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Topics - Stutch

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Hello again.  First of all, please forgive me for the long post.  I am very passionate about getting this system working so that I can help others. 
I've been troubleshooting this particular problem for 3 months now and I am running out of ideas.  When attempting to watch movies (ripped to the core system) on my diskless media devices, playback stutters periodically.  Considering that my intention is to move my entire DVD Library to this core system, the performance is absolutely critical.  Being an IT Infrastructure professional, I took a pretty hard core approach to correcting this issue.  (I like buying big toys.)

First, I thought maybe it was a disk access speed issue, so I dedicated four 250 GB drives in a hardware raid 10 configuration for the Linux MCE OS.  I then created a separate (hardware) raid 5 LUN for my media.  This resulted in no improvement on the media directors during playback; however they do seem to boot up quicker. 

Next I replaced my Linksys Gigabit switch with a Cisco Catalyst 3550 (Layer 3) Gigabit Switch and a few cat 6 certified patch cables to plug the systems directly into the switch.  I did see notable improvement after this change.  Movie play back still stutters on occasion, but it is far less severe. 

I have a core set up and running like a scalded dog, the config is below:

Motherboard: MSI Platinum AM2
RAID controller: 3Ware PCI-Express x16 SATA II Controller Card RAID
Processor: AMD Phenom 9950 2.6 GHz Quad Core
Memory: Crucial Ballistix 4gig memory
Case: Norco RPC-4020 4U
Power Supply: Antec TruePower Quattro 1000W
Video Card: MSI Video Card Nvidia Chipset
NIC: Intel Gigabit Ethernet
Hard Drives:
System: Western Digital Caviar 250GB X 4 Raid 10 configuration
Data: Western Digital Caviar 1TB X 8 Raid 5 configuration

Here are my current Media Directors:
Media Directors:
-1 MSI Media Live x64
-3 Generic PC x86(Testing)

What I think may help is increasing the MTU size for the media network.  I can do that easily enough on the switch, however, what would I need to do on the core /media directors?
Would this even help me?
Is there something else that I may be missing that could cause my video playback preformance issues?
I love you guys.

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Installation issues / 3Ware 9650SE Raid controller issues.
« on: August 31, 2008, 12:26:30 am »
Hello,

First off, let me say that I am not a total newbie when it comes to Linux, but I am also not as proficient in this OS as I am in Windows. Secondly I can safely say that I have spent limitless hours scouring the forums here looking for an answer to my issue. 

Here is my core system configuration:
•   MSI K9A2 Platinum motherboard
•   AMD Phenom 9650 2.3GHz Socket AM2+ 95W Quad-Core
•   4Gigs Ram
•   3Ware 9650SE-16ML Raid controller
•   Western Digital Caviar 1TB (8 total in a raid 5 array)
•   Broadcom Gig Nic
•   NORCO RPC-4020 4U Rack Mount Case
•   600 watt power supply

My issue seems centered around the 3ware Raid controller.  When using the DVD to install LinuxMCE, the system can see sda1 as a 5.4TB drive, but when the installer gets to the point where you are supposed to choose an drive to install too, you get this message:
HDIO_Drive_CMD (Identify) Failed: Invalid Argument
HDIO_Drive_CMD (Identify) Failed: Invalid Argument
/dev/sda1

It will allow you to choose the unidentified disk, and the install proceeds.  However, after the dvd is copied to the hard drive and the bios probes for devices,  you get a repeating message:
Unknown Partition table signature
If I remove the RAID controller and hook a drive directly to the motherboard, it works fine.   I really need to get this raid controller working.  According to the forums, the 6.22 kernel has the 3ware card driver, so I should be good to go.  Any suggestions?

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