[annonymouse]

Ok so I'm looking to build my first htpc/nas heres what I have in mind. I know that sounds counterproductive but I would like to incorporate my whs hdd into my htpc. I was thinking about running the os off of an ssd and the storage off of the hdd. I have 3 hdd ranging in size from 3tb to 1tb from a whs that I was looking to incorporate into this system. I was wondering if it would be possible to spindown or sleep the hdd while no data is needed while keeping the htpc running off of the ssd? This is what I was thinking for parts. I want to be able to do bluray, 3d, hd audio and also stream 1080p


Case:
COOLER MASTER RC-120A-KKN1 Mini-ITX Tower Computer Case

Power supply:
COOLER MASTER Elite 460 RS-460-PSAR-I3 460W ATX12V V2.31 Power Supply

Motherboard:http://forum.xbmc.org/newreply.php?tid=164576
ASRock FM2A85X-ITX FM2 AMD A85X (Hudson D4) SATA 6Gb/s USB 3.0 HDMI Mini ITX AMD Motherboard with UEFI BIOS

CPu:
AMD A10-5700 Trinity 3.4GHz (4.0GHz Turbo) Socket FM2 65W Quad-Core Desktop APU (CPU + GPU) with DirectX 11

Ram:
Crucial Ballistix Sport 8GB (2 x 4GB) 240-Pin DDR3 SDRAM DDR3 1600 (PC3 12800) Desktop Memory Model BLS2KIT4G3D1609DS1S00

Bluray:
LG Black 14X BD-R 2X BD-RE 16X DVD+R 5X DVD-RAM 12X BD-ROM 4MB Cache SATA BDXL Blu-ray Burner, Bare Drive, 3D Play Back

Need to figure out the remote and also win7 or 8 for base os

[rip_king]

I think FlexRAID should work with WHS for your purposes, but will defer to somebody with a bit more experience.

I use Windows 8 for my HTPC and it works great. It does have Windows spaces which is a RAID style set up for your HDDs, but I don't believe it will spin down the drives while not in use (FlexRAID does I believe).

[nokdim]

I use UnRaid and it is able to spin down disks that are not in use, I would assume FlexRaid has the same functionality.
Personally I cant stand noise so I have a NAS in the basement and simple disk-less clients like Apple TV and pi's that stream from the NAS so I dont have to listen to drives spin.
But UnRaid does allow unused disks to be spun down for power savings and noise reduction.

Also I am a linux guy so I would recommend Ubuntu as the OS as it is more stable than windows.

I do have one Neuros Link system that runs linux off a thumb drive and has 2Gig of ram a dual core and is capable of doing 1080p, it uses an RF remote which is nice and easy to map keys to functions.

[annonymouse]

I've only got 2 TVs and limited space so I feel its overkill to have a nas and htpc when most of my streaming will be done to my TV thats hooked up too my htpc so I figured why not try and combine the 2. I'm not too familiar with Linux although I'm pretty good with android. That said I'm leaning towards trying windows 8 pro. I was reading that if I set my power options in windows to shut down HDD after certain time that it will selectively shut down drives not in use while still leaving my ssd running, but I'm going to look into UNraid. Any suggestions on my parts? Or is that pretty good for an starter set?