Go | New | Find | Notify | Tools | Reply | |
Member |
The DS920+ uses an Intel Celeron j4125 with built in GPU. It can hardware encode a 4K file to a 1080p stream with the CPU at 20%. The DS923+ uses a Ryzen v1600 (IIRC) with no GPU. All encode/decoding is CPU based. It struggles to even start a single 4K decode. The Ryzen is a better processor if you want to run a bunch of Dockers on your box or virtualize Windows, but for the specific use as a media server, you cannot beat a NAS with an Intel CPU. I’ve had five simultaneous video transcoding streams from my NAS, including audio transcoding, and my CPU was less than 30%. People in the know are snatching up DS920+ units while they can still get them. I don’t know what the future CPU direction will be for Synology, but if they won’t offer an Intel CPU option for the prosumer models in the future, I’ll be giving QNAP a hard look, when the time comes. ETA: I have a ton of HEVC media. If you have mostly x264 stuff, you probably wouldn’t care as much. Demand not that events should happen as you wish; but wish them to happen as they do happen, and you will go on well. -Epictetus | |||
|
| Member |
Check out this comparison, particularly towards the end where he gets into the higher def files. Demand not that events should happen as you wish; but wish them to happen as they do happen, and you will go on well. -Epictetus | |||
|
Member |
$600 for just the NAS chassis? Plus 4 drives? Sounds like a good setup, just not likely for a starter package. The Enemy's gate is down. | |||
|
| Member |
This, in spades. JBOD is a bad idea, unless you have a mirror-copy backup. I have 2 unraid servers, 1 offsite that I bring home & mirror my main. That gives me parity protection x2. I'd lose 10-20 movies/shows/albums at any given time if I had multiple disk failures (very unlikely). I'd hate to re-rip & recompress: 8:51 AM :: MCM: Your library includes 2,281 titles and took 11.1 seconds to load. 8:51 AM :: MCM: 2,170 movie titles and 111 T.V. titles
This is also a good argument, I have a ton of movies that might never get watched or rewatched. If I hadn't started 10+ years ago, I doubt I'd rip movies. The plex setup is sweet, but it has been a lot of time setting it up. I do have Plex sharing setup & my great-uncle is plowing through MASH & some other stuff & my stepdad watches it periodically. Both are on my off-site server, so I don't notice the bandwidth. | |||
|
| Member |
Most of the cost is in the drives. 4x anything is expensive. If you have an old desktop laying around, grab 2-3 large HDDs & an UNraid license+USB stick. It will run on just about anything. I had it on a pentium 100 with 32MB RAM(that's megabytes) at one point. UNraid can run your NAS, Plex, downloading & many other things via docker & VMs. I have HomeAssistant running for some home automation (lights, door sensors, etc). Sonarr & a torrent client for TV shows, I've had radarr & lidarr for movies & music downloads, etc. I'm also using the same hardware as a PC with a Win10 virtual machine, so it looks like a PC, but windows can't crap out & take everything with it - windows re-starting after an update & not allowing wife/kid to use Plex is absolutely unacceptable  UNRAID | |||
|
| Raised Hands Surround Us Three Nails To Protect Us  |
How difficult is the UNRaid to use? I have a old desktop I just replaced that could work. ———————————————— The world's not perfect, but it's not that bad. If we got each other, and that's all we have. I will be your brother, and I'll hold your hand. You should know I'll be there for you! | |||
|
| Member |
Fair enough, but know that a NAS is way more than just a media server. It backs up your computers, runs surveillance systems, replaces Dropbox, is my VPN, etc. Also, you don’t have to start with four drives. You could use one, two would be better to at least get the benefits of a btrfs file system (using SHR). Pro tip: BestBuy has WD Easystore 14TB external drives on sale for $199. You bust those open and recover the drive for your NAS and you'll have a WD Ultrastar server grade drive for half the price of buying an Ultrastar labeled drive. The 8TB Easystore is on for $139. At the minimum, you could upgrade the space on that Dell, or provide for backup of your media library. Demand not that events should happen as you wish; but wish them to happen as they do happen, and you will go on well. -Epictetus | |||
|
quarter MOA visionary |
Of course ~ it is generally a low powered Linux based server. Processing power may vary depending on use. Network & Storage require little processing power. Most desktops regardless of the OS are more powerful so a desktop with adequate storage will work very well as a media server. One more thing as word of caution ~ pretty much all of them have been hit by malware/ransomware attacks and the common denominator is when they try to use different "apps" to connect over the Internet. The apps get compromised and let's the attacker in to do damage. Includes most all of them at one time or another. So using the cutesie apps to remotely operate can possible be dangerous. Using in a LAN scenario is pretty safe. So just be cautious. YMMV | |||
|
| Member |
The problem with using desktops is that most people don’t use RAID and suffer bitrot, nor do they properly backup (as you’ve earlier mentioned). It requires some Linux variant to support btrfs or zfs file systems and a NAS makes that easily accessible to most people. Also, if this is a concern, a typical NAS will do the job with 25w of power, while desktops will use much more. A far bigger concern for those in the UK than here in the US. As for security, hasn’t QNAP had more issues than Synology? I hadn’t heard of any major Synology breaches, but it seems like QNAP has had repeated problems. My Synology firewall gets banged on everyday, but it’s rather restricted, so it just keeps growing that exclude list. If you know of any Synology problems, please let me know so I can check my kit. Thanks. You’re right, though, as to the OP, playing with a first media server, an existing desktop will do nicely. In fact, using an older desktop as the media server with a cheap ARM based NAS (like Synology DS418) for storage is a very viable option. Demand not that events should happen as you wish; but wish them to happen as they do happen, and you will go on well. -Epictetus | |||
|
| Raised Hands Surround Us Three Nails To Protect Us |
What drive are you using for UHD BluRays? ———————————————— The world's not perfect, but it's not that bad. If we got each other, and that's all we have. I will be your brother, and I'll hold your hand. You should know I'll be there for you! | |||
|
| quarter MOA visionary |
There is no reason you can't deploy RAID in a desktop. Disk redundancy is a completely different topic. Both Synology and QNAP have had issues just a fact. It's isn't related to the brand - it is related on the subpar apps that want to make remote whatever easy for the novice. Use good networking protocols and don't trust apps to be the end-all. Of course the end-user could initiate an attack on a desktop and the malware could back-door to the NAS as well. Just use common sense. | |||
|
| Member |
Well, this has gotten a bit outside my expertise. I know a bit on raid from our servers at work, but rarely have to interact with it. Bit to read up on & research. May start with just the tower I have & expand/raid the storage there. If it weren't for the noise/size, we have a few decommissioned storage arrays that would be huge storage, but they're nearly 10 year old Dell EqualLogic arrays. The Enemy's gate is down. | |||
|
McNoob |
1. Do your own research and make a choice that fits your needs. 2. I bought and flashed my own drive. I have tried 1 UHD disk and it failed. I have not had time to get back to this with other things I have going. I do not know a ton about ripping UHD disks. I replaced my older Blu Ray drive with this: LG Electronics Blu-ray/DVD Writer Optical Drive - WH16NS60 https://www.amazon.com/gp/prod..._title?ie=UTF8&psc=1 I bought, and flashed my own drive, following the guide here: https://forum.makemkv.com/foru...pic.php?f=16&t=19634 "We've done four already, but now we're steady..." | |||
|
| Member |
It has a learning curve & the support is mostly forum based (they have a pretty good forum to get help quickly). I have been using it for 10+ years, so I'm not the best to say how easy it is to set up. That said, the current version has a good web GUI & there is very little to do to get a basic NAS up & running. Install on USB, boot from USB, go to IP of computer, assign parity drive, data drive(s) and click 'start array'. It does offer a free trial & runs from USB stick*. As long as you don't add any HDD to the array, it won't touch them & you can go back to windows or whatever. If you have some unused drives laying around, plug them in, unplug the 'good' drive(s) and play around. *UnRaid actually runs from RAM (very small), but you need the USB to boot & for a license key. There are some USB-stick requirements (needs a unique S/N), so you can't just run a cheap one. | |||
|
| quarter MOA visionary |
You could also try TruNAS . I have never tried UNRAID but I understand it is not free. I am experimenting with both CORE and SCALE. But not having a Linux background I am plotting my way around. Not hard to install ... use/configure a bit more challenging and probably why most prefer Synology, QNAP, etc. | |||
|
| Member |
TrueNAS looks like it was FreeNAS, which I have played around with a bit. It was solid, but less user-friendly for a beginner (that was 5+ years ago, could be completely different now). The big difference for a media server seems to be 'plugins' for home-server add-ons vs UnRAID's use of docker to separate those add-ons from the core. UnRAID used to use plugins for things like Plex & docker is better, IMO. I hadn't followed it, but it looks polished enough to try for free, if you are wanting NAS+Plex+downloads, it might do the trick. Unraid has a lot more applications available. With UnRAID, you never really get exposed to the Linux side of things if you don't want to- it's all a purpose-specific webpage GUI. I haven't touched QNAP in a long time either, but I doubt UnRAID is any harder to set up as a NAS than QNAP. I have got into the command-line a few times, but only for iGPU passthrough & other non-basic things. | |||
|
Republican in training |
I use Plex server running on a Synology NAS (DS920+). Works fantastic. Very easy to setup and use (whether you're on a Synology device or running Plex from a PC). Plex works just fine running on an old laptop or PC, especially if you are not transcoding anything. AnyDVD and Handbrake for most of the ripping needs. -------------------- I like Sigs and HK's, and maybe Glocks | |||
|
| Raised Hands Surround Us Three Nails To Protect Us |
Which external hard drive is the best to store media for Plex use. Using a desktop for now. One day I’ll likely set up a NAS. ———————————————— The world's not perfect, but it's not that bad. If we got each other, and that's all we have. I will be your brother, and I'll hold your hand. You should know I'll be there for you! | |||
|
| Member |
These Easystore drives from BestBuy are server quality drives. They are white labeled WD Ultrastar drives. The 14TB goes on sale all the time. A few weeks ago it was $199.99. https://www.bestbuy.com/site/w...5303.p?skuId=6425303 Demand not that events should happen as you wish; but wish them to happen as they do happen, and you will go on well. -Epictetus | |||
|
| quarter MOA visionary |
Any drive is fine. But why an external drive? Additional internal is fine too and better performing albeit the requirements are not high for media storage. I never wasted money on an aftermarket external drive. I always used enclosures and picked the appropriate drive for the job. Molten plastic enclosing a regular drive attached by their power supply never made sense to me but is convenient. If only serving audio I would just attach a 1tb SSD with a USB adaptor that has power for about $10. If serving video that won't be enough space and look for a spinner of appropriate size. Still I would have the same drive internally and reserve the USB external for backup. WD has a great lineup, Black or better, IMO. Enclosures can vary even ones with removeable bays are very useful. YMMV | |||
|
| Powered by Social Strata | Page 1 2 3 4 |
 | Please Wait. Your request is being processed... |
|
© SIGforum 2024