Can my old computer stream 4K contents as a NAS?

[lansing]

I'm about to turn my old 4770k computer into a NAS, my video card is a GTX 650 Ti boost. The NAS will be mainly use to store and stream my growing 4K recordings. The question is can I play them directly like regular hard drive or does it have to be transcoded before stream? Or can I even stream them with my current setup?

[Electronics Wizardy]

Yea you can easily stream them, It won't take much gpu power at all. Its just coping the data to the player, and the player is making that show on screen. 

 

Id remove the 650ti, save the power and use the igpu.

[kirashi]

5 minutes ago, lansing said:

The question is can I play them directly like regular hard drive or does it have to be transcoded before stream?

This depends entirely on the codecs the media files use and whether or not your client devices support native playback of said codecs. From a hardware perspective though, I see nothing wrong with using an i7-4770K to transcode video on-the-fly if you're planning on using something like PLEX as your media server.

[GuiltySpark_]

That'll be dependent on your network bandwidth. Wired, sure, but wireless is a little fuzzy as everyone's wifi performance is different. 

 

Transcoding will depend on your software. For instance if you use Plex in its free state, you'll only have access to software transcoding and that 4770k should be able to handle one stream. GPU transcoding (which you have to pay for) might be a little tricky with that 650 Ti as it only has first generation NVENC. 

 

EDIT

 

I like what @Electronics Wizardysuggested and just remove the 650Ti.

[lansing]

10 minutes ago, Electronics Wizardy said:

Yea you can easily stream them, It won't take much gpu power at all. Its just coping the data to the player, and the player is making that show on screen. 

 

Id remove the 650ti, save the power and use the igpu.

Can the 4770k igpu hardware transcode 4K h265? iirc they only work for 1080p? I don't want the cpu to go 100% just to stream a video. And what about the player? Do I need specific player to play them?

[Electronics Wizardy]

Just now, lansing said:

Can the 4770k igpu hardware transcode 4K h265? iirc they only work for 1080p? I don't want the cpu to go 100% just to stream a video. And what about the player? Do I need specific player to play them?

Do you need the nas to transcode footage?

 

What player are you using?

Id probably just use VLC on the client personally, then the nas doesn't touch the video files at all.

 

The igpu has a hardware encoder that is about the same as the 650ti, so I don't see the point to keep it. 

 

But none of the decoders on that hardware support h.265, so that would have to be on the cpu.

[lansing]

1 minute ago, Electronics Wizardy said:

Do you need the nas to transcode footage?

 

What player are you using?

Id probably just use VLC on the client personally, then the nas doesn't touch the video files at all.

 

The igpu has a hardware encoder that is about the same as the 650ti, so I don't see the point to keep it. 

 

But none of the decoders on that hardware support h.265, so that would have to be on the cpu.

I just want the NAS to be like an external hard drive for storing and playing videos. I remember playing 4K with media player classic on that old machine, it was laggy as hell.

[Electronics Wizardy]

Just now, lansing said:

I just want the NAS to be like an external hard drive for storing and playing videos. I remember playing 4K with media player classic on that old machine, it was laggy as hell.

THen the specs of the nas won't matter at all.

 

The nas won't be decdoing the video, just copying the files over the network.

 

The ability to play the video well will depend on the client being able to play the video and the network being fast enough. 

[lansing]

5 minutes ago, Electronics Wizardy said:

THen the specs of the nas won't matter at all.

 

The nas won't be decdoing the video, just copying the files over the network.

 

The ability to play the video well will depend on the client being able to play the video and the network being fast enough. 

Oh so it's even possible to have the video quality to be the same as if I am playing in local hard drive if I have a fast network connection?

[GuiltySpark_]

6 minutes ago, lansing said:

Oh so it's even possible to have the video quality to be the same as if I am playing in local hard drive if I have a fast network connection?

Of course, that's just a direct stream. Assuming the network connection is fast enough and stable, that's always possible.

[Electronics Wizardy]

7 minutes ago, lansing said:

Oh so it's even possible to have the video quality to be the same as if I am playing in local hard drive if I have a fast network connection?

Yea it will work exactly the same as if your playing from a HDD. The nas won't process the video at ll, like how your hdd doesn't need to encode the video for you to play it.

[lansing]

21 minutes ago, rickeo said:

Of course, that's just a direct stream. Assuming the network connection is fast enough and stable, that's always possible.

19 minutes ago, Electronics Wizardy said:

Yea it will work exactly the same as if your playing from a HDD. The nas won't process the video at ll, like how your hdd doesn't need to encode the video for you to play it.

Thanks. My router is a TP-Link AC1750, so I think it should be fine.