Hi everyone - first time long time. Have been a long time TiVo user but I’m in the process of migrating over to channels. I had a question about the dvr setup. I have a Mac mini I was thinking of using to run the channels dvr, can I have external storage somewhere on my network and point the Mac mini to it, or does it have to be plugged in directly to the mini usb/thunderbolt port to work like that? Sorry if this is a real basic question, I looked around and didn’t see it addressed. Thanks.
I think it works, but it is recommended to have it directly connected to the mac mini. I am running a Mac Mini with a USB 3 external drive connected. I have a QNAP that I was going to use for storage, but from reading comments on the forum it is better to just use storage directly connected.
I am newer also and have had many questions that have been answered by everyone on this board! There is no dumb question, I promise you!
I am using a Mac Mini as well and have used the external storage both ways, connected directly to the mac mini and connected elsewhere (in my router in my case) and it did work both ways. I ultimately decided to plug my external storage directly into my mac mini because of stability and speed. Ultimately, things just worked better when I plugged the external drive into the mac directly. There are other considerations that you have to take into account if you do not plug the storage directly into the mac, like making sure it is on 24/7 from the other location.
Wow, thanks for responding so quickly ya’ll. What about using the Mac mini hard drive directly? If it’s 2TB then it would be suitable for my recording needs. How does the channels dvr handle just an ssd drive? Will it wear it out quickly?
@janitor53 just search the Community for SSD, the general consensus seems to be newer SSDs should be fine.
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I have read many other users that have used the internal hard drive for the recordings with great success. You will just be limited to the storage capacity of that hard drive (although 2TB is not bad at all, better than most DVRs you get from cable companies). I went to Costco and bought a USB 3.0 Seagate 8TB hard drive that is devoted to the DVR for $140.
Also, I setup my mac mini using the tips included in this thread
and it has worked great. I would recommend you take a look at the tips in there. Particularly the ones below:
- Turn off sleep
- Turn on auto login for your user
- Turn on screen sharing in the Sharing pane of System Preferences. You can use VNC software to remotely connect to the Mac.
This makes the most sense. Using a NAS drive connected to the Mini is asking for trouble. There are invariably going to be times that the NAS is rebooting or something. A DVR is an appliance, and it needs to have its drive available. Likewise, using the internal drive is good for a test, but do you want the OS drive filling up on you? External USB3 drives are cheap, so that is what I did. Now I am up to 3 x 10TB drives on my Mac Mini and have about 10K recordings. That old 2012 Mac Mini handles it brilliantly.
Thanks everyone. Is 8 gig enough memory for good performance from the mini m1?
I am using the new M1 Mac Mini with 8gb memory with absolutely no issues!! It hovers around 40-45% memory utilization almost all the time.
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Is there a recommended usb3 drive that people use? Will just my seagate or WD do?
Any of them will work. I would suggest the large 3.5" vs the small 2.5" because they are designed for more steady use. Best Buy puts them on sale all the time. That's were I got all of mine.
As long as it is powered by an actual power cord and not the USB connection it should be good from what I recall reading in the forums.
I've been running my Mac Mini M1 (8GB) with an external UGREEN NMVe enclosure with 1TB Intel 660p NMVe storage. It's powered solely by the USB-C port, and I have had no issues. I have many times been recording 3 streams, playing 1 stream, and even doing commercial detection on another stream simultaneously. Also seemed to be the most compact way to do this.
Link to enclosure I purchased is below:
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That "UGREEN NMVe" looks like a nice setup and NMVe is capable of some excellent i/o speeds when internal, like 4 - 6 times faster (2500-3500 MBs) than most USB 3.x ports that are SATA based.
So, in my mind if using external SSD may as well go with possibly less expensive SATA SSD since USB 3.0 speeds may top out around 500MBs anyway (and maybe 1000MBs on USB 3.1) -- and internal SATA SSD also top out at about the same 500MBs as far as I know. For comparision, spinning disk may have i/o around 90-110 MBs.
But then, the NMVe SSD could always be repurposed for internal use on a compatible system at some later time if someone choose to do so.
To elaborate on what others have said. If you go with an external “spinny” disk, get one that has its own power supply, or if it doesn’t have that option use a powered usb hub to power it. SSDs typically have much lower power requirements so you can get away with powering them only via usb from the mini.
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I use a hard wired M1 Mini 8/256 connected to a 4 TB G Drive for storage. The G Drive has been in service for 3 years with no down time. Keep in mind the Ethernet port will be the bottleneck so anything above 100 mbps is not required for playback.