CPU for home server

[ChalkChalkson]

So Im looking to upgrade my home server, but Im not sure on the CPU. Currently looking at the 3200G and the 8100. Price difference including MoBo is negligible. Anyone have experiences with either in that kind of environment? Im running unraid with a plex server streaming 4k UHD content, and low traffic apache teamspeak and minecraft servers as well as a vpn for remote management. Have also been thinking about integrating my multimedia PC into it as a VM, since the NAS is next to the PC anyway and which probably reduces network strain while streaming those UHD blurays. What kind of chip would you folks choose? Havent payed much attention in a while

[Dutch_Master]

Right now, AMD holds all the cards, save for high end gaming with max FPS.

[ChalkChalkson]

So what does the 3200G do so much better? Like I get that AMDs current chips are better value along the entire spectrum of gaming PCs, but here I am talking a generation behind and very low end.

[adm0n]

I recently did a NAS build with the 3200G. It consumes almost no power and I like it a lot. But I don't know how well it puts up with media encoding. I'd look up on how well that would work. It is just a 4 core and it's still based on the ZEN+ architecture instead of ZEN 2. So you should not expect miracles from it, but it performes similar to and old 3rd or 4th gen i7.

[ChalkChalkson]

4 minutes ago, adm0n said:

I recently did a NAS build with the 3200G. It consumes almost no power and I like it a lot. But I don't know how well it puts up with media encoding. I'd look up on how well that would work. It is just a 4 core and it's still based on the ZEN+ architecture instead of ZEN 2. So you should not expect miracles from it, but it performes similar to and old 3rd or 4th gen i7.

so far I have been running a 4th gen Pentium G and it did manage the encoding (while sweating). Probably wouldnt like it if I ran a VM though and streamed video to the virtual machine though

[Boomwebsearch]

8 minutes ago, ChalkChalkson said:

So what does the 3200G do so much better? Like I get that AMDs current chips are better value along the entire spectrum of gaming PCs, but here I am talking a generation behind and very low end.

 

If you don't plan on upgrading the CPU in the future, then you may want to go with an AMD A10 9700 and save money on the motherboard and don't have to worry about compatibility with Ryzen without BIOS update requiring a different/older processor.

 

https://www.newegg.com/amd-a10-7th-gen-a10-9700/p/N82E16819113451

 

https://pcpartpicker.com/product/mB4BD3/msi-a320m-a-pro-micro-atx-am4-motherboard-a320m-a-pro

[ChalkChalkson]

4 minutes ago, Boomwebsearch said:

 

If you don't plan on upgrading the CPU in the future, then you may want to go with an AMD A10 9700 and save money on the motherboard and don't have to worry about compatibility with Ryzen without BIOS update requiring a different/older processor.

 

https://www.newegg.com/amd-a10-7th-gen-a10-9700/p/N82E16819113451

 

https://pcpartpicker.com/product/mB4BD3/msi-a320m-a-pro-micro-atx-am4-motherboard-a320m-a-pro

A320 has no MoBos with 6 sata ports and 4 DIMM slots so that doesnt work for me

[adm0n]

10 minutes ago, ChalkChalkson said:

so far I have been running a 4th gen Pentium G and it did manage the encoding (while sweating). Probably wouldnt like it if I ran a VM though and streamed video to the virtual machine though

Also for 4k UHD Bluerays? Then just expect about double the performance of that chip. If you go to a ryzen 3 3300X you can get almost top tier gaming performance but i guses that isn't really important for you

[ChalkChalkson]

Just now, adm0n said:

Also for 4k UHD Bluerays? Then just expect about double the performance of that chip. If you go to a ryzen 3 3300X you can get almost top tier gaming performance but i guses that isn't really important for you

hahah na dont expect to game on my nas Yeah the little pentium chip does fine streaming the UHD bluerays, but set the quality in plex to 1080p on a 4k source and it will die a horrible death  

My benchmark here would really be run a VM and stream a 4k blue ray from the nas to the vm via plex. If a chip can do that, Im happy. Assuming the cores on zen+ are comparable to haswell that might actually take a 6 core right? Afterall my haswell dualcore struggles with the encoding end, so Id kinda prefer having at least 3 cores there. And I dont know if a single zen+ core can decode 4k video afterall my current i5 4440 based media pc is not the most chill doing that.

[adm0n]

2 minutes ago, ChalkChalkson said:

hahah na dont expect to game on my nas Yeah the little pentium chip does fine streaming the UHD bluerays, but set the quality in plex to 1080p on a 4k source and it will die a horrible death  

My benchmark here would really be run a VM and stream a 4k blue ray from the nas to the vm via plex. If a chip can do that, Im happy. Assuming the cores on zen+ are comparable to haswell that might actually take a 6 core right? Afterall my haswell dualcore struggles with the encoding end, so Id kinda prefer having at least 3 cores there. And I dont know if a single zen+ core can decode 4k video afterall my current i5 4440 based media pc is not the most chill doing that.

Isn't usually the GPU used for media encoding? The cores on that chip aren't that fast. Ryzen did just take of, because it brought a lot of cores to the table.

In a VM, you'll lose some of your performance. So maybe go with an 6 core?

[Boomwebsearch]

10 minutes ago, ChalkChalkson said:

A320 has no MoBos with 6 sata ports and 4 DIMM slots so that doesnt work for me

 

Thank you for the additional information @ChalkChalkson, in that case I would recommend this motherboard and SATA card with the AMD A10 9700 which has an APU that should be great for encoding, although I would recommend GPU decoding for more smooth playback and less CPU usage especially with multiple video sessions:

 

https://www.amazon.com/SHINESTAR-Splitter-Controller-Expansion-Non-Raid/dp/B07KNXZFRH

 

https://pcpartpicker.com/product/hpRzK8/gigabyte-b450m-ds3h-micro-atx-am4-motherboard-b450m-ds3h

[ChalkChalkson]

2 minutes ago, adm0n said:

Isn't usually the GPU used for media encoding?  

For sure though the 1050 I had to end up using wants to be fed and as I said, that old haswell i5 sometimes gets toasty enough that the box cooler needs to work uncomfortably hard.

2 minutes ago, adm0n said:

The cores on that chip aren't that fast. Ryzen did just take of, because it brought a lot of cores to the table.

In a VM, you'll lose some of your performance. So maybe go with an 6 core?

yeah I remember per core performance being an intel talking point. The cheapest 6 core is like 30 bucks more, should be fine.

6 minutes ago, Boomwebsearch said:

 

Thank you for the additional information @ChalkChalkson, in that case I would recommend this motherboard and SATA card with the AMD A10 9700 which has an APU that should be great for encoding, although I would recommend GPU decoding for more smooth playback and less CPU usage especially with multiple video sessions:

 

https://www.amazon.com/SHINESTAR-Splitter-Controller-Expansion-Non-Raid/dp/B07KNXZFRH

 

https://pcpartpicker.com/product/hpRzK8/gigabyte-b450m-ds3h-micro-atx-am4-motherboard-b450m-ds3h

Well plex only officially supports hardware accelerated streaming on intel chips, so that likely doesnt work. GPU decoding wont be an issue, I intend to use a 1050 that I will pass through to the media pc. Using a Sata card might be an option in general, but comparing prices it seems to be cheaper to just buy the MoBo with more slots

[Boomwebsearch]

7 minutes ago, ChalkChalkson said:

Well plex only officially supports hardware accelerated streaming on intel chips, so that likely doesnt work. GPU decoding wont be an issue, I intend to use a 1050 that I will pass through to the media pc. Using a Sata card might be an option in general, but comparing prices it seems to be cheaper to just buy the MoBo with more slots

 

If the motherboard with more SATA slots is lower cost than the cheaper board plus the cost of a SATA card then it is most likely better to get that, do you have in mind a budget for the CPU, if you are running virtual machines and running GPU decoding (especially with multiple sessions), would at least recommend an 8 core CPU, although you may be able to get away with less depending on your needs?

[ChalkChalkson]

1 hour ago, Boomwebsearch said:

 

If the motherboard with more SATA slots is lower cost than the cheaper board plus the cost of a SATA card then it is most likely better to get that, do you have in mind a budget for the CPU, if you are running virtual machines and running GPU decoding (especially with multiple sessions), would at least recommend an 8 core CPU, although you may be able to get away with less depending on your needs?

My budget is up to 250€ for the MoBo and CPU, cheapest (modern) 8 core I could find is 280 on its own

[Jarsky]

The 8100 supports hardware transcoding in Plex/Emby on unraid (via quicksync modprobe i915) , the 3200g does not. Being 8th Gen it does full hevc/h265/vp9-10bit if that's a determining factor. 

[ChalkChalkson]

3 minutes ago, Jarsky said:

The 8100 supports hardware transcoding in Plex/Emby on unraid (via quicksync modprobe i915) , the 3200g does not. Being 8th Gen it does full hevc/h265/vp9-10bit if that's a determining factor. 

Thats a real factor yeah. But I need a second nvidia gpu then right? And then there is still the issue with cores, not 100% optimistic on 2 cores for the media pc and server respectively getting there. Cheapest intel 6 core is like 50 bucks more than the AMD one, so itd be right on the edge of my budget.

The cheat sheet shows 0 encoding channels for anything before Maxwell 2nd gen, which would also cost me 70-100 bucks on ebay. So Id have to choose between:

• 8100 + 950
• 3200g + a 4k blue ray
• 9400F (+ the 710 that is literally collecting dust, but that aparently doesnt encode 4k, having the hardware encoding option is nice though)
• 2600

Right now I am gravitating to the 9400F. Do you have a guess whether the 2 cores on the server and 2 cores on the client the i3 offers would be sufficient for 4k streaming?

[adm0n]

Are you sure the 9400F would work? The F means, that it doesn't have an integrated GPU, which is usually used for that kind of task.

[ChalkChalkson]

1 minute ago, adm0n said:

Are you sure the 9400F would work? The F means, that it doesn't have an integrated GPU, which is usually used for that kind of task.

Well, as I said, I would throw in a 710 to have some kind of video. AFAIK Plex transcoding doesnt use the igpu

[Jarsky]

2 hours ago, ChalkChalkson said:

Thats a real factor yeah. But I need a second nvidia gpu then right? And then there is still the issue with cores, not 100% optimistic on 2 cores for the media pc and server respectively getting there. Cheapest intel 6 core is like 50 bucks more than the AMD one, so itd be right on the edge of my budget.

The cheat sheet shows 0 encoding channels for anything before Maxwell 2nd gen, which would also cost me 70-100 bucks on ebay. So Id have to choose between:

• 8100 + 950
• 3200g + a 4k blue ray
• 9400F (+ the 710 that is literally collecting dust, but that aparently doesnt encode 4k, having the hardware encoding option is nice though)
• 2600

Not sure, I don't think so but my only Intel systems are currently in storage so I can't test it. You just have to use UnRAID in normal mode without GUI / Desktop and just use the browser interface. 

 

If you're going to need transcoding and rely on the iGPU, dont get an Intel older than the 7th Gen (7100). The 5th & 6th Gen have some limited HEVC support, but full support starts from 7th Gen. 3200G Vega Graphics are only supported in WIndows for hardware encoding. 

 

If you dont need transcoding, or are set on a discrete GPU then not an issue, just keep in mind the lowest Nvidia card that properly supports HEVC/X265 is the 10 Series (GT1030)

 

2 hours ago, ChalkChalkson said:

Right now I am gravitating to the 9400F. Do you have a guess whether the 2 cores on the server and 2 cores on the client the i3 offers would be sufficient for 4k streaming?

Again you'd need a 10 series card, as the F series chips don't have QuickSync. 

If you're doing GPU encoding then 2 cores can handle plenty of streams, your CPU will be mostly utilized for transcoding audio. 

 

Heres my Plex VM running on 2 cores (on my Ryzen 3950x). Keep in mind this VM has QBitTorrent, Sonarr, Radarr, Lidarr, Ombi, Organizr, Jackett, etc....running as well. 

It's also running Deep Analysis. This is 4 x 1080p to 480p transcode streams

 

[ChalkChalkson]

 

21 hours ago, Jarsky said:

If you're going to need transcoding and rely on the iGPU, dont get an Intel older than the 7th Gen (7100). The 5th & 6th Gen have some limited HEVC support, but full support starts from 7th Gen. 3200G Vega Graphics are only supported in WIndows for hardware encoding. 

 

21 hours ago, Jarsky said:

If you dont need transcoding, or are set on a discrete GPU then not an issue, just keep in mind the lowest Nvidia card that properly supports HEVC/X265 is the 10 Series (GT1030)

Wow I gues I read the cheat sheet wrong, thanks for the correctiong!

21 hours ago, Jarsky said:

Again you'd need a 10 series card, as the F series chips don't have QuickSync. 

If you're doing GPU encoding then 2 cores can handle plenty of streams, your CPU will be mostly utilized for transcoding audio. 

I have to admit here, I was confused and mistaken on 3 fronts:

1. I read this page's "Check the system requirements" section as: "Hardware acceleration doesn't work at all unless you are on an Intel 2nd gen or newer chip"
2. Therefor I assumed QuickSync was some kind of GPU related virtualisation feature
3. I thought F series chips had feature parity in all but iGPU related things

21 hours ago, Jarsky said:

Heres my Plex VM running on 2 cores (on my Ryzen 3950x).

Looks very promising! Do you run Plex in docker or do you run a Linux VM with a direct install?

[Jarsky]

1 hour ago, ChalkChalkson said:

1. I read this page's "Check the system requirements" section as: "Hardware acceleration doesn't work at all unless you are on an Intel 2nd gen or newer chip"

Thats probably specific to QuickSync, as QuickSync is an Intel technology that started with 2nd Gen Core with their Iris Graphics. Intel HD graphics (5th Gen Core) is where you get support for HEVC, but Intel HD 600 series (7th Gen Core) is where you get the majority of h265 support for modern transcoding. The latest 10th Gen supports both encode & decode for VP9-10bit as well. 

 

Quote

1. Therefor I assumed QuickSync was some kind of GPU related virtualisation feature

QuickSync is just Intel's Video Encoding/Decoding engine for their GPU's. Same as you have NVENC/NVDEC for Nvidia and VCE for AMD. 

 

Quote

1. I thought F series chips had feature parity in all but iGPU related things

They do, but QuickSync is an iGPU feature, and F series don't have Intel HD graphics. 

 

Quote

Looks very promising! Do you run Plex in docker or do you run a Linux VM with a direct install?

My setup is a bit convoluted. My latest server which houses my Plex is running UnRAID. I then use IOMMU to passthrough the GPU to an Ubuntu VM. I then passthrough that GPU to Docker with Plex running in a docker. It's quite an unnecessary configuration, it's just how I like it so everything related to my media management is together, because my server also runs various other roles such as my VMware test lab, development machines, general backup for the house, and SSH bastion / proxy server. 

 

My example is using an Nvidia (GTX1070) card, but for 6-10 transcodes QuickSync on Intel HD630 is a good solution as well.

 

Big thing when you're working with high quality x265 content is what support your card has. 

Nvidia Support Matrix: https://developer.nvidia.com/video-encode-decode-gpu-support-matrix

Intel Support Matrix: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Intel_Quick_Sync_Video#Hardware_decoding_and_encoding

AMD VCE: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Video_Coding_Engine  (not supported for Plex in Linux yet)

 

Edit: The main take away is that any Intel iGPU before 7th Gen, or before 10 series Nvidia (excluding the GTX960 with limited support) doesnt support HEVC transcoding. Image quality also suffers with the older engines. 

[ChalkChalkson]

Thanks a ton @Jarsky! My setup will probably be the 9400F (a tad cheaper when including the mobo then the cheapest recent amd 6 core right now) and a 1050 or 1660 depending on whether further reading shows "HEVC B Frame support" to be necessary or not. Kinda expect h265 lossless to be the thing I want to aim for though... at least it "sounds" like what I want.

[ChalkChalkson]

Update: Running the 9400F with a GT 710 and a GTX 1050 with 16GB of RAM. I passed the 1050 and 2 threads to a windows VM driving my TV. The 710 is passed through to the plex docker and happily encoding footage. With the slow preset for h264 it transcodes 4K footage to 1080p fine and converts the raw 4k blue ray rips to "orginal quality" at about 0.8x speed. So in terms of speed everything is doing quite fine, however as @Jarsky suggested getting a h265 / nvenc supporting card might actually increase image quality when watching transcoded footage (not sure if I'd notice though, watching transcoded stuff mostly happens on my laptop or phone).

Judging from the CPU numbers a quad core would have likely been enough, but I am happy I have he extra cores, both so I can bump my media pc to a quad core whenever I play couch games and so I can pin CPUs to Plex and the PC

[Jarsky]

3 hours ago, ChalkChalkson said:

With the slow preset for h264 it transcodes 4K footage to 1080p fine and converts the raw 4k blue ray rips to "orginal quality" at about 0.8x speed. So in terms of speed everything is doing quite fine, however as @Jarsky suggested getting a h265 / nvenc supporting card might actually increase image quality when watching transcoded footage (not sure if I'd notice though, watching transcoded stuff mostly happens on my laptop or phone).

 

That's going to be your problem. You can transcode a single h264 just fine, but it doesn't support h265 which is the new standard for most BluRay ripsand is a requirement for HDR content. 

 

GT710 (GK208 chip)

 

For H.265 minimum is GTX750 / GTX950-960

 

But ideally you want something GTX1050 minimum for best compatibility and modern encoding/decoding engine (quality). 

This is why I suggested Intel with HD630 iGPU graphics (i.e i3-7100+) as they support all these standards with their QuickSync video engine. 

 

 

[ChalkChalkson]

1 hour ago, Jarsky said:

That's going to be your problem. You can transcode a single h264 just fine, but it doesn't support h265 which is the new standard for most BluRay ripsand is a requirement for HDR content.

I mean it did transcode a 4k hdr rip to 1080p sdr just fine and on the only hdr device I have I usually play the rips back directly. But yeah I have the ful intention on getting a 1050 later for transcoding, just waiting for a good deal - the 710 was literally acting as replacement for a missing slot cover until last week