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Mythtv on Server hardware

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toby at np

Jun 30, 2010, 8:29 PM

Post #1 of 17 (1540 views)
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Mythtv on Server hardware

I'm due for a backend upgrade and thinking of picking up a Dell 2650 or
2850.
These have PCIx slots.

Does anyone have any experience running a Skystar2 and or PVR150 card in
these slots.

I understand the PVR150 needs modification, but am not sure what it is.

Any suggestions would be useful.

Cheers
Toby

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stevehodge at gmail

Jun 30, 2010, 8:52 PM

Post #2 of 17 (1487 views)
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Re: Mythtv on Server hardware [In reply to]

On Thu, Jul 1, 2010 at 3:29 PM, toby [at] np <toby [at] np> wrote:

> I'm due for a backend upgrade and thinking of picking up a Dell 2650 or
> 2850.
> These have PCIx slots.
>
> Does anyone have any experience running a Skystar2 and or PVR150 card in
> these slots.
>
> I understand the PVR150 needs modification, but am not sure what it is.
>
> Any suggestions would be useful.
>

As far as I know the only potential incompatibility is the voltage - PCI-X
only supports 3.3v cards, not the 5.0v that PCI 1.0 cards require. I doubt
there is anything you can do to get a 5.0v card to work. Assuming the cards
are 3.3v cards then it's just a matter of whether they physically fit in the
slot (i.e. keyed correctly and don't obstruct the excess part of the slot).

Cheers,
Steve

duncan.kennington at gmail

Jun 30, 2010, 8:55 PM

Post #3 of 17 (1491 views)
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Re: Mythtv on Server hardware [In reply to]

On 1 July 2010 15:29, toby [at] np <toby [at] np> wrote:

> I'm due for a backend upgrade and thinking of picking up a Dell 2650 or
> 2850.
> These have PCIx slots.
>
> Does anyone have any experience running a Skystar2 and or PVR150 card in
> these slots.
>
> I understand the PVR150 needs modification, but am not sure what it is.
>
> Any suggestions would be useful.
>

I thought I'd give this a go myself, and I have not had a great deal of
success unfortunately.

PVR-150s are notched as universal (3.3 and 5v) cards[1] so they physically
fit, however they will not work in a PCI-X slot without having a couple of
surface mount capacitors or something replaced. I have two PVR-150MCEs and
inquired with Hauppauge about what modifications were required. After being
bounced around the world I got put in touch with a chap in Singapore who
said that they could modify the cards to work in PCI-X slots, and it would
cost USD$50 per card, plus shipping and handling. I elected that that was
too much to spend so didn't get it done (a big factor was the 6 weeks or
whatever it would have taken which is a long time to have no Sky feed into
Myth = WAF--).

The Skystar2 I have is notched for 5v only[2] so it doesn't even go into the
PCI-X slots in my server (which are notched for 3.3v only)[3].

On the upside, the Nova-TD500 works perfectly, and even comes with a low
profile bracket, allowing me to use one of the three free low profile PCI-X
slots in my server, theoritically leaving the free full height ones for the
PVR150s or Skystar. Hrm.

As a result my plan to do what you are planning resulted in the database,
master backend and Nova-TD500 being in the server and the Skystar2 and one
of the PVR150s being in a slave backend on an old P4 2.4 I had lying
around. It's not terribly clean but it's working for now.

Sounds like a good idea, and probably would be pretty good with USB tuners,
but PCI-X slots are more trouble than they're worth for this sort of
application unfortunately.

My 2c anyway. :)

[1] http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/51PcZW7qTDL._SL500_AA300_.jpg
[2] http://img261.imageshack.us/i/skystar2bx4.jpg/
[3] http://linuxtidbits.files.wordpress.com/2009/01/pci-pcix.jpg

toby at np

Jun 30, 2010, 10:17 PM

Post #4 of 17 (1499 views)
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Re: Mythtv on Server hardware [In reply to]

Is anyone running a Hauppauge HVR 4000 card?
It looks like it ticks all the boxes.
Will run on PCIx, has DVB-S, DVB-T and SVideo.

Regards
Toby

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steven at openmedia

Jun 30, 2010, 10:38 PM

Post #5 of 17 (1494 views)
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Re: Mythtv on Server hardware [In reply to]

On 1/07/2010, at 3:29 PM, toby [at] np wrote:

> I'm due for a backend upgrade and thinking of picking up a Dell 2650 or
> 2850.
> These have PCIx slots.
>
> Does anyone have any experience running a Skystar2 and or PVR150 card in
> these slots.

Out of interest where are you getting these PowerEdge servers from, and are you getting ones that can take Sata Disk?

Been looking for some Atom gear that has multiple PCI/PCIe slots. Supermicro have a flexATX board that looks quite good.

Steve

Steven Ellis - Technical Director
OpenMedia Limited
email - steven [at] openmedia
website - http://www.openmedia.co.nz

mythicalbeast at slingshot

Jul 1, 2010, 1:19 AM

Post #6 of 17 (1487 views)
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Re: Mythtv on Server hardware [In reply to]

On Thu, 2010-07-01 at 01:17 -0400, toby [at] np wrote:
> Is anyone running a Hauppauge HVR 4000 card?
> It looks like it ticks all the boxes.
> Will run on PCIx, has DVB-S, DVB-T and SVideo.
>
> Regards
> Toby
>
HVR 4000 from looking at this some time back...
Just remember it is a hybrid tuner device, single tuner. It can not
operate in all of the four configurations at one time.
The dvb-T & dvb-S/S2 can not be used simultaneously.
The LinuxTV wiki page does not say what functions can be used together.
Do all the functions work with linux now ?

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toby at np

Jul 1, 2010, 2:55 AM

Post #7 of 17 (1492 views)
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Re: Mythtv on Server hardware [In reply to]

> Out of interest where are you getting these PowerEdge servers from,
and are you getting ones that can take Sata Disk?

Just do a search for Poweredge on Trademe, there are a lot of old boxes.

No, just getting a SCSI based box, but I have access to lots of 140Gb
SCSI drives and a big 14 bay array to put them in.

Toby

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jonathan.hoskin at gmail

Jul 1, 2010, 8:21 PM

Post #8 of 17 (1455 views)
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Re: Mythtv on Server hardware [In reply to]

>
> No, just getting a SCSI based box, but I have access to lots of 140Gb
> SCSI drives and a big 14 bay array to put them in.

Crikey - you must also have a lot of shares in a power company.

stevehodge at gmail

Jul 1, 2010, 8:31 PM

Post #9 of 17 (1448 views)
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Re: Mythtv on Server hardware [In reply to]

On Fri, Jul 2, 2010 at 3:21 PM, Jonathan Hoskin
<jonathan.hoskin [at] gmail>wrote:

> No, just getting a SCSI based box, but I have access to lots of 140Gb
>> SCSI drives and a big 14 bay array to put them in.
>
>
> Crikey - you must also have a lot of shares in a power company.
>

14 x 15W each = 210W worst case. It's not nothing but it's not really
anything to get excited about either. They'll draw about twice that during
startup though.

Cheers,
Steve

g8ecj at gilks

Jul 1, 2010, 8:48 PM

Post #10 of 17 (1455 views)
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Re: Mythtv on Server hardware [In reply to]

> On Fri, Jul 2, 2010 at 3:21 PM, Jonathan Hoskin
> <jonathan.hoskin [at] gmail>wrote:
>
>> No, just getting a SCSI based box, but I have access to lots of 140Gb
>>> SCSI drives and a big 14 bay array to put them in.
>>
>>
>> Crikey - you must also have a lot of shares in a power company.
>>
>
> 14 x 15W each = 210W worst case. It's not nothing but it's not really
> anything to get excited about either. They'll draw about twice that during
> startup though.

Ouch

I'm spinning 5Tb with a AMD 5050e CPU on an ASUS m/b and sit at 80W idle,
85 when recording a couple of channels and 95W commflagging. That includes
the Sky box, ADSL modem and UPS...

--
Robin Gilks

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toby at np

Jul 1, 2010, 9:01 PM

Post #11 of 17 (1451 views)
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Re: Mythtv on Server hardware [In reply to]

>> Crikey - you must also have a lot of shares in a power company.

Power is not really my biggest concern. The server alone pulls 288watts at
idle and given all the other crap I have plugged in and running in my
house, this is small fry.

I have big power bills, I get over it :)

I've taken the plunge, ordered an HVR4000, will report back how it goes.

Toby

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stevehodge at gmail

Jul 1, 2010, 9:10 PM

Post #12 of 17 (1455 views)
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Re: Mythtv on Server hardware [In reply to]

On Fri, Jul 2, 2010 at 3:48 PM, Robin Gilks <g8ecj [at] gilks> wrote:

>
> > On Fri, Jul 2, 2010 at 3:21 PM, Jonathan Hoskin
> > <jonathan.hoskin [at] gmail>wrote:
> >
> >> No, just getting a SCSI based box, but I have access to lots of 140Gb
> >>> SCSI drives and a big 14 bay array to put them in.
> >>
> >>
> >> Crikey - you must also have a lot of shares in a power company.
> >>
> >
> > 14 x 15W each = 210W worst case. It's not nothing but it's not really
> > anything to get excited about either. They'll draw about twice that
> during
> > startup though.
>
> Ouch
>
> I'm spinning 5Tb with a AMD 5050e CPU on an ASUS m/b and sit at 80W idle,
> 85 when recording a couple of channels and 95W commflagging. That includes
> the Sky box, ADSL modem and UPS...
>

Obviously if you care about a couple of hundred watts then you're better off
with SATA where the GB/W metric is about 10x better. In my case I've got a
400W plasma screen that rather makes everything else look pretty trivial.

Cheers,
Steve

markk at kc

Jul 1, 2010, 9:19 PM

Post #13 of 17 (1452 views)
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Re: Mythtv on Server hardware [In reply to]

On Fri, 2010-07-02 at 00:01 -0400, toby [at] np wrote:

> >> Crikey - you must also have a lot of shares in a power company.
>
> Power is not really my biggest concern. The server alone pulls 288watts at
> idle and given all the other crap I have plugged in and running in my
> house, this is small fry.
>
> I have big power bills, I get over it :)
>
> I've taken the plunge, ordered an HVR4000, will report back how it goes.
>
> Toby
>

You may run into DVB-T channel scanning problems that several people
have encountered with the HVR3000. I'm using a HVR3000 without any
problem but didn't do any channel scans as I was already using a
Nova-TD-500 which did the channel scans.

Mark

nick.rout at gmail

Jul 2, 2010, 1:14 AM

Post #14 of 17 (1438 views)
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Re: Mythtv on Server hardware [In reply to]

On Fri, Jul 2, 2010 at 4:10 PM, Steve Hodge <stevehodge [at] gmail> wrote:
> On Fri, Jul 2, 2010 at 3:48 PM, Robin Gilks <g8ecj [at] gilks> wrote:
>>
>> > On Fri, Jul 2, 2010 at 3:21 PM, Jonathan Hoskin
>> > <jonathan.hoskin [at] gmail>wrote:
>> >
>> >> No, just getting a SCSI based box, but I have access to lots of 140Gb
>> >>> SCSI drives and a big 14 bay array to put them in.
>> >>
>> >>
>> >> Crikey - you must also have a lot of shares in a power company.
>> >>
>> >
>> > 14 x 15W each = 210W worst case. It's not nothing but it's not really
>> > anything to get excited about either. They'll draw about twice that
>> > during
>> > startup though.
>>
>> Ouch
>>
>> I'm spinning 5Tb with a AMD 5050e CPU on an ASUS m/b and sit at 80W idle,
>> 85 when recording a couple of channels and 95W commflagging. That includes
>> the Sky box, ADSL modem and UPS...
>
> Obviously if you care about a couple of hundred watts then you're better off
> with SATA where the GB/W metric is about 10x better. In my case I've got a
> 400W plasma screen that rather makes everything else look pretty trivial.

My Sony LCD boasts 300W which rather makes me pissed off to come down
in the morning to find the backlight glow on! Such is the consequence
of getting to the timeof life when teenagers go to bed before their
parents!

As for leaving the gas heater on 8/10 all night, nice to wake up to
the house being warm, not so nice to get the gas bill.

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mythtvnz at hotblack

Jul 2, 2010, 5:27 PM

Post #15 of 17 (1405 views)
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Re: Mythtv on Server hardware [In reply to]

On 2/07/10 8:14 PM, Nick Rout wrote:
> My Sony LCD boasts 300W which rather makes me pissed off to come down
> in the morning to find the backlight glow on! Such is the consequence
> of getting to the timeof life when teenagers go to bed before their
> parents!
>

My Sony LCD has an eco option "Idle TV Standby". I've set it to it's max
at 3 hours. After 3 hours idle it prompts for any key press to keep
going, otherwise it goes to standby. Since everything we watch is via
Myth, once the TV is turned on we don't use the TV remote, so we have to
scramble for it every 3 hours to push a button to keep it going, but
it's great for handling the kid situation you describe.

- Wade

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nick.rout at gmail

Jul 2, 2010, 5:59 PM

Post #16 of 17 (1402 views)
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Re: Mythtv on Server hardware [In reply to]

On Sat, Jul 3, 2010 at 12:27 PM, Wade Maxfield <mythtvnz [at] hotblack> wrote:
> On 2/07/10 8:14 PM, Nick Rout wrote:
>> My Sony LCD boasts 300W which rather makes me pissed off to come down
>> in the morning to find the backlight glow on! Such is the consequence
>> of getting to the timeof life when teenagers go to bed before their
>> parents!
>>
>
> My Sony LCD has an eco option "Idle TV Standby". I've set it to it's max
> at 3 hours. After 3 hours idle it prompts for any key press to keep
> going, otherwise it goes to standby. Since everything we watch is via
> Myth, once the TV is turned on we don't use the TV remote, so we have to
> scramble for it every 3 hours to push a button to keep it going, but
> it's great for handling the kid situation you describe.

I'll look for that option! ta.

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hads at nice

Jul 2, 2010, 6:39 PM

Post #17 of 17 (1384 views)
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Re: Mythtv on Server hardware [In reply to]

On Sat, 2010-07-03 at 12:27 +1200, Wade Maxfield wrote:
> My Sony LCD has an eco option "Idle TV Standby". I've set it to it's
> max at 3 hours. After 3 hours idle it prompts for any key press to
> keep going, otherwise it goes to standby. Since everything we watch is
> via Myth, once the TV is turned on we don't use the TV remote, so we
> have to scramble for it every 3 hours to push a button to keep it
> going, but it's great for handling the kid situation you describe.

Ours is Sony too, connected over VGA. It supports DPMS so puts itself
into standby when the PC tells it to go to sleep.

hads
--
http://nicegear.co.nz
New Zealand's Open Source Hardware Supplier

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