Ok iv got a special little project starting this weekend - iv decided to build my own all-in-one device -
a custom made home NAS / file sever and HTPC combined
Its going to be atom n330 (with ION) powered, will have 4gb low voltage ram, and for the time being the 3x 1tb green hdd's in my main gaming rig (as iv blown all my cash on the core components ) - will later be upgraded to as many 2tb hdd's as I can fit in the case.
I'll put up a build log as soon as the stuff is delivered and I put it all together (hopefully delivered tomorrow).
Anyway, this box will be powered on pretty much 24/7 (hence the atom choice for as little power use as possible), and needs to be as flexible as possible to do everything I need.
So - in a nutshell I need an OS that has / can have a decent media front end, but also has a few NAS options.
I esentially want to be able to run a 'pretty' media centre front end (so OS needs full gpu acceleration for interface and 1080p playback), but with various servers running in the background (like ps3mediaserver), give access to various storage drives / network shares (restricted on a per user basis) from my other pcs, and be able to remote login from my main gaming rig (but not across the internet).
Do I just want a standard windows 7 install? I love the look of xbmc, but im not sure about it running stuff other than the media pc functionality.
Ideas?