im planning on finally conquering my tv setup.
first i was thinking of using apple tv, then modding my original xbox, but now i think ill just use one of the old PCs i have and turn it into a linux based home server
suggestions for operating systems? how would i send or receive movies from the server? would it require some sort of FTP service or what? i don't know much, information is needed!
Well if it was me I'd install OSx86 (assuming you have hardware that works) and use something like this: http://www.plexapp.com/
This seems to be what you're looking for: http://rubbervir.us/projects/ubuntu_media_server/
I can't go the OS X way.
Right now I'm installing Ubuntu, JMV suggested xbmc for Linux and yours seems nice too. I probably will be going the xbmc way since I've heard a shit ton about it and they have really pretty skins.
It wouldn't be awful but I'm not sure if xbmc can stream or let you download files from the computer to another remotely. (Or Linux, which I don't know much about.)