Help Me Max Out my New but Rather Old Dell Optiplex as a Media Server on a budget

LKorban Dallas on 20/02/2018 - 02:19
Last edited 20/02/2018 - 02:20

Hey guys, looking to setup a media server and need some advice for biggest bang for your buck. I have a 4TB external USB 3.0 with all my media. I am looking to run Plex mostly.

I am thinking:
Q9650 CPU / Q9550 / X3363
256GB SSD / 128
8GB RAM / 6

Ideally I don't want to spend more than $100 for all the upgrades.

Currently have an E8400, 4GB of RAM and 256GB drive.

Not sure if a graphics card would help run my system better but that is also an option, along with USB PCIe x16 3.0 card.There will be no monitor and i'll be RDPing when I need to. Computer will be directly connected to the the modem / LAN.

Computing

Comments

  • mskeggs on 20/02/2018 - 06:18
    +2

    Better to sell it and buy a low power system. This will use hundreds of dollars of power per year.

  • Serious Lee on 20/02/2018 - 06:31

    I have an ARM based Helios4 from Kobol. https://shop.kobol.io/ (Currently sold out)

    ARM CPU based systems are low powered and are quite capable of running Armbian Linux with OpenMediaVault which can do RAID, DLNA, Samba etc. There are great guides out there and if you are not comfy with the command line there is the Webmin add-on which can be installed very easily.

    Good luck!

  • o53djz7qTPY4der on 20/02/2018 - 09:33

    I use an optiplex 780. I hooked my storage drive up to the sata connection and then an SSD up to the cd/DVD drive connection.

    Ubuntu server runs great, Plex is fantastic. It has only failed to play one movie so far and that was a 1080p version of Armageddon. Not sure if it was the machine or file but a 720 version worked flawlessly.

    I don't run a GUI, simply ssh in and use terminal. I shutdown each night and auto boot in the morning.

    It has scripts for rclone to backup our phones and I run resilio sync to backup our Mac's.

    It's great!

    • Korban Dallas on 20/02/2018 - 13:22

      Does Ubuntu perform better than windows regarding plex? Think I might go down this path. Also is there a way we can remote turn on off our system. WOL or other method?

      • o53djz7qTPY4der on 20/02/2018 - 16:40

        Yes. Mine is 300mb of ram never more. But remember this is Ubuntu server, not desktop. If I'm running a big lftp or rsync/clone job ram might increase to 500mb. I've got 4gb installed and no need for more.

        Auto turn on is controlled by the bios and shutdown by a cron script.

        It's faultless.

        Happy to help if needed, it took me a few installs before I got it up and running the way I wanted.

  • BuzzBuzzBuzz on 20/02/2018 - 10:18
    +1

    If you haven't already paid for a Plex license, check out Emby, as I found (this was about a year ago however), that Emby offered more functionality for free than Plex.

    • spackbace on 20/02/2018 - 11:22

      No need to pay for a Plex Pass these days, doesn't offer that much more for the money

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