I have a Synology 1618+ NAS that I bought a year or so ago. I bought it mainly for backup purposes and storage, but in the meantime, took all my movies, tv shows etc. and setup Plex and got hooked on Plex.
My NAS seems to work well with Plex for most everything at home, but if there is anything that needs any transcoding, it doesn’t handle it as well as I would like.
I also share my server with my Mom, so she can watch many of the shows she likes, but it seems that ever since I bought the lifetime membership, her remote streaming from my share, doesn’t work very well. Low quality videos seem to even buffer. I don’t know if settings need to be changed or what, but I really want it to work out for my 80 year old mother.
I am not an expert, so I’m sure I’m missing something in the settings that could help to make her experience better, but I don’t know what it is.
I have about 30 for the upload speed, while she has 150 download speed. Both should be sufficient for even 4K I think. But my NAS just isn’t good enough I guess.
Can I use my NAS for the storage, but build a separate Plex server, or even just buy a used HP EliteDesk 800 or something like that, where it will have an i7 CPU for more power for transcoding etc? If so, how can I make them work together for the best streaming environment possible?
Thanks.
The DS1618+ has an Atom CPU. It can transcode 480p videos to lower rates. It can maybe transcode low bitrate 720p and 1080p. It does not have a GPU, so you cannot use hardware accelerated transcoding.
See View Plex NAS Compatibility Guide and Using Hardware Accelerated Streaming.
Not even close. Netflix, et al stream 4K at ~25 Mbps, but it is highly compressed. 4K HDR Blu-ray rips & remuxes can average 80 Mbps and burst above 100 Mbps.
That is a good plan.
Look for an i5 8th gen or better, with UHD 630 graphics. You’ve a Plex Pass, so you can take advantage of hardware accelerated transcoding, using the Intel Quick Sync graphics to transcode the video. You do not need a Nvidia GPU. Many people use an Intel NUC or similar computers from other manufacturers. They have mobile processors, so they do not draw much power, but have UHD 630 graphics, so they can use hardware accelerated transcoding when needed.
Also, don’t share/stream 4K HDR video over the Internet unless you’re willing to/comfortable running Linux as the OS for the Plex server.
Given your Internet connection you will need to transcode video. Plex on Linux can use the Intel Quick Sync GPU to perform the transcoding and tonemapping. Plex on Windows uses the GPU, but performance is reduced compared to Linux (transcoding non-HDR video on Windows is not a problem). See HDR to SDR Tonemapping and Using Hardware Accelerated Streaming.
Thanks so much for the great info.
There was not a problem for my Mom until I upgraded to Plex Pass. What settings changed that I can go into and fix, if that is an option, until I can get my server switched to a separate PC, with an i7 etc?
Should I uncheck the box use hardware decoding in player?
For remote access, what should I put for internet speed and what I limit remote stream bitrate?
Should I uncheck enable HDR tone mapping?
Should I uncheck use hardware acceleration when available?
Should I uncheck use hardware accelerated video encoding?
How hard will it be to have my Plex server on a PC, but all of my videos on my NAS? Will I need to do any thing special for that? Will networking it be fine, or will I need to connect over usb 3?
Thanks for all of your help.
What Plex client/player? Plex for Windows?
Try it enabled and disabled. Use whichever works best.
Internet speed: The upload speed where the Plex server is located…
Limit Remote Stream Bitrate: If you are only streaming to one or two remote users, choose the setting closest to, but not higher than, your Internet upload speed.
If you try to stream video that is 80% or higher of those limits, Plex will want to transcode the video. If it cannot transcode the video, playback will fail with an error message similar to “this server is not strong enough to transcode the video.”
Yes.
Yes to both. I’m surprised they are even listed. A DS1618+ is not capable of hardware acceleration.
It is a straightforward process. Nothing special needed. Many people do the same.
PC running Plex Media Server and Synology must both be using wired Ethernet.
On the Synology, enable SMB file sharing in Control Panel → File Services.
The PC running Plex will mount the shared folders on the Synology. Windows calls it mapping a network drive. The shared folders will appear in Windows File Manager as another drive, such as e:, f:, etc. You pick the letter when setting up the connection.
In PMS on Windows you add the folder to a library just like when running PMS on the Synology. It will have a Windows path, ex: m:\media\movies, instead of a linux path, ex: /volume1/media/movies.
Thanks so much for all of you great info.
When you say uncheck enable HDR tone mapping, are you referring to anytime, or just if the server is on the NAS? If it is on an i7 or greater server?
What about hardware acceleration when available or use hardware accelerated video encoding for a new i7 or greater server?
When I asked about hardware decoding in the player, I was referring to it when the server was in the NAS.
What about in an i7 or greater environment?
I have been experimenting using a server I use for CasaTunes Music. It is only an i5, but it is kicking some serious butt, compared to the NAS for sure.
I’ll be buying an i7 or if I can find one, an i9 used computer and use that as my server.
Thanks for all of your help.
The HDR/Hardware Acceleration settings I mentioned are when running Plex Media Server on the Synology. Disable them because the CPU in the NAS either a) is not strong enough to perform the function or b) is not capable due to hardware limitations. None of that applies to running Plex on a different system.
You definitely want to enable hardware accelerated transcoding when running PMS on the i5 system. Unsure about tonemapping. Need to know the full model of i5. If the GPU cannot handle tonemapping it will occur on the CPU and is very compute intensive.
What specific model is the i5? i5-xxxx.
If running Windows 10: Settings → System → About.
Does the system have a GPU card? If so, what make/model?
The i5 I’m testing on right now is an 8500.
No, there is no card in it right now. I do have an AMD GPU, but since it is going into an HP EliteDesk SFF, no big powerful GPU can be used. I can’t remember what the model of what the AMD GPU is since I’m not home at this time.
How important do you think it is to use an 8 core i7 as compared to the 6 core one? The 8500 or higher, as compared to the 7500 or earlier?
Also, the one thing that I am noticing since I made this new server, is that all of my previous settings are gone. All the movies, and TV shows that showed what I have watched is gone. Is there anyway to save the settings from the old server and pass them on to the new one?
@FordGuy61 has you covered here but I didn’t see one thing you might want to check for buffering kicking in for your mom - make sure the client at your mom’s side has “remote quality” set to original or max. The default is pretty low and if transcoding is kicking in that could account for the buffering. Since you’re managing the bandwidth from your end that should take that bandwidth setting limitation on her end out of the equation and isn’t triggering a transcode when it’s not necessary.
I had a user who kept saying “looks fine for me” when I noticed lots of transcoding even for low end videos and it took a few chats to get them to understand changing that setting is for ME so the server isn’t transcoding unnecessarily. 
Thanks.
You’ve a Plex Pass, so you can use hardware accelerated transcoding to transcode video.
The i5-8500 should have you covered for everything except tonemapping 4K HDR video.
It will transcode 4K video just fine. The tonemapping is the unknown part. Plex is still working out the kinks with tonemapping on Windows. It is still hits the CPU very hard from what I can tell. I’m not sure what CPU is necessary for tonemapping on Windows. I have not seen any performance reports. However, I run Plex on a Synology NAS, and do not read the Windows threads regularly. I’ll gladly defer to others with better information regarding tonemapping on Windows based systems.
My suggestion
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Run Plex Media Server on the i5-8500 system. It will be much, much better than on the Synology.
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Do not share 4K HDR media over the Internet.
You do not have the upstream bandwidth to do so without transcoding. Transcoding HDR converts it to SDR, so the person on the other end does not see HDR video anyway. -
See how the i5-8500 system works. You can always upgrade later if needed.
I actually use the i5 8500 computer for a music server already, so I need to have it’s own dedicated server. I am either going to be getting an i7 9700 or and i5 11500 computer.
I will find out in several days which one I end up getting. I think with the Passmark score, is pretty high for both of these, but the i5 is much better than the i7.
I should be okay sharing any 4K stuff because the sever I use should be able to transcode it pretty easily.
So, I guess what I’m asking to anyone is will I gain more from the i5 11500 over the i7 9700? The 9700 has 8 cores and the i5 has 6, but the i5 kills the i7 in passmark tests.
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