TechnoChubby

Thanks all for your interest so far in TechnoChubby.   We’re gonna make some changes.

Right now, we are running on the Wordpress platform and are quire happy with it.  However, we do not feel that it will be adequate for what we want TechnoChubby to be moving forward.  With that said, we will be moving to the VBulletin system to run the back end of this site.

We want to provide the best possible experience and foster a “community” feel here at TechnoChubby.  We want and invite you all to have discussions about the opinions that we share with you.   We think that VBulliten will better serve this purpose.

So, bear with us, as we get the changes on the back end done.   TechnoChubby will ROCK!

Ok, one week later and project is not completed.  We have not spent the last week in vain.  We have tested the various parts and we decided to make some changes and have settled on a new plan. 

First off, let’s go over the returns:

We tested the DiNovo Ege from Logitech and decided that as cool as it looks, it would not work for our purposes.  So, it got returned. It’s touch pad and volume control was slightly unresponsive.  The other thing was that it’s bluetooth/wireless connection was single device only.  We were hoping that it would allow for “pairing” to a single bluetooth dongle attached to the system and thereby eliminating the need for a seperate wireles dongle.  (Note:  there is already several wireless devices in that area, I want to keep them to a minimum)

We also returned the LG Blu-Ray/HD-DVD drive.  This was an excellent drive.  It does exactly what it’s supposed to do and played Blu-Ray and HD-DVD fine.   This was returned due to major changes in our original plan. (Read on…  this drive has not gone away)

The New Plan:

Originally, we had hope to consolidate all our home service on a single box that would be attached to the TV in the Living Room.  This box would act as our server, media center, and have VM’s for various other things that we need to work on in the home.   After some thought, (and as we were nearing implementation),  we decided that it would be beneficial to keep our services seperated.  You never know when a system might need to be upgraded or resources allocated for whatever reason.  Especially since the system attached to the TV would be used by several people for watching of media on the Television.  So much for centralized.

The “new plan” is to seperate the two main functions.  We will seperate the “Server” and the “Media Center PC”. We also felt that the new Quad core PC would be a bit overkill for just a media center box.  So, we’re adding a 3rd PC to the mix.  Below is a geneeral diagram of what the network will look like after it’s implemented:

For the new “Media Center Only” box, we decided to go with a pre-configured system.  We chose the HP S3330F Slimline PC with the following specs:

 Specifications

• AMD AthlonTM 64 X2 Dual-Core Processor 5400+ for TRUE multi-tasking (2.80GHz, 512kB +512KB L2 Cache, 2000MHz System Bus)
• Memory: 2GB PC2-5300 DDR2 SDRAM memory (2×1GB)
• Hard Drive: 500GB 7200RPM SATA 3Gb/s hard drive
• Expandable Drive Bay: HP Pocket Media Drive Bay
• Optical Drive: Blu-ray / HD DVD player & SuperMulti DVD burner with LightScribe Technology
• Video Graphics: NVIDIA GeForce 8500 GT graphics card with 256MB dedicated video memory, DVI, and HDMI capabilities with support for Microsoft® DirectX® 10. Up to 1023MB Total Available Graphics Memory as allocated by Windows Vista®.
• Network Interface: Integrated 10/100 BaseT network interface
• Wireless Connectivity: Wireless LAN 802.11 b/g
• TV Tuner: NTSC TV tuner and over-the-air ATSC high-definition television tuner
• Remote Control: HP Media Center remote control with IR receiver
• Sound: High Definition Audio, 6 speaker configurable
• Fax/Modem: 56k modem
• Operating System: Genuine Windows Vista™ Home Premium

External Ports

• 15-in-1 memory card reader ? supports SmartMedia, xD, MultiMedia Card, Secure Digital (SD), Compact Flash I, Compact Flash II, Memory Stick, Memory Stick Pro, Memory Stick Duo, Memory Stick Pro Duo, RSMMC, MMC Mobile, MMC+, Mini Secure Digital, IBM Microdrive
• 6 USB 2.0 port(s) (2 FRONT, 4 back)
• 1 FireWire (IEEE 1394) (back)
• Headphone (front)
• Microphone/Line-in/Line-out (back)
• 2 PS/2
• Digital Audio-out
• LAN
• VGA-out

We will keep the  original server box for our home server but it will be re-configured with CentOS 5.1 running VMWare server and Webmin for administration.  This will have our main files and act as a backup system for our media files.

We liked the Quad Core PC that we built so much, that we are keeping it.  It will be used for our Video/Media editing machine.

This is where we are at on this project.  We’ll do a round up in the next few days once it’s all configured.

We putting together the system we described in “New Server & Media Center - Part 1“.  Here are the videos of the unboxings and build of that system:
– unboxing video to go here –
– system build video to go here –

We’ll be talking about how it all worked and what changed in the next segment.

For some time, we have changed the way we look at computing at the home/home office.   Originally, we had our SOHO (Small Office/Home Office - does anyone use this term still) equipment, like our computers and servers all in our “office” in our home.  

At one point, we had three beefy servers (beefy for the home), about 40+ Desktop computers (don’t ask), and two Laptops.  This was our final “large” set-up before we started to pair down about two years ago. We sold most of the desktops and consolidated the server into one machine.   We’re currently at one server, one desktop, and nine laptops.  We feel that for the most part, laptops are the way to go since most of them now can be full desktop replacements. 

We recently moved, and during the move, I decided that our “server” space no longer needs to be in the office.  For the SOHO environment that we have, I felt it was time that our “server” and premise equipment be near the main TV or the living room (since this was our main focal point in our home).  Our first step in moving in this direction involved keeping the cable-modem and router at the entertainment center in the living room.  This has worked out nicely.  Only the file server and the “work” laptops are in the “office” and at various “work areas” around the apartment. 

The Idea: 

The next big step in my plan was to create a central file server/media center that will also “live” in the living room. I want to create a beefy machine that will act as our central file server and be the “hub” for our media.   

This box will have the following functions: 

1. File Server - This machine will house our all our shared files and serve up shares so that anyone within our network will have a central place to do so.
2. Media Center - This machine will also act as our main Media Center (windows) and display on our living room television.  It will also act as the main Media Center hub for our existing Media Center extender (an XBOX360) and additional extenders we will add later.
3. uPNP/DLNA Media Server- This machine will also serve media to any devices in our network that can talk via uPNP/DLNA.  (XBOX360, PS3, other devices)
4. VMware- This machine will also run VMware to run various OS’s that will serve various functions that we need throughout our work/home environment.

 This machine will eliminate the need for the current file server in the office.

Core Software: (So far) 

After doing a lot of research and assessment of above needs, we decided on the following: 

Host OS:  Windows Vista Ultimate 64-bit 

•   We looked at possible solutions and narrowed our choices to LinuxMCE or Windows Vista.  (Note: we are OS non-biased, we try to find the solution that best fits to what our overall needs are)  With that said and after a lot of consideration, we decided to go with Windows Vista Ultimate 64-bit for our base/main operating system. We felt that it would work better with our plans moving forward. This will also meet our requirements #1 and especially #2. 

uPNP/DLNA Media Server: It’s down to Windows Media Connect or Nero MediaHome. (need to take a look at Tversity) 

•   We’re still on the fence on this.  We are leaning towards Windows Media Connect.  We’ve been testing this arrangement with a small system currently and are ’so so’ on it.  We used to run a Nero MediaHome server and were very happy with how it worked. However, we know how Microsoft works somewhat better with “Microsoft” software, so we are leaning towards Windows Media Connect. Both solutions communicate well our uPNP devices. We may also play with Tversity

 Virtalization:  VMWare Workstation 6

•   We’re going to use VMWare workstation 6 to run our various Linux distros for our test systems and for other internal reasons.

Core Hardware:

 THIS IS THE FUN PART! Chubby Time!

• Processor: Intel Q6600 Core 2 Quad
• Motherboard: Asus Maximus Formula
• RAM:  8 GB (4xOCZ 2048 PC6400 DDR2)
• Video Card: XFX 8800GT 512
• Case: Thermaltake Armor
• Power Supply: Thermaltake Toughpower 700w Modular
• Optical: LG GGW-H20L (LG Lightscribe 6x Blu-Ray R/RW, HD DVD-ROM, DVD+R(W)/-R(W), CD-R(W))

Hard Drive Configuration:

• Boot: 2 x Raptor 74 GB mirrored (maybe 2×160GB)
• Media: 500 GB
• Data:  750 GB

(Eventually we will go with an array - this is why we chose the armor case - we have about 2,000 DVD’s that we want instant access to, that’s a project for another time)

All of the above will connect to our living room TV which is a Sony 60″ BRAVIA A series SXRD Rear Projection HDTV.

That’s the plan so far, we’ll post a videos once we get the parts in and throughout various aspects of the configuration.

We’ll be posting various opinions and reviews on our choices once we get all the parts and begin the actual set-up.