Setup Advice

[MrWolfinWV]

I thought I had gathered all the information I needed; however, now that I've ordered a few components and started to plan out my installation, I have some more questions. I'm sure these things have already been thought of and conquered, already.

1. It sounds like the BM DVD plug-in will do what I want, but exactly how does it work when I'm going to have a media server with BTV Link boxes throughout the house? I'm assuming I need BM on each client. Do I need to have it on the server too? How do the clients with BM on them connect to the DVD library--file share?

2. On my server I'm planning to have a PVR-500 with either two STB's connected to the A/V inputs or one STB connected to the A/V input and one with analog cable. There will also be a couple OTA HD tuners. I understand I can prioritize the input devices and the OTA channels are assigned channels in the 1000's so the server knows which input to give to the client. When my clients connect to the input(s) with the STB(s), does the USB-UIRT know how to work from a BTV Link client?

3. It is my understanding that I will also need a USB-UIRT on the local client if I want it to be able to turn my TV on and off from the Firefly. Will this work with having a USB-UIRT on the server and on the client and will I need Girder to do this?

4. Along with #3, will I need Girder to control other devices such as a receiver or other A/V components I have or might add?

[kandlg]

Question 1:
You will need BM on each machine to watch the movies on the remote PCs. I have loaded all the movie files on large disk drives on my main HTPC. Then I use normal Windows file/folder sharing to share the drives/folders containing the movies. The other computers with BM/DVD Library are able to access the movies over the network. I configure DVD Library on the main computer and scan all the new movies into DVD Library normally just on that computer. Instead of reloading all the movies on the other PCs, I then take the entire DVD Library plugin folder on that computer and copy it to the other computers. I then edit the movies.xml file and do a search replace to update the file location. The main computer has the file location as "D:\movies\" and I just use the search/replace to change it to "\HTPC D Drive\movies\". There may be an easier way to do it, but this works for me.

[MrWolfinWV]

Thanks for the response. Anyone else on the other questions I have posed?