2011-04-29, 21:58
So I have a few old PCs laying around and I decided to turn a couple into HTPCs. They are circa 2003ish so their specs are pretty lousy. The one I use most often has a decent graphics card and does just fine. The only problem is the playback of locally stored hidef is choppy if the PC has been running a while.
I should also mention that I am downloading alot of content and this is happening on the HTPC that I have the media stored on and xbmc is running on. If I reboot and turn off SABnzbd and Utorrent the locally stored hidef playback is fine.
So, it seems like the hidef files play OK as long as I'm not doing anything else on the box. I was thinking about taking the DL/UL load off of my HTPC and setting up my other PC a couple 2TB drives and using it to do the DL/UL and also be my long term storage. I was hoping I could point xbmc to the UL/DL PC and play the media from there.
So, my questions are...
If the media is stored on PCB and played on PCA, how much overhead does PCB have when PCA is playing media? If there is alot of overhead on PCB, it seems like I'll just be shifting the problem to PCB. How ever if most of the overhead is on PCA, I might have a decent solution.
How fast would the LAN connection have to be to support the transfer of hidef movies stored on PCB and yet played on PCA?
I know I need to just bite the bullet and upgrade PCs, and I absolutely plan to, but I have a couple of other things that have to come fist, so I am trying to get by with what I have.
I should also mention that I am downloading alot of content and this is happening on the HTPC that I have the media stored on and xbmc is running on. If I reboot and turn off SABnzbd and Utorrent the locally stored hidef playback is fine.
So, it seems like the hidef files play OK as long as I'm not doing anything else on the box. I was thinking about taking the DL/UL load off of my HTPC and setting up my other PC a couple 2TB drives and using it to do the DL/UL and also be my long term storage. I was hoping I could point xbmc to the UL/DL PC and play the media from there.
So, my questions are...
If the media is stored on PCB and played on PCA, how much overhead does PCB have when PCA is playing media? If there is alot of overhead on PCB, it seems like I'll just be shifting the problem to PCB. How ever if most of the overhead is on PCA, I might have a decent solution.
How fast would the LAN connection have to be to support the transfer of hidef movies stored on PCB and yet played on PCA?
I know I need to just bite the bullet and upgrade PCs, and I absolutely plan to, but I have a couple of other things that have to come fist, so I am trying to get by with what I have.