Building a Plex Server - needing advice regarding dual ethernet and data transfer between HTPC / NAS

General Discussions
1

Hi Guys,

Firstly, really sorry if this is in the wrong section, couldn’t see an obvious fit.

At the moment I’m running a Synology 1813+, a machine with absolutely no pulling power. Just to be a little more specific it’s running an Atom D2600.

After doing what I consider to be a lot of research I have established that a dual Ethernet motherboard (or expansion card) is ideal for connecting the HTPC to the network, as well as directly to the NAS. How important is this?

So can someone please let me know how this works, or confirm the following.
NAS is for mass media storage (PMS not installed).
HTPC is running PMS, with mapped drives to the NAS.
Playing media requiring transcoding will use the HTPC hardware to play the files on the NAS
Would I have a HDD bigger than 120GB if only Windows and PMS is installed. Does transcoding use space on the PMS PC?
Would I require a monitor once set up? Server settings can be changed by another PC on the network, is this correct?

At the moment this is what i’m looking at:
Intel Core i3 6100 Dual Core LGA 1151 3.70 GHz CPU Processor
ASRock H170M-ITX/ac LGA1151 Mini-ITX Motherboard
Team Elite+ 8GB (2x 4GB) DDR4 2133Mhz Memory
SanDisk Ultra II 120GB SATA III SSD SDSSDHII-120G-Q25
Seasonic M12II EVO Edition 620W 80Plus Bronze Modular Power Supply
No dedicated GPU

That’s coming in at $750 AUD (excluding a case as I have not yet decided on one).

I’m suspecting to get comments about the i3, but according to the plex guidelines, that’s enough to run 2 1080p streams at the same time.

Also, using integrated graphics, does that usually reduce system memory by a specific amount, or does it vary. And either way, am I guaranteed a particular amount of memory on 8GB for example?

Thanks for your help.
Kurt

2

Hey guys, any advice on this at all?

3

Replying on my mobile. I think you’re overcomplicating things if you set dual NICs as a baseline. If your demand is two transcodes at the same time I have a hard time seeing that as a potential issue given both computers will be running cat6 to a gigabit router/switch using a gigabit network card (on each computer). Sure, its a nice feature to have [dual nic] but it isnt necessary with the information you’ve given us.

I would def have a larger hard disk than 120GB. Especially if you intend on using video thumbnails and transcoding fairly large files. Then it will most certainly not suffice. You could potentially add a cheap mechanic disk and symlink out certain functions as to solve that issue, should it appear in the future.

Not sure how the monitor comes into play. A htpc should have one, right? But. No, no monitor is needed for a server. I’d say you should look at having PMS setup as a service, google that and you’ll find a custom solution.

Remember that the guidelines regarding trancoding is a rough estimate for a fairly modest file in terms of bitrate etc. As soon as you bump up certain aspects that calculagiln goes out the window. When running a tight ship as you will with an i3, you can always pretranscode files and have two versions. One high bitrate and one low bitrate. Another option is of course to use clients that can handle most files without transcoding.

4

@Kurt Barker said:
Hi Guys,

Firstly, really sorry if this is in the wrong section, couldn’t see an obvious fit.

At the moment I’m running a Synology 1813+, a machine with absolutely no pulling power. Just to be a little more specific it’s running an Atom D2600.

After doing what I consider to be a lot of research I have established that a dual Ethernet motherboard (or expansion card) is ideal for connecting the HTPC to the network, as well as directly to the NAS. How important is this?

So can someone please let me know how this works, or confirm the following.
NAS is for mass media storage (PMS not installed).
HTPC is running PMS, with mapped drives to the NAS.
Playing media requiring transcoding will use the HTPC hardware to play the files on the NAS
Would I have a HDD bigger than 120GB if only Windows and PMS is installed. Does transcoding use space on the PMS PC?
Would I require a monitor once set up? Server settings can be changed by another PC on the network, is this correct?

At the moment this is what i’m looking at:
Intel Core i3 6100 Dual Core LGA 1151 3.70 GHz CPU Processor
ASRock H170M-ITX/ac LGA1151 Mini-ITX Motherboard
Team Elite+ 8GB (2x 4GB) DDR4 2133Mhz Memory
SanDisk Ultra II 120GB SATA III SSD SDSSDHII-120G-Q25
Seasonic M12II EVO Edition 620W 80Plus Bronze Modular Power Supply
No dedicated GPU

That’s coming in at $750 AUD (excluding a case as I have not yet decided on one).

I’m suspecting to get comments about the i3, but according to the plex guidelines, that’s enough to run 2 1080p streams at the same time.

Also, using integrated graphics, does that usually reduce system memory by a specific amount, or does it vary. And either way, am I guaranteed a particular amount of memory on 8GB for example?

Thanks for your help.
Kurt

Keep your NAS for data.

Your 120 GB should be fine.
After the installation of windows and plex, you should have plenty of space left.
PMS needs size of your gigest file +100 MB for transcoding.

The rest of your configuration looks ok, except the power supply which is way to big. buy one at 450W, plenty enough.
No monitor once setup. if you use windows, you can rdp from another device into the server.

some food for thoughts.

http://www.michons.us/2015/12/09/file-server-hardware-update/

5

@Kurt Barker said:
Hi Guys,

Firstly, really sorry if this is in the wrong section, couldn’t see an obvious fit.

At the moment I’m running a Synology 1813+, a machine with absolutely no pulling power. Just to be a little more specific it’s running an Atom D2600.

After doing what I consider to be a lot of research I have established that a dual Ethernet motherboard (or expansion card) is ideal for connecting the HTPC to the network, as well as directly to the NAS. How important is this?

So can someone please let me know how this works, or confirm the following.
NAS is for mass media storage (PMS not installed).
HTPC is running PMS, with mapped drives to the NAS.
Playing media requiring transcoding will use the HTPC hardware to play the files on the NAS
Would I have a HDD bigger than 120GB if only Windows and PMS is installed. Does transcoding use space on the PMS PC?
Would I require a monitor once set up? Server settings can be changed by another PC on the network, is this correct?

At the moment this is what i’m looking at:
Intel Core i3 6100 Dual Core LGA 1151 3.70 GHz CPU Processor
ASRock H170M-ITX/ac LGA1151 Mini-ITX Motherboard
Team Elite+ 8GB (2x 4GB) DDR4 2133Mhz Memory
SanDisk Ultra II 120GB SATA III SSD SDSSDHII-120G-Q25
Seasonic M12II EVO Edition 620W 80Plus Bronze Modular Power Supply
No dedicated GPU

That’s coming in at $750 AUD (excluding a case as I have not yet decided on one).

I’m suspecting to get comments about the i3, but according to the plex guidelines, that’s enough to run 2 1080p streams at the same time.

Also, using integrated graphics, does that usually reduce system memory by a specific amount, or does it vary. And either way, am I guaranteed a particular amount of memory on 8GB for example?

Thanks for your help.
Kurt

plex does not use integrated graphics, 8GB plenty for PMS.

6

So long as you’re running gig-ethernet on your network, I wouldn’t worry too much about utilizing the dual-ethernet ports. I run a set-up very similar to yours (a DS412+, and a separate desktop server). They both connect to the same gigabit switch that is shared with the rest of my network. Throughput between the two of them has never been a problem for me. A single gig ethernet is more than enough to provide the throughput that you need.

7

@DFury said:
So long as you’re running gig-ethernet on your network, I wouldn’t worry too much about utilizing the dual-ethernet ports. I run a set-up very similar to yours (a DS412+, and a separate desktop server). They both connect to the same gigabit switch that is shared with the rest of my network. Throughput between the two of them has never been a problem for me. A single gig ethernet is more than enough to provide the throughput that you need.

I agree as well

8

@Kurt Barker said:

After doing what I consider to be a lot of research I have established that a dual Ethernet motherboard (or expansion card) is ideal for connecting the HTPC to the network, as well as directly to the NAS. How important is this?

A dual ethernet is useless if your switch doesnt have the necessary backplane to support large data flows. I think you need to look at it in terms of the use of the available bandwidth. e.g.

  1. How many streams you intend to support? A 1Gbit pipe can support a fair number of simultaneous streams. Ive run 4-5 simultaneous streams on a 1gbit single port without issues if the HTPC is doing all the transcoding… however your bottleneck will ultimately be your CPU’s ability to transcode all the streams. Secondly, if you are doing directstream, then this may start to eat up bandwidth because the pulls from clients will pull at the maximum throughput of your pipe (roughly 70-100MB/s minus overheads).

  2. Is your HTPC also your download machine? If so, this will also suck up throughput when the download is complete and being transferred onto the NAS.

So can someone please let me know how this works, or confirm the following.
NAS is for mass media storage (PMS not installed).

Works for me (drobo)

HTPC is running PMS, with mapped drives to the NAS.

Usually not an issue but if your HT is using directplay/stream then it may clog up bandwidth. Ideally the PMS should only be serving files and transcoding for clients

Playing media requiring transcoding will use the HTPC hardware to play the files on the NAS

Yes of course

Would I have a HDD bigger than 120GB if only Windows and PMS is installed. Does transcoding use space on the PMS PC?

Yes. Not only does it use space, the PMS requires anything from a few GB to hundreds of GB (for large libraries) to store metadata eg movie pics etc… my metadata is roughly 60-70GB at the moment. On top of that, the bigger the HDD the easier it is for any OS to ‘breathe.’ On my setup i use a 1tb SSD to store the metadata/cache and for the windows setup i fix the swap file allocation so the fragmentation is less.

Would I require a monitor once set up? Server settings can be changed by another PC on the network, is this correct?

Yes. When you update the PMS you will need to either remote desktop in via another pc / mac or have a physical monitor. Most monitors have dual or more inputs these days anyway.

At the moment this is what i’m looking at:
Intel Core i3 6100 Dual Core LGA 1151 3.70 GHz CPU Processor

Again, depending on your streams. I have Core i7 with 8gb and at most that can handle 3-4 streams and it also depends on what other background duties it will be handling. eg downloads etc. Remember the PC isnt just handling your PMS but also windows/mac background applications/server duties/file sharing etc.

ASRock H170M-ITX/ac LGA1151 Mini-ITX Motherboard
Team Elite+ 8GB (2x 4GB) DDR4 2133Mhz Memory
SanDisk Ultra II 120GB SATA III SSD SDSSDHII-120G-Q25

Bigger is better.

Seasonic M12II EVO Edition 620W 80Plus Bronze Modular Power Supply
No dedicated GPU

That’s coming in at $750 AUD (excluding a case as I have not yet decided on one).

I’m suspecting to get comments about the i3, but according to the plex guidelines, that’s enough to run 2 1080p streams at the same time.

Also, using integrated graphics, does that usually reduce system memory by a specific amount, or does it vary. And either way, am I guaranteed a particular amount of memory on 8GB for example?

8GB is more than sufficient. GPU does very little except for displaying duties for the HT and you are only using one screen or less.

My current setup is as follows:

  1. ancient mac-mini running download and server duties eg sickbeard/couchpotato that saves the completed media to
  2. old 8-bay drobo pro being read by
    3a) Core i7 gaming PC delegated to PMS server duties when im not using it
    Intel 3770k i7 8gb 1tb adata ssd connected via mapping to drobo
    3b) dual 8 core 12gb macpro 512GB ssd as backup PMS
  3. clients
    5 ATV3 running plexconnect
    4 ipad mini
    3 iphones

When my family is in full consume mod (kids included) i can run about 7-8 simultaneous 1080p 20mbit streams.

9

Jesus 1TB to store metadata and cache? How much media do you have? I have 15TB and my plex folder is 7G. I have probably about 20 people transcoding every week.

10

@cul8rmom1 that will depend greatly on how you have configured Plex. OK 1TB might be a tad bit over the top, but I wouldn’t say by much. If you have 15TB of media and activate for example video thumbnails, I would say that it would cost you perhaps as much as 200GB. 7GB is also quite small for 15TB, regardless of video thumbnail. I haven’t counted mine but I’d say it isn’t under 20GB and I have no video thumbnails activated. Add to that, that you need the same amount of GB free as the transcoding taking place (the size of media being transcoded + a few hundred MB).

All in all, 1TB isn’t so unfeasible as you make it to be. Perhaps 500GB might have had been enough but I wouldn’t personally install Plex on anything as small as 120GB.

11

totally missed the video thumbnails part. I make sure never to turn that on! :stuck_out_tongue: Thanks!