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[liffy99]

Hi
At present I have an Imac for general computing needs and a Vortexbox server in my upstairs study (running Logitech Media Server) for audio streaming around the house. The stream goes to Raspberry Pi and LMS players downstairs via my router. All works fine for my 1100 or so FLAC albums.

As the IMac is getting on a bit, and I want to reduce the rats nest of wiring in the study, I am hoping to ditch them in favour of a single PC that can do it all.

So, I was thinking of going Windows based (I'm fed up with Apple's closed universe and the inability to upgrade equipment) with a quiet PC. Probably along the following lines;
Intel I5 CPU
Motherboard capable of driving a 4k screen via HDMI 2.0 (Asus make one)
16gb RAM DDR4
A 256Gb SSD drive (M2 ?) for hosting the OS and office applications etc)
A 2tb hard drive for storing audio (and perhaps some video in future).
A 4k monitor (Dell ? or someone else)
It should be a low power PC (the IMac eats about 200w, the Vortexbox <20W) to be economical.
etc.

Will JRiver simply run from such a PC without interfering its other, general computing, functions ?

If I stayed with Apple (newer Imac or Mac Mini with 4 k monitor) will JRiver run happily under OSX alongside other computing applications ?
Would launch of JRiver from a remote (eg a tablet) kick an Imac or Mac Mini out of sleep mode (that way I would be less concerned about power consumption).

Anyone have a setup like this rather than a dedicated media server ?

Thanks

[JimH]

If Windows is the OS, JRiver will run on it.

[blgentry]

In no particular order:

If you're a long time Mac user, be prepared for a hard bumpy ride switching to Windows.

I run MC22 on a 2014 iMac with no trouble.  The iMac is my everyday computer, where I run web browsers, text editors, and pretty much every other program I use on a daily basis.   MC doesn't seem to have any issue with this, even when I'm streaming audio to a remote device.  That being said, I'd like to have a dedicated audio "server" for MC and I'm probably going to be using a Raspberry Pi 3 as a JRiver audio "server".

I have no idea about sleep and remotes.

Good luck.

Brian.

[RoderickGI]

If I were setting up an audio only PC or iMac, which was my primary computer and I wanted it to be quiet, I would definitely go SSD for both OS and data. In fact I would probably use a 500GB SSD for the OS and applications, and a 2TB SSD for data, assuming 2TB was enough. Expensive, yes, but quiet, although not silent. (Why does an SSD make any sound at all?! All mine will make some noise when working hard.  )

I have built a few "quiet" PCs now, and continually upgraded for silence, and still they just are not quiet enough for me, if there are spinning hard disks and fans, and they are near me, like my main PC in my office. If I needed more than 2TB of data space, my future PCs would use a remote located NAS.

Whether a Remote Control App on a tablet could wake a computer is quite dependent on the App, and your network environment, and if you want to do it from your LAN, or while you are outside your LAN and want to do it over the internet. Very possible with the right Router, App(s), Network Cards, etc. on a PC. Sometimes you might need to use a separate App to wake the MC Server, then start the Remote App. Some routers, and Internet Service Providers, do not allow WOL requests to be passed from outside your LAN to the MC Server. You would need to check that if you require it.

I would be very surprised if it was much different on an iMac. A quick search of the internet shows many people doing it.

My MC Server is my HTPC, and it wakes as required when I access it from my office PC, which is acting as a MC Client. Easy. Reliable.