[denywinarto]

Assuming i'm fetching the lowest quality metadata for my movies and serials..
What would be the rough thumbnail size for each movie or serial?
I,m asking this because i'm building a diskless server and i don't know how much should i spend on harddisk for the thumbnails.. My movies and serial are on different server.. this server is specifically made for diskless purpose..

[Milhouse]

Remember the thumbnail artwork is cached, so it may be stored locally on the network (or remotely on the internet), then again on each client.

8GB is often sufficient for most libraries, and that's when using highest quality settings. It's possible to bloat the cache with pictures and crap from add-ons, but if you're careful this can be avoided. If you're looking at using an SSD then 32GB should be more than enough, particularly if you use something like OpenELEC (so almost all of your SSD is available for storage).

Reducing artwork quality to save on storage you're never likely to exceed doesn't seem like a good idea.

[denywinarto]

Remember the thumbnail artwork is cached, so it may be stored locally on the network (or remotely on the internet), then again on each client.

8GB is often sufficient for most libraries, and that's when using highest quality settings. It's possible to bloat the cache with pictures and crap from add-ons, but if you're careful this can be avoided. If you're looking at using an SSD then 32GB should be more than enough, particularly if you use something like OpenELEC (so almost all of your SSD is available for storage).

Reducing artwork quality to save on storage you're never likely to exceed doesn't seem like a good idea.

Thanks,
Yes its Kinda hard to estimate since it's cached
my library is around 20 TB.. with that size would it exceed 128gb?
Thats what i plan to allocate for thumbnails..
The second thing i'm worried about is the loading speed..
With such gigantic database, would having 4gb ram enough for smooth browsing experience?
Or should i add a vga / more ram? Does it help xbmc loading speed?

[Milhouse]

Yes its Kinda hard to estimate since it's cached
my library is around 20 TB.. with that size would it exceed 128gb?
Thats what i plan to allocate for thumbnails..

No, not even close. You probably won't even exceed 8GB with just movie, music and TV show fanart, posters, logos, clearart and thumbnails.

My library is 6TB, and my cache is less than 1.1GB (populated with all of the above artwork types), although the number of items in your media library is more relevant than the storage taken by your library - you'll have far more artwork in your cache for 1000x 1GB movies than you would for 100x 10GB movies). My library consists of 694 movies, 3250 episodes and 8000 songs (353 albums). All my artwork is cached at the highest 1080/720 resolutions.

The second thing i'm worried about is the loading speed..
With such gigantic database, would having 4gb ram enough for smooth browsing experience?
Or should i add a vga / more ram? Does it help xbmc loading speed?

Again, size (in TB) is not relevant - it's the quantity of items. Though any x86 with 2GB RAM running OpenELEC should be fine with even a large (in terms of items) library. You may need more RAM when using a less frugal OS, particularly Windows.

Heck, even the Pi2 works very well with my library - movie and tvshow libraries are displayed instantly, while it takes about 2 seconds to display all songs, and pretty much instant for albums and artists. If/when the x86-based Revo 3700 in my lounge expires, I'd have no problem replacing it with a Pi2 (I currently only use the Pi2 for test purposes).