[moontan77]

I run openelec and tvheadend on one server pc and have just started using the standby option when the pc is idle. I have now started using xbmc on a tablet for watching live tv as a client. My issue is that the server pc will go to sleep if xbmc is idle for 10 minutes (which in a way is what i want) but what i would like to happen is for as long as xbmc is running on the tablet it keeps xbmc awake on the server pc. The advanced wake on lan addon lets me wake the server pc from the client tablet but it doesnt keep xbmc awake on the server pc. Anyone hear of any such service/addon that keeps one xbmc awake while another xbmc is on?

There's an addon for inhibiting the shutdown timer if certain ports are accessed but didnt have much luck with that.

[moontan77]

anyone else have a solution for this scenario?

[nickr]

Yes, don't let the server go to sleep.

[teeedubb]

Mythtv can do this.

[Kdekraker]

I'm running a Win7 based server set to go to sleep after 10 minutes of inactivity.
The XBMC client is also Win 7 based. I use standard Windows SMB (simple file sharing), werethe shared drive is mounted on the client (X. This location also configures as a video source in XBMC.

When the client is asleep or off(line) the server goes to sleep after 10 minutes of inactivity. When the client is awake and XBMC is running, the server won't go to sleep, even when there is no activity on the XBMC client.
When running powercfg -energy on the server, it tells that the proces srvnet is preventing the server to fall asleep after 10 min.

This seems to the trick for me!

[moontan77]

I use an app called smartpower on my windows 7 pc which hosts my media and it works great staying awake when certains clients are awake. However i run tvheadend on another pc (my pvr server) where the OS is Openelec and that will stay awake if a client is streaming from it but if a client stops streaming it will eventually fall asleep. I want it to always stay while the client is on, streaming or not, as i might start watching tv then start watching an mkv or something and then might want to go back to watching tv; by this time the tvheadend server would be gone to sleep and there would be tv server errors displayed on the client.

I would like not to have to waste electricity keeping the tvheadend server on 24/7 when its not being used 24/7. When live tv becomes more popular with xbmc it will probably be something that is more sought after with people who use the likes of openelec as their pvr server. Anyways hopefully something comes up in the future.

[robweber]

"when live tv becomes more popular with xbmc"

Who says it isn't already popular? There are numerous PVR backends ported to the PVR addon framework and lots of people in the forums talking about it. I think the issue here is that a lot of people aren't in the need for your exact use case here. Generally the purpose of a server to stream, or record, media is that it is ON and ready to be used when the clients are. If you can't get OpenELEC to keep itself on when connecting with other clients that can hardly be blamed on XBMC.

I also wonder about your desire not to waste electricity by keeping the machine on. Have you actually done any fact checking here to see what the power consumption would be? Just keeping one computer on 24/7 shouldn't be adding a lot to your power bill. I hooked a kWh monitor up to my media server and found that it costs $5-$8 a month depending on usage. It seems like just letting the machine run and do its job will keep you alot happier than coming up with numerous workarounds to keep it alive when you want it and sleeping when you don't.

[moontan77]

I'm not blaming xbmc for anything, i was just looking for ideas that is all.

[opdenkamp]

this is something for the backend software (myth, tvheadend, whatever) rather than xbmc

[teeedubb]

I also wonder about your desire not to waste electricity by keeping the machine on. Have you actually done any fact checking here to see what the power consumption would be? Just keeping one computer on 24/7 shouldn't be adding a lot to your power bill. I hooked a kWh monitor up to my media server and found that it costs $5-$8 a month depending on usage. It seems like just letting the machine run and do its job will keep you alot happier than coming up with numerous workarounds to keep it alive when you want it and sleeping when you don't.

But why keep something on when you don't need to? I estimate my back end is on maybe on average 6hrs a day, so using your costs having it suspend when not in use saves me between $45-72 dollars a year. Also add in the cost of wear and tear as its on 4 times as much. Sure its not huge amounts were talking about here, but better money in my pocket then someone else's.

Mythtv wakes automatically for recordings and stays awake while serving media, downloading, running certain programs etc and suspends when idle for an hour. Its wake able from xbmc, laptop, phone and (if I wanted to) my remote control from anywhere in the world and is ready to use in 4 seconds. From what I've read Gotham will have the ability to automatically wake PCs when accessing network shares, so apart from the 4 second delay it won't be any different to having the back end on already and disks spun up.

Knowing that my hard earned money isn't being wasted keeps me happy.

[robweber]

But why keep something on when you don't need to? I estimate my back end is on maybe on average 6hrs a day, so using your costs having it suspend when not in use saves me between $45-72 dollars a year. Also add in the cost of wear and tear as its on 4 times as much. Sure its not huge amounts were talking about here, but better money in my pocket then someone else's.

Mythtv wakes automatically for recordings and stays awake while serving media, downloading, running certain programs etc and suspends when idle for an hour. Its wake able from xbmc, laptop, phone and (if I wanted to) my remote control from anywhere in the world and is ready to use in 4 seconds. From what I've read Gotham will have the ability to automatically wake PCs when accessing network shares, so apart from the 4 second delay it won't be any different to having the back end on already and disks spun up.

Knowing that my hard earned money isn't being wasted keeps me happy.

I guess whatever makes sense for your setup is the best way to do it, we just have a different idea of "wasted money". My point for the OP was that having a whole bunch of hacks or workarounds to wake up and keep your server alive when needed may just be more of a hassle than just keeping it on. Especially if you aren't just using it for PVR, but have NFS or SMB shares on it as well.

Granted this has a lot to do with where you live and what your living situation is, but in general people seem to think they are going to save this pile of cash by turning off one computer when their non-energy-efficient water heater/refrigerator/washer/dryer is eating up way more electricity every day. To me personally the yearly cost of the electricity is minimal compared to the convenience, but that's a personal preference for sure. I think it's important that you actually do the math and figure out what the true cost savings are going to be, in many cases you may find that you can live with less hassle for the extra $$ a year.

My estimates are super rough and based on my price for electricity and the "average" desktop power consumption. If you have a good PC that spins down the hard disks and such, and a decent price for electricity you could be paying very minimal per year. According to this post: http://www.raspberrypi.org/phpBB3/viewto...3&p=182118 the power consumption per year for an RPI is 43.95 kWh. Where I live that is about $5.50 per year in electricity. I also looked up a Synology DS413 (just a random synoloy model but I know they are rather popular on this forum). Given the manufacturer stats, if it was reading/writing data 24/7 for a year it would use 314 kWh. Again using my cost of electricity that would be $37.00 for the year. If the hard drives are idle even 50% of the time that cost goes down to $25 for the year. let's face it, it will be idle a lot more than that.