I7-8700 (6C/12T) Plex Server

[Head Scratcher]

With an I7-8700, is one better off building a DS3622 and lose the ability to hardware transcode or building a DS918 and lose 4 of the 12 threads?

Edited December 4, 2022 by Head Scratcher

[smilenkovski]

HW transcoding is overrated if you have good CPU (which you have). Picture quality is much better if you use cpu only. I know that hw transcoding is a kind of holly grail of every media server, but, nowadays we have so many devices which support direct play, so, overrated. But in case if you want save power (electricity bills) that's another story. I'm using j5040 Asrock (10 wats only) for hw transcoding to spare some energy. A matter of choice.

[Head Scratcher]

8 hours ago, smilenkovski said:

HW transcoding is overrated if you have good CPU (which you have). Picture quality is much better if you use cpu only. I know that hw transcoding is a kind of holly grail of every media server, but, nowadays we have so many devices which support direct play, so, overrated. But in case if you want save power (electricity bills) that's another story. I'm using j5040 Asrock (10 wats only) for hw transcoding to spare some energy. A matter of choice.

Thank you for the reply!  I was kinda leaning that direction, but needed some external validation.

[WiteWulf]

Just to +1 the above reply. The key to transcoding is not to transcode! (especially with 4k content) 

 

I put all my 4k TV and movies in a separate library so my users who don't have 4k capable hardware know not to play them. Transcoding 1080p and 720p material is a lot less CPU intensive. But as my server is hosted somewhere with plenty of upstream bandwidth I encourage my users to set their clients to *not* transcode remote material if their home internet connections can handle it.

 

[silaswanders]

On 12/4/2022 at 3:42 AM, smilenkovski said:

HW transcoding is overrated if you have good CPU (which you have). Picture quality is much better if you use cpu only. I know that hw transcoding is a kind of holly grail of every media server, but, nowadays we have so many devices which support direct play, so, overrated. But in case if you want save power (electricity bills) that's another story. I'm using j5040 Asrock (10 wats only) for hw transcoding to spare some energy. A matter of choice.

Is there a process you followed to enable hw transcoding on your j5040 with Xpenology? I get like 99% CPU, which means QuickSync isn’t working. PlexPass and everything. 90% of the time I’ll be direct playing, but I just want to transcode remotely to my partner’s laptop on occasion.

 

I switched from DS920+ to DS918+ thinking that could be the issue, but no dice.

[smilenkovski]

DS920 is the way to go. I was using arpl the last beta and that's it. Nothing to do except enabling hw transcoding in plex settings.

[psyguy]

I'll give it a try! Should I be installing Plex through Docker or internally? Then pass dev/dri all the same? Thanks

[smilenkovski]

You can install plex either way. I'm installing via manual install and Package manager. Docker images might be few days late. And you should install watchtower docker image to follow updates. So, your decision.

[psyguy]

5 hours ago, smilenkovski said:

You can install plex either way. I'm installing via manual install and Package manager. Docker images might be few days late. And you should install watchtower docker image to follow updates. So, your decision.

What the hell. That worked. I didn't even have to enable transcoding, as it was already on. It took me longer to install because I lost my flash drive for 3 hours, than it did to just install Plex and... Wow. 

 

I think what happened was, my first install was on a spare AMD that I put 3615 on, then migrated to a DS920 install, but it must've not installed the drivers because it didn't work, and neither did a clean 918 install, but this one sure did. Thank you so much. I've been pulling my hair for 2 weeks on this.

 

Deep down, I knew the solution was going to be super simple, as it so often is. I'm just glad it's over.