set up a media server at home

So, I’m going to do a half-step (or more like a quarter-step) for now. Have an old Dell GX240; I’m going to throw a couple hard drives in it and hook it up to the network. At least I’ll have a start. I won’t really be streaming much from it, but having a storage server for all our media will be nice.

Figured out last night that my desired media-server config would run $600-700. Not hugely expensive, but quite a bit more than we have to expend right now.

My desktop just died, and I’m happy using my laptop, so maybe I’ll “replace” it with a media server.

What I’d like is 3 or 4 large (250GB or more) drives in a RAID 5 array. Haven’t yet figured out for sure what I want to do for the clients. The Roku Soundbridge looks good for audio, but I have to find something for video. I know there are things out there; I’ve read reviews various places. But haven’t come close to deciding on one yet. Any suggestions?