I have a small form factor PC.

I am new to Linux and am looking for advice.

The main functions of the computer are to store all my files (MP3’s, Movies etc) so that other computers on my network can access them.

I also want to connect it using TV using tv out and use a remote to play music, TV, movies etc.

What linux distro would you recommend also additional programs?

I have one 74Gb SATA drive and one 120Gb IDE drive. How would you recommend partitioning?

Where should I place the shares?

Thanks in advance for your help

ThomasJay

Hello and welcome to Linux Questions.

Many post's on here where people are looking for the "right" distro. Depends on the distro but most have the functions you are looking for. I am biased and prefer Slack.

To start with, something easy. 10 gigs for / , 14 gigs for /usr 50 gigs for /home and mount the other drive as additional storage for /home, resierfs or ext3fs are what I would use for the partition type.
You will need to read alot before doing all this.
If you are doing *nix to windoze shares see
http://us4.samba.org/samba/
There are a massive amount of threads on here related to samba, networking, setting up, installing,media players,movie players etc.....
Hope that helps some and hope I did not mislead you.
Good luck!
By the way thats just my 2 pennies, TIMTOWTDI.