Hi there,
first off: Yes, I’ve done my homework and read the acceleration article. But the article has left me with quite a few questions as it neither gives any recommendation on the actual hardware PMS should run on nor make a distinction between the different transcoding engines in regards to quality and compatibility.
As I am building a new Server for PMS, should I favor an Intel CPU over AMDs Ryzen 3000 series in order to utilize QuickSync? Or am I better off just throwing an Nvidia GT 1030 or 1050 into the mix and rolling with the experimental patch?
I’ll be running on Linux exclusively (probably Debian), hence the server-linux tag.
So the direction of which hardware to use really depends on what you plan to do.
Plex will use Quicksync first over Nvidia if it’s available, but if you are planning to run several transcodes at once you may be limited in capacity.
If you only plan to have 2-3 1080p transcodes going at the same time, then QSV should be fine.
If you want to work with 4K content or 4+ transcodes I would recommend going with a higher core count CPU and use an NVIDIA M2000 or P2000 (or GTX1050 with the driver hack to bypass the NVENC 2-stream limit). The CPU is still used heavily for doing resizing of the video as well as transcoding audio, so offloading some work to more dedicated hardware is a better path to go with.
As a note, the 1030 does not support NVENC.
Also note, the patch I wrote is no longer needed as Plex has added native support. This patch specially enabled NVDEC on Linux.
So, to sum up some questions for you.
What are you planning to build?
What OS?
How much do you plan to utilize Plex?
Hi, thanks for the quick reply. I am aiming for four parallel streams (on 1080p), but the more the better I’ve been eyeballing an AMD Ryzen 5 3600, paired with 16GB RAM. Can I pull that off whilst omitting the graphics card, or should I get a more potent CPU?
So with that, I would recommend getting an Nvidia 1050Ti GPU to go with the Ryzen. You will likely be CPU bound if all 4 streams require transcode.
If you’re going to run windows, you will be limited to 2 transcodes on the GPU and the other 2 will hit the CPU. If you are running Linux, there is a driver hack that will let you run more than 2 transcodes on the GPU. You can usually eBay a Quadro M2000 for pretty cheap, which will not have the same limit but it’s roughly the same as a GTX950 and supports all the features that Plex will use to transcode.
hello, if you do not expect any 4k/hevc content to require transcoding, then all you need for cpu is about 2000 passmarks per transcode, according to the plex recommendations.
generally you do not need a gpu or hardware transcoding for 1080/x264 content.
4k/hevc is an entirely different story, as it requires upwards of 17000 cpu passmarks per transcode. In which case gpu transcoding offloads from the cpu to the gpu.
Thanks, that was a lot of very useful information. Would you recommend an Intel CPU over an AMD CPU due to QuickSync? The general consensus for CPUs right now is strongly in favour of AMDs Ryzen right now, but they of course do not feature QuickSync, and I have no idea whether or not that would make much of a difference in this use case…
One minor thing though: @TeknoJunky stated that 1080p eats about 2000 passmark points per stream. The Ryzen 5 3600 scores at about 20.000 points, which would roughly translate to 9 - 10 1080p streams - more than enough for me, with plenty of room to spare. Why did @revr3nd recommend a 1050Ti on top of that? Am I missing something?
it all depends on what you are trying to accomplish.
quicksync is only for video decoding/encoding.
it does not help with any other cpu tasks.
ryzen does not have any video decode/encode offloading that I am aware of (at least none supported by plex).
personally for a strictly plex server box, I would pick a newer intel cpu with quicksync over ryzen any day.
even if you reached the limit on quick sync transcodes, plex will fall over to cpu transcoding.
if you have no immediate plans for 4k or HEVC content, then cpu alone will suffice in according to ~2000 passmarks per transcode.
I can’t speak for the good revr3nd, but I can only guess that he is making that recommendation that you will eventually have or want to have hevc/4k content, which may need to be transcoded.
You can either plan for it, or wait until you actually need it, before investing the money into an extra gpu.
Thanks techno. Most of my performance experience on Plex is based on my Xeon CPUs, which even at 12 cores @ 2.9GHz have performance issues with 1080p transcoding in software. Granted this is also Ivy Bridge based, so there is a generous generation gap. With that also said, I would rather overbuild for future expansion than underbuild and revisit
I see. I don’t really care about 4k at the moment, so I’ll take the CPU-only route and throw in a proper GPU later when the time comes. Intel-wise I could take a Core-i5-9400F instead of the Ryzen 5 3600 - but the Intel CPU scores at 12.000 points, a whopping 8.000 points below the Ryzen. Will QuickSync really make that much of a difference?
I’m not sure where the QuickSync limitation mentioned earlier comes from as I got bored after creating 10 QS instances running in web browsers at about 20% CPU usage. There are posts on Reddit of 20 QS transcodes without issue.
This was a year or four ago with a KabyLake and QS improves with every architecture.
That said in your particular case throwing a card In would be a far simpler (and cheaper) option than having to change Mobo and CPU.
Thank you all for your invaluable insight! I think I’m gonna go with an i5-9400 or an i5-9600. Thanks @revr3nd for pointing out that getting an F-version would be nonsensical.
I’ve been eyeballing an AMD Ryzen 5 3600, paired with 16GB RAM. Can I pull that off whilst omitting the graphics card, or should I get a more potent CPU?