Do I replace Plex Server hardware or Update?

General Discussions
1

I am looking for your help.

Hi I have Plex on my gaming pc but want to build a seperate Plex Server. So thinking should I use my current computer and build a new gaming pc or build a new Plex Server instead.

I have seen people using old server hardware but most of these at reasonable prices have passmark scores less than the 6700k.

I was thinking building a Ryzen build or i7-8700 but not sure.

I have all my data on a Qnap Nas which has 4 x 6TB WD Red HDD in raid 5 connected to my 1GB network. Only issue is the Nas is slightly older so the drives runs at 3Gb/s not 6Gb/s

Do I also need to upgrade my NAS to 6Gb/s?

I currently have 4K and 1080p movies on direct play on up to 2 Nvidia Shield. I can have 4 internet streams at the same time.

My internet speed is 150Mbps download and 10Mbps upload speed.

My current pc is:
i7-6700k
Asus Z170-A motherboard
32GB DDR4 3000mhz memory
512mb 950 Pro Nvme SSD
1200w PSU

2

@Sykesit said:
I am looking for your help.

Hi I have Plex on my gaming pc but want to build a seperate Plex Server. So thinking should I use my current computer and build a new gaming pc or build a new Plex Server instead.

I have seen people using old server hardware but most of these at reasonable prices have passmark scores less than the 6700k.

I was thinking building a Ryzen build or i7-8700 but not sure.

I have all my data on a Qnap Nas which has 4 x 6TB WD Red HDD in raid 5 connected to my 1GB network. Only issue is the Nas is slightly older so the drives runs at 3Gb/s not 6Gb/s

Do I also need to upgrade my NAS to 6Gb/s?

I currently have 4K and 1080p movies on direct play on up to 2 Nvidia Shield. I can have 4 internet streams at the same time.

My internet speed is 150Mbps download and 10Mbps upload speed.

My current pc is:
i7-6700k
Asus Z170-A motherboard
32GB DDR4 3000mhz memory
512mb 950 Pro Nvme SSD
1200w PSU

Just heading home from work shortly so I have to keep it brief for now but…don’t get hung up on benchmark scores.
Hardware acceleration is “the thing” and to a certain extent makes CPU scores irrelevant especially for regular 1080p.
I have a Kaby i7 and 5 simultaneous transcodes peak at around 30% and is usually around idle-10%. If your transcodes are for remote users then your upload speed will become a bottle neck far sooner than your CPU. Obviously depending on the bitrate you want to transcode to.

3

Hi I had a direct stream and 2 internet streams last night and cpu was hitting about 50% with idle about 10%.

I have a 12GB ram drive created as my plex transcoding drive don’t know if that is a good thing or not.

I may just keep this pc as my plex server and then build a new gaming machine.