Basically need a Windows XP file server (iTunes must be running for AppleTV).

Do you think a P2 - 333 MHz would be able to run it?

12/8/2008 9:31:21 PM

sure, it'll run it

12/8/2008 9:37:37 PM

will openfiler run on that?

might be more than you want to get into--just an idea.

12/8/2008 9:39:58 PM

it's going to run xp fine.

iTunes will choke it to death.

12/8/2008 9:58:57 PM

It is just hosting files across a gigabit lan for my AppleTV
File sharing for my MacBook

It doesn't have to play a damn thing, just pump to AppleTV and my MacBook's iTunes too.

I don't think I can use anything open source due to the DRM video on iTunes.

12/8/2008 10:02:40 PM

oops

missed the Itunes requirement so obviously forget about openfiler

12/8/2008 10:04:21 PM

The debate is to use this old P2 laying around the house ($20 SATA card to be added that's it)

Or buy a cheap MB / CPU / VGA system.

12/8/2008 10:04:23 PM

try what you have

if that doesn't work like you want it to then buy something else.

12/8/2008 10:05:55 PM

yeah, if you already have the stuff to do it, whats the harm in trying, 2 hours wasted while XP installs?

12/8/2008 10:08:22 PM

yo, what's your email? ..meant to email you today about some stuff and forgot

[Edited on December 8, 2008 at 10:10 PM. Reason : PM me]

12/8/2008 10:09:48 PM

Lets just hope the PCI bus on this thing works with the SATA card I'm going to try and get from Intrex!!!

12/8/2008 10:10:30 PM

if it fits, it will work

that's how PCI rolls, son

12/8/2008 10:13:24 PM

I've got some telephony cards that will prove you wrong evan

12/8/2008 10:41:43 PM

just keep in mind that sata on that motherboard will be over the pci bus with a theoretical max of 66mhz so you MIGHT see 50mb/s assuming 0 cpu overhead. I'd suggest against this if you're trying to stream hd video.

12/8/2008 10:45:04 PM

66mhz 33mhz @ 32 bit = 133MB/s, but around 66MB/sec for uncached reads considering it has to hit the bus twice to read + transmit

another issue will be that a 333MHz CPU generally has issues pushing gigabit speeds, though it will probably be hitting 100% at around the 66MB/sec you'll be bus-limited to anyway

[Edited on December 9, 2008 at 12:18 AM. Reason : ah he's using SATA cards, first two comments apply still]

12/9/2008 12:16:58 AM

How does the PCI SATA card differ between the South Bridge on a machine?

I thought the internal SATA connections were still all pumping through the SB.... shows how much I've kept up.

The machine isn't going to do a lot at one time, mostly looking for a cheap solution for now, only to be changed later to a more power efficient solution.

If the P2 will crank out the files, that's good enough for me right now

12/9/2008 11:05:43 AM

that depends, really

many later NB/SB boards use proprietary interconnects, practically all early PCI boards and some later PCI-X boards have southbridges that are generally just a conglomeration of PCI devices sometimes on a seperate PCI bus but usually sharing bandwidth with installed PCI cards, while AMD64 boards have no north bridge and the "south bridges" are just hypertransport tunnels

in the former and latter cases, there will be less bus contention using some (but not necessarily all, a lot of enthusiast boards have channels provided by on-board PCI devices in addition to the southbridge channels) of the on-board SATA controllers. in the remaining case that you're probably dealing with on that P2 board, there is no difference really...

if that question is in response to my post, I didn't actually mean to imply anything about the integrated channels along these lines, rather that they are probably ATA/33 at most and would be the tightest bottleneck in the configuration, but then I noticed you were planning to use SATA devices with a PCI controller

[Edited on December 9, 2008 at 1:10 PM. Reason : .]

12/9/2008 1:02:38 PM

Quote :

"if it fits, it will work that's how PCI rolls, son"

also that's not necessarily true, there are some abnormalities in early PCI 64/66 systems prior to PCI-X, and the transition from 5V to 3.3V that can cause cards to fail (sometimes in flames)

12/9/2008 1:33:30 PM