Spec me a server

[Mitzy]

Hey Peeps

So I currently rent a server for all my media needs which is for plex and media "acquisition", I pay £55 a month. Current specs that I know

Processor; E-2274G
RAM; 32GB
Storage; 32TB

Seems to be running Ubuntu with Swizzen interface.

So I've been looking at building my own but I just don't know where I should be looking, every time I have spec'd something up it's over £1600 so I figured I would turn to you guys for help because I am clearly doing something wrong.

My requirements are that the server is the same or better than my current specs and cost less than £1320, also needs to support HW transcoding and this machine would be serving remote users. Let me know if you need any more detail.

 

[Mitzy]

If it helps, that CPU is similar in performance to a 7700K, so even a 12400 would have a lot more computing power.

It is the storage I'd imagine is going to be expensive.

It genuinely does help I think I’m over spec’ing. The HDD costs is too damn high lol

 

[Mitzy]

So some general advice on ports, should I be looking at a card for SATA ports rather than relying on mobo?

 

[Mitzy]

Thank you for such a detailed reply. I'm definitely looking at mechanical drives, I guess due to budget I'm going to have to stick with 4 x 8TB and then a small m.2 for boot. This won't be used for anything other than media. Unfortunately I do see me needing that space, up until recently I had only 8TB of storage, since increasing I'm up to 10TB used. If I was serving just me it would probably be less but with all the TV shows it adds up pretty quickly.

Do you think an i5 would be okay?
I'll drop the sata expansion card seeing as I'm sticking to 4 sata drives for now
I'll drop the ram down to 16GB

What would you recommend for a power supply, I wouldn't need much would I?

Here's my current server stats / usage (don't know if this is useful) it's dedicated not virtual

 

[Mitzy]

My basket at OcUK:

• 1 x Intel Core i5-10400F 2.90GHz (Comet Lake) Socket LGA1200 Processor - Retail (SKU: CP-680-IN) = £119.99
• 1 x Asus Prime H510M-K (Socket LGA 1200) Micro ATX Motherboard (SKU: MB-6GK-AS) = £79.99
• 1 x be quiet! Pure Power 11 500W 80 Plus Gold Power Supply (SKU: CA-12X-BQ) = £62.99
• 1 x Team Group Vulcan Z T-Force 16GB (2x8GB) DDR4 PC4-25600C16 3200MHz Dual Channel Kit - Grey (SKU: MY-0AK-TG) = £49.99
• 4 x Seagate 8TB Barracuda HDD 5400RPM 256MB Cache Internal Hard Drive (ST8000DM004) (SKU: HD-39Z-SE) = £169.99

Total: £1,004.03 (includes delivery: £11.10)







​

 

[Mitzy]

Have you looked at ram usage when it's under heavier load. Using less than a quarter of ram, a third of the storage is going to be rather expensive.

Funny you mention, I have never seen the ram usage spike ever, it's fairly consistent.

Here's it's transcoding a 4k movie, it's around 60Gb

ram

 

[Mitzy]

Can't a decent NAS do everything you want. I don't do much transcoding but sure my Asustor Nimbuster does all that you need.
I do plan to get a QNAP at some point, more for playing with that anything, and using at to do everything from routing to Plex server, and just use my NAS as storage.

I don't know, what would you recommend?

Not sure if it helps - but Seagate 18TB drives can be had for £275 at the moment (ST18000NM000J)

Thank you for that, works out cheaper and more storage!

 

[Mitzy]

Updated, removed 2 drives, added a case. I don't think this CPU is suitable.

My basket at OcUK:

• 1 x Intel Core i5-10400F 2.90GHz (Comet Lake) Socket LGA1200 Processor - Retail (SKU: CP-680-IN) = £119.99
  
• 1 x Asus Prime H510M-K (Socket LGA 1200) Micro ATX Motherboard (SKU: MB-6GK-AS) = £79.99
  
• 1 x be quiet! Pure Power 11 500W 80 Plus Gold Power Supply (SKU: CA-12X-BQ) = £62.99
  
• 1 x Team Group Vulcan Z T-Force 16GB (2x8GB) DDR4 PC4-25600C16 3200MHz Dual Channel Kit - Grey (SKU: MY-0AK-TG) = £49.99
  
• 2 x Seagate 8TB Barracuda HDD 5400RPM 256MB Cache Internal Hard Drive (ST8000DM004) (SKU: HD-39Z-SE) = £169.99
  
• 1 x Raijintek Zofos Evo Silent Full Tower Gaming Case - Black (SKU: CA-03S-RT) = £149.99

Total: £817.63 (includes delivery: £14.70)​

 

[Mitzy]

That CPU has no IGP (-F) so it's not appropriate, no. Any reason you're not going 12th gen?

100 thank you!

Honestly I don’t know what I’m looking for. If you could point out a mobo cpu combo I would really appreciate it!

Like do I really need a i5 or higher or would a i3 be okay assuming it had the same iGPU as the more expensive big brothers?

 

[Mitzy]

Assuming your server will be local, is there even much of a requirement for transcoding? Would have expected much of it to be direct play.

Unfortunately a few friends and family cannot direct play because of the devices they use to watch

 

[Mitzy]

Use Handbrake or similar and convert everything to a suitable format.

I’m not prepared to do that.

 

[Mitzy]

but aren’t you are already doing that when you transcode ? So for each play, you’re churning a full recode when it could be done once and saved for direct play after?

It would be awesome if Plex kept the transcodes that it generates on the fly, why don’t they offer that as a setting?

So I ended getting a M1 Mac Mini and a 16TB external HDD. For the time being 16TB is enough, longer term I’m looking at getting 1 more drive. This Mac Mini is a beast transcoding on the fly, it crushes my full fat 80Gb remux, it’s not even an issue.

So the next thing on my journey has been to upgrade my broadband, I am end of contract with Virgin Media on Gig1. I have cancelled with them and ordered FTTP Gigafast 900 from Vodafone, this gives me double the upload I could get with VM and it’s cheaper.