I'm posting this here because I'm not sure where else it belongs. I've been reading over the forum and the wiki for the past couple of weeks and I feel like I have a pretty good handle on what it would take to rebuild my current server situation into a more streamlined unRAID build. But it will be a substantial effort. So before I cross the point of no return, I just wanted to hear some opinions of current users.

 

My current "server" is used for three things: serving bluray.iso and dvd.iso files to three Dune D1s and a WDTV, serving music to a Sonos system, and backing up my workstation. I call it a server, but really it's little more than a secondary PC that grew well beyond it's initial design. It's a Windows Vista based, i3 530 PC housed in a Norco 4220. It contains 16-17 HDDs, mostly 2TB but a few 1TB drives in a JBOD configuration attached via the MB or through two AOC-SASLP-MV8s. Right now, everything just works, save for the occasional drive drop-out requiring a reboot. I control it in a somewhat headless fashion via Splashtop.

 

I think it might be time for a rebuild, now that this computer has a more defined purpose. I currently have no backup in the event of a drive failure, and Vista is less than an ideal for a server (though it works). My options at this point are to continue using it as is or rebuild it into a WHS or unRAID system. And I use My Movies as my front end, so that will have to be rebuilt as well. This will take a substantial amount of time given that I have to physically dismantle the server, install and set up three empty drives and unRAID, and then slowly move files over from current HDDs and expand the newly built server as I go.

 

If you guys were in my position, what would you do? Or should I not try to fix what isn't broken?

I think you should make the move to unraid. 1. You have a ton of data with no protection at all. 2. WHS is dead after the current version. Microsoft is canceling it and the upgrade path after the current version is Windows Server 2012 Essentials which is over $400 bucks for a license and doesn't include free upgrades to new versions like unraid does. And from your description it sounds like you use your server mostly for streaming which unraid is ideal to handle.

...looks like a good plan to me.

According to this, My Movies will continue from WHS onto Win8.

Maybe you should consider building an ESXi version of unRAID  and run a Win8 VM alongside

(depending on the efforts already spent into My Movies but I think you'd rather stick to your used workflow).... more expensive HW though.

...looks like a good plan to me.

According to this, My Movies will continue from WHS onto Win8.

Maybe you should consider building an ESXi version of unRAID  and run a Win8 VM alongside

(depending on the efforts already spent into My Movies but I think you'd rather stick to your used workflow).... more expensive HW though.

 

That seems like a lot of extra money (at least a thousand dollars probably) and effort required just to keep using My Movies. He can move to XBMC and MySQL for the library with a little effort required and no extra money.

It is true that my server exists primarily for streaming my files. But the more I think about it, I do use it for a few other tasks simply because I can. For example, I also run Air Video on my server to send non .iso files to our iPhones/iPads. The kids use this feature a lot. I don't recall if Air Video can run on a workstation but point to a server for files, I have to check. That would be an unfortunate loss but I could live with it. I also run PlayOn on the server, but since this doesn't point to stored content I think I would just have to move it to the workstation.

 

The My Movies workflow is an important one to keep, primarily because it works so solid with the Dunes and my whole family is used to the interface (and I have put a considerable amount of work into creating that database and setting up rsync to keep the various Dunes up to date). I don't mind going through and changing the network paths in my library even though it's about 1,100 files, so long as I only have to do it the one time. But I want to make sure that unRAID plays nice with My Movies and Dune players. I know I have to install and run My Movies on my workstation to maintain the library if I move to unRAID, and I don't mind that. But I will not give up My Movies at this point for another front end.

 

Finally, although I don't do it now, does unRAID work in an environment where I want to use my server along with a cable card to record live TV?

 

Thanks for the feedback!

Finally, although I don't do it now, does unRAID work in an environment where I want to use my server along with a cable card to record live TV?

 

Thanks for the feedback!

I have my unRAID servers virtualized on 2 PCs with ESXi.  Along with an unRAID VM on each I also have Win7 x64 VMs running SageTV and Tuner cards on Passthrough.  Specifically 2 hauppauge HVR-2250 in one VM and 1 HVR-2250, 1 AVerMedia Duet and 2 HD-PVRs connected to a USB 2.0 card on passthrough.  Both VMs also have HDHomeruns connected for an addition 2 OTA tuners via network.

You wouldn't lose air video - there is an air video plugin for unRaid.  Or if you want something better than air video, you can look at plex

You can also run a Windows Virtual Machine on unraid using virtualbox and run any needed windows app on top of that virtual machine.

http://lime-technology.com/forum/index.php?topic=10978.0

 

I did a similar project myself a while back.

I when from WHS v1 to unraid and it was a project.

 

Im glad i did it, bit there was a lot of time involved during the transfer of data.

 

I would recommend you pick up some new drives for this task and build up the unraid box.

put some of your old drives into a windows workstation for the data transfer.

I would also recommend a program like beyond compare to make sure your data copied as an exact binary copy before reusing the old drive. it will be a little slower, but it is worth the time if it finds any errors...

 

if you have a spare pc, maybe you can run a 3 drive unraid on it for a week or so and see if it is right for you.

Why not use Teracopy instead of Beyond Compare?

 

 

You wouldn't lose air video - there is an air video plugin for unRaid.  Or if you want something better than air video, you can look at plex

 

This is good to hear about air video. My kids are the primary users and they use our old iPhone 3GSs. I would consider looking into Plex if for no other reason than to share some love with my ICS based Transformer Prime which can't use Air Video (so far as I can tell).

 

I have three PCs running on my network in additon to mobile devices and media players, but I don't have a "spare" PC to try a small unRAID build. I would consider buying new components for that purpose as unRAID isn't very hardware intense, but all of the hardware in my current "server" build are on the acceptable list (though I would probably upgrade the MB to expand the server/headless features since I couldn't use Splashtop or LogMeIn). So it's easiest to just pull the SSD (contains OS) and all but three empty drives from the server chassis and start from there. And thanks for the recommedations on file transfer software. I'll look into both options. All it takes is a tiny bit of corruption to keep a bluray.iso menu from loading and it drives my family crazy.

 

EXSi and virtual machines is an area that I haven't considered, primarily because of ignorance on my part. I'll go do some reading.

 

Maybe I'll dump all of the kids' DVDs onto a USB HDD and plug it into the living room Dune player to tide them over. How knows, I might end up making the switch to an unRAID server after all.

There is a Logmein plug-in.