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Do I need a beefy system for Plex Media Server

R

rygy

Limp Gawd
Joined
Jun 19, 2003
Messages
448
I originally intended to combine a HTPC and server into one for my basement but I realized I'd be doing too much tweaking on the server and accessing it remotely to allow for consistent and convenient access to it as a HTPC and decided to split it into two machines.

I'm now trying to decide what hardware to use for each task. This is what I have right now:

Office / Gaming PC:
  • Core i3 540
  • Zotac H55 mITX
  • 8GB DDR3
  • Sandisk Extreme 240GB SSD
  • Sapphire Radeon 6670 LP
  • Antec ISK300 mITX case


Server / HTPC:
  • Athlon X2 245e
  • Gigabyte GA-MA785GM-US2H mATX
  • 6GB DDR2
  • OCZ Vertex 2 100GB SSD
  • Radeon 5570 LP
  • Silverstone LC35 HTPC ATX case

Old PC:
  • Athlon X2 7750
  • MSI K9N2GM mATX
  • 4GB DDR2

The X2 7750 system is old and probably near EOL. It used to run quite well running Windows Home Server with Plex and a bunch of other server applications while the X2 245e ran as a HTPC but I always wondering if I'd get better performance from Plex Media Server while transcoding and streaming if it was running on faster hardware. I've got a Roku XS that I don't use because I don't like waiting for files to buffer (transcode or whatever) before they'll play so I don't use it.

I've been considering upgrading the office / gaming PC to Ivy Bridge (buy a second hand mITX board and CPU) which would mean I have the Clarkdale parts to use as a server or HTPC. This would probably be the most expensive and the most time consuming.
I could also buy a used Sandy Bridge system to run as a server, use the X2 245e as a HTPC and sell / give away the 7750 system. This would be less work and less money.
The simplest would be to leave the Office PC as is, leave the X2 245e as a server and get a decent case for the X2 7750 to run as a HTPC.

I just don't know how much power I should have for my server. Thoughts?
 
Im running plex off an old Athlon X2 4800 and i stream 720p and 1080p mkv's to my ps3 and it works great.
Personally i'd recommend getting a PS3 and streaming plex through that... you can find older consoles on kijiji for like $80.00, well at least where i live...

What exactly do you want to accomplish with your HTPC? Are you looking to just watch downloads? or did you want to install a nice front end, i.e. XBMC? How extensive do you want your HTPC to be?
 
Yes you would get better performance from Plex Server while transcoding. However, in terms of encoding/transcoding duties, the X2 245e and the X2 7750 aren't that much different from one another. As such, not that good of an idea to use the X2 245e as a transcoding server if you're looking for an improvement over your current X2 7750. So your option C is out.

The Core i3 540 does provide a decent performance increase over the X2 245e. However, this is the slight issue of mobo mounts and expansion. For the expansion bit, if that Zotac mobo has enough SATA ports for you, then that's a plus in the "Use" column. But there's still the issue of the mobo mounts: Are you sure you actually have a Silverstone LC 35 case? As far as I can tell from google, that case doesn't exists.

Also note that streaming is different from transcoding in terms of performance requirements. As long as you have a good NIC, a good switch/router, and a solid OS, any of the systems you have now will be just fine for streaming. So you probably won't notice a major difference in streaming performance with a new system.

Now, what power supplies does the HTPC and old PC use?
 
Hmm, not sure why I said LC 35, its the LC17 which can fit up to an ATX board and six 3.5" drives and a standard ATX PSU. The specs don't mention mitx compatibility and I can't remember what the mounts look like, I just assumed a mitx board would fit. Guess I'll have to actually check first.

The Zotac board had six SATA ports which is pretty standard for any motherboard regardless of size.

Regarding streaming what I meant was handling multiple streams and transcoding. I'd be accessing Plex from a number of different clients.

The power supplies are all quite good and around 450 to 500 watts. More than enough really.
 
xkalibr said:
Im running plex off an old Athlon X2 4800 and i stream 720p and 1080p mkv's to my ps3 and it works great.
Personally i'd recommend getting a PS3 and streaming plex through that... you can find older consoles on kijiji for like $80.00, well at least where i live...
Click to expand...

As someone who has used the PS3's DLNA functions a lot, I can't agree with your advice. At first it was one of the most available DLNA players, but it's never been good. The UI is crap, it often claims network errors (much more than my 360 does, and edit to note: no wifi is being used at all here so that's not the reason) for little or no reason, and every time I want to play the next episode of something I have to go back into the VERY laggy menus. Also, slightly unrelated, but the PS3 Netflix UI is absolutely terrible as well, and streaming on it is much less reliable than using a PC or 360 in my experience.

Use a PS3 if it's all you have, but otherwise no.
 
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rygy said:
Hmm, not sure why I said LC 35, its the LC17 which can fit up to an ATX board and six 3.5" drives and a standard ATX PSU. The specs don't mention mitx compatibility and I can't remember what the mounts look like, I just assumed a mitx board would fit. Guess I'll have to actually check first.
Click to expand...
Yup. Though if you have the tools, you can easily just create the screw/mount holes needed for the motherboard.

rygy said:
Regarding streaming what I meant was handling multiple streams and transcoding. I'd be accessing Plex from a number of different clients.
Click to expand...
If you're talking about transcoding to multiple clients at the same time, then you should be looking at a quad-core CPU.
rygy said:
The power supplies are all quite good and around 450 to 500 watts. More than enough really.
Click to expand...
That doesn't answer my question. Let me rephrase: What are the exact power supplies that you are using now in the server and old PC? Model numbers, manufacturers, etc. The information you have given is insufficient.


dandragonrage said:
Also, slightly unrelated, but the PS3 Netflix UI is absolutely terrible as well, and streaming on it is much less reliable than using a PC or 360 in my experience.
Click to expand...
We definitely have different thoughts/tastes/rubricks: I've found that the Xbox 360's Netflix UI is crappier and a bit less intuitive/informative than the PS3 Netflix UI. Now I'm not recommending the PS3 route either but that the PS3's Netflix UI isn't all that bad to some people.
 
@rygy - I had a similar thread for a Plex build for transcoding. Perhaps that thread discussion can help you as well. But the transcoding is very CPU intensive, so a quad core proc is definitely recommended for supporting multiple simultaneous transcodes. (Plex even has instructions on monitoring the hardware utilization during transcode.)
 
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Would a Core 2 quad be enough? Looking to save money and buy used rather than new.
 
rygy said:
Would a Core 2 quad be enough? Looking to save money and buy used rather than new.
Click to expand...

Depends on how many clients you have and how much "responsiveness" you need. Though if PTNL can share his experience so far with that Plex Server, that'll give us a baseline on the minimums.
 
Multiple clients but rarely will they be simultaneous. What I meant was will I see an enormous difference when transcoding for streaming to clients that are not direct-play capable if I were to go with a newer generation system?
 
Danny Bui said:
Though if PTNL can share his experience so far with that Plex Server, that'll give us a baseline on the minimums.
Click to expand...
With a single stream to the Plex client on my Android-based phone, the machine running Plex server barely sips resources.

When invoking playback from my phone, the "PlexNewTranscoder.exe" process was spun-up. Depending on the video being played, the initial CPU spike was usually 30-40 percent, but a few got into the 50-60 percent range (usually 720p content). After a few seconds of watching the video on my phone, the CPU utilization tapered off to just 1 or 2 percent CPU usage. Any further CPU spikes were only triggered on large seeks in the video (usually more than a few minutes of the video stream), or selecting a new video file for playback. The utilization also looked even across the CPU cores.

RAM utilization topped around 40-45 MB, and steadily stayed within that range.

(A few other ancillary Plex processes had a lower CPU and memory footprint, and did not have a CPU spike like the transcoder process.)

I don't see a bottleneck being hit, unless I manage to simultaneously start a video at exactly the same time on many different devices. And even then, the ceiling would only be maintained for a brief period.

Edit: These tests were done within my home network.
 
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There is a used Dell Precision T3500 for sale locally. It's got a Xeon W3570, 12GB (6x2GB) DDR3, nVidia Quadro FX1800 and from what I can tell there are 5 internal and one external SATA 2 ports. Could pick this up for about $200.

Seems like it would be a great option, no?

I'd want to transplant it into my Silverstone case however as it's a tower but I'm not sure if the motherboard is too deep.
 
rygy said:
There is a used Dell Precision T3500 for sale locally. It's got a Xeon W3570, 12GB (6x2GB) DDR3, nVidia Quadro FX1800 and from what I can tell there are 5 internal and one external SATA 2 ports. Could pick this up for about $200.

Seems like it would be a great option, no?
Click to expand...

Sounds good to me. I have its successor, a T3600, here at work and it's good stuff. Of course, that CPU is much older, but Bloomfield was still a great architecture, and a pretty good step up over a C2Q.
 
Looking at picture of the motherboard I can't imagine it'll fit in an ATX case.
 
No idea on that one. I don't hate the case for my T3600, though I'm not sure how many HDD slots it has.
 
rygy said:
There is a used Dell Precision T3500 for sale locally. It's got a Xeon W3570, 12GB (6x2GB) DDR3, nVidia Quadro FX1800 and from what I can tell there are 5 internal and one external SATA 2 ports. Could pick this up for about $200.
Click to expand...
$200 for a Plex transcoder box? I'd definitely tolerate that Dell case for such a bargain, and put it somewhere out of sight that has an ethernet connection and some airflow :)
 
Ya, it's super tempting I was just hoping to put all the gear in my rack. Although, I guess it'll save me money not having to buy another rack-suitable case and just put this tower in the utility room behind the rack.
 
There are only 3 internal drive bays in the Dell workstation and considering the motherboard won't fit in a standard ATX chassis I think it's a no-go.
 
I just build a PMS on a Lenovo Q190 with a dual core Celeron 887. It seems to transcode just fine both mpeg2 DVD rips and even 1080p content.
 
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