[afly]

Absolutely baffled by this.

Main living room machine runs xmbcbuntu and houses all storage. I previously added sources via local paths.

When adding a new machine I setup a central mysql database, but that failed as the second machine didnt understand the local path name to files (fair enough) so I set them up again as smb references.

The remote machine can stream 45gb blurays over the network without batting an eyelid, but the local machine (essentially accessing the files via smb://localhost) plays for around 3 seconds and buffers for 30 over and over again even on the tiniest of files

The local machine is a performance powerhouse so I dont think it could be getting overloaded and re-adding soures as local references play fine but result in duplicates that the second machine cannot play. Any ideas anyone? I'm stumped

[viditor]

Did you find a solution for your problem? Would like to know, as i'm experiencing exactly the same problem.

Best regards

[Plaguester]

I thought the file paths stored in the database were relative to the source. I know I've switched back and forth between local, smb, and ftp sources in sources.xml and the application seamlessly adjusted without rescraping anything.

However, should that not be the case, you should permanently mount the shared folders on the remote machines using the same directory. If the main box contains movies at /server/movies, mount the samba share permanently on the remote machines with the same path (/server/movies).

This allows all machines to use the exact same path and local sources, but on the remote machines, the local path actually points to the samba share. If you need help mounting a share, try this guide.

Edit: It should be noted that the speed boost from mounted shares mentioned in the guide is no longer applicable to Ubuntu 11.10. I found that CIFS performance dropped somewhere between 10.10 and 11.10. I've since switched to using FTP sources.

[afly]

My solution was to not share the database at all and have each xbmc installation independant

[viditor]

The solution for me where to use nfs instead of smb, then when I add a new xbmc box to the system the only change/tweak I need is to copy the advancedsettings.xml to the device, and then all is up and running

[afly]

Nfs you say? I will certainly give that a try when I have time