Ok so here is an update, and this post if separate to the existing one because of it being my own experience with it and how I set it up. Didn't want to flood an ongoing conversation with my dribble. Those who want to read this one can do so
Installed Ubuntu Server 12.04 LTS without any problems, USB boot picked up perfectly and the install went through nice and fast.
Before adding additional drives I wanted to get the software set up first.
Plex installed without a hitch, which I was a bit surprised with, guess I expected problems.
I proceeded then to set up the port forwarding for Plex and Transmission. The phase 2 for torrent downloading will be setting up Torrentflex to automatically download new items.
So back to the hardware and this is where the fun started. Not as much with the hardware though.
I installed a current NTFS formatted 2TB drive into the HP, booted up and everything picked up fine. But the usual issue of Linux and NTFS permissions was quite a headache. Just using chmod to set permissions for the plex username did not work, in any combination.
I hunted around the net and read up about the NTFS configuration tool, ntfs-config, ran the app and it sorted the permissions in an instant. Score!
Next up was getting Plex set up with all the libraries, again no problems here.
As for the transcoding...
Tested SD content and HD content with all the default setting on an Android tablet with the PlexPass app and it worked like a dream. And I am only running a wirelessG at home! Tested SD and HD content on my PS3, worked perfectly.
Next challenge was watching HD content with the PS3 while watching HD content on the tablet. No problems
So from first impressions and some testing, without changing any default settings the transcoding works better than my previous ps3mediaserver set up. The HP is also still running with it's original 2GB of RAM. Haven't installed the additional 2GB yet. That will be something for the weekend.
