Draeconix

Very cool video. I work in the mainframe world as a Systems Programmer specializing in Automation. I have been doing that for the last 9 years now. I was a Mainframe Operator for 6 years before that. There is very little in the server space that can compete with a Z series mainframe in terms of raw performance, compute power and redundancy. It is impressive technology. Most people don't realize it but almost every banking transaction hits a mainframe at some point in its lifetime and the up time is real. There are places that don't IPL (Initial Program Load - think "reboot") their mainframe for months and even years. It just sits in the data center calmly doing what it does.
 
I was at Poughkeepsie, NY for some training and got a tour of the factory as well. We got to see how they put them together from the ground up. One thing the video didn't show is how heavy those drawers can get when fully loaded. In the assembly area instead of lifting the drawers into place they raise and lower the entire rack to the correct height so the technician assembling the machine never has to climb a ladder or raise a heavy object over their head. The rack will actually lower into the floor so the technician can reach the top.
 
By the way, if anyone is looking for a good paying job in IT, definitely look into the mainframe world. Because people think that the mainframe is a "dinosaur" and "on its way out" the industry is somewhat hurting for people. I assure you the mainframe is going to be around for quite some time. The company I work for is definitely looking for people (PM me for more info) and will train you (they have a whole academy).

Very cool video. I work in the mainframe world as a Systems Programmer specializing in Automation. I have been doing that for the last 9 years now. I was a Mainframe Operator for 6 years before that. There is very little in the server space that can compete with a Z series mainframe in terms of raw performance, compute power and redundancy. It is impressive technology. Most people don't realize it but almost every banking transaction hits a mainframe at some point in its lifetime and the up time is real. There are places that don't IPL (Initial Program Load - think "reboot") their mainframe for months and even years. It just sits in the data center calmly doing what it does.
 
I was at Poughkeepsie, NY for some training and got a tour of the factory as well. We got to see how they put them together from the ground up. One thing the video didn't show is how heavy those drawers can get when fully loaded. In the assembly area instead of lifting the drawers into place they raise and lower the entire rack to the correct height so the technician assembling the machine never has to climb a ladder or raise a heavy object over their head. The rack will actually lower into the floor so the technician can reach the top.
 
By the way, if anyone is looking for a good paying job in IT, definitely look into the mainframe world. Because people think that the mainframe is a "dinosaur" and "on its way out" the industry is somewhat hurting for people. I assure you the mainframe is going to be around for quite some time. The company I work for is definitely looking for people (PM me for more info) and will train you (they have a whole academy).

"I don't need SAS from my camera operator..."
 
Get it? SAS!
 
*insert mic drop here*

There is a reason data centers are cool and dry and have environmental controls. Now several racks of servers chugging along all day versus a person computer or laptop are very different in tolerances but they are analogous to some degree. Computers in general don't like warm, moist environments. They may continue to work for a while but the longer you leave them there the more effect it can have.

I have a Synology DS918+ with 4 x 6 TB Drives in it. I have them RAID'ed so I can loose a drive and still be ok. It nets me about 15TB and handles my back up and Plex server duties just fine, but then I am the only one in my household. If you have multiple people streaming from your Plex server, it is my understanding you will want something with a bit more CPU power. I had a Antec 1200 Tower that I thought about putting a bunch of drives in but the NAS was a much simpler set up and easier to manage. It also allowed me to connect my cloud accounts to the NAS so now I have my cloud drives on my PC, my NAS and in the cloud. In terms of expandability, there are NAS boxes out there with tons of drive bays. I know Synology has consumer ones going up to at least 12 bays and rack mounted, server style bays have even more.
 
That said, if a NAS isn't to your liking and the second PC is really only going to be backing up and possibly running a Plex server, the specs really don't need to be that huge. My Synology for example is running a dual core Celeron and it is plenty fast for Plex. I am thinking along the lines of a Core i3 or a Ryzen 3. RAM might be a bigger concern and/or possibly the size of the C drive. When I ran Windows Home Server, it needed a larger area for the C drive to act as a sort of cache to be able to balance out the storage array and facilitate copies. If it didn't have the right amount of space, the  process would be slow since it had to keep clearing out the space. My NAS has 2 x 512 GB SSD's in it for just that purpose. If you are running something in the Windows family, that is definitely something to consider. If on the hand you are going with another OS, I am not as well versed so I can't say for sure.