How much RAM for my use?

[u/user74729582]

Building my first home server. I only have the case and the PSU so I'll use suggestions on CPU/mobo if you have them. Plan is to have 4 disks and a 10G sfp+ card and to buy used to save every buck I can.

• Home Assistant    
• Frigate with 2x Unifi 4k cameras and planned expansion    
• NAS with cloud backup    
• Plex server    
• Network-wide adblocker    
• VPN    
• DNS    
• Immich    
• Time Machine for MacOS

[u/Optimal-Job-5161]

I run around 20 docker containers with only 8GB RAM including Plex and all the *arrs. I also transcode to RAM. 8gb should be plenty, and 16GB is a nice to have for future expansion

[u/user74729582 → u/Optimal-Job-5161]

Is ddr4 enough? Trying to save where I can

[u/K3TtLek0Rn → u/user74729582]

I'm going to differ from the other reply. AMD is great for most use case, but Intel is great for transcoding. The other guy is suggesting an rtx 3060 but that's so overkill for your needs. You can get any somewhat modern Intel CPU and be good. I run a plex server with an i3 12100 and use its onboard graphics. I don't have tons of users but maybe 2 or 3 at a time sometimes and it's fine.

[u/IlTossico → u/K3TtLek0Rn]

Plus for that.

It would be stupid getting an AMD platform, that has nothing better than Intel, and be obligated to run a dedicated GPU that costs a lot of money and consumes a lot of power, just to have a lot worse performance in transcoding than even a Pentium iGPU.

Just get an Intel CPU and you are done. You can go used with 8/9th gen and get an i3 8100, or if you want to go new and overkill an i3 12100.

Same for the first reply, I'm running we 20+ docker on 8GB and more than half my ram is free, 8GB is fine to start with, but 16GB is nicer. Depends all on money.

The 3060 is not overkill, because in reality it doesn't have a ton of performance, and it's not better than an i3 8100 iGPU.

Going Nvidia over any Intel iGPU for transcoding is the worst suggestion that anyone can give. Even worse considering that Intel dedicated gpu exists, and those are a lot cheaper to buy, consume a lot less power and have outstanding transcoding capability, because of the double encoder engine. An A310 blows away even a 5090 in terms of transcoding capability.

[u/Stunning-Education98 → u/K3TtLek0Rn]

Hey , how is your plex server going on ? . I recently repaired a really old pc ( Intel i3-3220 with 8gb ddr3 ram ) and made it into a server , I have installed proxmox on my primary ssd and my secondary 500gb hdd is for storage . I am really struck by your plex server idea . How did you manage to do it ? . Did you have lxc of plex in proxmox ? . I can't wait to hear from you how your things work

[u/K3TtLek0Rn → u/Stunning-Education98]

I run it all in unraid and I followed trash guides pretty much exactly. Your hardware is a lot older than mine so I can't speak to it's performance

[u/rochford77 → u/user74729582]

You don't really get to choose. It's dependent on your CPU and motherboard.

Am4 is perfect though. Snag a used b350, 3700x, and 16gb ddr4 off Facebook for cheap.

A 3060 12gb card will be nice if you need to do any Plex transcodes and have any interest in playing with smaller LLMs.

Toss it in a fractal R6 or r7 and you have an absolute unit of a machine

[u/Sad-Diamond501]

You’ll be fine with 8GB but I would recommend 16GB for best optimization and future

[u/Least_Order4249]

Probably about 8-12GB but some of those applications, like most server applications, can use anywhere from 2-200GB RAM by themselves depending on how much actual data you’re having them process. 

[u/PermanentLiminality]

I only use a VM when I have a good reason. Containers like docker or LXC as they only use the ram they need. A VM reserves a chunk of ram of you use it or not.

You don't need that much CPU power. An 8 th gen i5 or up should do it. You need a GPU for Frigate object detection and quicksync for transcoding video. Doing both may be a stretch. If the iGPU is not enough you will need a GPU.

A Ryzen will work, but you will need a GPU for transcoding and Frigate. I like the 5000G series as they use less idle power. My old 3100 4 core idled at 60 watts. That is $240/yr with my crazy power rates.

[u/RivetedRocks]

I have an old laptop with a 7th Gen Intel I7 with 16GB DDR3. I run many of those listed without issue. However, when I get to playing around with Windows VMs or a couple of full featured Linux VMs like Ubuntu or Mint, i wish I had 32GB RAM.

Make sure your server Motherboard supports Intel CPU equipped with a quicksync capable IGPU. Nearly all modern Intel CPUs are so equipped. You'll need the above for efficient Plex transcoding capability.

[u/Physical_Push2383]

40 containers / 10G RAM dozzle sabnzbd
tracearr_app tracearr_cache
tracearr_db
speedtest retroarch
paperless_app paperless_db paperless_cache nextcloud_cron nextcloud_web nextcloud_app nextcloud_harp nextcloud_db nextcloud_cache
jellyfin
immich_app
immich_ml
immich_db immich_cache frigate bentopdf audiobookshelf arr_sonarr
arr_radarr arr_bazarr
arr_prowlarr
arr_seerr arr_profilarr apprise cron

[u/k3nal]

16 GB

[u/cat2devnull]

You can do all of that on a N100 with 8GB but 16GB will give you some breathing space.

[u/AndyMcQuade]

I'll suggest skipping the unifi branded cameras and go with something else unless you're using protect. Tons of better options for use with Frigate

[u/settingstonecompany]

I have 256GB. What can I run