[crwilson]

I'm looking to move home in January to a new build, 4 bedroom. I want to have a pc somehwere in the house (a cupboard if possible) where all of my downloaded media content is stored and can be accessed on 3 or 4 TV's (living room, kitchen, bedroom(s)).

Basically i want to be able to switch on any of these TV's and play a movie from the 'server'. Ideally, it would be controlled from our iPad 3.

- I don't mind having to run networking cables through the house if this is the preferred over wireless setup
- I'd like to watch 1080p movies with little or no buffering or loss of quality
- The media doesn't have to be synchronised so i can pause on one tv and play on another (although that would be cool if easy to do)

What i'd like to know is what's the best way of approaching this (in detail if possible). Is it through jailbroken Apple TV's, networking, etc?

I don't really have a budget for this but would like to keep it under £1k if possible.

(Please also point me in the direction of any relevant guides on how to do this)

[Jägs]

Does the £1k include the server? If not:

1. Buy a Nettop, like this: http://www.amazon.com/ZOTAC-Intel-Barebo...B004WO8O9Y
Note: you can buy something newer, but make sure there are supported drivers in Ubuntu for all of the hardware.
2. Install XBMCbuntu (http://wiki.xbmc.org/index.php?title=XBMCbuntu) on it.
3. Repeat for each TV

Next, on your server, set up MySQL (http://wiki.xbmc.org/index.php?title=HOW...g_up_MySQL) and then follow the rest of the multiple library guide (http://wiki.xbmc.org/index.php?title=HOW..._libraries). Also, make sure you are sharing your media files using a protocol XBMC understands (NFS, SMB, FTP).

Additional notes:

1. JB ATV2s don't have the oomph to do 1080p, and most skins have pretty slow performance on them. At least that's the case on mine.
2. Without ethernet, you are going to get buffering on 1080p, so wire everything, where possible.
3. Eventually, Frodo will be able to do this without MySQL using UPnP, so that will be one less step.
4. This will have the added benefit of synchronizing your media.

[crwilson]

Thanks for the reply, i should be able to follow this. I don't actually have the server yet, but this wasn't within the budget. Would you recommend anything?

Out of interest, do the JB ATV2's play 720p content ok? I actually have an ATV3 at the moment, but no sign of any JB as yet.

I was also wondering if the setup could be done through 1x server distributing 3 or 4 hdmi cables to each tv?

---

I don't need to watch different content on each tv, hence why i was asuming i could setup with 1 server and send the same picture to 3 or 4 tv's via hdmi cables?

[vicbitter]

I have two ATV2s and a Zotac ID41 running OpenELEC (www.openelec.tv) and everything runs perfectly. The ATV2s have no problem with 720p content (use wired not wireless) and the Zotac ID41 can play full 1080p content with HD audio bitstreaming without any frame drops, etc.

Note: I use HomePlugs to achieve a wired network around my house.

[crwilson]

Another thing i considered, for 720p content only, was the use of something like AirParrot on a decent Windows 7 machine. Anyone have any experience of how this performs?

[Jägs]

Yeah, the ATV2s can play 720p, and are pretty capable for video playback. My main problem is that XBMC--more specifically, the skins--are slow, but given how they squeezed full XBMC onto it, it's a tradeoff.

My setup is as follows:

1.) Large, central server, multiple RAID arrays. Sharing is done via NFS and SMB to all of my devices--those running XBMC, as well as just for file sharing in general. It also hosts MySQL, to manage media info across all XBMC heads.
2.) Mac Mini (Core2Duo/NVIDIA 9400) for primary playback on the main TV. Synced to MySQL/NFS for thumbs.
3.) ATV2 in the bedroom, for Netflix (via ATV2 menu) and DVD/recorded TV playback. Synced to MySQL/NFS for thumbs.
4.) Windows PC in my home office, so I can watch media whilst grading. Synced to MySQL/NFS for thumbs.
5.) MBA, so I can watch media when the wife's shows are on the main screen. Synced to MySQL/NFS for thumbs.

For a server, you do not need much of anything in terms of processing power--a dual core AMD would fit the bill nicely--but it should plenty of RAM, a fast (gigabit) ethernet card, and loads of storage--preferably RAID 1/5/6. I do RAID 1, as it is the simplest, but most expensive--two HDDs = 1 share = 1/2 total storage volume. This is mainly due to historic purposes, though, but is pretty easy to manage. HDD goes bad? Shut down the array, buy a new drive, rebuild. The risk is that the remaining "good" drive fails during the rebuild.

Check out FreeNAS, if you are starting from scratch, as it is very robust and lightweight. I am using Ubuntu for the server, but that is for historical reasons. As soon as I get enough funds to rotate out hard drives, I will move everything to FreeNAS.

As for your last question, about running the video from the server to each head, I'd recommend against that. It's actually easier to set up what I described above. With HDMI, you run into problems with length vs. signal strength. You can get converters that do HDMI to ethernet back to HDMI, but I've found it is just easier to run CAT6 GB ethernet everywhere, and let the heads decode the video. If you do go this route, you'll need a much beefier server, as you'd need a couple of video cards to manage playback, enough hardware to decode to all destinations, etc.

[Reverent001]

My setup is close to Jägs, but i do not have a Server with Dual Core and plenty of RAM! I only have a Synology DiskStation DS411j and this unit is doing his job perfect. I have three clients running, Office PC, Living Room HTPC (Zotach) and Bedroom ATV2 everything is setup with mysql Database for syncing the scraped Thumbs AND video/music informations.
The DS411j has 4x 2TB HDD with JBOD (yes, its not secure if a hdd runs broken, but the next one will be in raid 5, so the loss of freediskspace is not that big than in raid1), a running Webserver for my own websites und the mysqlserver and everything is workin really great, no need to have a typically fileserver, with that much RAM und a Dual Core CPU. And the NAS Station costs me only 500€ incl the HDD. Plus the Mediaplayer in Livingroom and bedroom it costs me only 850€.

Thats my setup and my opinion!

[Malosar]

Yeah I built a very cheap server out of mostly old parts with an Athlon 3200 single core running on WHS1 and I don't have any problems streaming full BD's. It's also the mysql server for XBMC and my network storage for WMC recordings so I can access from any PC.