Subj : Slimmed down Debian To : Ky Moffet From : Barry Martin Date : Thu Aug 29 2019 19:32:00 Hi Ky! > KM> Yeah, Unity was not well-received. Then again, Gnome3 is why > KM> Cinnamon and Mate exist. > What some people don't like others do like. ...I had to install Gnome > Tweak Tools on the systems running Ubuntu 18.04 because the 'new way' is > just to have a clock displaying the hours and minutes. Admittedly few > people need the accuracy of seconds but I find their display handy to > verify I didn't lock up something, or something huge just grabbed all > the CPU cycles termporarily. KM> See, that exemplifies what a lot of us hated: removing and KM> dumbing down features, to where it's basically a singletracking KM> OS. The removal of the seconds options in the clock does make one sort of wonder what else got removed. An earlier version of either Ubuntu or Raspbian one went into the configuration screen, switched "%R" to "%c" (or something similar), and the seconds now displayed. (Various letters and letter combinations allowed for various display formats: day, date, time). > > I'm running Ubuntu 18.04 on a few systems here, though I will admit > > those systems are 'hefty': fast multi-core CPU, 8- and 16 GB of RAM, > KM> How fast is fast? It chugged on a 3GHz quad-core. Haven't tried > KM> it on the i7. (Amazingly, the Closet doesn't have anything > KM> inbetween.) > This one has a AMD FX-8320 8-core @ 3500 MHz with 32 GB of RAM (in > hindsight would have been fine with half that). OS on a 250 GB SSD > 'cause I hate waiting for the thing to reboot when I did something > stupid to cause a lockup or other issue. Storage HDD is 3 TB. KM> Ah, that's practically futuristic by our standards! :D Yeah! Lots of options I don't have installed -- LIS in an earlier message no BluRay. Case does have an open bay should I decide is needed. Went with more USB 3.0 ports. KM> I found 32GB RAM of the fast stuff at half price locally, so one KM> of the 9010s got upgraded and its former 16GB kicked downhill (so KM> now the other two have 16gb and 12gb, with the mismatched KM> slower-clocked RAM ejected to the parts pile, cuz 25% performance KM> penalty seemed an excessive tradeoff for more RAM than they'll KM> need anyway.) LIS I haven't seen the need for that much RAM in my hardware -- could sort of seeonly needed 16 GB on this system but figured the one running the MythTV server would. Just checked and only using 2.1 GiB of 15.6 GiB (13%). Would figure it would like more RAM but guess not. > The MythTV Server is an AMD FX-8300, 8-core, 3300 MHz with 16 GB RAM. KM> That's no slouch either! Probably overkill but I'd rather overbuilt and underbuild. > Actually it started out with 32 GB but one stick was faulty which > between that and me learning about GPT and IOMMU -- umm, provided a KM> KM> Apparently IOMMU is intended for hardware virtualization. Ah good: you didn't know either! Here it seemed to have to be turned on during Ubuntu installation to allow both USB 2 and USB 3 to work -- early in the installs (multiple because of not knowing I had a bad RAM stick) had to unplug the keyboard and mouse from a USB 2 port into a USB 3 port. Knew that was wrong! > plethora of annoyances. While waiting for the replacement RAM (only a > few days!) I did get Ubuntu and MythTV installed and running; between > seeing this system (with the FX-8320) monitoring the server (FX-8300) > never getting anywhere close to 16 GB decided to leave the replacement > RAM out and eventually use it elsewhere. KM> Yeah, realistically almost none of us use over 8GB or so. But I KM> do try to max up system RAM when I see it priced right, under the KM> theory that it can't hurt to have it available as KM> future-proofing. Right: I try to build for the future. Cheaper to buy once and do minor upgrades than to buy multiple times because can't do the minor upgrades. KM> And that's how I discovered that ReactOS, at least the version I KM> had installed, was fine with 2GB but did not like 8GB. Oh well, KM> alpha software, and they've done so much with it since that I'd KM> have nuked it for a new version anyway. I've got a system which says it will accept 8 GB of RAM (2+2+2+2) but with that refused to boot. It liked 6: 2+2+1+1. Was the BIOS, not the OS. Even odder was it was a Lenovo -- one of the M51 series IIRC. > KM> Isn't MythTV defunct? (not that I'd care; I still run XP for > KM> everyday!) > MythTV is alive and well -- just finished a project with a gentleman in > New Zealand to copy recordings from a old server to new (old databases > are not directly compatible with then new). KM> The joy of upgrading... Well I sort of lucked out and worked with a gentleman from New Zealand who I think is one of the developers. Regardless of if he is or not knows the internals inside out. He had a database conversion utility which we worked on -- I got my programmes transferred and he got a guinea pig . AFAICT the only data that did not transfer was the channel information. It says "#1081" if something was recorded on Channel 8.1 or "#1362" on Channel 36.2. Big deal. Everything else was present: title, summary, etc. > The Mythbuntu option has been discontinued. Was an abbreviated version > of Ubuntu, just enough to let MythTV run. Now it's a MythTV app added > to the OS. KM> Ah, that's what I'm remembering. OK. > MythDora was a competitor to MythTV several years ago. That ended > around ten years ago and I switched to MythTV. KM> Or that. All I knew is MythSomething died. :P As long as that something isn't 'TV'! > > KM> If I were to set up a media server, I might look at Kodi. > KM> https://kodi.tv/ > I had looked at Kodi two or three (maybe three or four!) years ago and > seemed too complicated: seemed had to go down through several seb-menu > levels to get to the TV shows portion. I wasn't too thrilled with that; > the other person using the system here would have never figured it out! KM> Heh... since I don't have TV reception or cable I'd never notice. KM> My idea of a media server is to trawl the big external drive, KM> find the desired MP4, and fire up VLC. Your dogs want to watch _Lassie_ and _Rin Tin Tin_! > > which once loaded seems to run properly on (up to a point) older > > hardware. Just easier for me to run a constant set: all the same OS. > > Well, then there is the Raspberry Pi's! > KM> Have you tried Rasbian? Debian for RPi. > KM> https://raspbian.org/ > Yup! :) Actually had used an RPi 3 (B?) as a Frontend. Because of > antenna -- later found out more tuner -- issues was running two > Backends: BE1 and BE2. (The new/current one is BE3 -- isn't my naming > convention clever?!) Was having troubles with pixelation: sometimes one > Backend would have a high-loss recoding while the other was essentially > fine. Antennae were about 10' apart but may have been enough to miss > the tree branch waving in the wind, record on a tuner better suited to > that channel, and other variables. So rather than moving our rumps to a > Frontend looking at the other Backend where we usually watched TV had a > computer looking at BE2 and the RPi looking at BE1 - flip source on the > TV. KM> My brain hurts. :) And I had to figure it out! > New system - BE3 - was partially an expensive experiment. I had read > the Hauppauge 1609 tuner was better at resolving varying signal issues > (so pixelation) but never found any specifics: microvoltage, signal > threshold levels, etc. Everything was empirical. Gee thanks: the old > tuners are supposed to work too. KM> I have some of the old analog tuners. Probably not useful KM> anymore... Probably not. There are still some analog station on the air but they're all low power which won't get to you if the high-powered digital ones don't. https://www.fcc.gov/consumers/guides/low-power-television-lptv-service According to that article the low-powered analog stations are going to have to update to digital within the year. FWIW there are two licensed low-power stations in the Quad City Metropolitian Area. Both have been off the air for some time, although one has a 'construction permit'. > Finally found some information which seemed to verify the 1609 tuner is > what I probably needed -- take deep breath and build new system. Needed > one anyway. ...Plugged the antenna input into the splitter for BE1's > tuners and test. New system records "98%" while the old systems are > definitely less. (Meaning there is a little bit of pixelation while the > other two have significantly more when is windy, etc.) KM> Call tree service. :D I don't think my neighbours would like me: the trees are on their property. > ..There are 'flaws' in my reception setup which I can't do too much > about. Trees tower over the house. Have to have the antennae in the > Storage Area on the second floor -- we'll just say discussions to put > outside where they belong were met coldly. KM> Haha... this house has an old very large TV antenna in the attic, KM> probably to preserve it from hail and high winds... I suppose I KM> could put the analog TV up there too. :D Run a long extension cord up there to power the TV! ...I might have a Digital to Analog converter -- don't know if it would work in your sub-zero attic! ¯ ® ¯ Barry_Martin_3@ ® ¯ @Q.COM ® ¯ ® .... Fahrflungnoodle: mouthful of spaghetti after a sneeze! --- MultiMail/Win32 v0.47 þ wcECHO 4.2 ÷ ILink: The Safe BBS þ Bettendorf, IA --- QScan/PCB v1.20a / 01-0462 * Origin: ILink: CFBBS | cfbbs.no-ip.com | 856-933-7096 (454:1/1) .