Building a Plex/Media server, which cpu should I use?

Hi all, I'm building a plex server from some old pc parts that I have laying around. I'm wanting to use an ancient Athlon II x 2 255 processor with a gigabyte 790 motherboard. I plan to use the server to stream Plex around the house on potentially 5 tv's. Does anyone know if this old CPU will be up for the task? Plex recommends an i3 or better. I have a 2500k that I could use but it needs a motherboard to get running and am trying to avoid spending money on this server if possible.

The Athlon will not cut it. It all depends how many of these sources will require transcoding. I would highly recommend you get that 2500K running.

Depends if all 5 tv's will require transcoding, that Athlon probably won't even do one 720p movie. Another thing, what will your usage be like? Because all 5 going on a non-gigabit network would crawl.

The 2500k will get you at least (3) simultaneous 1080p transcodes; I would definitely use that. Whether or not you'll need a lot of transcoding power depends on your media and the Plex endpoints at the TV's.

so their general recomendation is that for every 1080p transcode you need to do you need 2000 points on cinebench

so 5 TV all at the same time needs 10000 on cinebench score.... that is going to be a high end x4 with hyperthreading or 6-8 core CPU.

I believe the 3930k is 12,000 or so ...

a i7 4790k, 4770k, 6700k, 4820k, 3770k, FX-9370, get you there or close..... you 2700k stock is only 8,000 so that will be 4 transcodes at the same time.... without anything else utilizing the CPU on the server



That being said, likely not all 5 TVs will be in use at the same time or perhaps 1-2 will be direct playing the content and will not need transcoding.

Just depends on the clients at each TV the encoding your videos are in.... and audio formats since some devices will not play multichannel in cetrain forms and requires a full transcode



That Athlon II x 2 255 system would make for a fine client on a TV that will direct play bascially all your content and get you using that 2600k as a server CPU (it literally would not be able to transcode 1 1080p stream)

Thanks for the responses guys. I'm doubting I'd ever be running 5 tv's with plex, but was just throwing the hypotheticals. It's what I was afraid of, that the 255 wouldn't cut it as a Plex Server cpu. I also have an AMD 1090T cpu that I could possibly use if that would be better than the 2500k. Need to do some more research! Maybe I'll turn the Athlon 255 setup into a minecraft rig for the kids instead!

yeah that 1090T would be fine for 2-3 streams..... it will eat power!!!! for that workload 125w

I'll probably stick with the 2500k for that reason!

sKiDmArK said:

The 2500k will get you at least (3) simultaneous 1080p transcodes; I would definitely use that. Whether or not you'll need a lot of transcoding power depends on your media and the Plex endpoints at the TV's.

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AMD FX-8320 encodes faster then a 2500k even overclocked. So an FX-8320 would be better then an Intel vs this CPU.

Dion said:

AMD FX-8320 encodes faster then a 2500k even overclocked. So an FX-8320 would be better then an Intel vs this CPU.

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Source? From what I've seen, the 2500k beats most FX chips handily in handbrake benchmarks, other than in 4k encoding and 2nd passes which it is slightly slower (neither matter to Plex). The 8320 is a good buy for a cheap (4) 1080p Plex transcode chip; which it would probably edge out most newer i5's in quantity of transcodes, not the speed of a single encode.

Other than that specific use case, I really would not see a reason to buy one over an Intel offering.

Also, the OP already owns the 2500k, and the FX-8320 wasn't being discussed (he mentioned an Athlon II x2 and 1090T - which the 2500k is far superior to either).

sKiDmArK said:

Source?

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I don't keep my own personal experiences as benchmarks. But my FX-8320 @ 4.0ghz could beat my i5 2500k at encoding.

But no desktop CPU encodes fast enough to be real time. Transcoding is pointless. You will still have to wait and buffer videos :/

If there is no transcoding.. Then either CPU will do fine. As network traffic does not require a fast CPU.

He is right the fx-8320 would smoke the i5 for plex, plex doesn't take advantage of intels greater IPC and does well on cores alone.

With that said the FX wasn't part of the equation.

Dion said:

I don't keep my own personal experiences as benchmarks. But my FX-8320 @ 4.0ghz could beat my i5 2500k at encoding.

But no desktop CPU encodes fast enough to be real time. Transcoding is pointless. You will still have to wait and buffer videos :/

If there is no transcoding.. Then either CPU will do fine. As network traffic does not require a fast CPU.

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the initial buffer time on my lowend server is very litte..... when i watch shows on my iphone it transcoded and is no big deal...


Definitely not pointless

^Exactly.

Dion said:

I don't keep my own personal experiences as benchmarks. But my FX-8320 @ 4.0ghz could beat my i5 2500k at encoding.

But no desktop CPU encodes fast enough to be real time. Transcoding is pointless. You will still have to wait and buffer videos :/

If there is no transcoding.. Then either CPU will do fine. As network traffic does not require a fast CPU.

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I don't really get this. I'm not sure what you mean about "real time" in a VoD world. Transcoding does add overhead in delivery time, but you're talking fractions of a second to a couple of seconds in a LAN environment with a fast enough processor. And yes, almost any modern desktop CPU can handle x264 transcoding/encoding at 30+fps 1080p with ease. My iphone will start playing a native 30Mbps+ BD rip transcoded to 10Mbps in about 0.5 seconds. I wouldn't consider that waiting.

If you're constantly buffering, you have a network issue, a transcode configuration issue, or your CPU is not up for the task.

silkiejohnson, what devices are you streaming to on those tv's? If you do not need transcoding on them, then that x2 amd might do the trick. I used to have a synology 1512+ with a crappy atom chip that would do alright until transcoding needed to be done. However if you are going to make a purchase, and a Microcenter around, they have the AMD 8320e for $90 with 40 off a motherboard, and there is a gigabyte AM3 that is about $10 with that discount. I would assume that the 2500k is maybe a equal or better chip, but they are still worth a lot on ebay

sKiDmArK said:

^Exactly.



I don't really get this. I'm not sure what you mean about "real time" in a VoD world. Transcoding does add overhead in delivery time, but you're talking fractions of a second to a couple of seconds in a LAN environment with a fast enough processor. And yes, almost any modern desktop CPU can handle x264 transcoding/encoding at 30+fps 1080p with ease. My iphone will start playing a native 30Mbps+ BD rip transcoded to 10Mbps in about 0.5 seconds. I wouldn't consider that waiting.

If you're constantly buffering, you have a network issue, a transcode configuration issue, or your CPU is not up for the task.

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Ya maybe if you use shitty x264 settings. Which defeats the purpose of having high quality videos.

No desktop level CPU can encode 24fps 1080p in realtime with high quality settings.

Besides almost every devices plays 1080p h264 now anyways. Transcoding really isn't needed.

Dion said:

Ya maybe if you use shitty x264 settings. Which defeats the purpose of having high quality videos.

No desktop level CPU can encode 24fps 1080p in realtime with high quality settings.

Besides almost every devices plays 1080p h264 now anyways. Transcoding really isn't needed.

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So do you have magical devices with every codec/container, H264 level support, and unlimited bandwidth through every medium, everywhere you go?

That 10Mbps transcode on a 5" screen using "shitty" x264 settings is also overkill for the device. It's probably also better than 90% of the material I could get through a streaming service even on a larger display.

But why comment in a Plex build thread if you hate transcoding? That's the whole reason why Plex is so successful in the first place; it allows dynamic LAN/WAN/internet capabilities with transcoding. There are plenty of direct play solutions out there if you want less options.

You almost always have to compromise between quality or compatibility. Plex allows you to do both. Despite what you say, many devices still only support H264 L4.0 at 20Mbps or lower (latest gen mobile devices/streaming STBs are finally supporting L4.1+ H264) which means you can't even support blu ray rips without re-encoding or transcoding. Without transcoding, that now means you have to re-encode to the lowest common denominator with your codec/container/bitrate. Now your home theater is playing the same quality shit as your tablet unless you want to store two copies of the same content, and you spend hours (if not days) making a high quality re-encode.