Media server

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A media server is a computer appliance, ranging from an enterprise class machine providing video on demand, to, more commonly, a small home computer storing various digital media.

Contents

[edit] Purpose

By definition a media server is a device that simply stores and shares media. This definition is vague, and can allow several different device to be called a Media Server. It may be a simple Network-attached storage, a media center PC running Windows XP Media Center Edition, MediaPortal or Mythtv, or a commercial web server that hosts media for a large web site. In a home setting, a media server acts as an aggregator of information: video, audio, photos, books, etc. These different types of media (whether they originated on DVD, CD, digital camera, or in physical form) are stored on the media server's hard drive. Access to these is then available from a central location. It may also be used to run special applications that allow the user(s) to access the media from a remote location via the internet.

[edit] Hardware

The only requirement for a media server is a method of storing media and a network connection with enough speed to allow access to that media. Depending on the uses and applications that it runs, a media server may require large amounts of RAM, or a powerful, multicore CPU. A RAID may be used to create a large amount of storage, though it is generally not necessary in a home media server to use a RAID that gives a performance increase because current home network transfer speeds are slower than that of most current hard drives. However, a redundant RAID configuration may be used to prevent accidental loss of the media files. Many Media servers also have the ability to capture the media. This is done with specialized hardware such as TV tuner cards. Analog TV tuner cards can capture video from analog broadcast TV and output from cable/satellite set top boxes. This analog video then needs to be encoded in digital format to be stored on the Media server. This encoding can be done with software running on the Media server computer or by hardware on the TV tuner card. Digital TV tuner cards take input from broadcast digital TV. In the USA, the ATSC standard is used. In most of the rest of the world, DVB-T is the accepted standard. Since these transmissions are already digital, they do not need to be encoded.

[edit] See also

[edit] HTPC packages with server capabilities

[edit] Links to possible Media Server applications and information

[edit] TV Tuner Hardware