Hello. I am trying to decide on hardware for a new media server. I will either go with a higher end graphical work station like a Dell 3430 Precision Workstation (i7-8700 6 Core / NVidea Quadro P620 / 8 GB Memory/Windows 10) or a Server like an HPE ProLiant ML110 Gen10 3106 1.7GHz 8-core 1P 16GB-R S100i 4LFF Hot Plug 550W PS Perf Server - Windows Server OS. If anyone has some recommendations on reliable HW based on experience.
I guess the main question here is what you want your computer to do.
Will this be a dedicated media server, or do you also want it for other uses?
Will you be ripping content with this server, or will it only be hosting the content?
How many streams do you expect to run simultaneously?
How large is your media library? How large do you expect it to become?
A few basic points to note are that:
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If you want to do video transcoding, processor power is king. I don’t think Plex (correct me if I’m wrong) can utilize hardware encoding on a graphics card. I don’t even have a graphics card on my server, and rely on the motherboard’s built in graphics. (use passmark and other benchmark sites to compare cpu performance)
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Memory is pretty much a non-issue with Plex. My server runs at a very constant 3GB of memory used. 16+ GB is unnecessary, unless you are hoping to use this Plex server for other stuff. I only have 8Gb and it has been very comfortable with that.
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Hard drive space may become a big concern. Make sure your server has enough SATA ports and your case has enough hard drive bays for current and future storage needs.
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I strongly recommend a SSD for your primary boot drive. HDDs are fine for the rest of your media.
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Don’t skimp on a backup system. Factor this into your budget if you care about your content.
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Many graphical workstations come with awesome CPUs for video transcoding, but also come with expensive graphics cards that will likely never be used. It may be worth (if you are comfortable) building your own system so you don’t end up buying an expensive graphics card you didn’t need.
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I pretty much agree with everything @jaredwilliams916 has stated so far. Have a look on eBay for cheaper hardware; I’d probably steer clear of new stuff as it’s disproportionately expensive. The reason why they have such a premium on brand new stuff is purely down to the people that buy it (businesses) and what they require from it, i.e. support contracts etc. I made this mistake and now I have something that is underpowered for what I spent.
Have a look on eBay for a company called “Bargain*Hardware”. Their prices are generally fair and they have a decent selection.
I’m also in agreement with Jared when it comes to the premium on the importance of the CPU and the lack of requirement for a GPU (unless you’re using it for something else). After CPU, storage and NICs are probably your highest concern. I would strongly recommend getting something that can support RAID (an explanation can be found here), and plump for at least RAID 1. What this means is that you can have an entire hard drive fail and you’ll be OK to just replace it and crack on. You may know this already, but it takes a very long time to collect all of the media you use, and to see that go with one HDD fail is a real kick in the slats.
One thing I’d also look at implementing is ESXi/vSphere as your base, under which circumstances memory begins to play an important part. It’s fairly simple to get to grips with and provides much better resilience and flexibility. It’s not overly difficult to configure and manage, but you will need to read up on how to do it, unless it’s something that you’re already familiar with.
An important factor, but one that is often overlooked, is where is your device going to be physically situated? If it’s going to be in your living room/office and you’re going to be sitting next to it all of the time, then steer clear of a 1U and maybe even 2U server because you’ll be deaf in 30 minutes and all of that lovely Dolby Atmos content you’ve got to enjoy through your expensive 7.1 surround system will be totally useless as the noise of the fan WILL drown it out. Towers are generally the quietest; but then you also pay more for similar capability.
If I was going to replace my current server; I’d probably be looking at something along the lines of this:
http://www.bargainhardware.co.uk/dell-poweredge-t320-configure-to-order/
The reason for this is that it is probably one of the best “servers” that you can get which still uses 3.5" HDDs. 2.5" HDDs, unless SSD, are both loud and more expensive. All this needs to do is store your OS’s, so putting in a few SSDs wont really be that restrictive in terms of space. I currently have 2 servers running, but will likely put another on without much issue and I have a much lower spec PC than this. All your media, which takes up the bulk of your storage) could be placed in something like a NAS which can use RAID. However, to start with, you could just as easily fill this PC up with 6TB 3.5" HDDs and put them in a RAID10 configuration, giving you a total of 12TB of storage, with the bonus of 4 x read speed and 2 x write speed with the capacity for at least 1 drive failure.
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Thank you so much Jared and Skatman - really appreciate the guidance. Just on the questions from Jared, the thought was to use this as a dedicated media server, we do have a QNAP TVS-873 NAS that we can connect to. The idea was to maybe transcode live TV for 3-4 users. Super appreciate the comments about the GPU/graphics cards, as I was leaning that way - so that is good to know and will remove from my list for sure. The server will sit away from everyone, in a utility room - so noise won’t be an issue, and we can also RAID up the drives, good suggestion to prevent failure. Also will look into VSphere in this application, have some experience with virtualization, so it could be a benefit,. Do you run Windows Server 2016 for your media server? Or really would a good Workstation with a good i7 processor (any recommendations) would be a better way to go? Again, greatly appreciate the quick feedback - this is super helpful - Thanks!
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I run an older Xeon (e5-2665) with Windows Server 2012. Here is a list of my parts : Plex Server/Video Encoder by jdwill916 - Intel Xeon E5-2665, Corsair Obsidian Series 750D ATX Full Tower - PCPartPicker.
I have been very happy with my setup, and it even has the possibility of adding an additional processor for increased computational power.
A lot of the determination for what you buy will be based on your budget. Intel and AMD have both made massive improvements recently on their consumer/workstation processors. If you have the money for it, I would look at 8th generation Intel processors (i7 8xxx), since they are a major upgrade over the 7th gen. As far as AMD goes, AMD’s 2700x, or their Threadripper line are both great, and could possibly offer more processing power for your money. More cores will definitely help with transcoding multiple streams.
Intel Xeon processors are also great, especially older ones, but you may make some compromises by getting older processor. I love my processor, but it did limit me to DDR3 ECC memory, a motherboard without USB 3 (I use an expansion card), it was difficult to find a motherboard at all, since many compatible ones had been discontinued, and my motherboard will likely never receive a bios update to protect against Spectre and Meltdown.
Whatever processor you choose to buy, look it up on https://www.cpubenchmark.net/. You will probably want to look for a processor with a score over 10,000 (possibly higher if you want 4 simultaneous transcodes), since it sounds like you will be making this processor work.
I would also recommend looking for a tv tuner that supports h.264 encoding, since multiple live streams will be common. h.264 is a much more efficient codec than the more common mpeg2 format that most tv tuners use. Using h.264 means that your streams will be significantly smaller (almost half) for similar quality, and that you will be more likely to direct play the stream, saving your processor from having to do the heavy lifting.
Sorry, I am not very familiar with pre-built workstations, as I usually prefer to build my own. If you want to post links to a couple pre-builts you are considering, I would be happy to give you the pros and cons of each system.
One final note, RAID is good, but not a substitute for a true backup. At a minimum, I would get an external backup hard drive, or use your NAS (if that is possible in this situation) for the backup. You can see some of the reasonings here: Why is RAID not a backup? - Server Fault
Good luck on your search!
Edit note: I just noticed that this statement could be a little ambiguous.
My recommendations are based on 3-4 simultaneous live tv transcodes. If you have 3-4 users only, then you could get away with a much smaller system, although the recommendations I made would be awesome but maybe a little overkill… Let me know if this is the case.
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Hi Jared - first of all your interest is so appreciated - thank you. Yes, I can confirm thinking is several simultaneous streamed live tv feeds… I am also taking note of your suggestions around backup - very well received. For machines - maybe something along the lines of Dell Precision Workstation, Intel Core i7-8700, 6 Core, 12MB Cache, 3.20GHz, 16GB of memory, 256GB SSD, running windows 10. I’ll have to look into TV Tuners…also a really good suggestion. Invaluable assistance.
Sorry for the late response. I actually run this server with 16GB of RAM. I have two instances of Server 2016 running on my ESXi/vSphere implementation and a physically separate NAS as my storage solution. I’m looking to transition to a single, more powerful, server like I suggested to you. On this I’m going to keep the two virtual instances of Server 2016 running (one is the actual Media Server, the other one is the server which pulls my content), but I’ll also add FreeNAS to act as the manager for the file system etc. Likely wont need any more than 32GB initially as what I’m currently doing is more than enough.
The main things you should keep an eye on here are:
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Ensure that you get a PCIe Card with extra Ethernet ports on it, 2 will do, but 4 is better (You can always team the NICs to increase throughput), but most importantly if you’re going down the ESXi/vSphere route - CHECK TO MAKE SURE THEY’RE ON THE SUPPORTED DEVICES LIST.
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The other thing is make sure that you have a proper hardware RAID controller that is again, on the ESXi/vSphere supported devices list. The server I bought above has a Software RAID and ESXi/vSphere can’t use it.
A good workstation with an i7 would do. Contrary to popular belief you don’t actually need a super powerful PC to host Plex. I know people that have it running on a Rasperry Pi to serve 2/3 people on 1080p - but then this is totally dependent on the transcoding requirements. If it’s all on the LAN, and you have good network speeds, then chances are it’ll rarely transcode at all. With my instance, I have stress tested it to 7 people with a variety of connections (phone, LAN, WAN - someone actually in Dubai) concurrently and it’s been fine with only 6GB RAM and 2 vCPU from the above server. Don’t overspend, is I guess what I’m saying IMO. Definitely look on eBay at refurbished hardware as you get much more for your money.
Personally, I wouldn’t bother with a dedicated NAS again. It’s just another piece of dedicated hardware that draws power, works inefficiently, and is VERY expensive for the relative power output they provide. You’re generally paying for the OS and application development that lives on them. The fancy GUI and the DDNS-based cloud access. If you’re not going to use these functions, you’ll get a much better deal buying a single server and running FreeNAS like I suggested earlier.
Hopefully this reaches you in time buddy!
P.S. Jared is correct suggesting that RAID isn’t a backup service. It improves resilience of your service, but that’s it. They’re two different things that protect against different issues.
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