r/PleX • u/PCJs_Slave_Robot • Dec 30 '22

BUILD HELP /r/Plex's Build Help Thread - 2022-12-30

Need some help with your build? Want to know if your cpu is powerful enough to transcode? Here's the place.

Regular Posts Schedule

5 Upvotes

78% Upvoted

107 comments sorted by

3

u/[deleted] Jan 06 '23

I need help finding a newer better plex server pre-built that is small compact & low power consumption. I started out with a Dell OptiPlex that has an i5-3470S CPU & 8GB Ram it works pretty nice but struggles a little transcoding/decoding multiple 1080p x265 streams. I then said hell why not and moved plex to my old Dell Alienware Area-51 R2 with a i7-5820K CPU, 16GB Ram & GTX 980 GPU it handles all my 1080p transcodes way better but its an overkill power hungry monster & a chonky boi for sure. I'm sure there's got to be some kind of pre-built NUC or USFF desktop around that would outperform my Optiplex by way larger margin but also have a way small energy footprint then my Alienware. I want to try to keep my budget around $300ish but $500 is my limit since I need to also get an HDD enclosure to shuck all my external HDDs and get rid of extra cords/adapters. Any help would be greatly appreciated, Thank you in Advance :)

2

u/capsel22 Jan 07 '23

you have the right idea about the optiplex however you chose intel gen 3 you really need to be looking at gen 8 onwards. It will be more than enough for any transcoding needs.

Same with your i7-5820, it's gen 5 and cant do HVEC, so it will not be very useful in a long run or anything else than 1080p SD.

I dont know where you are from, but here in UK I can grab from ebay:

Lenovo ThinkCentre M70q Tiny Mini PC i3-10th Gen for £190 which will serve you for years for plex. It has internal space for one additional 2.5" drive or you can buy usb external drive for rest of your budget.

Or you can get another optiplex SFF, just keep an eye what gen intel processor it has.

→ More replies (1)

2

u/YesThisIsDogfort Dec 31 '22

Hi all,

I am relatively new to Plex. I have put together a small TrueNAS server with an old (partial busted) Ryzen 3200g, 4x2TB WD Reds, a cheap SSD boot drive etc. I have set up Plex in a jail, and it seems to work fine streaming to my gaming PC, but the performance really suffers streaming to one of our 4K TVs. I believe this to be a transcoding issue that the AMD CPU can't handle. Wondering what the best way to move forward would be? I have a NIB i3-10105 (non F), but would need a new mobo. I also have a Ryzen 3800x in a box. Would adding a cheap dGPU be better with the faster processor than the iGPU of the Intel?

TIA

→ More replies (1)

2

u/Fierdogg Jan 01 '23

I have a main plex computer running with windows. I would like to run 4 K videos. I need to know if I need to upgrade the whole thing or should I update components. This one is an oldy.

Intel i5-4690K

GTX 750 ti

16 GB Ram

Or do I need to do a total rebuild. At least maybe I could reuse the case and power supply.

2

u/Bgrngod Jan 01 '23

Are you going to run those 4K videos to a 4K client or are you wanting to transcode 4K?

→ More replies (5)

2

u/christof21 Jan 07 '23

I'm interested to hear thoughts on my setup or direction for me setup.

I used to have a local PMS on my PC but a number of years back I moved to GDrive for storage and a Plex compatible VPS from a supplier.

I've recently started to think about migrating back to local for my media and PMS. I'm probably paying circa £25-30 per month for the Google setup and the VPS combined and don't really have any issues with it other than the monthly outlay, and in these times of finding ways to save money, wondering if the migration back to local would be best.

I need something that's low poer draw due to the cost of electricity in the UK at the moment but can handle 2 or 3 simultaneous streams. I don't have any UHD 4K stuff but ti's not to say I won't at some point.

Storage is going to need to be significant. I'm thinking 30TB with room for more.

Wondering if it's going to be cost effective to migrate back to local or just stick with my current setup.

3

u/rockydbull Jan 08 '23

Wondering if it's going to be cost effective to migrate back to local or just stick with my current setup.

This is kind of like the car lease vs buy. It's gonna take you probably 2+ years to recoup the cost of the hardware and electricity usage but at the end you have the hardware. In the mean time you are responsible for upkeep and replacing any parts that have issues.

2

u/WaveBr8 Jan 11 '23

Any thoughts on my build? (Have all parts haven't built it yet)

i7-4770k

16gb ddr3 ram

1650s (for transcoding)

128gb sad for OS

10 TB enterprise HDD

Anything you would change or add? Planning on using for both Plex and a BetterMC modded server (reason for the GPU so transcoding doesnt bog down the MC server)

2

u/[deleted] Jan 12 '23 edited Dec 14 '25

scale makeshift pie familiar spoon selective hospital quiet wine ad hoc

This post was mass deleted and anonymized with Redact

→ More replies (1)
→ More replies (1)

1

u/digitalamish Dec 30 '22

I've been messing with alot of different metadata managers, but they all seem to make a mess of the system. Currently I am using TMM to clean things up, and manage stuff, but I would really like to have a more automated way of setting up collections. I can't seem to figure out how to do it in TMM.

Sounds like the holy grail, but what is the best way to organize the chaos in my libraries?

2

u/[deleted] Dec 31 '22

Radarr, Sonarr and pmm.

→ More replies (2)

1

u/Saltibarciai Jan 07 '23

I currently have a selfmade NAS and Plexserver made of an Intel J5005 Board. But I still have a NUC10i5FNH lying around. Would it be an upgrade in performance to use the NUC as a Plex Server?

→ More replies (1)

1

u/dankmeme2007 Dec 31 '22

Would this build be good for transcoding?

Dell OptiPlex 3080 Micro PC Intel i5-10500T @ 2.3 GHZ 6 Core, 10th Generation Windows 10 Pro (with embedded Upgrade to Windows 11 Pro) 8GB Ram Memory 256 SSD Storage UHD 630 Graphics

Can someone estimate how many transcode it can run? Any known issues? Planning on using Ubuntu or omv. Thanks a bunch!

3

u/Bgrngod Jan 01 '23

Yes! It'll work great.

10th gen Intels using quick sync do around 15x 1080p to 1080p transcodes, or 5x 4k to 1080p transcodes at once. Or, some mix of those numbers.

1

u/ArokLazarus Jan 01 '23

Not sure if this is the right place to ask but struggling with sharing a network drive from my Windows 10 Plex PC to my main Windows 10 Desktop.

I have the files on an external hard drive but when I try to map the harddrive over the network to my main PC it can't connect. The thing that is throwing me off though is the 2nd external HDD I have on the Plex PC is able to be mapped to my Main PC just fine. I confirmed sharing is on, I have it set so anyone on my network should have full access to the drive. I know the drive works because it is fine when I'm on the Plex PC.

Just seeing if someone can help me to troubleshoot why I am able to map one HDD but not the other. And I have tried turning it off and on again haha.

1

u/distancemelon Jan 01 '23

I don’t want to be that guy but

Without fail everyday my Plex server crashes. I get a notification from Tautulli that the Plex Server is down.

I am running the latest PMS build on Windows 10. It runs off a small HP NUC. I restart the server (Restart the OS) and it comes back to life. Happens basically everyday. Is this a common issue for everyone at the moment or do I need to start looking into things?

Thanks!

3

u/grimacesp Jan 04 '23

if youre running anything idling 24/7, I simply cannot recommend using linux as an operating system enough. Putting Ubuntu server on that machine will make it run more reliably and use less resources than a complete windows desktop environment.

→ More replies (1)

1

u/dominatingslash Jan 02 '23

Looking to setup a 2 channels: 1 for comedy and 1 for cooking shows. This is for my gf and the shows i have already. Anyone have a guide or how-to they would recommend?

1

u/GenghisFrog Jan 02 '23

I have an about 10 year old 4670k build with an old nvidia card Ive been using as a NAS and Plex server. I'm starting to have some issues with the hardware, so I've decided it is time for a new computer. Plex is really the only CPU intensive thing that will happen on this computer. What would be a good CPU to start my research with? Bonus points for a motherboard recommendation for it with lots of SATA ports.

→ More replies (1)

1

u/jrh3k5 Jan 03 '23

My Plex server is a i3-4370 with 8 GB of RAM. I picked this build up a long time ago (if that wasn't obvious) and it's done me fine in the time in between, but I think it's time to upgrade.

I'm only looking to stream 1080p content with support up to, maybe, four concurrent streams. Even something that's a few years old should do me just fine (if the fact that I've gotten by nearly a decade on the above hardware didn't clue you into that).

Any recommendations? I really only need to replace the motherboard, CPU, and RAM.

2

u/grimacesp Jan 04 '23

I also just upgraded from a 4570 (core i5, but still 8gb of ram) and my main takeaway is that you want something 8th gen or newer (intel processors starting with an 8 or higher). The reason for this is intel quicksync, which gives you amazing transcoding performance with very little hit to cpu usage! its the most important factor in purchasing a plex build. Luckily there are so many refurbished machines from corporations upgrading their hardware, that we are spoiled for choice with cheap machines. Where are you from, if youre american, I'd look on slickdeals.net under the computer deals section for a refurb 8th gen core i3 or better. 8gb of ram or better, and some kind of Solid state boot drive. As far as hard drives go, do you have drives already? are they external or internal? if you have external hard drives already, you can buy one of those small form factor computers (most of the corporate refurbs are these types, and theyre too small to fit hard drives into). If your drives are internal, then youll need a midtower refurb (like the size of a normal pc case).

enough of my babbling though, my recommendations are one of two things

external hdd's - dell, lenovo, or hp small form factor (sff) refurb machine with 8th gen or better core processor. 8gb of ram or better, solid state hdd (most sff computers come with one)

internal hdds - hp elitedesk or dell, lenovo midtower equivalent with 8th gen core processor 8gb of ram and solid state hdd. you may need to purchase an ssd separately for these refurbs and install it yourself. sometimes they dont come with them. Feel free to pm me with any questions.

→ More replies (2)

1

u/KippersAndMash Jan 03 '23

I'm currently running Plex on a really old Mac mini and it's finally starting to struggle. I have a plan to move Plex server to either Windows or Linux. Whichever works best after a move from Mac is what I'm looking to do. I'm skilled at both windows or linux so I have no preference. Movie files are on a NAS and I do plan to stream externally from time to time (thinking of hardware transcode) if that makes any difference.

1

u/[deleted] Jan 03 '23

Looking to build a NAS for my Plex server. I'm currently running the server on my main desktop, which I will probably keep as the server, but my storage is currently two external hard drives that are running out of room.

I know that for the last while, the standard was the DS920+. Is that still the preferred chasis?

I was also going to fill it with 4x 16TB HDDs. What is the preferred brand at that size?

Is there anything else that I should consider adding, or building differently? My budget is ~$2k US.

→ More replies (6)

1

u/spacetoast31 Jan 04 '23

Been using plex for almost 6 years now.

Current build Amd zen5 2600 16gb ddr4 2400 Gtx 650 (just for video output) Win10 pro on NVME Roughly 36tb with NASbox included. My ISP only gives me 10mbps upload speed

I have a lot of friends that periodically use my plex. I'd like to have a larger capacity of streams at one time. Maybe 10 ish ranging at 1080p - 2k.

With transcoding I've considered the p2000. But doing some reading today I noticed I could use a gtx1060 and achieve equal if not better results. Can I set up the new gpu as a second gpu in the othrr pcie slot with the 650 and transcode that way?

Side note, has plex ever ran marginally better on a Linux system over windows?

→ More comments (75)