Why force client/server on just clients?

[marcisikoff 4]

I have a perfectly working 2.6.2 client release where my MB libraries pull from a network location on my freenas.  Everything seems to work well, accepting the once in awhile manual refresh.

 

But MB3 would require me to download the client and server to my Win7 box even though the content is on a network share on freenas.

 

And I'm being told so many times to get off 2.6.2 and move to MB3 but there's just no support for people like me who have invested in some NAS s/w or device.

 

I see the server options are for Windows, Linux, and OSX, but I don't know of too many peeps having their media libraries on those O/S distros.

 

Typically you'll have all-in-one boxes like Windows where I suppose it makes sense to install client and server (as it's filling both rolls) but with proper client / server divide the server installs should be freeNAS, NAS4Free, Windows (Home) Server and lastly OSX.

 

So because I don't have a supported MB3 Server distro, there's just no way I'm going to throw MB3 client and server onto a thin Win7 box I use strictly as a client.

 

Thoughts?

[Luke 37015]

A lot of people have your exact setup with one machine sharing both roles. It will work just fine.

[ebr 14904]

And the server will run on WHS (2011).

[Deathsquirrel 741]

Sorry, but why NOT have the server and client app both on your Win 7 HTPC box?  It will work just fine.  What is the objection?

[CBers 6766]

Depending on the W7 box in question may mean it's not man enough for the job.

 

I doubt I could run MBS and MBC on one of my Asrock ION PCS, though as a MBC client it's fine.

 

Having your content on freenas is not an issue as long as you use UNC addressing.

[Deathsquirrel 741]

Having it as a server, feeding multiple clients, is certainly more demanding than just running MBC 2.x.  But running as a server feeding just that the client on that one PC I've not found to be any more taxing than 2.6 was by itself.  That's probaly not true during scheduled tasks but that's why they're scheduled for the middle of the night.

[moviefan 183]

Just think of the MB Server as the old configurator.  It points to the libraries, does the indexing, etc.  It just also adds some new features in - ones which you can disable if you want.  Turn of all the scheduled tasks and it basically runs the same as the old setup with the configurator - except now it is web based.   The new configurator is pretty much defunct (don't mean that in a bad way ebr)  so really all functionality it used to have besides the external player is now just separated into MBS and MBC.

 

When MBC plays the files it just plays from them from the NAS like it used to so no extra processing power needed there.

 

Give it a shot and let us know if it really requires that much more CPU when scheduled tasks aren't running.  I'd be surprised if it does. 

[Koleckai Silvestri 1150]

The Server/Client architecture works best if you have multiple clients. In that environment it shines over running disconnected clients on multiple devices. Ultimately, the goal should be to make the *nix server light enough to run on something like Freenas similar to the Plex Media Server. Then the server paradigm works better. This may eventually lead to a designated "Transcode Client" that the server can offload processes to. With Content Syncing and the ability to store multiple versions, the need to transcode will probably lessen over time for a lot of people.

[Beardyname 194]

I have a perfectly working 2.6.2 client release where my MB libraries pull from a network location on my freenas.  Everything seems to work well, accepting the once in awhile manual refresh.

 

But MB3 would require me to download the client and server to my Win7 box even though the content is on a network share on freenas.

 

And I'm being told so many times to get off 2.6.2 and move to MB3 but there's just no support for people like me who have invested in some NAS s/w or device.

 

I see the server options are for Windows, Linux, and OSX, but I don't know of too many peeps having their media libraries on those O/S distros.

 

Typically you'll have all-in-one boxes like Windows where I suppose it makes sense to install client and server (as it's filling both rolls) but with proper client / server divide the server installs should be freeNAS, NAS4Free, Windows (Home) Server and lastly OSX.

 

So because I don't have a supported MB3 Server distro, there's just no way I'm going to throw MB3 client and server onto a thin Win7 box I use strictly as a client.

 

Thoughts?

 

 

This is somewhat of a mixed bag, as many people in this thread have pointed out it works absolutely fine having the server on a different machine accessing your content over the network, so with that said I'm gonna focus more on the other point of this.

 

In a perfect world i too would want to run the MediaBrowser Server on lets say a netgear ready nas, But here comes the why it's not such a great idea. All the nases unless you build them yourself are really really low on cpu power, which in fact makes it almost impossible to feed devices such as Phones. And that is why at least I'm not running MBS on a dedicated box.

 

In the future I will probably build a powerful NAS-like computer running FreeNAS, and when that time comes I am quite sure i will be able to run the server component on that, in fact it might even be possible as of now since the linux server port works ?.

 

Otherwise it's just a matter of time before it comes to things such as FreeNAS

[marcisikoff 4]

The HTPC I have in my living room is very, very light.  It has a 128GB hard drive, 4GB of RAM, and a CPU with builtin graphics.

 

There is literally no client software on it other than the old MB and Windows 7 32-bit with maybe flash for browsing, and little else.

 

That is, IMHO, how a client should be.

 

I let my 16GB FreeNAS handle the heavy lifting, and it runs Plex there, and my devices enjoy remote viewing through Plex apps.  I need no real updates to happen on the client since SickBeard gets Windows/MediaBrowser metadata for me.

 

For my HTPC, Plex falls down with Plex Home Theater since there's no mouse support.   Classic Microsoft blunder, treating a desktop PC like an iPad.  I see MB3 did the same thing, so that's why I'm simply looking for MBC to see if it's a better experience than MB 2.6.x...and so far it's not.

 

So for those saying run MBS and MBC on the same client, I doubt it will be effective and philosophically I'm completely opposed

[ebr 14904]

MB 2.6 also has a "server" component as well (the service) and it isn't as efficient as the new MB 3 server.

 

You can doubt if you wish but a lot of people are using it successfully on the same hardware they had MB 2 on.  And, with the unix version, you can put the server on your real server box making all of this moot.

[Luke 37015]

And yet there's a lot of people here who do that. I think a lot of your issues are purely your own creation because MBC is almost the same as MB2, and if you remember, MB2 had a stand-alone service that performed many of the same functions that Media Browser Server does. So it's not as different as you might think.

[Macburp 109]

The HTPC I have in my living room is very, very light.  It has a 128GB hard drive, 4GB of RAM, and a CPU with builtin graphics.

 

There is literally no client software on it other than the old MB and Windows 7 32-bit with maybe flash for browsing, and little else.

 

That is, IMHO, how a client should be.

 

I let my 16GB FreeNAS handle the heavy lifting, and it runs Plex there, and my devices enjoy remote viewing through Plex apps.  I need no real updates to happen on the client since SickBeard gets Windows/MediaBrowser metadata for me.

 

For my HTPC, Plex falls down with Plex Home Theater since there's no mouse support.   Classic Microsoft blunder, treating a desktop PC like an iPad.  I see MB3 did the same thing, so that's why I'm simply looking for MBC to see if it's a better experience than MB 2.6.x...and so far it's not.

 

So for those saying run MBS and MBC on the same client, I doubt it will be effective and philosophically I'm completely opposed

 

My main PC has a similar spec to your HTPC client. I run an Xbox 360 extender for living room viewing, and also use android, ipad and Roku clients. I have had no issues running MBS on the PC, my issues (resolvable and resolved for the most part) have come with the clients I use.

[breezytm 124]

I have a low powered intel nuc, dual core, 4g of ram, 120 gb hard drive and it's running both server and client. My contents are on my nas storage. Pretty much the same setup that you have. I would like to move my server over to my nas box since it has more processing power but for the time being everything works quite well. Remember, you don't use that much CPU if you enable hw acceleration (GPU) in your codecs during playback. The only time MB spike my CPU is during library scan and other schedule tasks or at MBS startup. Also I get high cpu usage when watching a video from one of the channels. Transcoding is cpu intensive so that's expected. 

[c0m3r 95]

As you say you only doubt it will be effective I assume you haven't actually tried MB3? I would suggest you do and should you still be against it or it adversely affects performance, go back to MB2. I have a feeling that it will work just fine as everybody here has already explained.