@trumpy81 said:
Both of those devices should be able to handle the 4K > 1080p transcoding. The NUC should be able to handle additional Direct Play streams, but the shield may falter a little. It of course depends entirely on the file being transcoded and the files being Direct Played and what loads they place on the devices.
Using MP4 H.264/AAC or AVC/AAC is advised since the majority of your clients only accept that format.
I would lean towards the Skull Canyon i7 NUC over the Shield as it provides a little more overhead and you have indicated that would be needed.
If you can keep the number of streams to a minimum, then the Shield would serve the purpose.
Of course you can always re-encode your 4K files to a lower quality using HandBrake or the like and simply place them in a separate library.
That way your transcoding needs would be greatly reduced and you should be able to stream any number of Direct Play streams anywhere using the Shield or the NUC or even a NAS.
Play the higher quality rips on the appropriate device/s and the lower quality encodes on the their appropriate device/s.
That would also save you power costs as you would not have to transcode every time you watch a Movie, it would only cost you once when you re-encode and no more ever after.
It would also reduce the complications that transcoding may bring to the table and you could be confident in the outcome of any attempt to play your media as you would have control over their quality etc. during the re-encoding process.
Food for thought. 
Thanks for that, I only have 3 4k files, which direct play perfectly, on my 4k TV, however I have about 70 Blu-ray copies, all of which have a second copy which I encoded to 4mbps/MP4/sac/ac3, these all direct play on all my devices, I just want the ability if needed to have hardware transcoding if and when it may be needed, ie when away from the home streaming something, I was thinking of the shield because there is no Linux or Windows admin required, I work in ICT so neither versions of OS are an issue but I just want simplicity, especially as I work away from home and don’t want the dreaded call to say that Plex is down and then have to talk the wife through how to login to the pc and go through everything.
