5 Things to consider BEFORE you build a Plex Server!

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@ 1:13 #1 - SSD for Plex Meta-Data
@ 4:17 #2 - Mass Storage/Operating System - Options - 1)Microsoft Windows 2)Unraid 3)TrueNas/FreeNas
@ 9:09 #3 - Expandability Short or Long Term Thinking
@11:01 #4 - Performance
@13:25 #5 - Backup Battery Supply
@15:05 - # Honorable Mention - External TV Antenna & HD Home Run TV TUNER - Local News

[ThatWilsonGuyvids]

A few more recommendations from my experience:

- If you do have an "extra" SSD, consider making it your dedicated scratch disc to do your transcoding. Transcoding can be very hard on SSDs and it would be better to not put that wear and tear on your primary drive.

- An Nvidia Shield Pro and a 8-14TB external drive is a surprisingly compact and a relatively cheap starting point. The Shield is still one of the best Plex players, but also makes a surprisingly good server.

- Synology NAS with Quicksync enabled processor would be the next most compact and efficient storage/server combination while being scalable.

- Think about your internet upload speed before you get too carried away with how many transcode streams you want to support. Your CPU may be able to transcode 10 but your internet bandwidth may only allow 2-3.

[dantreview]

Where people overlook and end up blowing it is not understanding their clients. Seems to make more sense to understand the client environment first, then build the server to suit it. Not the other way around.

[andrewskaterrr]

Important notes:
1. Last I checked only Windows supports multicore subtitle encoding
2. Use software like Macrium Reect Free to backup your Plex drive (mine is all on NVME OS drive so everything is backed up)
3. GTX/RTX cards have the encoding limit locked so use the unlimited cracked drivers. GTX 1660 has Turing encoder for best quality.
4. Get better performance and be able to add drives to your Raid array with an Adaptec ASR 71605 Raid Controller with 1GB Ram, battery, and cables for ~$90 on eBay. But strap a 40mm fan to it because it will overheat (it pumps out heat)
5. Transcoding DTS-HD MA or Dolby True HD audio to when streaming to a device uses quite a bit of CPU, especially during the first couple seconds when it’s loading your videos buffer. If you have over ~8 streams then be sure to get at least a medium level CPU like an R3/5 or i3/5, not an Intel Atom or Pentium.

[cerusa]

Definitely power consumption. Some stats like where I live, it's $0.37/KWh. I just downgraded my plex server from a 2950x ThreadRipper with a 1070TI to a 10700 only. And it's a big difference power wise.

[matthewonciul]

8:30 You can always build a pool of a single vdev with two mirrored disks in TrueNAS, then add another two disk vdev whenever you want to expand your storage. Allows you to start small and also not have to worry about a bunch of pools and datasets.

[adrianwiuk]

Re: TrueNAS/FreeNAS the term you were looking for is 'all disks for a vdev at the same time' - you can still combine multiple vdevs into a single storage pool, but do need to consider the redundancy of each vdev and not the storage pool

[Wydenproductions]

Dude, you have more infrastructure than most small companies. Great job!

[maverickbna]

Make sure you have a sufficient upload speed on your Internet connection. I got screwed when I wanted to get a 500Mbps connection, and only get a wimpy 15-20Mbps upload. I've been barely able to do 1 transcoding stream on a Z77 Xeon E3-1225v2.

[mrdriver]

Buying used enterprise servers are a good idea if you want something that sounds like a jet taking off in your house, those fans are really loud in enterprise servers

[jamescox]

Jason, you should do a video of plex Transcodes using intel QS vs a p2000 or even the ryzen 3900x.

[iamamish]

A UPS seems like a pointless expense until you lose valuable hardware or data due to a power outage/surge/brownout. I now have 3 of the Cyberpower UPS systems - one for my PC, one for my networking equipment, and one for my home theater.

[dathyr]

Thanks for the video. I share my Plex server on the same laptop PC that I run the PLEX operating program. I have a 1 TB SSD on a I7 processor with Windows 10. My internet speed is around 250 Mbps. I am a single user and use PLEX to DVD record some local TV Antenna channels that get saved to my MEDIA storage area on my server. So far I have not had any problems doing this. I edit the TV shows and remove the commercials, save it to another EXT hard drive and then remove the original content from the server storage. So another words, I do not store and keep allot of personal content on the server storage area- I have other EXT hard drives that do this. There is no way to record their PLEX movie content or TV shows other than to watch them later. Once I am done watching the movie, etc, I remove it from the watch later function.

Setup was easy to do for my PC. Only thing I needed to buy extra was the HDHomerun Tuner box and few coax cables. Everything else I already had.
Overall, everything works great with PLEX and I now have a way to record my local Digital TV channels from my Antenna. Quality of the recordings are pretty good. take care.

[gabeis]

Anyone else notice the wardrobe change. I see what you did there.

[JoshWhitford]

Could you do a tutorial on setting up a UPS with an unraid server over a network? I've got 2 servers in my rack (one is a backup) but the ups is only connecting to the the 1 for some reason 🤷🏽‍♂️

[thechivostreamsarchive]

If you can swing it, having enough RAM to have a RAM drive for your transcoding is HUGE. Saves on the write endurance of your SSD a TON so you don't eat through SSDs, and has the added benefit kf being UBER quick. Dont underestimate this!

[adamohl]

Can I attach multiple external drives to my shield pro Plex server? I have 5 10tb drives connected to a usb dock.

[curtispavlovec]

I’m running a cheap $89 dell tower I got on clearance. Only upgrades I did was a $50 SSD and 16GB of RAM. CPU is a G4400 nothing special or extreme. It runs fine, pretty low power use (runs 24/7). I’ve considered moving to a Shield as my server and still might because I’m sick of dealing with Windows.

[DodgersNation]

Helllo I have a question I have issue with plex Desh my server does show how can fix it on my iPhone. Thank you.

[pattes]

I‘ve started with Windows and because of you I switched to unraid. This was the best thing this year. It is so much more performance. It is a so cool and stable system.
Thank you!