Can I do 4K on my Plex server?

[Donut417]

Spec:

• i5 3570K (Stock Clock) 
• 16 Gigs DDR3
• 500 Gig SSD
• HD7950 
• QNap Was with 10 TB of storage (Where all my Plex libraries are stored) 

I need to know if I can run 2x 1080i transcodes and 1x 4K direct stream with the specs above? Want to upgrade to a 4K TV at some point this year or early next year. If we get the stimulus money then it will definitely be this year. I have an audio setup that works well, but I need a good way to watch 4K content. So I need to know if Im purchasing a USB 4K Blu-ray drive or a stand alone Blu-ray Player. Id like to start getting costs down so I can figure out how much I want to spend on a TV. 

[lieder1987]

Doesnt answer exactly, but if you buy a 4k bluray player, just buy an xbox one s.

[leadeater]

2 hours ago, Donut417 said:

I need to know if I can run 2x 1080i transcodes and 1x 4K direct stream with the specs above?

Yes, the 4K direct will actually be the simplest of those.

 

2 hours ago, Donut417 said:

So I need to know if Im purchasing a USB 4K Blu-ray drive or a stand alone Blu-ray Player

Personally I have a dedicated blu-ray player for watching movies even though I have Plex. I do watch movies via Plex as well but I'll preference the real disc when it's something "good".

[Donut417]

4 minutes ago, leadeater said:

Yes, the 4K direct will actually be the simplest of those.

Good. 

 

4 minutes ago, leadeater said:

Personally I have a dedicated blu-ray player for watching movies even though I have Plex. I do watch movies via Plex as well but I'll preference the real disc when it's something "good".

I have limited space where my TV is. I could fit a player but not having to makes it much easier. Plus I can keep the disks looking nice. 

[AngryBeaver]

On 8/8/2020 at 6:31 PM, Donut417 said:

Spec:

• i5 3570K (Stock Clock) 
• 16 Gigs DDR3
• 500 Gig SSD
• HD7950 
• QNap Was with 10 TB of storage (Where all my Plex libraries are stored) 

I need to know if I can run 2x 1080i transcodes and 1x 4K direct stream with the specs above? Want to upgrade to a 4K TV at some point this year or early next year. If we get the stimulus money then it will definitely be this year. I have an audio setup that works well, but I need a good way to watch 4K content. So I need to know if Im purchasing a USB 4K Blu-ray drive or a stand alone Blu-ray Player. Id like to start getting costs down so I can figure out how much I want to spend on a TV. 

Not sure how that card will work, but I know that if you use the integrated gpu on your cpu it should be able to do 2 1080p transcodes and a 4k direct without issue.... if you have enough network and IO headroom on your NAS. Might consider running them dual homed.

[Donut417]

1 hour ago, AngryBeaver said:

Not sure how that card will work

It won't. Because I dont run Windows, only new AMD cards with Windows 10 can do hardware transcoding when it comes to Plex. 

 

Though if the rumors are true and the government is trying to defer Payroll taxes, I might have to hold on to that $1,200 because Id expect a huge tax bill for 2021. 

[Jarsky]

On 8/9/2020 at 2:14 PM, leadeater said:

Personally I have a dedicated blu-ray player for watching movies even though I have Plex. I do watch movies via Plex as well but I'll preference the real disc when it's something "good".

 

Personally I can't be bothered with that lol. My Blu-Ray collection is all ripped, predominantly encoded in x265. If it's something worth the ~40GB of space, like my Star Wars collection, those are just remuxed avc, and served via my plex. Remuxed AVC is essentially a containered version of the BD with the same compression as the source disc. 

 

These examples below are exactly the same quality as watching them off my original BD's. It's far more convenient for me or my family who decide to watch them, not just confined to the TV either....I often just watch stuff in the kitchen/family room area, which just has a Smart TV. Or I watch things from work in my downtime if it's exceptionally quiet in the evening

 

 

[leadeater]

25 minutes ago, Jarsky said:

those are just remuxed avc

What are you using to create the REMUX's? I tried one tool and it created it but didn't work within Plex for some reason (transcoding played but Original/Native didn't). Had to borrow a USB blu-ray drive because I don't actually have one for my PC lol. I'll have to get one and do it again but I basically can't be arsed without knowing it'll work. I don't mind just downloading them instead of creating but a lot of stuff just doesn't have REMUX versions.

 

Other thing is I don't have a nice way of playing Plex in the theater room, like I could but I have the discs in the room so kinda moot. The Oppo blu-ray player doesn't have a Plex app and my PS4 isn't in that room, heck even that house. Still got my projector etc at my parent place since I haven't got round to sorting out my own place for it, where it is a room that was built for projectors so it's better it stays there tbh.

[Jarsky]

4 hours ago, leadeater said:

What are you using to create the REMUX's? I tried one tool and it created it but didn't work within Plex for some reason (transcoding played but Original/Native didn't). 

tsMuxer and mkvmerge. Basically just like this guide https://www.dvd-guides.com/guides/blu-ray-rip/256-remux-blu-ray-to-mkv

[leadeater]

3 minutes ago, Jarsky said:

tsMuxer and mkvmerge. Basically just like this guide https://www.dvd-guides.com/guides/blu-ray-rip/256-remux-blu-ray-to-mkv

Thanks, looks like what I was using but looking at the guide it's likely I just wasn't setting things correctly. I'll have to get a drive and try it out again.

[paddy-stone]

I don't bother with transcoding personally. Not when you have to have a subscription to use it... whilst I want to support the creators of the program/apps I really don't like subscriptions, I'd rather pay £50 for it one time.

Anyway, so I either use Emby for regular TV and movies, which I have found much better than plex TBH, with plex often giving me "buffering" screens, or wanting to transcode subs/sound etc when it shouldn't have needed to... or in the rare case that Emby can't play the file (I haven't found one yet TBH), then I would use KODI like I used to if plex couldn't/wouldn't  play it. I also keep some movies in other resolutions for if any of my users haven't got a device that'll play 1080p/x265 etc. I have even added extra audio to a file in case the user couldn't play 5.1/DTS/AC3 for example, this saves a lot of transcoding problems that I used to get with plex. It's not that it couldn't play it per say, more that I didn't want the server to have to transcode stuff.

And to be honest, some of that was laziness on my part, I could ahve shown the user how to access the server using KODI and set it up etc... but couldn't be bothered at the time, so just left them using plex. With emby it's much simpler, having user profiles you can specify which libraries a user can see and use... so that it doesn't mess up your account. You could probably do this in plex too, but then you'd have to pay for the app for each user that's using android for example IIRC.

I'm not trying to convert anyone to Emby BTW, I just think the UI and settings are more advanced and have simpler solutions... for example you can set what account the DLNA server uses by default, which has come in very handy too.

Emby isn't perfect, but I was surprised at how much more refined it felt to plex when I switched... I'd tried Emby a few years back and hated it. Now I won't ever go back to plex TBH. I still keep multiple versions of some titles around for the users that have lower spec devices, but on a whole if they can't play something they'll let me know, and I can knock out a re-rip version for them or acquire one from the net fairly quickly that it's not a problem. And storage is pretty cheap... I still have like 10TB free on my main NAS, and 3TB on my backup NAS (6TB used on each right now).

 

TLDR: Sorry if I haven't given you anything useful in the above, might want to look at having multiple versions unless you don't mind paying a subscription and having a higher tier CPU/GPU for transcoding usage.

[Donut417]

15 minutes ago, paddy-stone said:

Not when you have to have a subscription to use it.

$119 for a life time license and only hardware transcoding if I recall correctly is behind the pay wall and I don’t use hardware transcoding. I had to pay for it to use the DVR functionality. Because the main use for my Plex server is to share one OTA antenna with multiple TVs. DVR functions are used extensively in my house hold. Plex was the best solution at the time I found for whole home DVR. 
 

19 minutes ago, paddy-stone said:

CPU/GPU for transcoding usage.

I’ve read that a newer i3 iGPU can easily transcode multiple streams. Further more you don’t transcode 4K and you do have multiple versions at different resolutions. At least that’s the advice Plex gives. 

[leadeater]

22 minutes ago, Donut417 said:

I’ve read that a newer i3 iGPU can easily transcode multiple streams. Further more you don’t transcode 4K and you do have multiple versions at different resolutions. At least that’s the advice Plex gives. 

Yep, without transcoding and having everything in a format all your devices can play native means only your bandwidth will ever limit you, or disk performance.

[Donut417]

1 minute ago, leadeater said:

Yep, without transcoding and having everything in a format all your devices can play native means only your bandwidth will ever limit you, or disk performance.

That’s what sucks. Roku doesn’t support MPEG2 so every time the folks watch Live TV it has to transcode. But my setup works ok for doing it at least right now. 

[paddy-stone]

1 hour ago, leadeater said:

Yep, without transcoding and having everything in a format all your devices can play native means only your bandwidth will ever limit you, or disk performance.

Exactly. This is what I was long-windedly trying to say

 

2 hours ago, Donut417 said:

$119 for a life time license and only hardware transcoding if I recall correctly is behind the pay wall and I don’t use hardware transcoding. I had to pay for it to use the DVR functionality. Because the main use for my Plex server is to share one OTA antenna with multiple TVs. DVR functions are used extensively in my house hold. Plex was the best solution at the time I found for whole home DVR. 
 

I’ve read that a newer i3 iGPU can easily transcode multiple streams. Further more you don’t transcode 4K and you do have multiple versions at different resolutions. At least that’s the advice Plex gives. 

Yeah, but if you need newer hardware to do it, that also comes into my NO area. I mean I COULD put my i7 into the NAS, but then the power draw would be significantly more, especially when it's transcoding. Plus paying for the ability to use hardware decoding... and some other factors of why I wouldn't use the i7 6700K too.

Also, I never got offered the lifetime subscription in all the time I was using it... and from what I could understand from others, was that you had to be offered it, not everyone could just go and buy it.. unless I didn't get that correctly?. Regardless it was still too limiting for me in both hardware and cost of sub. But I can understand why some would prefer it for sure, especially if you only just are in the process of buying hardware specifically for it, or have a relatively newer Intel CPU spare.

 

Yep, for both Plex and Emby you don't transcode anything that can be played natively anyway, so that's why I have some movies in 1080p/720p as well as 4K... the only device I can think of that wouldn't play nicely for some of the movies is my brothers ipad mini first gen, but that has other issues like not getting updates any more, and basically being forced obsolescent as there are apps that he can't download/use now too.... another reason why I hate Apple. Anyway, he doesn't use it for movies very often, and if there's one he can't play I can convert it for him or acquire another suitable copy very easily, so it's not a problem most of the time.

[paddy-stone]

I'll tell you one thing I REALLY like about Emby, if you group your movies, you get it like this  below. I just realised I have 2x 1080p versions LOL, probably because of audio and was in hurry... that's another one to add to my library edits, just rip the audio and add it into the other .mkv container.

 

 

The ability to choose which stream to play, which subs, audio right from the UI before playing it... this has been a major factor in liking it more than Plex - and it's like this on the mobile version of Emby too. IIRC with Plex it was a burger menu, then having to choose "play version" and then selecting it. Doesn't seem like a big deal, but boy is it better on mobile just being able to choose from a dropdown menu everything you want.

[Donut417]

2 hours ago, paddy-stone said:

Yeah, but if you need newer hardware to do it, that also comes into my NO area

You don’t. My old ass i5 3570k can do the 2 transcodes I need by use of software transcoding. You don’t ever want to transcode 4K. So as long as you have the power to do 1080p your generally fine. 
 

2 hours ago, paddy-stone said:

NAS

My Plex server is stand alone, I don’t use it as a NAS. Some Plex features don’t work or work well under free Nas I read. 
 

2 hours ago, paddy-stone said:

rs, was that you had to be offered it,

Who ever told you that was an idiot. I went to the site and selected lifetime. 

[Donut417]

Another thing I want to add. Live TV, the guide is never free. There is always a charge, every drop in DVR solution as well as software solutions. Thats part of the reason Plex is a subscription. 

[leadeater]

8 hours ago, paddy-stone said:

Exactly. This is what I was long-windedly trying to say

Wouldn't know, was too long so I didn't read it  lol

[Jarsky]

 

11 hours ago, paddy-stone said:

Yeah, but if you need newer hardware to do it, that also comes into my NO area. I mean I COULD put my i7 into the NAS, but then the power draw would be significantly more, especially when it's transcoding. Plus paying for the ability to use hardware decoding... and some other factors of why I wouldn't use the i7 6700K too.

You don't need new hardware for hw transcoding unless you want the top of the line 4K/HDR support. An i3-7100 has the same video codec engine as a i9-9900K. What im saying is that a i3 (7/8/9 Gen) is relatively cheap for supporting hw transcoding, and theyre low power.

 

11 hours ago, paddy-stone said:

Also, I never got offered the lifetime subscription in all the time I was using it... and from what I could understand from others, was that you had to be offered it, not everyone could just go and buy it.. unless I didn't get that correctly?

You've been able to upgrade subscription for years https://plex.tv/subscription/upgrade

I believe early on though you could only get the Lifetime during certain periods. Its also worth noting they often run discount promos for the Lifetime

 

11 hours ago, paddy-stone said:

. Regardless it was still too limiting for me in both hardware and cost of sub. But I can understand why some would prefer it for sure, especially if you only just are in the process of buying hardware specifically for it, or have a relatively newer Intel CPU spare.

You can do software transcoding for free btw, it's only the hw transcoding that requires Plex Pass. Same as for Emby, you need Premiere for that feature. 

Building a server to support hw transcoding if building new, isnt any more expensive than a software Plex/Emby server that can support transcoding. 

 

11 hours ago, paddy-stone said:

Yep, for both Plex and Emby you don't transcode anything that can be played natively anyway, so that's why I have some movies in 1080p/720p as well as 4K... the only device I can think of that wouldn't play nicely for some of the movies is my brothers ipad mini first gen, but that has other issues like not getting updates any more, and basically being forced obsolescent as there are apps that he can't download/use now too.... another reason why I hate Apple. Anyway, he doesn't use it for movies very often, and if there's one he can't play I can convert it for him or acquire another suitable copy very easily, so it's not a problem most of the time.

Transcoding isn't just about resolution, it's about codec. A lot of devices older than ~2018 don't support h265 or hevc. Most Plex Servers have to do some form of transcoding anyway because most people download rips with either AC3 or DTS audio which arent supported by a lot of devices either, and need to transcode to something like AAC. 

 

 

 

I'll add that in recent months i've been trialling an Emby Server and I really like it. I'm not a huge fan of the scraper, but I do prefer the layout, and 'addons'. I find that videos typically start faster, and I absolutely love that it doesnt have to 'buffer' to switch subtitles...it initializes them in the background. I'm considering a switch to Emby Premiere myself....I do have a number of people that stream off my server though which is the only thing. 

[guillepunx]

Try to find a cheap used GTX 1060 6GB. My system is an Unraid Server with i7 3770, 16GB ram, GTX 1060 6GB and it can handle like 5-6 4k transcodes. In my case I'm limited by my internet conection, 50Mbps download, 10Mbps upload. And I found the 1060 for about 100€

[paddy-stone]

14 hours ago, Donut417 said:

You don’t. My old ass i5 3570k can do the 2 transcodes I need by use of software transcoding. You don’t ever want to transcode 4K. So as long as you have the power to do 1080p your generally fine. 
 

My Plex server is stand alone, I don’t use it as a NAS. Some Plex features don’t work or work well under free Nas I read. 
 

Who ever told you that was an idiot. I went to the site and selected lifetime. 

 

Yeah, my backup NAS is the low power one that I was using at the time for Plex, only has a dual core celeron, it's OK for direct play of course in any res and codec, and it's running freenas, and my main TV was only outputting to stereo speakers at the time, so could have been it transcoding sound/subs that was the problem I was running into often.

TBH, I don;'t  think I tried Plex with my newer OLED TV and Surround system.or my newer NAS.. maybe Plex would have been perfectly adequate if I tried it now with regards to transcoding. I probably still would have been annoyed to get it give the buffering errors and such though, I got them even when using my i7 6700K PC for plex IIRC.

 

4 hours ago, Jarsky said:

 

You don't need new hardware for hw transcoding unless you want the top of the line 4K/HDR support. An i3-7100 has the same video codec engine as a i9-9900K. What im saying is that a i3 (7/8/9 Gen) is relatively cheap for supporting hw transcoding, and theyre low power.

 

 

 

Yeah, I don't need it for 4k Transcoding. I just keep lower res/codec options for the devices that can't play 4K/x265, plus I don't get every film in 4K anyway, it's unnecessary IMO for all films. As long as I have my comic book movies, and some high-octane action/thriller/sci-fi movies in 4K HDR etc, then I'm good to go.

 

4 hours ago, Jarsky said:

Transcoding isn't just about resolution, it's about codec. A lot of devices older than ~2018 don't support h265 or hevc. Most Plex Servers have to do some form of transcoding anyway because most people download rips with either AC3 or DTS audio which arent supported by a lot of devices either, and need to transcode to something like AAC.

Yeah, I realise that thank you... I didn't word it well enough earlier, sorry about that. Years ago I used to use a pi 3b as my media player along with XBMC, and that was a fantastic little media player... or going back like 15-odd years back used an original XBOX along with different launchers etc until XBMC came out, then that was my goto player. I sometimes miss those days, as that box did almost everything.

 

4 hours ago, Jarsky said:

I'll add that in recent months i've been trialling an Emby Server and I really like it. I'm not a huge fan of the scraper, but I do prefer the layout, and 'addons'. I find that videos typically start faster, and I absolutely love that it doesnt have to 'buffer' to switch subtitles...it initializes them in the background. I'm considering a switch to Emby Premiere myself....I do have a number of people that stream off my server though which is the only thing. 

 

Yeah, I have been blown away with the improvement since I last tried it a few years back IIRC... I haven't gotten everything worked out how I like it, but close enough that I don't have to mess with it at all most of the time.

I tried using Emby for KODI too, that was pretty good, but I disliked that it pretty much took over KODI completely on my shieldTV. I do like though, that if you already have Emby on your Android device, that it syncs your play states etc with KODI too, so you don't have to go through the tasks of selecting all your movies/tv etc and what their play states etc were.