Server PC
If you’re not concerned with video editing and DVD burning, you can skip this section and use most anything you have lying around. The requirements for the Sage TV software we used (client and server) are merely as follows:
1. Microsoft Windows 98 Second Edition or Millennium Edition, or Windows 2000 (SP3 or later) or XP.Windows 9X won’t handle the large files and disks well.
2. 128MB RAM (256MB recommended)
3. Intel Pentium III or later, or AMD Athlon. Either way, the processor should run at 600 MHz or faster
4. Supported TV tuner card and video card; make sure you have both composite video capture inputs and television outputs to get the most from the system
Being the performance fanatics we are, however, we built up a PC specifically for this project, selecting these components in particular:
1. 3.6 GHz Pentium 4 (Prescott) CPU for compression performance when burning DVDs
2. Thermally advantaged case to meet the higher cooling demands of the Prescott CPU
3. Added fans at CPU air case inlet and case front, including noise reduction gaskets
4. Four 200 GB disks. The 250 GB Serial ATA (SATA) disks were hard to get, and 400 GB units didn’t ship until after our publication deadline.
5. RAID controller on the motherboard to simplify disk integration
The processor, motherboard, disks, video card, and case are matched — the motherboard supports the processor power and socket interface, while the case is specifically designed to provide the extra cooling the processor requires. The video card works with the PCI Express graphics port made available by the motherboard.
You’ll get the best TV video quality using an S-Video output from the video card to the television. We suggest setting the video card at 800 ? 600 resolution, and 32-bit color. Don’t forget a screen saver, particularly if you’re using a large-screen projection TV subject to burn-in.