<div><blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="border-left: 1px solid rgb(204, 204, 204); margin: 0pt 0pt 0pt 0.8ex; padding-left: 1ex;">Reqs:<br>- min 100 Mbit Ethernet card (built in)<br>- Dual monitors...<br> + 32" CRT TV (scart/s-video)
<br> + 7" LCD Monitor (VGA)<br>- Sound...<br> + SPDIF to Logitech 5.1 system <br> + RCA to CRT TV
<br>- Playing...<br> + DVDs<br> + Music (MP3 from server)<br> + Movies (AVI/ISO/.. from server)<br>- Recordings (on the server via Samba/NFS)<br clear="all"><br>I have not decided if I want the MythTV backend on the server (available) or the backend on the client.
<br> <br>* I have looked at VIA EPIA MII12000, would that be a good choice or do you recommend other (what do you have)?</blockquote><div><br>I have an EPIA EN10000EG, and it works just fine as a Myth frontend, playing back DVDs and recorded video with XvMC, as well as downloaded content in MPEG4 and other formats. Granted, I've never run both VGA and svideo out at the same time.
<br><br>*However*, I would highly recommend you double check that the video chipset on that board is compatible with the OpenChrome drivers (I had a heck of a time getting my board up and running). I also have no idea about support for SPDIF (my system is far too primitive for that :). Again, the web can probably help you out, there.
<br></div><br><blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="border-left: 1px solid rgb(204, 204, 204); margin: 0pt 0pt 0pt 0.8ex; padding-left: 1ex;">* Would that be able to run both frontend/backend?</blockquote><div><br>If possible, I'd split them. Depending on how you do things, you probably want your frontend to be small and quiet. Meanwhile, your backend should be at list marginally expandable, fair bit of storage, one or more capture cards, etc. These two requirements are typically at odds, so your best experience will be had with a separate backend server, IMHO.
<br><br>In addition, the I/O load on the backend server can be... formidable, particularly during guide data updates. And the EPIA boards aren't what I would call top performers (my board supports UDMA-2, tops), so putting that load on a separate machine is generally a good idea.
<br></div><br><blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="border-left: 1px solid rgb(204, 204, 204); margin: 0pt 0pt 0pt 0.8ex; padding-left: 1ex;">* Is it compatible with Kubuntu/MythTV?<br>
* Would you recommend CompactFlash or harddrive if a frontend only box?</blockquote><div><br>No idea about Kubuntu. I used Fedora on my machines (though I wish I hadn't... upgrading Fedora releases can be... a pain), and both the BE and FE worked well, though the OpenChrome video drivers, which I had to build manually, took quite a bit of tweaking to get working well.
<br><br>As for CF or HD, that's a matter of taste. If you split the FE/BE, then CF is a very good option... quiet, low power requirements, etc. If you build a combined system, you may find the performance of CF isn't sufficient, not to mention limited in storage capacity.
<br></div></div><br>Brett.<br>