References

Drivers

Intel Ethernet Controller I217-V NIC;
https://downloadcenter.intel.com/Detail_Desc.aspx?DwnldID=15817

Western Digital RED 3TB Firmware:
http://support.wd.com/product/download.asp?modelno=WD30EFRX&x=0&y=0

Intel HD Integrated Graphics;
http://askubuntu.com/questions/364269/how-to-install-intel-graphics-driver-installer-in-ubuntu-12-04-lts
http://www.webupd8.org/2013/04/how-to-use-intel-linux-graphics-drivers.html
https://01.org/linuxgraphics/downloads/2014/intelr-graphics-installer-1.0.4-linux

 

Configuration

Configuring S.M.A.R.T tests;
https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/S.M.A.R.T.

Configuring TRIM;
http://blog.neutrino.es/2013/howto-properly-activate-trim-for-your-ssd-on-linux-fstrim-lvm-and-dmcrypt/

How to install a WD Advanced Format Drive on a non-Windows Operating System;
http://wdc.custhelp.com/app/answers/detail/a_id/5655

Linux MDADM reference;
https://raid.wiki.kernel.org/index.php/Linux_Raid

Another Linux MDADM reference;
http://dennisfleurbaaij.blogspot.co.uk/2013/01/setting-up-linux-mdadm-raid-array-with.html

And another Linux MDADM reference;
http://zackreed.me/articles/38-software-raid-5-in-debian-with-mdadm

RAID stripe cache size info;
http://www.spinics.net/lists/raid/msg45364.html

NCQ performance decrease with Linux RAID5;
http://serverfault.com/questions/305890/poor-linux-software-raid-5-performance-with-ncq

Information on Linux I/O schedulers;
http://blog.nexcess.net/2010/11/07/changing-your-linux-io-scheduler/

Information on device read-ahead settings;
http://www.kchodorow.com/blog/2012/04/05/thursday-4-blockdev/

Information on Bitmaps;
https://raid.wiki.kernel.org/index.php/Bitmap

 

Software

SMPlayer;
http://smplayer.sourceforge.net/en/downloads
VLC Media Player;
http://www.videolan.org/vlc/index.html
get_iplayer;
http://www.infradead.org/get_iplayer/html/get_iplayer.html

 

Testing and sample video & audio

Big Buck Bunny (1080p and 4k at varying FPS, surrour and stero sound);
http://bbb3d.renderfarming.net/download.html
http://download.blender.org/peach/bigbuckbunny_movies/

Sintel Movie (1080p, 2K & UHD 3840 wide);
http://www.sintel.org/download

Tears of Steel movie (1080p, 4k);
http://mango.blender.org/download/

HDD/SDD performance testing with dd;
http://www.thomas-krenn.com/en/wiki/Linux_I/O_Performance_Tests_using_dd
https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/SSD_Benchmarking#Using_dd

 

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