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[bunglemebaby]

Is there an option to prevent a media server system from going to sleep while a client is playing back media from it? This seems like a basic feature so I'm guessing that it exists, but I can't find it in the options anywhere.
-Jon

[Matt]

I believe only television recording wakes and/or keeps the computer awake, not file serving.

The challenge is that there's a lot of network chatter, so I'm not certain what transactions should be considered stay-awake-worthy.

One approach would be to always keep the machine awake when any server is running, but this would sort of defeat the purpose of auto-sleep on the machine.

[bunglemebaby]

That makes sense (not wanting to keep the machine always on), and without understanding what's going on behind the scenes I may not have much in the way of suggestions. Doesn't the server know that a non-local zone has an active playing now though (in order to do a "Link Zones" command, et al)?
From a user's perspective though, I definitely want the media server to stay on while I'm playing music (or watching video, etc) from a client. It is really frustrating to have to go turn the server back on midway through an album. I'm a little bit surprised that I haven't seen anything else about this as it's a very important issue in my book.
What have others done to deal with this?
-Jon

[imugli]

Obvious answer - left my server on 

Seriously though, I would have thought ANY activity would have kept the server running.

If you're looking to save power (as I am), I've set my server to close down at 12:00 midnight each night and wake up at 7:00am each day. No one streams media in my house during those hours, so little point in having the server on...

I run ubuntu server on an old PC with SMB shares so it's really just like turning my PC on and off every day. The shutdown is a cron, the startup is via alarm in the bios.

[Vocalpoint]

From a user's perspective though, I definitely want the media server to stay on while I'm playing music (or watching video, etc) from a client. It is really frustrating to have to go turn the server back on midway through an album. I'm a little bit surprised that I haven't seen anything else about this as it's a very important issue in my book. What have others done to deal with this?

Exactly what kind of server do you have that would even be allowed to sleep? Or are you using a workstation OS but calling it a server?

Bottom line: Just leave it on - that's what servers are designed for. And trust me  I have done plenty of electrical analysis and all sorts of costing over a 6 month period using Windows Home Server here and in the end - I think was about 8 bucks more to keep the thing on all the time. 8 bucks is more than worth it to avoid all hassle factor

VP

[Matt]

I put my Library Server machine (which is also my main computer) to sleep manually most nights.

Gizmo, Media Center, and television recording in Media Center all wake it up automatically if needed.

It's about $1 per-watt-per-year in the US.  My server machine draws 100W at idle, so if it can sleep 1/3 of the time, it saves a little over $30 a year.

[Vocalpoint]

I put my Library Server machine (which is also my main computer) to sleep manually most nights.
Gizmo, Media Center, and television recording in Media Center all wake it up automatically if needed. It's about $1 per-watt-per-year in the US.  My server machine draws 100W at idle, so if it can sleep 1/3 of the time, it saves a little over $30 a year.

Yes - as do I - but that's a desktop OS (as I assume yours is). I was referring to the "server" where the media files are actually located. And over here that's a WHS 2011 (Windows Server 2008) box that's running 24x7x365 and it never goes to sleep.

VP

[bunglemebaby]

Exactly what kind of server do you have that would even be allowed to sleep? Or are you using a workstation OS but calling it a server?

The latter, because it stores my media and serves it to other devices. (Pseudo-) Server by function, if not by form.
I was under the impression that a media server is often expected to sleep/wake as needed by client devices (hence features like WoL). Setting the system up to turn on each morning would be easy enough, but guessing a safe shutdown time is near impossible, so that will take some tinkering to avoid shutdown/sleep when the system is actively being used. Maybe a manual shutdown is fine.

I still think that preventing sleep while serving media would be a reasonable feature. I'd guess that there are others that occasionally stream from their laptop when an odd situation calls for it (that's the only streaming I'd done prior to setting up the new system). I suppose I get why it's not a higher priority feature now though.

Thanks for the thoughts and advice. -Jon

[BryanC]

Any updates on this? I'd love to prevent sleep/hibernation while Library Server is running...

[wibblefish]

Medic!

resurrecting this old thread as I have to keep getting off the sofa to wake up my media sever which keeps going to sleep whilst I am listening to music on MC on my laptop.

Can jrmc not issue some kind of "keep alive" instruction whilst serving music? I am fairly sure this this possible (at least) within the windows API.

FWIW, viewers might be interested in this utility. (I have not tried it out myself) http://dennisbabkin.com/toff/

[Mr ChriZ]

I'd really like to see this tacked.

My server isn't a real server.  It's my desktop computer which most of the time I want to go to sleep after 30 minutes of non use.  However I sometimes work on my laptop computer - playing media off of my desktop.
Having it go to sleep every 30 minutes is quite frustrating!

[csimon]

Windows 7 at least has a parameter in the power options that specifies a minimum processor activity required to stay awake, at least that's how I interpret it. It works for me anyway - I have my main PC set to sleep after 10 minutes but simply using MC on it to serve a DLNA renderer keeps it awake the whole time. Althought, I'm using JRemote as a controller and I know that sends WOL packets to wake the server up.

[Mr ChriZ]

Windows 7 at least has a parameter in the power options that specifies a minimum processor activity required to stay awake, at least that's how I interpret it. It works for me anyway - I have my main PC set to sleep after 10 minutes but simply using MC on it to serve a DLNA renderer keeps it awake the whole time. Althought, I'm using JRemote as a controller and I know that sends WOL packets to wake the server up.

If we're looking at the same parameter I think what it actually does is vary the clock rate on the cpu to save battery juice?