Media Server Setup

[smeehrrr]

Yes, I just did a quick experiment and you can only create DFS mount points on a server machine. So you couldn't go XP throughout and still use my exact system. I should point out, though, that the DFS part is really just a nicety - there isn't a requirement that it be done that way, particularly if you're using Xlobby as your front end. Xlobby will happily handle content on multiple drives/shares, you just need to make sure your cover art is stored either locally or on a server that's up all the time, otherwise you'll wake up everything while you're browsing.

The cases didn't have enough power cables, but molex splitters are cheap (like $1), so I bought a ton of them. I also bought a bunch of 3.5" to 5" mounting kits so I could put drives in the big bays as well as the small ones, those run about a buck a piece also.

I'm honestly not sure if Home would be sufficient for this. From looking at the Microsoft web page I don't see anything that would be a showstopper, especially if you aren't running a domain and don't care about access control. I've done Pro mostly because it's what I'm used to, and I get it cheap because I'm a Microsoft employee. I won't tell you how cheap, it might make you cry.

[Groover]

I've done Pro mostly because it's what I'm used to, and I get it cheap because I'm a Microsoft employee. I won't tell you how cheap, it might make you cry.

Doesn't buying Microsoft make you cry regardless of how much it costs?

It would be nice if things in NZ only cost what they do in the US. Sometimes it can be cheap to import from there, but customs then comes along and slaps a big import tax on things and it ends up costing more than it would have to buy it locally - well usually. I reckon I'll have to spend about $10,000NZ to setup the system I would like - and that would probably only give me 4TB's. The most cost effective drive here I've found is 200Gb at around $200NZ. To jump up the extra 50 Gb to 250GB (which seems to be the defacto standard for most people with media servers) costs over a $100 more. (I'm talking SATA drives of course).

Getting back to your system - are all the drives just setup with a drive no: (D:/ E:/, Etc) across the 4 servers?

How many DVD's do you have ripped across all the machines? Any trouble ripping any of them? What software did you use.

I'm really looking forward to getting our system setup - unfortunately, a major house renovation makes the time and expenditure an arena of the dream zone at present - still...there is so much to learn I could probably spend ages sussing it all out - if ever!

[smeehrrr]

The first thing you should do if you want to do this on the cheap is stop using SATA drives. You don't need them for this application and you're going to pay a significant price premium. IDE drives are more than sufficient for server DVD content over a network - you're going to saturate the network long before you exceed the throughput of the disc. I've been buying up Maxtor and Western Digital 250GB drives when I see them on sale, I average around $120 per drive. I could get smaller drives for a better price per gigabyte, but then I end up building more servers to house them, so I've found the 250GB to be the most cost effective overall.

I don't do any partitioning tricks on the media servers themselves - each drive has a single big partition and each partition is shared out as a separate network share. So the first server is \\media-one\dvd1 through \\media-one\dvd9, etc.

As of right now I have 936 individual DVDs ripped. I use DVD Decrypter and I rip them in file mode without messing around with recompressing or removing audio tracks or what have you. i've had problems with a few discs, but they were all related to physical damage of the disc itself. For the most part I was able to work around these problems by rubbing out scratches or trying to rip in different DVD drives, some drives seem more tolerant of scratches than others.

[alleng]

Hey smeehrrr,

Great Idea with the DFS!

Could you help me out on setting up DFS. I acn get it to work fine, but each share shows up as a differant folder.

I would like it set up like this.

\\Server1\Share1
\Movie1
\Movie2

\\Server2\Share2
\Movie3
\Movie4


I can get it to show up like this

\\DFSServer\Share1
\Movie1
\Movie2

\\DFSServer\Share2
\Movie3
\Movie4


I want it to show up this way

\\DFSServer\DVDs
\Movie1
\Movie2
\Movie3
\Movie4

How do I get this to work? I think I can so it by adding a link to each movie share (\\Server2\Share2\Movie3), but then I would have to add a link each time I rip a new movie. I would like to add a link to 2 shares and their contents show up in the same folder!

Any sugestions, how do you do it. Screenshots of you DFS setup vs the structure would help.

Thanks,
Allen

[Groover]

smeehrrr

The first thing you should do if you want to do this on the cheap is stop using SATA drives. You don't need them for this application and you're going to pay a significant price premium. IDE drives are more than sufficient for server DVD content over a network - you're going to saturate the network long before you exceed the throughput of the disc.

Thanks for the advice. Like most things, when you don't really know what's needed, or what the difference is between some of the latest tech you can certainly spend some money. If IDE drives do the job then I can save a bundle. Good call. Same about the 250GB advice.

As of right now I have 936 individual DVDs ripped. I use DVD Decrypter and I rip them in file mode without messing around with recompressing or removing audio tracks or what have you. i've had problems with a few discs, but they were all related to physical damage of the disc itself. For the most part I was able to work around these problems by rubbing out scratches or trying to rip in different DVD drives, some drives seem more tolerant of scratches than others.

Wow...impressive collection. DVD Decrypter rocks and is my ripping software of choice as well. I've read lots of people's issues about ripping certain titles and I was wondering how someone like ourself has got on with so many titles.

Do you have to defrag your drives, or because you don't actually write to the drive you don't have to worry? Defragging 6.5 TB would take forever.

Thanks for all your comments and advice. It certainly helps me no end.

Groover

[smeehrrr]

How do I get this to work? I think I can so it by adding a link to each movie share (\\Server2\Share2\Movie3), but then I would have to add a link each time I rip a new movie. I would like to add a link to 2 shares and their contents show up in the same folder!

If you want to do it that way, you have to add a link every time you rip a film, which is what I did. There's a handy-dandy utility called dfscmd.exe that lets you do it from the command line, so I wrote a little script that calls DVD Decrypter to rip, then creates the link for me.

[smeehrrr]

Do you have to defrag your drives, or because you don't actually write to the drive you don't have to worry? Defragging 6.5 TB would take forever.

I've never bothered with a defrag. Since I start from an empty drive and only write once (basically) fragmentation should be pretty low already, and I've never had a performance problem that could be attributed to disk fragmentation.