My current media sever (800MHz P3 on Asus CUSL2 w/ 512MB RAM) is running out of steam with the 50,000 or so songs I got on it which I access through Media Center 9.
Since I got a 3Ware 64bit PCI raid controller in it, I'd like to step up to a P4 motherboard that will support the full 64bit. The problem is that I don't seem to be able to locate such a motherboard.
I've been looking at server motherboards that have this feature, but they are all dual Zeon based.
If I was to bust out a dual Zeon motherboard, like the Intel SE7505VB2 and drop a pair of Zeon 2.4GHz 533MHz FSB onto it, how would the performance under XP Pro running Media Center 9 compare to a 3.2GHz P4?
Could I dedicate one of the CPUs to run MC9 and have the other one deal with all the I/O and other system functions?
My goal is to end up with a system in which MC9 (and therefore Mario's lobby suite) will be more or less instantaneous, even with 100,000 tracks in the MC9 database.
Other than running MC9, the server will also serve up ripped DVDs to various media clients in the house. This is a low CPU task that the current 800MHz P3 handles just fine, but I can't stand the delay in MC9 (several seconds) when jumping between genres/views, etc when browsing my music collection.
I don't mind spending the $$$ on a dual Zeon setup if it will blow away a single P4 setup, but I'm not sure that my main application MC9 supports multi-threading, so perhaps a fast P4 is better, even if that means running my raid controller in 32bit mode?
Since I got a 3Ware 64bit PCI raid controller in it, I'd like to step up to a P4 motherboard that will support the full 64bit. The problem is that I don't seem to be able to locate such a motherboard.
I've been looking at server motherboards that have this feature, but they are all dual Zeon based.
If I was to bust out a dual Zeon motherboard, like the Intel SE7505VB2 and drop a pair of Zeon 2.4GHz 533MHz FSB onto it, how would the performance under XP Pro running Media Center 9 compare to a 3.2GHz P4?
Could I dedicate one of the CPUs to run MC9 and have the other one deal with all the I/O and other system functions?
My goal is to end up with a system in which MC9 (and therefore Mario's lobby suite) will be more or less instantaneous, even with 100,000 tracks in the MC9 database.
Other than running MC9, the server will also serve up ripped DVDs to various media clients in the house. This is a low CPU task that the current 800MHz P3 handles just fine, but I can't stand the delay in MC9 (several seconds) when jumping between genres/views, etc when browsing my music collection.
I don't mind spending the $$$ on a dual Zeon setup if it will blow away a single P4 setup, but I'm not sure that my main application MC9 supports multi-threading, so perhaps a fast P4 is better, even if that means running my raid controller in 32bit mode?