Choosing hardware for my Home Server

[trevb0t]

I have the following hardware options:
A: Lenovo M73 Mini PC - OEM MOBO, i5-4570T, 8GB DDR3

B: Dell Inspiron 3668 - OEM MOBO, i7-7700, 16GB DDR4
C: Custom PC - Strix B460-I, (CPU TBD), 16GB DDR4

 

Intended use case: 

• Proxmox server with a handful of VMs
• A simple NAS with file sharing.
  • (I may end up utilizing some of this extra space in the large case, and running a small RAID array seperately via a SBC. TBD.)
• Ripping my own DVD and Bluray media VIA internal ODD
• Plex/Jellyfin (Family of 6, so a handful of devices streaming simultaneously is possible.)
• Radarr, Sonarr, Openbooks, Photoprism, Nextcloud, etc are likelihoods as I get deeper into the project.

 

I have a nice roomy old PC case with a bunch of 3.5" bays, a Bluray Drive capable of 4k rips, and a decent PSU.

I am either going to swap the OEM stuff out A or B, or if 10th/11th gen is significantly better for my use case, buy a cheaper CPU for my Strix ITX board. 

 

My main question:

Is there anything here that would theoretically be too intensive for build A?
If so, would build B be sufficient? Or would perhaps a cheap i3-10100 or i5-10400 in build C be a significant improvement?
The main concern would be hosting enough VMs to run the above, and using QuickSync to transcode a few Jellyfin streams.
Advice is appreciated!

[Levent]

Ram will be the limiting factor here. None of the things you listed particularly heavy on the CPU. I3 10100 should be plenty (get the igpu one though, as it can help with jellyfin transcoding)

 

Aim to get 32G. 

[trevb0t]

10 minutes ago, Levent said:

Ram will be the limiting factor here. None of the things you listed particularly heavy on the CPU. I3 10100 should be plenty (get the igpu one though, as it can help with jellyfin transcoding)

 

Aim to get 32G. 

Copy that. To expand, is the QuickSync on the 10100 going to do anything transcoding-wise that the QS on the 4570T or 7700 won't?

[Rysters Tech]

Custom is the way to go. Pre-Builts can have wierd issues when performing things like raid, plus they dont usually fit in standard cases anymore. Quicksync on modern intel igpus is faster than older ones. 

[johnt]

I have no clue what you need 32 GB of memory for. I’m sure the cost is not a huge difference between 16 vs 32, but if you plan to recycle 16 GB, then that’s all you need. 
 

I run Windows 11 pro on my server/nas and I’m topping out at 7 GB of memory usage with 4k plex, home bridge, home assistant through VM, and a few other apps on a bad day, plus software RAID1.
 

 

[m9x3mos]

4 minutes ago, johnt said:

I have no clue what you need 32 GB of memory for. I’m sure the cost is not a huge difference between 16 vs 32, but if you plan to recycle 16 GB, then that’s all you need. 
 

I run Windows 11 pro on my server/nas and I’m topping out at 7 GB of memory usage with 4k plex, home bridge, home assistant through VM, and a few other apps on a bad day, plus software RAID1.
 

 

It kind of depends on the software raid system you are using. Zfs and btrfs like having ram for caching. 

[johnt]

2 minutes ago, m9x3mos said:

It kind of depends on the software raid system you are using. Zfs and btrfs like having ram for caching. 

Oh that makes a lot of sense. Never mind then.