Spec me a Media/Storage thingy, bitches

mrbobbins · Post by **mrbobbins** » March 4th, 2009, 17:08

I'm going to replace the large PC that sits in the cupboard making loud noises and annoying my flatmates. It's basically just used for media storage, streaming and for torrenting.

From a quick investigation I see that there are NAS storage boxes out there that have integrated Bit Torrent clients which seem quite an appealing replacement for my massive aging server PC.

But I came across (pfft) a box which has these features, and includes video output and playback. This seems quite appealing as at the moment I use an old chipped Xbox for video watching but it's getting cranky and sometimes doesn't work.

Egreat M31B

Unfortunately it seems a bit, erm, Chinese. Does anyone know of a box that has: NAS, Torrent Client and Video output??

Post by **deject** » March 4th, 2009, 17:13

Maybe a WHS box?

Post by **ProfHawking** » March 4th, 2009, 17:30

how much stuff does it need to store?

If less than 1tb, the old xbox could do all of that i think using something like xbox linux.

Or up to 2tb if you pop thisthing in as well as a sata drive

spoodie · Post by **spoodie** » March 4th, 2009, 19:31

These are worth investigating: http://excito.com/

I have the original Bubba and it's great little device; small, low power usage and virtually silent. I use mine for torrents, some general network sharing and backups. The new version looks like it has proper movie streaming capabilities, which mine doesn't as the CPU and RAM are a bit weak. Also if you have full access to the OS if you want to change or add applications. The support forum is useful for help on that.

Post by **ProfHawking** » March 4th, 2009, 19:43

that bubba2 does look nice.

Nothing that any linux box + linux geek cant do mind, but having it all set up for you off the shelf in an easy to use package is very handy.

spoodie · Post by **spoodie** » March 4th, 2009, 19:54

ProfHawking wrote:Nothing that any linux box + linux geek cant do mind, but having it all set up for you off the shelf in an easy to use package is very handy.

Yeah, the main advantage with this is the custom hardware. Very small and low power usage. My one is about the same size as an external disk chassis.

mrbobbins · Post by **mrbobbins** » March 5th, 2009, 13:01

Cheer for the ideas but I'm trying to get away from the PC form factor into something a bit smaller that does similar stuff™

A bit more investigation found this, Popcorn Hour Networked Media Tank which looks like it does everything I want in one box and looks ok (well, except for the massive picture of popcorn on the top)

MrGreen · Post by **MrGreen** » March 6th, 2009, 17:34

mrbobbins wrote:]Popcorn Hour Networked Media Tank[/url] which looks like it does everything I want in one box and looks ok (well, except for the massive picture of popcorn on the top)

I have one of those. They're nice, but don't depend on it for anything important, they like to crash a couple times a day for no reason other than because they can.

spoodie · Post by **spoodie** » March 6th, 2009, 17:44

Code: Select all

seth@bubba:~$ uptime
 17:40:47 up 67 days,  6:14,  1 user,  load average: 0.17, 0.10, 0.07

And that's only because I switch everything off at the mains when I know they're not doing anything. Although Bubbas don't output video directly, like that Popcorn thing.