router can send a magic-packet to the server to wake it. Never tried it myself though.

Not all traffic routed via dd-wrt, i have 3 routers DD-WRT (on each floor) i use them as WIFI AP only.

[wsume99]

I just got my own unRAID server up and running this weekend. I'm currently using win7 MCE to record shows but I plan on switching over to SageTV once I get my unRAID box squared away. That's about 1-2 weeks away.

I have my server set to sleep 5 minutes after all the disks are spun down and the server wakes correctly whenever a magic packet is received. So I'm looking for an answer to the same question that bjkiller is.

My particular situation is this ...

I have a Happauge 1250 card installed in my win7 computer that also doubles as a photo editing machine for my wife. I can automatically wake the server by creating a .bat file that first opens an executable file that sends a magic packet to my unRAID server and then opens the SageTV application. So I'm not too concerned about wakng the server when I manually launch Sage (i.e. double click on the icon that opens the .bat file). Where I am concerned is how do I wake the server when Sage loads on it's own to record a show. For instance, let's say I scheduled a recording at 1:00 am. Let's assume that both my Sage box and my unRaid server are in sleep mode. Sage (I assume) will wake my win7 machine to record the show but how do I get it to send a magic packet to the server to wake it so that the disk Sage is going to recod to can be accessed. If the server does not wake then I assume that Sage would not record the show because the disk would not be accessable? Is this correct? Any suggestions on how to make this happen?

FWIW I did find a WMC plug-in that sends a magic packet whenever it is opened however I cannot test it in the scenario above because WMC will only record to a local disk. Another reason to switch to Sage.

[wsume99]

Ok I found the following info in the Using Windows Power Management with SageTV section of the SageTV User's Guide (v6.6).

If Windows is configured to go into standby mode after a period of inactivity, SageTV will set a timer for the system to resume operations in time to record a Favorite or Manual Recording. If needed, all capture devices and video hardware will be reinitialized so that SageTV will continue to be able to use them. Note: SageTV will not wake the system for Intelligent Recordings.

Alright, so "all capture devices and video hardware will be reinitialized". Great, what exactly does that mean? So if it's supposed to record to a server will it send a magic packet to wake it?

[Fuzzy]

No, it means all capture devices (your tuner) and video hardware (your graphics card). It basically rebuilds and reinitializes the hardware after a wake-up.

[wsume99]

That's what I thought it meant but I was hoping I was wrong. Another option I'm considering is to record shows locally (i.e. to the hard drive in ny SageTV box) and then use Sage Job Queue to remove commercials, transcode, and then write the to unRAID server. Perhaps I can include some code in the SJQ plug-in to run the .exe file I have that sends a magic packet to my server. I'll have to research that one a little more.

This actually might be a better option as my goal is to minimize power use. If I record directly to the server then both my Sage machine and my server must be on for the entire length of the recording. If I can make SJQ work then I'd only need to power on my Sage machine for recordings. I'm expecting that the time to process the files in SJQ will be a lot less than the real time length of the recording so the time that both machines are on would be minimized.

For example,

Recording a 30 min show directly to the server would require both machines to be on for 30 mins, total of 60 minutes. As opposed to recording a 30 minute show locally and then moving with SJQ means the sage box is on for 30 mins plus both are on when SJQ runs for 5 minutes (?). Total time would be 40 minutes. Plus recording locally is probably more robust since there is less hardware in the loop that could cause a problem.

[Fuzzy]

That probably would work.. I'm not one to recommend moving recordings though, as it gets complicated if you are actively trying to watch said recording... I, honestly, also don't see a reason to use UnRAID for recordings, as I really could care less about losing recordings. I'd say keep recording's local to your server, and perhaps only move them if you mark them archived (meaning you want to keep forever - hence a desire for RAID protection).

[bjkiller]

wsume99, i use 1.5Tb disk for local recording, the rest of media stored on unrain server.

[wsume99]

Ok sounds like I should record locally then. Althought it would be nice to have no spinning media in a HTPC located near the TV. I guess modern HDDs are not that loud now so perhaps the benefits don't outweigh the consequences.

Other than the issue of moving the file while it's being watched are there any other problems that I may encounter by moving a file from where it was originally recorded?

[Fuzzy]

Originally Posted by wsume99

Ok sounds like I should record locally then. Althought it would be nice to have no spinning media in a HTPC located near the TV. I guess modern HDDs are not that loud now so perhaps the benefits don't outweigh the consequences.

Then move it away from the TV... My Server is actually in another room in the closet... with a 30ft HDMI and USB extension running out to the TV. Works great, keeps the living room quiet, and lets me keep my 3 STB's, my network switch, the sage server, etc, all stacked up together.

Originally Posted by wsume99

Other than the issue of moving the file while it's being watched are there any other problems that I may encounter by moving a file from where it was originally recorded?

Not really, I think there are plenty of people who move their files around.

[wsume99]

Originally Posted by Fuzzy

Then move it away from the TV... My Server is actually in another room in the closet... with a 30ft HDMI and USB extension running out to the TV.

I was afraid you'd say something like that. I just finished running Cat 6 wire from my router and switch in the basement to a bunch of rooms. The last thing I want to do is run more cables, but that is probably the best thing to do.

[Fuzzy]

Well, the 'best' way to make use of it would be to instead keep the cat6 running to the TV, and put an HD300 there.. ;-)

[ojosch]

I'm going to build a WOL solution for my HTPC / HD-200 client setup, and this is my theoretical plan on how to effectively wake the server from either of my 2 HD-200 clients, since I don't think Sage TV has upgraded the HD-200 to support WOL at this time (as far as I know).

Here's my idea: My motherboard has 2 onboard gig-ethernet adapters on it, so to do this I am going to install a third gig-e card into it to connect to my gig home LAN. So my 2 adapters in my motherboard are Intel Pro 1000 interfaces and they support wake-on-link (just to emphasize that wake-on-link is different than wake-on-LAN), so my plan is to just run 2 separate wires from the 2 onboard Intel interfaces to each of my HD-200 clients in their respective locations, and I will either enable Internet Connection Sharing on that HTPC server, or I will just create a software bridge to my third interface (which is an added-in Intel Pro-1000 PCI-e x4 card).

But theoretically, this should work, since when you turn off the HD-200 clients it should kill the link lights on the 2 interfaces (still need to verify that it does kill link lights when HD-200s are off) and then after the timeout period, my HTPC should go into standby, and then if I turn on an HD-200 it should turn on that link-state, on whichever one of the HTPC's network interfaces and that should cause it to wake the HTPC from standby. Then with the network bridge, it should be able to get full internet and LAN/netbios/Samba connectivity, but if it does not work for some reason and I cannot get the bridge to work right, I could also just leave them as the 3 separate LANs and just enable Windows ICS to get internet to each of the HD-200s, and set some custom routes in to make the 3 LANs fully interface and work like they are all on the same LAN. I also just want to clarify that the setting of wake-on-link will only be enabled on the 2 network interfaces that are physically connected to the HD-200 clients, since obviously, the 3rd adapter will always be physically connected to my home LAN which will always have link up.

Does this sound like a feasible approach, or am I overlooking some obvious roadblock here that I'm not thinking of right now?

If this DOES work, other people could do this same thing on their PCs as long as they have a couple of open card slots open on their motherboard they could just buy network cards that support wake-on-link.

Any thoughts on this?
.
.

[Fuzzy]

Guessing by the fact that the HD200 only powers down about 1W lower than full running when 'off', I'm guessing the ethernet link will remain active when the extender is 'off'.

[ojosch]

Yeah, you were right. When on standby the link state stays active on the HD-200.

I did however, also realize just now, that I still have my little RadioShack remote control power relay plugged into one of my HD-200 clients, because I used to always watch this show I used to download off the internet that would lock up my HD-200 a few times a week, so I had this separate remote control that I could turn off that relay for the power and then back on to reboot it without having to get up off the couch. I suppose as a totally LAME but functional workaround, I could just power that thing off whenever I get done watching TV so that when turned on later, it will wake the PC. Plus I would have to teach the wife that detail. Suck...

Or I could do the previously mentioned trick using the script on a Linux box since I have a DNS-323 that I did the whole fun_plug thing to, or I could do it to my CentOS router/web server since it runs 24/7. If I did that, does it make it totally seemless, or is it still a bit hoaky? I read the counts here where people were saying they had to turn the HD-200 'on', then 'off', then 'on' again for it to work. Did anyone ever refine that process to be WAF factor= 100% yet? My interfaces on my HTPC support Direct Packet, Magic Packet, and plain old wake-on-link.

[ugh]

Sorry to resurrect an old thread but I had to share a success with my Sage/MVP setup (and didn't see any threads talking about it).

Having a 24/7 dedicated linux box would defeat the purpose of my PC sleeping.

But I stumbled on the ddwrt's ability to run scripts.
http://www.dd-wrt.com/phpBB2/viewtopic.php?p=602120

I couldn't get it to work having BCAST set to my server IP, so I had to set to my subnet BCAST=192.168.2.255.

It's a bit slow to wake the server, about 1 minute. But infinitely better than running down to the basement to jiggle a mouse.

Hope it helps folks!