Implementation and performance measurement of microcomputer as multimedia server for supporting e-learning infrastructure

摘要

The rapid development of e-learning and towards Massive Online Open Course requires the diversity of learning media as content. One type of learning media is interesting and easy to understand is multimedia learning media, especially video. In providing video content, an e-learning system requires high hardware and network availability resources. It certainly requires a lot of investment cost and resources. This research proposes solutions to these problems by designing and implementing multimedia servers with a simple network infrastructure that can provide video content and other multimedia-based learning media. Multimedia servers are created using single board microcomputer called Raspberry Pi that has a function as servers, and multimedia content will be accessed using smartphone devices by users. The advantages of this infrastructure are 1) Low cost but high performance approaching conventional servers; 2) Flexible and can be accessed via mobile using a smartphone. The result after performance measurement showed that CPU usage is approximately 10% from 1.2 GHz, the memory usage approximately 518 Mb out of 998 Mb, the network latency is still below threshold delay from TIPHON standardization, the video quality is still on the mini HD although accessed by 50 users, and the temperature is still in the normal levels.