You can get an Intel mini-itx mainboard with an atom CPU & cooler for $60 from newegg. This would greatly reduce the power used by your DVDrip project. This also reduces the cost of power supplies, the physical space used, and the heat generated. You will still probably end up with micro-atx cases if you want to have 2 dvd drives per system. You can get 80GB laptop hard drives for $44 with free shipping...this is just $2 more than the cost of a 80GB desktop drive with shipping, and will save you more than that in power savings while making less noise and heat. Ram usualy isn't included in combos, though you might get a good deal buying one set of 2 DDR2 sticks, and one set of 4 sticks, (or 3 sets of 2 sticks) and using one stick for each system.
depends im trying to rip as many dvds at ounce. 2 drives if possable 4 . i have 6000 dvds to do. so yeah. you think 1 gig will be enough for encoding 4 2hr videos at ounce.
forgot to add usb drives are a good idea. the psu is an easy one i might just build a case out of a cabnet. prevented. just thinking, using remote access since the units will be headless/server type: automated
"depends im trying to rip as many dvds at ounce. 2 drives if possable (sic) 4 . " IMHO, NFW can you do this effectively "on the cheap". There are several threads at AD about multiple concurrent rip/burn. I would suggest that you try one box first to see if you can even get this running on one system to your liking before you try expanding multiple systems
It would rip faster if you had two hard drives per system and a dual core, or if you simply used 1 DVD drive per system, and doubled the number of cycles that can be done in a night (instead of ripping 4 sets of 16, you rip 8 sets of 8...in about the same time used). BTW...what you are looking to do can be done with very old computers; how are you at dumpster diving?
trying on 1 system first. good idea i already have dirt old pcs. p3 550mghz 6-8 of them setting up as we speak. i don,t know if theyll work though. dumpster diving is not my thing; luck would have it, a friend of mine dumped a bunch on me.