i am interested in buying a wd my cloud ex2 ultra for plex, as currently run an intel NUC i5 skylake with a 16TB drobo usb3.0 for plex, but am looking for a more compact all in one kinda system that can connect to the router and leave ouy the way as well as being “always on”.
what is the performance like on these ex2 ultra and how many streams can it happily do at one time as i know it cant transcode video but i believe it can remux audio
I even have a hp microserver gen8 but am tearing my hair out as to which to keep for plex
Certain WD models will be no longer be supported as of 0.9.17.0 because of insufficient CPU performance.
While the QNAP might have seemed overkill, it would have given you the resources you need to grow your library as you need and play just about anything you can throw at it.
The WD will be, as of 0.9.17.0, ‘just a hard drive’. You will need to run Plex somewhere else if you want all the new features.
While the QNAP might have seemed overkill, it would have given you the resources you need to grow your library as you need and play just about anything you can throw at it.
I won’t call it “overkill”… I have a NUC Plex server with the same CPU as the QNAP, it can transcode 1 stream of 1080p h265 with not too high bitrate, and plays everything up to 720p very happily, but compared to the server people have here on the board it feels so weak
While the QNAP might have seemed overkill, it would have given you the resources you need to grow your library as you need and play just about anything you can throw at it.
I won’t call it “overkill”… I have a NUC Plex server with the same CPU as the QNAP, it can transcode 1 stream of 1080p h265 with not too high bitrate, and plays everything up to 720p very happily, but compared to the server people have here on the board it feels so weak
To be clear, I was referring to the OP’s reason for returning the QNAP.
I personally would put as much CPU in the NAS as I can. Do it now and be done. Don’t buy something and need to replace it in less than one year .
I won’t call it “overkill”… I have a NUC Plex server with the same CPU as the QNAP, it can transcode 1 stream of 1080p h265 with not too high bitrate, and plays everything up to 720p very happily, but compared to the server people have here on the board it feels so weak
To be clear, I was referring to the OP’s reason for returning the QNAP.
I know, I agree with you that although it “sounds” overkill, it is not in fact.
I have the Synology DS1815+ (Atom C2538) and stream some insane rates (to most)… 38 Mbps to a Roku 3 (yes, haha) wifi or wired. Two weeks ago I streamed 4K 2160p, 58 Mbps, wifi. The DS1813+ (Atom D2700) didn’t flinch. If it had needed to convert the audio, it would have been ‘game over’.
@jjwerrett said:
i am interested in buying a wd my cloud ex2 ultra for plex, as currently run an intel NUC i5 skylake with a 16TB drobo usb3.0 for plex, but am looking for a more compact all in one kinda system that can connect to the router and leave ouy the way as well as being “always on”.
what is the performance like on these ex2 ultra and how many streams can it happily do at one time as i know it cant transcode video but i believe it can remux audio
I even have a hp microserver gen8 but am tearing my hair out as to which to keep for plex
Thank you
I have the WD my cloud EX2 Ultra and it performs like a champ with PMS installed and streaming my libraries with my Roku 4. However I can’t answer your question about multiple streams because it’s only me using it. What I can tell you is that its stable and performs flawlessly. Although all my content is all ripped Roku friendly. About the only minor negative I see is it’s not the fastest uploading my content to it but that could just be my set up FTPing my media.
All in all I couldn’t be happier with the EX2 Ultra. Stable, Fast and without ever needing the buffer even when playing my pure Blu-ray quality rips.
Sorry I couldn’t answer all your questions but I hope this helps a little.
thank you so much to people who have responded to me as has helped me a little on what do keep or what not to buy, knowing the WD will no longer be for plex with new updates means i can now mark this off my list.
so i have down to my few options i have left so love here more views as im sure may help others as well
so i have the qnap 453a which obviously seems a great one to keep by sounds of it maybe with the ram upgraded perhaps?
also got a i5 NUC linked to a drobo 3rd gen 4bay which is pretty good.
and recently bout a HP gen8 server but think that may come off the list as isnt the most quietest and also the drives run 24/7 which is fine as have WD red’s but if not watching anything i prefer them to sleep rather than just run for no reason
so i guess the 2 options i have is qnap or NUC/Drobo hopefully someone can help me finally keep one overall device
@jjwerrett said:
thank you so much to people who have responded to me as has helped me a little on what do keep or what not to buy, knowing the WD will no longer be for plex with new updates means i can now mark this off my list.
If you are referring to future updates for the Plex app on the WD my cloud EX2 ultra, it just got a brand-new update and I have just instaled it myself. For this to work on the EX2 ultra you must install the WD my cloud mirror 2nd generation app. It’s essentially the same thing and works perfectly. Where did you get your information the WD my cloud apps will no longer be updated?
Plex will continue to run on these processors but upgrades to 0.9.17.0 and beyond will not be possible. At some point interoperability with other Plex servers of higher revision may become an issue.
Thank you chuckpa you certainly seem to know your stuff which is great.
I have looked back at the qnap 453a and now trying pick between this and the nuc/drobo combo
Hopefully you can share your experience about your media servers as to why you went with a nas instead of say nuc with external storage etc, well guess a computer
I went with a NAS because I can use it for other things as well
The most significant are:
Capturing OTA content and processing it for inclusion in my Plex Library
The NAS has data protection (RAID) built in so I never have to worry about a single disk failure / bad block corrupting my media
Backup for every other computing device in my house (computer, tablet, and phone)
Centralized backups (NAS -> External drives which are then put in the closet)
My computer is completely free to do other things as well as be turned completely off.
Ease of expansion: I have 8x 4TB at present. Doubling my storage is as easy as unplugging each drive, plugging in the new drive, and let the NAS rebuild parity / integrate the new drive before proceeding to integrating the next drive. I also may add 2 5-bay expansion units with this Synology model. If fully expanded, I would have 18 drives and at 8TB each, that’s a lot of storage.
My NAS operates 24/7/365 and the drives never spin down. It is connected to a UPS (Back-UPS BE-750G) which tells it when the battery is nearly depleted so it can shut down cleanly. The UPS also protects and operates the networking in the house. This means that with power out, I can do a ‘fast download’ of programs from the NAS to the tablets & computers just in case the power might be out for an extended period.
The NUC makes for a GREAT client. It has a lot of power onboard. If you had a Plex Pass, I would recommend you consider trying the preview release of Plex Media Player. Putting it on NUC is pretty sweet arrangement. The NAS won’t need to do the transcoding.
If there is no Plex client for your future 4K Television, a properly sized newer NUC will permit you to go to 4K UHD (2160p) as easily as plugging HDMI into it I can already confirm Plex plays 4K with ease on even a smaller NAS (Synology DS1813+ w/ Atom D2700 processor). The video for that movie is 58 Mbps and the NAS ran at about 3-5% CPU utilization because it only had to shovel the data to the TV (Samsung 2015 4K UHD 3D curved)
Thank you once again for amazing explanation and your setup is amazing and one day hope have something like you
For clients I currently use fire tv’s and nvidia shield android tv box for the 65" TV
Would you recommend the NUC I have as my plex server having more cpu power? It is the 6th generation skylake i5 model which I believe is the newest so far, and keeping it linked to the drobo 4 bay 16tb ‘WD RED’?
I also have a spare hp gen8 server 1610t which was also considering but it’s noise is what put me off using it.
The drobo I have tested with like swapping drives and letting it rebuild as cut the power to find it rebuilds perfectly “inbuilt battery” so it seems great for data protection as you mentioned about a raid setup being great to have
I thoroughly enjoy my EX2 ultra, knowing its limitations (all my media is iOS device friendly). We routinely have 2-3 streams running in my house simultaneously with no issues.
I would love to know how this performs when multiple users are streaming from the My Cloud EX2 Ultra and if someone had issues with any file formats for example MKV to an apple device like an iphone
I thoroughly enjoy my EX2 ultra, knowing its limitations (all my media is iOS device friendly). We routinely have 2-3 streams running in my house simultaneously with no issues.
Thankful for this post as I just purchased the EX2 Ultra 16tb and was about to start crying.
Hi all.
I too am in the market for a small, cost-effective NAS to use with plex. I am purely interested in streaming ALAC/M4A to my Cambridge Audio CXN - which natively supports ALAC, therefore there is no need to any transcoding. I am not streaming any video.
Based upon this, I think that the WD My Cloud EX2 Ultra with 1GB RAM should perform well enough.
Any experiences of this out there?
Thanks.
I thoroughly enjoy my EX2 ultra, knowing its limitations (all my media is iOS device friendly). We routinely have 2-3 streams running in my house simultaneously with no issues.
Thankful for this post as I just purchased the EX2 Ultra 16tb and was about to start crying.
Hi all, I wanted to know if finally the WD EX2 Ultra finally supported the 0.9.1.7 version of PMS.
Thanks.
