Media Server

[Dockhead]

Originally Posted by conachair

Probably, but building from scratch the Pi is well worth a look. Low power, tiny footprint and well up to the job. Hide it somewhere.

Looks like a remote is easy to sort as well if you're just a little geeky

Overview | Using an IR Remote with a Raspberry Pi Media Center | Adafruit Learning System

But I think you need decent graphics processing for 1080p, don't you? I can see the difference on my laptop (pretty good CPU with onboard graphics --2.8GHz Core i7) versus connected to the docking station (adds separate graphics processor - AMD HD 6650M). I would think a Raspberry Pi would be hard pressed to do all that graphics processing smoothly.

[conachair]

Originally Posted by Dockhead

But I think you need decent graphics processing for 1080p, don't you? I can see the difference on my laptop (pretty good CPU with onboard graphics --2.8GHz Core i7) versus connected to the docking station (adds separate graphics processor - AMD HD 6650M). I would think a Raspberry Pi would be hard pressed to do all that graphics processing smoothly.

I haven't tried a side by side but apparently the videocore iv GPU handles it all.

Lots demos on YouTube.







The SoC is a Broadcom BCM2835. This contains an ARM1176JZFS, with floating point, running at 700Mhz, and a Videocore 4 GPU. The GPU is capable of BluRay quality playback, using H.264 at 40MBits/s. It has a fast 3D core accessed using the supplied OpenGL ES2.0 and OpenVG libraries.

[Dockhead]

Originally Posted by conachair

I haven't tried a side by side but apparently the videocore iv GPU handles it all.

Lots demos on YouTube.







The SoC is a Broadcom BCM2835. This contains an ARM1176JZFS, with floating point, running at 700Mhz, and a Videocore 4 GPU. The GPU is capable of BluRay quality playback, using H.264 at 40MBits/s. It has a fast 3D core accessed using the supplied OpenGL ES2.0 and OpenVG libraries.

Cool. Very impressive.

[conachair]

Originally Posted by Dockhead

Cool. Very impressive.

For twenty five quid it is


(quid is a UK pound for the rest of you )

[goboatingnow]

Hi dock head, purely tech stuff, no phycology

For domestic use a raid device is useful , however I find that typically I don't bother with raid anymore as I find its often the electronics on the cheaper servers that drops out not the disks. Hence I've switched to mirrored Sata drives , my mirroring runs in the background , ( disks are cheap ) raid 5 is really a throwback to the days of 5000 hour MTBF drives.

I run incremental backup software on a custom home Linux distro, to do all this. These days however at home it's all nearly streaming based and the drive farm is rarely being used.

On board it's a bit more tricky , most of the cheapie media servers are poor build quality. Personally , if you want to flash the cash , I'd build a SSD server. Virtually indestructible. 250 GB at around £ 150 , easily to build say a I tb unit.


The pi is quite a capable 1080 server , even if some of the software isn't Up to the job. But it's a homebrew solution

For a good cinema like experience on the boat , install a surround sound like AC5.1 and use one of the betters" personal projectors " onto a white screen pulled down from the headliner ( hey yet another project ) saw this on a yacht in Cannes , great viewing experience. If you can get 70-80 diagonal inches of viewing you forget it's a TV and it feels more like a cinema


Dave

[JRM]

Originally Posted by colemj

The suggestions to stick with optical media are insane. Besides taking up space, optical media never lasts more than a year or so on our boat before they self-destruct. We have had UNOPENED DVD's that were not playable when we finally got around to opening them after a couple of years. Mark

I think you may be doing it wrong... The boat I bought sat for six years, and spent the couple previous to that in the South Pacific. It came with a bunch of CD-R media, and the few that I've messed with so far are all fully functional. They're easily all 10 years old plus. I've had the same personal DNS domain for 16 years, and I still have valid CD-R backups of my original server. I can't say the same for hard disks.

If you stop and actually think about it, instead of just immediately dismissing it, optical media have many upsides. I've listed some above. They do have some drawbacks, but insanity isn't really one of them.

To me, it seems like the OP's goal is more data archiving than backup. In that he wants to take huge amounts of data with him, data that does not necessarily have to be immediately available. Optical media excel at data archiving, and have since they first appeared (and we all called them WORM drives). If I'm wrong, and he wants immediate access to all his media 24/7 then optical is unfit for the purpose.

I also second the Raspberry Pi. While the beaglebone black is faster, the video subsystem on the Pi is better, if for no other reason than it has a full size HDMI connector (there are others). The Pi makes a better media server.

To jump around a bit more in this post... Your chosen encoding scheme does limit you. It appears that you've already considered the variables and options and made an informed decision based on your equipment and preferences. As such, I'll assume you've already thought of this, but I'll toss it out there anyway: since you don't wish to sacrifice video quality, have you considered dialing down the audio? A lot of extra channels takes up a lot of space. I know it's sacrilege to sacrifice audio, but it's an option (my mentor in things multimedia used to always harp that audio was more important than video by asking "which is scarier; a silent movie or radio play?").

JRM

[K_V_B]

Originally Posted by conachair

Probably, but building from scratch the Pi is well worth a look. Low power, tiny footprint and well up to the job. Hide it somewhere. Looks like a remote is easy to sort as well if you're just a little geeky http://learn.adafruit.com/using-an-i...-media-center/

I've got a raspberry ip xmbc media player, and can confirm that it's up to the job. Mine I just stuck to the back of the TV, and power it from a USB socket (originally intended to charge 3D glasses).

Nice feature of XMBC is that it understands HDMI-CEC, so I don't have to deal with another remote. The tv remote works just fine...

[goboatingnow]

Originally Posted by JRM

I think you may be doing it wrong... The boat I bought sat for six years, and spent the couple previous to that in the South Pacific. It came with a bunch of CD-R media, and the few that I've messed with so far are all fully functional. They're easily all 10 years old plus. I've had the same personal DNS domain for 16 years, and I still have valid CD-R backups of my original server. I can't say the same for hard disks.

If you stop and actually think about it, instead of just immediately dismissing it, optical media have many upsides. I've listed some above. They do have some drawbacks, but insanity isn't really one of them.

To me, it seems like the OP's goal is more data archiving than backup. In that he wants to take huge amounts of data with him, data that does not necessarily have to be immediately available. Optical media excel at data archiving, and have since they first appeared (and we all called them WORM drives). If I'm wrong, and he wants immediate access to all his media 24/7 then optical is unfit for the purpose.

I also second the Raspberry Pi. While the beaglebone black is faster, the video subsystem on the Pi is better, if for no other reason than it has a full size HDMI connector (there are others). The Pi makes a better media server.

To jump around a bit more in this post... Your chosen encoding scheme does limit you. It appears that you've already considered the variables and options and made an informed decision based on your equipment and preferences. As such, I'll assume you've already thought of this, but I'll toss it out there anyway: since you don't wish to sacrifice video quality, have you considered dialing down the audio? A lot of extra channels takes up a lot of space. I know it's sacrilege to sacrifice audio, but it's an option (my mentor in things multimedia used to always harp that audio was more important than video by asking "which is scarier; a silent movie or radio play?").

JRM

Using optical storage really makes no sense. Firstly it's bulky in volume , secondly it's not electronically searchable , third writing times are still abysmally slow. It's a dated storage technology. Furthermore WORM laser drives are notoriously unreliable . SSD is where it's at , at the moment.


Think of the number of DVDs needed to store 3-5 TB ?

Dave

[goboatingnow]

Originally Posted by K_V_B

I've got a raspberry ip xmbc media player, and can confirm that it's up to the job. Mine I just stuck to the back of the TV, and power it from a USB socket (originally intended to charge 3D glasses).

Nice feature of XMBC is that it understands HDMI-CEC, so I don't have to deal with another remote. The tv remote works just fine...

Which reminds me why the hell apple didn't put CEC into the Apple TV. Drives me nuts the box can't switch the tv on

Dave

[noelex 77]

Originally Posted by Dockhead

I think most people would use their normal computers, wouldn't they?

A lot of people do.
I used to do this but as my laptop was used for other duties in other locations to set set up a movie involved plugging power, HDMI, speakers, and external hard drives. In addition the screen needed switching to the external monitor and the resolution changing. Sound settings needed to be altered.
It consumed a couple amps even with the laptop screen off.

OK I realise this nobody is feeling sorry for me , but computing power is cheap so a dedicated low power PC mounted out of the way with all the right connections and settings to run your monitor for watching movies has some appeal.

I chose a fan less sealed atom pc, but the alternatives of Raspberry pi, or android media player are appealing.
All these options have the advantages of lower power consumption, no extra cables to connect, no settings to change and very quick set up. Given the low, or very low cost it is worth considering.

[colemj]

Originally Posted by JRM

I think you may be doing it wrong... The boat I bought sat for six years, and spent the couple previous to that in the South Pacific. It came with a bunch of CD-R media, and the few that I've messed with so far are all fully functional. They're easily all 10 years old plus. I've had the same personal DNS domain for 16 years, and I still have valid CD-R backups of my original server. I can't say the same for hard disks.

You have certainly done better with them than we have, as well as everyone we have met out cruising. We have a very dry boat, yet CD's and DVD's still get "cancer" - where the metallic layer gets eaten away. Never saw that happen on land, where decades old CD's looked just fine. Now, every swap meet, sharing point, etc are stuffed with DVD's and CD's that are in horrible shape. And this seems to happen to everyone.

We have 2TB of movies. I would hate to think of storing that on DVD's and how many it would require (400? 500?). And I would have to have a burner to make them. And lots of time and motivation for doing it. And then I would have to have a DVD player connected to the TV to use them. And I would need a filing database to determine which discs had which files. And once I found the disc containing the file I wanted, I would have to scrub through it to find the file I wanted. And if I decided part way in that it is a stupid movie and wanted to watch something else, I would have to start over again. And then I couldn't share them without dumping a box of them on someone else and expecting them to scrub through them and save the ones they wanted. And if someone had something I wanted, I would have to burn another DVD just for it.

Compared to a single, easily searched, updated and loaned 4"x3" hard drive?

Yep, I'm sticking with insanity.

Mark

[ReMetau]

We use portable USB drives. We currently have about 7 drives ranging from 750 MB to 1.5 tb that store our photos, movies, tv shows, documentaries, and music. For the music and photos, they are back up drives. For TV and movies, we back up to another powered drive we store in a pelican case.

We use our movie and TV drives with a media player connected to the TV which is connected to our amplified stereo for sound.

[JRM]

Originally Posted by colemj

You have certainly done better with them than we have, as well as everyone we have met out cruising. We have a very dry boat, yet CD's and DVD's still get "cancer" - where the metallic layer gets eaten away. Never saw that happen on land, where decades old CD's looked just fine. Now, every swap meet, sharing point, etc are stuffed with DVD's and CD's that are in horrible shape. And this seems to happen to everyone. We have 2TB of movies. I would hate to think of storing that on DVD's and how many it would require (400? 500?). And I would have to have a burner to make them. And lots of time and motivation for doing it. And then I would have to have a DVD player connected to the TV to use them. And I would need a filing database to determine which discs had which files. And once I found the disc containing the file I wanted, I would have to scrub through it to find the file I wanted. And if I decided part way in that it is a stupid movie and wanted to watch something else, I would have to start over again. And then I couldn't share them without dumping a box of them on someone else and expecting them to scrub through them and save the ones they wanted. And if someone had something I wanted, I would have to burn another DVD just for it. Compared to a single, easily searched, updated and loaned 4"x3" hard drive? Yep, I'm sticking with insanity. Mark

Ummmmm. I don't think your picking up what I'm putting down. Obviously. So let's go back a few steps.

I'm going to try really hard not to be a total jerk, but this is going to be hard. I mean, you're kidding right? Please tell me this is a total troll. Because I'm having a hard time believing that anyone would mistake the term "optical media" for DVD viewable format discs. I mean, the "V" stands for "versatile" not "video" even so.

This is probably totally pointless, but I'm stuck here with nothing better to do, so here goes...

Optical media is just that, a form of media. It comes in several flavors, the most common being CD, DVD, and BluRay. Read/write drives are available for each of these. Some even have re-writable options. I personally use BDR discs currently, because they have the highest capacity. Think of it like a hard drive that you write one and read as often as you like. Data stored can be in any format.

Even assuming single layer BD media, you could duplicate your entire 2TB archive with 100 disks. It would take 50 for dual layer. I agree, that is insanity. Having that much media data, I mean. You probably could have bought my boat with what you paid for that much entertainment (wink). That stack, even in low profile jewel cases, would take up less space than two volumes of Bowditch. In a binder, about as much space as a Grisham hardback. Even if it took you half an hour each, at the 100 mark, your talking 50 hours total burn time. It's a lot, but I'd be curious how much time the OP has devoted to ripping so far... I'll wager it's way more than that (and the archiving is way less)

I made the mistake of assuming a base level of knowledge in this discussion. I'll drop it back a level. Basically, if it were me, I would have a single hard drive for normal use. But I'd make a copy of all that media on BDR discs. These would go in a binder in drawer. They're a backup. They're insurance against all the time the OP has spent dialing in his collection. Not for everyday use. It's a much safer backup solution because they require no additional power (a la RAID), they last much longer than magnetic media (swap meet Chinese knockoff disc experiences notwithstanding), they're basically infinitely expandable, and they media is physically differentiated from the electronic equipment (replacing the electronics doesn't result in data loss like it would with an HDD).

Now if, armed with this new information, you still consider me insane then we'll just have to agree to disagree. Because I'm in good company :-)

JRM

[colemj]

Some users do find optical media to be useful on their boats (notice the "cancer" on these).

Mark

[goboatingnow]

JRM, I think you demean many people here, Even at 50Gb BDRs , and these are around $25 each for good brands, you have too many disks. ( and a 2TB will be in excess of $1000 in media alone) Then you have the issue of search ability or maintaining an upto date online files list.

Its simply too much effort for no gain, instead build a 1Tb SSD ( crucials is currently about $400). You have all the resilience of BDRs, with the online instant access of hard disk access, coupled with the lack of mechanical handling , which gets all optical media in the end.

When your online media is getting large , its the cataloguing and instant access that defines your need. No point spending hours shuffling disks.

I see 5-10TB medias servers in the near future in peoples houses.( or very very fast Internet, I have 150Mb cable, and its still not practical to store everything in the cloud )

Dave