Plex on an Intel NUC with Ubuntu

snickerz on 15/03/2023 - 01:27

Hi guys,

I am very new to the world of plex and transcoding. I have been a long-time user of Kodi and that works just fine. But I just subscribed to a Plex pass and I see the benefit of being able to access my media outside the house. The problem is hardware transcoding. I have tried various combinations for HW transcoding:

1- Use my desktop machine (AMD 5600G with RX6600 XT) and this works perfectly fine to transcode my 50-60 GB x265 HDR files to any format I want - However I don't want to keep my desktop up and running for plex

2- Tried to set up an Nvidia Shield Pro (2019) Plex server - it buffers and does not do a satisfactory job

3- Tried setting up a plex server on my QNAP TS-453Be - which fails at HW transcoding

4- Intel NUC7i5BNK with 256 GB NVMe and 16 GB Ram - works quite poorly

All three of these setups work well as long as I am direct streaming on the home network. However, my concern is about remote access:

I have read on some forums about installing Ubuntu and setting up a plex server. I am thinking to do this, but I am not sure the result would be any different than having a plex server on windows NUC.

Do you think its worth going down the path of Ubuntu and Plex on the Intel NUC7i5BNK?

Computing Plex

Comments

  • solidussnake on 15/03/2023 - 06:51
    +1

    Cant you just configure power settings on your PC and set it to wake on lan and turn off after 1 hour of inactivity

    • snickerz on 15/03/2023 - 07:27

      I already have it configured… but power on LAN won’t work when i am outside the house (would it?)

      • Ryanek on 15/03/2023 - 07:35
        +1

        You can trigger a power on LAN using IFTTT and an old android phone running Tasker

  • holisticboy on 15/03/2023 - 08:43
    +1

    The Intel NUC should do fine as a server running ubuntu as long as you have configured it to do the hardware transcoding. Ideally 8th gen and above for best quality, but 7th gen will transcode H265 via quicksync, so performance should be good while drawing very little power.

  • jaimex2 on 15/03/2023 - 10:07
    +2

    Stick with Kodi, I never understood paying for the Plex model.

    Nothing stops you from accessing your Kodi library remotely. Setup something like wireguard and you're now on the same network with access to everything securely.

    From there just run Kodi on the consuming device and everything will just work beautifully.

    Did you know LastPass got pwned because one of the lead engineers ran Plex? Hilariously an attacker found his server, escalated privileges through an exploit in Plex and then keylogged the master password.

  • nedski on 15/03/2023 - 10:27
    +2

    Get an ex government PC box for under $100. An old i5 with 16gb of ram. Throw Truenas on it and run Plex as an app on it. Fixed.

  • Bid Sniper on 15/03/2023 - 10:49

    i ran plex on a POS celeron NUC, didnt bother with transcode if you have a good enough network. modern x265 format is great

  • bargaino on 15/03/2023 - 11:18

    I too had Plex on an old NUC, but too slow for transcoding.
    Now I have it on an i3-6100 (old laptop, Ubuntu) , which is just enough for transcoding to my remote phone.
    i.e. looks fine, but CPU running at >80%.
    So your NUC7i5BNK i5-7xxx should easily manage. Maybe Windows is the problem? Could be.

    Plex pass and I see the benefit of being able to access my media outside the house

    BTW, You don't need plex pass for that. I just have the one-off purchased app/license for Android.

    For anyone buying a new device as Plex server, I'd recommend one of those micro-sized ex-office PCs listed here. e.g. Optiplex USFF 7050, 7060.

    • snickerz on 15/03/2023 - 11:27

      Are you able to transcode huge media files from 4k HDR (40-50 Mbps) to a 7 - 8 Mbps (1080p) remote stream easily?

      • bargaino on 15/03/2023 - 11:30

        on the i3? I very much doubt it, and would have not the slightest interest in doing so :-)

        Why would you dowload a 50Mbps file, only to watch it on a tiny screen on the train at low bitrate?

        • snickerz on 15/03/2023 - 11:34

          Thats for a remote stream only buddy. Generally i am watching at home with direct play

    • snickerz on 15/03/2023 - 11:28

      For HW transcoding i would need plex pass

      • bargaino on 15/03/2023 - 11:31

        Are you saying my old i3 is doing realtime 1080p h264/h265 transcoding without GPU support???

        • snickerz on 15/03/2023 - 11:33

          1080p really isnt a problem

          • bargaino on 15/03/2023 - 11:36

            @snickerz: I guess that explains the high cpu utilisation :-)
            So why would you want to view a 4K file remotely? That's a movie-night video for me :)
            Frankly few movies (and fewer TV shows) benefit from 4K encoding, especially action movies. All so dark and grainy now too.
            The only way they look better is when compared to poorly-encoded 1080p. … IMHO

            • snickerz on 15/03/2023 - 11:40

              @bargaino: Haha …. Friends and family clients :)

              I prefer to watch the 4k HDR on my OLED

  • Chandler on 15/03/2023 - 15:31
    +1

    Why are you transcoding in the first place? If you find that your content is always getting transcoded, consider re-encoding it in a format that the bulk of your players support - you will then find your server not transcoding nearly as often, if at all.

  • jizmo on 15/03/2023 - 17:25

    Keep your blue ray discs at home and sail the seas for the same movie in 1.4GB format for Plex. It would be faster downloading than transcoding and you're not losing space storing different file formats of the same movie on the drive/s

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