i9 vs Xeon??

General Discussions
1

I know the differences between i9 and Xeon. Xeon is for “servers” and stability while i9 is for “high end desktop” applications. But I wonder how important are factors such as low TDP, lower clocks, better voltage binning, ECC RAM etc. etc. for a PLEX server? Does all those things have an actual impact on the user experience? In reality? Or is it a waste of money going for Xeon with ECC LRDIMM RAM etc.

I sold my harddrives (except 1), i7 4790k and 16 GB DDR3 RAM two weeks ago.

I found out I got go 2 routes for an upgrade.

Something like a cheaper option:
(Consumer / entuiast grade?)

  • Intel i9 or AMD Ryzen Threadripper
  • A more pricy motherboard that fits
  • 32 GB+ DDR4 non-ecc RAM
  • Intel Optane M2 SSD
  • 7x10 TB Red Drives
  • Noctua Cooler

Something like a more price option:
(Enterprise grade)

  • Xeon S2066 in the $350 - $900 range (Or else EPYC)
  • Supermicro Motherboard approx $ 500
  • 32 GB - 128 GB DDR4 ECC LRDIMM RAM
  • Samsung 970 Pro or 980 Pro 512 GB SSD (release in 2017-2018)
  • 7x10 TB Gold Drives (almost same price as RED)
  • GPU Required? Possibly a used current gen Titan X when next gen been released and pricing drops
  • Noctua Cooler? Fits?

I will still have some of my old components:

  • Fractal Design R5 chassis
  • Seasonic Prime Titanium 750w
  • 1x4 TB WD Red (music drive)
  • Asus Blu-Ray reader

OS: Windows 10 OR CentOS 7. Really prefer Win as BootOS but can handle CentOS and use Windows 10 in VirtualBox.

Desktop USE: Browsing the web, using photoshop CC2017 for my Nikon D5300 camera, internet banking, writing in office 2016 Pro Plus, printing photos and papers, regulary typing on 10 blogs, search engine optimization online, reading news online, sending mails, ebay and shopping etc. etc. (Stopped playing games)

Server USE: Serious PLEX server with multiple users worldwide and high res content. 2 % movies/TV are SD, 98 % is between 720p and 4K and 98 % of the music is Lossless 16 Bit FLAC, 24 Bit or DSD. Photos are high res too since it’s only edited DSLR camera images. Currently 5 families (with multiple kids and adults) are using PLEX, it WILL expand in the future. Often there are multiple streams.

Internet: Gigabit LAN with 1000/1000 mbps (ordered from next month)

So, should (?) I go for the cheaper or more expensive option? I DON’T care if it’s “overkill”, if I don’t use the power etc. Most likely, I will use it’s full power. But not in the short term. I looking for a long time investment. For me, I can use such system for 10-15 years maybe. And my requirements will or may get higher than it’s now. That’s for sure. And it’s fine by me…

What is the most “proper” solution? Does “PLEX” utilize those enterprise features or is it a complete waste? You think I might notice any difference (whatever requirements I have) if I go with Xeon?

I hope my thoughts are clear?

2

@SupreX said:
You think I might notice any difference (whatever requirements I have) if I go with Xeon?

No.

3

Plex hardware transcoding requires an Intel QSV capable processor (an internal GPU). Xeons, being server CPUs, don’t usually have a GPU because servers are used for crunching and many operate in a headless environment where there is no point in having a GPU.

4

Could PLEX benefit from a i9 7900k then? I consider either a i9 7900k or a i7 7700k…

5

Hands down an i7 for the Plex server. I wouldn’t consider the Ryzen or Xeon given the choice.
The i9 will be faster per core and will have a built in state of the art decoder/encoder for H.264 and H.265.

That CPU was “made” for Plex :slight_smile:

Carlo

6

Thanks for the valuable input guys!!

@cayars said:
Hands down the i9 for the Plex server. I wouldn’t consider the Ryzen or Xeon given the choice.
The i9 will be faster per core and will have a built in state of the art decoder/encoder for H.264 and H.265.

That CPU was “made” for Plex :slight_smile:

Carlo

NOW the choice is between either the i7 or the i9. After 3 years of duty I was sending my i7 4790k today.

My new girlfriend told me today she would “gift me” the CPU, CPU-cooler, motherboard and RAM WHEN she sold one of her 3 cars. She told me it may take one or a couple of month. Currently I got a crappy AMD Vision Premium CPU mounted. I got a computer “freely” from a friend. He was about to throw it away… The CPU is such terrible I can’t even stream PLEX music in my FLAC library. I can run Windows 10 and I can

At the time I was considering…

Those components she offered to gift me:

MOBO: EVGA Z270 FTW K ATX
CPU: Intel i7 7700K
COOLER: Cryorig H5 Universal
RAM: Ripjaws Trident Z 16 GB DDR4 3200 MHz CL16
EXTRA: Intel Optane 32 GB M.2

The parts I SOLD today:

MOBO: Gigabyte GA-H97M-D3H mATX
CPU: Intel i7 4790k
RAM: AMD “Performance Series” 16 GB DDR3 1866 Mhz CL9
COOLER: Noctua NH U9B SE2

The parts I kept from my previous installation:

CASE: Fractal Design Define R5
NET: Seasonic Prime Titanium 750w
SSD: Samsung 850 Pro 256 GB
HDD 1: WD RED 4 TB
ODD: Asus BC-12D2HT

(I got backups of most of my movies elsewhere and all music on HDD 1)

IF I go this route I might probably upgrade with:

SSD: Samsung M.2 970 Pro (or 980 Pro) 512 GB SSD when released. Hopefully (quite) soon…
HDD Bay 2-8: WD Gold 10 TB (Z2 RAID) (OR WD Red standalone drives)
RAM: Another 16 GB = Then a total of 32 GB RAM
GPU: Possibly!? But I’m not convinced at all.

I ordered 100/100 mbps upgrade today (from 100/10) and when I get those free components + ONE 10 TB drive I’ll upgrade my broadband to 1000/1000 mbps.

WHAT do you say?? Worth it? Since I’m offered to get some of those components for free I don’t know if I can say no. The step up from S1150 to S1151 is not huge but still fair.

I can see there are some advantages for instance:

  • Faster PLEX library scanning and metadata handling with such M.2 SSD + Intel Optane M.2 memory (the motherboard supports optane now) (I know transcoding won’t be affected) (time saver)
  • Transfering heavy 4K content between drives FASTER (time saver)
  • Higher quality motherboard with better VRM, heatsinks, components etc. that (might?) utilize the power supply better?
  • Better NIC and support of network aggregation in case I upgrade my Asus RT-AC68U to an upcoming flagship model (from ASUS or Netgear) with 2 Supra CAT8 cables. Might (?) come in handy with the 1000 Mbit broadband IN case I get multiple more users in the future with a heavy load on 4K and multiple tasks.
  • Slightly better i7 speed than my old i7 4790k, maybe not by much but a small difference at least.
  • Faster RAM which might be good for the RAID or if the system would be on a heavy load i.e. for multitasking.
7

@ChuckPA said:
Plex hardware transcoding requires an Intel QSV capable processor (an internal GPU). Xeons, being server CPUs, don’t usually have a GPU because servers are used for crunching and many operate in a headless environment where there is no point in having a GPU.

I’m now considering the 7820X since the i9 is a bit pricey. I can get RAM, CPU-cooler, a motherboard and a CPU for approx 1k $ if I go with the 7820X. But IF I go for the i9 I will not get the motherboard or the RAM. So, I might to go with the 7820X instead. The 7820X is probably fair enough for my current and future PLEX needs.

But HW transcoding decrases the image quality right? I rather go with cheap GPU like the 1050 Ti and using software transcoding.

BTW, I noticed pricing will be about the same if go with X299 and i7 7820X instead of Z270 and the 7700K. I can skip the Intel Optane (until they offer more, which I might need for the RAID) and I can keep my Samsung 850 Pro SSD until Samsung 980 M.2 SSD being released early next year possibly. Then, I’ll save another 70 $ by getting the MSI X299 Raider motherboard instead of the EVGA FTW K. And voila, the price is even lower. Then I can double the RAM from 16 GB to 32 GB and I’ll have pretty much the same price (in SEK) as the spec above. I guess… it’s a better bang for the buck.

8

I won’t endorse any particular hardware ‘builds’ but I can tell you to look at http://ark.intel.com and look up the processor. If it has Intel Quick Sync Video support, it will be compatible with hardware transcoding.

9

@ChuckPA said:
I won’t endorse any particular hardware ‘builds’ but I can tell you to look at http://ark.intel.com and look up the processor. If it has Intel Quick Sync Video support, it will be compatible with hardware transcoding.

It seems like the i7 7820X doesn’t. But… I can still use the CPU for software transcoding. Right?

10

You can but won’t want to. HW transcoding works really well on the latest i7s that have it.

Personally I’d think it foolish not to get an i7 without QSV. You can always turn it off if you have it but can’t enable it if you don’t have the support in HW.

Carlo

11

Hi,

7820x has a nice passmark so when cpu can’t handle maybe u can use a recent amd card for hw transcode or a quadro card.

12

This is a KabyLake

13

Hi,

I was talking on this one

14

Understood. I was trying to find the biggest i7 with graphics I could as a comparison.

15

The answer is… it depends … Is this a dedicated machine to Plex? Will you be using it for other server apps?

I have this https://www3.lenovo.com/us/en/data-center/servers/towers/ThinkServer-TD350/p/77LS7TD350D for my plex machine, dual xeon processors. Lots of ram, etc. I would have bought from the i series, but I realized i need LOTs of threads and I run several other server side apps. The difference between the two? Not much, even with quicksync.

Transcoding over 12 devices at the same time did not even put 5% cpu strain. This is with 5 people on ARK, few on minecraft, and a few on terraria.

Please repeat after me. NEVER, EVER mix server and desktop. EVER. Servers should always be kept separately, especially if you are having people on the internet connecting to your box.

It looks like you are combining them … so… uh… i7 or i9… best of luck.

16

Hi @ShannaraAK that is trued but we are talking about a lot of investment on a machine like that one. How much did it went for? With CPUs are on it? how does it handle a 4k in te mix?

17

@tchucho said:
Hi @ShannaraAK that is trued but we are talking about a lot of investment on a machine like that one. How much did it went for? With CPUs are on it? how does it handle a 4k in te mix?

The pricing on his server is “only” 1000 USD approx. That’s the price in Sweden… and we got an expensive market thanks to high taxes. My server is maybe about 2000 USD (I have honestly not counted) excluding harddrives and I’m building it all by myself. I got things like 32 GB DDR4 CL14 RAM instead of 8 GB DDR3 RAM like this server has for instance… and a 750W PSU Titanium rated PSU instead of a quite basic (?) PSU. It’s more of a bang for the back if you ask me… server or not.

@ShannaraAK said:
The answer is… it depends … Is this a dedicated machine to Plex? Will you be using it for other server apps?

I have this https://www3.lenovo.com/us/en/data-center/servers/towers/ThinkServer-TD350/p/77LS7TD350D for my plex machine, dual xeon processors. Lots of ram, etc. I would have bought from the i series, but I realized i need LOTs of threads and I run several other server side apps. The difference between the two? Not much, even with quicksync.

Transcoding over 12 devices at the same time did not even put 5% cpu strain. This is with 5 people on ARK, few on minecraft, and a few on terraria.

Please repeat after me. NEVER, EVER mix server and desktop. EVER. Servers should always be kept separately, especially if you are having people on the internet connecting to your box.

It looks like you are combining them … so… uh… i7 or i9… best of luck.

I don’t use the server for multiple “server” tasks like you do…

I’m currently using my desktop for things such as:

(examples)

  • Internet banking
  • Reading news on the web
  • Local scripting related to my websites online
  • Photoshop CC for digital family photos and professional A2-A5 prints
  • Photoshop CC for raw images for multiple Wordpress blogs
  • Seeding lots of torrents
  • Creating documents in Microsoft Office

I been also considering things such as:

  • Pure 4K 60hz gaming (Nvidia GameStream)
  • Altcoin Mining (IF profitable)

BUT… My main “server” use would be PLEX and only PLEX. Currently. That’s my main purpose building this… I got only 5 families (some including a few kids) using PLEX. I been trying out CentOS 7 for almost a year… (but I been using Linux for 10 years) and I got a way better experience with Windows 10. It’s way more flexible/easier to manage and I don’t have any issues at all with crashes etc. Plex don’t require lots of work editing files with Gedit/VIM etc. It’s simply work out of the box. I rarely needs to be restarted, and if I update windows it takes 1 min with an fast M2. SSD to reboot. It won’t have an impact on the users experience. The main reason to stick with CentOS 7 would be security and the lack of malware.

@ChuckPA said:
Intel Core i77820HK Processor 8M Cache up to 3.90 GHz Product Specifications

This is a KabyLake

This is a “mobile” laptop CPU. There is no reason for me to get a laptop CPU in a desktop. I wouldn’t even fit and there is not place that is selling that in Sweden. Also, it’s far less powerfull than my i7 4790 I just sold for an upgrade. Thanks anyway…

@cayars said:
You can but won’t want to. HW transcoding works really well on the latest i7s that have it.

Personally I’d think it foolish not to get an i7 without QSV. You can always turn it off if you have it but can’t enable it if you don’t have the support in HW.

Carlo

Carlo, my english is not the best. But you get me a bit confused. The new i9’s and i7’s (Skylake X) doesn’t have HW encoding. They doesn’t have QSV or internal graphics. Right? But you still say it’s the best suited CPU’s for PLEX. You still recommend an i9 7900x or and i7 7820x for PLEX? As an upgrade from i7 4790k. Can you explain, please? Thanks.

18

I’ll try to make it simple.

DO NOT purchase a CPU without HW transcoding built in. :slight_smile:

19

@cayars said:
I’ll try to make it simple.

DO NOT purchase a CPU without HW transcoding built in. :slight_smile:

I found this list:

https://ark.intel.com/Search/FeatureFilter?productType=processors&QuickSyncVideo=true

That’s all Intel CPU’s with QSV. So, currently the best CPU (with QSV) would be either the i7 8700k or an Xeon E3-1285 v6. That i7 is cheaper than an i9 or an i7 7820x and clearly an upgrade to my previous 4790k.

20

i7 8700k would be a great choice if you can afford it.