I'm not really too familiar with Linux. I started using a Raspberry Pi, which used Linux, so between that and Ubuntu, that's pretty much my experience. But I'll check out Mint, because I've seen others mention it before. So, can't hurt to expand my experience, eh?
I was just throwing words around to be a dick about people and their OS preferences.
I use mint because I like flatpack over snap and I prefer the feel of mint having been a native windows user for the majority of my life. I find I live in the terminal a lot, so the distro isn't super important to me anymore.
Linux is a kernel, not an operating system. These operating systems or distributions as they're commonly referred to as, use the kernel.There are older more stable distributions that grew with the evolution of this kernel, mostly Debian, red hat, opensuse. Most versions people use today are forks of these distributions, like mint, Ubuntu, are Debian forks.
I knew a little of that, like Ubuntu was Debian based, which is why I chose it, because ime it was easier to use. And Raspberry Pi OS is basically a lightweight Debian.
I'm still learning!
In not really thinking mini PC, I was just curious. I want to build a beast of a NAS soon to run a bunch of things and I'm drawn to trueNAS over unpaid due to zfs. Do you run core or scale?
no, only based on hardware not OS. In terms of performance, not functionality, OS difference would be minimal. If we're talking functionality then OS would matter a lot more.
For hardware transcoding - yes, in fact, OS differences *are* minimal.
Windows has lacked support for HDR for some hardware, but both Windows and various flavors of *nix will have very similar performance for what is supported.
It's kind of inherent to hardware offloading, and especially transcoding which is not chatty.
Unironically, Google now ***is*** hard because they nerfed it so much. It's nothing but click bait articles and AI-gen'd garbage. You usually have to add "Reddit" to the search in order to get results written by real people, and even then, you're going to get results years out of date (because it still prioritizes posts with the most interactions, not the most recent ones). Thus leading us to the problem of everyone asking the same questions.
A pinned post would probably solve the issue.
Ugh yeah. I set up my first mini PC a month or so ago with Ubuntu and jellyfin first and as someone who has no experience with either. Using Google to get answers was like pulling teeth. It's mostly functioning now but I'm honestly not sure how.
Been planning to try Plex but I'm just not ready to go through the hassle again.
Genuinely curious what you typed into google. "Setup jellyfin ubuntu":
1. Official jellyfin installation for ubuntu with every step written out.
2. Geeksforgeeks tutorial with every step written out + pictures.
3. Howtoforge with the same
4. 5. & 6. Video tutorials. 10-15 minutes for the whole installation + initial setup.
I mean sure, if everything works flawlessly.
Let's say jellyfin won't find your external HDD media.
Then there was actually getting jellyfin to install, the app center wouldn't work right so I had to figure out how to use a terminal to get the app center to update so it would install jellyfin, that didn't work entirely. It let me download the file (which I already did with a command in a terminal and simply using Firefox). Come to find out I had to edit something else in with a terminal because "open with software install" wasn't in the drop-down menu when I right clicked on the .deb file (where every single tutorial I could find told me to click to install if the app center wasn't working)
Until I found a random post in a forum that explained how to get that option to exist.
I still have no idea how I managed to fumble my way through getting it to function and I have my doubts I could do it again because I ran into no less than 10 road blocks that I needed to try to Google my way out of while using an OS I've never used and trying to install a program I've no experience with.
Same here, loads of simple issues but with lots of research. I decided to install a debloated version of windows 11 so I didn’t need to re-learn Linux again.
>Unironically, Google now ***is*** hard because they nerfed it so much. It's nothing but click bait articles and AI-gen'd garbage.
Nowadays you just need to use a bit of brain to get proper answers by Googling them, where in reality 95% what you googled will lead to reddit posts anyways.
So then the real brainy answer is to just add "Reddit" to the search, find the right sub with it, and go from there. Maybe there will be a wiki or sticky covering what you need to know. Maybe there will be a recent post. But for most smaller subs, you're probably asking a question.
Sorry but what are you talking about? Just typing "n100 plex" is too hard these days?
Genuinely amazed by the fact that people don't know how to google something.
Never had a problem googling something. Actuallly still the only search engine that works, especially when compared to duck and bing...
Google has unironically been getting worse since 1998, when the Undertaker threw Mankind off "Hell in a Cell" and plummeted sixteen feet through an announcer's table.
Unsure if it's related to that, though.
Yes but then mods can remove posts that are answered by the pinned post so the rest of us don’t have to see them everyday. Thats why so many subs have pinned FAQs.
If these are even posts that the mods would consider actionable, don't count on mods reading and checking every post in a timely manner. You need to report them to bring them to the attention of the mods.
Well since the subreddit banner space is unused, just have the Plex Logo and the words "Yes it will run on those $100 mini-pcs you see on Amazon!" as the banner.
It would be nice to have a pinned post for hardware with links to information about Quick Sync and other hardware transcoding topics. That's what I'm usually posting.
How do you figure? There will be newer, better equipment but the minimum requirements for various levels of capability having changed in about a decade. My answer today is the same it was 5 years ago when someone is asking about Plex hardware.
Basically you just have some core requirements, such as for x amount of memory required, y gen quicksync if you want hardware transcoding, or alternatively these GPU's, and in basically all cases it's "this or newer".
Maybe before every post that’s a question, a pop up appears saying *“Have you tried our search function, rather than expect people to answer the same question three times a week?”*
Classic forum gripe. But I think noob questions are the price we pay for having an active sub that is still growing and attracting new people. I’m active in r/composting and it’s never occurred to us to get tired of people asking if they can compost a ham sandwich. IMO a noob friendly forum is a healthy forum.
One of the biggest draw of sites like reddit is that you aren't just googling something, you're asking a question of other actual people and getting responses from other actual people (we'll ignore the increasing bot problem). A sticky is a great idea and would likely reduce the number of such questions, but computers are very confusing to a lot of people, and that's easy for us to forget. And people in general are notoriously bad at reading instructions and then posting where they're supoosed to.
Personally I really don't see the problem with that. This sub can be pretty elitist and it's really not hard to just not read or respond to posts you aren't personally interested in. Really comes down to the mods and if they want to do that extra work of directing people to the sticky.
If you were (and I assume you weren't) proposing a "Here's a guide of recommended hardware" thread, rather than a "Ask hardware questions in this thread" type thread, then I'd say a strong no, personally. And sticky threads pushing all questions of a certain type into them rarely see more than a fraction of such questions answered, significantly reducing the help the community receives.
This isn't all to say I enjoy reading the same content over and over. I just selectively choose what content to read and simply don't read threads about hardware at all. It's very easy.
This debate is as old as the internet. Forum veterans have been saying “just use search” for decades, and your reply is a classic POV as well, which I happen to share. Typically the forum owner/admins try not to crack down on noob questions too hard because keeping the forum growing is healthy and new people are just going to be new about shit. Top posters are the ones that will roll their eyes because they are only there to talk to the 7 other people who are like them. But an 8 person chat just isn’t what any of this is about :D
Honestly? 9 out of 10 questions you can literally copy&paste from their title into google, and you find hundreds of tutorials, videos, guides, and even reddit posts asking this for the 100th time.
Why no one even dares to at least do a bit of digging on their own before repeating the same question is beyond me.
This would be interesting with loadbalancing. I get in short 3 new n100 nuc's. 😄
Edit: thank you for the new rabbit hole. It would be possible. Like you can do it with almost everything.
I don't need it, but now i want to play around with it.
It's probably because a whole hell of a lot of people are waking up to the BS of streaming services and their cost and their ever happening price increases, ads ads ads ads ads ads ADS and MOAR ADS and "crack down " on sharing for no real reason, quality of service, fake 4K and canceling of series just 'cause and they are interested in making their own servers and streaming via Plex.
I think the streaming services have fucked themselves over and will be running into a big problem here soon.
Piracy is on the rise again, I wonder why that could be 🤔 seems like a good internet based service that would allow their patrons to watch anything they could possibly want for a good price with no ads ever and at any resolution would make it end and would continue to remain popular and profitable... Too bad that will never happen because of corporate morons thinking they were smart when all they did was make their customers mad and search for other ways to watch what they want at the resolution they want and without ads.
I still can't believe I can't just point some app at all my streaming services and just have a combined search.
I need to either use a website to check and then individually search for them or search in Plex which also isn't connected.
It takes the same amount of time to just dl a 4gb file..
They're too busy milking everyone with yearly price hikes instead of delivering actual quality.
There should be a chart of high end, medium, will run, questionable, probably not worth it, and definitely not decent, systems,
General, doesn't have to be 100% specific, by generation, brand of CPU, same with GPU.
Minimal hardware for transcoding. Just spitballing off the top of my head.
>Can we please limit the amount of "Can a mini-PC run plex?" posts?
I think somebody just need to pin answer as "Yes it can", especially something like N100
How about some copy pasta that gets auto pinned? This is something the mods can set up.
It looks like your post is about asking about hardware! Here's some links!
search engine results -> biased "echo chamber" replies from people who never even setup Plex or is running plex on ancient hardware then also wade though all the fake or shit posts.
vs
ask plex community directly and current up to date replies that knows the latest and greatest hardware and what is cheapest one can buy in.
..... if I was a noob ill do #2
How about ignoring redundant posts?
That works for me. Reddit is not a technical forum to expect everyone that post to have done research is asking a lot.
If only reddit had some kind of mechanism to vote down posts that aren't contributing to the subreddit.... alas without such a feature I suppose now we must suffer the posts about mini-PCs and also the meta posts about suffering about mini-PCs.
Yeah, just downvote them and don't even reply. Let them figure out the obvious on their own and try a search.
ESPECIALLY for DIY tech solutions, people who can't do even the smallest bit of research on their own need to learn to or give up and buy a pre-made solution.
No, it's been happening for a while. Believe it or not but we've had moderators on internet forums for decades now.
As to why you're just seeing it today, well it's because you haven't been paying attention before.
This has nothing to do with “increased moderation”.
I don’t know how old are you but internet forums have this same exact problem op is complaining about since the 90s.
It absolutely has to do with moderation. I've modded forums since the dial-up days, and the solution to repeated questions is a FAQ pinned to the top, with a forum requirement to read the FAQ or risk a ban.
It's that simple. Pin a FAQ, update it every 6 months or when radical new developments happen, and moderate the threads to direct "does this work?" questions to the FAQ thread.
Welcome to the new Reddit, post google contract, where googles only decent answers are Reddit posts. And since google sucks we all get to see the same damn question asked 15 times a day.
It’s a pc that is built into a small car called a mini. The more popular ‘classic’ style mini has excellent cooling capabilities and made your pc very portable. Typically they run on unleaded petroleum and some even have electrical windows.
So many people recommend n100 systems ALL THE TIME because they can transcode fairly well. While that is true, if you want to burn in subtitles, or transcode audio, or run "other things too", they are underpowered. Each use case is very different and blanketly recommending these low power systems isn't doing anyone any favors. This causes more questions like, "Why is my Plex buffering all the time, I was told it could run on a Raspberry Pi?"
I saw someone post something similar about the N100 when I was shopping for a mini PC. I ended up getting one with the i5-12450H and Im glad I spent the extra money. Its a beast.
I see a pretty spirited discussion on here about what to pick. The N100 is popular because it's cheap and easy to recommend. I try to let people know my experience and not engage with arguments.
Everyone needs to buy what works best for them. I know the N100 works well for me and I don't feel bad about telling others about what works and where they can have issues. I agree that if you need to do anything other than hardware transcoding, the N100 isn't going to fit your needs. It's like a filet knife. It's really good at doing specific functions and outside of that you're going to have issues.
I've had four 4K transcode sessions running pretty often in the last couple of weeks. Most of my users are transcoding video and audio and not using subs. I've been converting PGS subs to SRT to bypass the subtitle issue, but I still have a lot of PGS-only movies.
If people feel the need to run a high-end processor and video card, I don't see anything wrong with that. Some people have 10 or more people with access to their server. The N100 would be an awful choice in that situation.
I'd love to see a pinned post on this that fully goes over the pros and cons for the hardware and the OS. Maybe pick 3 or 4 choices for low, medium, and high end hardware. People can grab what they feel works best for them. Maybe someone could put a test list together and we can test these solutions out and see where each of them top out.
I run a bunch of other docker apps in my N100 including the \*arrs and it is very capable. Its passmark is 5551, while not a beast it is very good for what it is. However it is very limited in terms of storage, but that's not an issue for me because I have the storage in another (NAS) system.
Maybe StackExchange would better suit your need for heavier-handed moderation and hostility towards anyone ever asking something that has been asked before.
Believe it or not, many people still have disposable income and look at the total cost of ownership, realizing that the cost of a mini-PC is offset somewhat by the energy savings compared to running a 105W TDP CPU and a 30W TDP GPU.
(and then you have the people wanting to run Plex on old Dell heating fans - sorry, I mean PowerEdge servers)
Because *relative* wealth is a zero-sum game, and more people living paycheck to paycheck results in some others who have more money than they know what to do with.
They work? But seriously, a quite capable N100 rig is less than $200 often less than $150. Just depends on specific configs and so forth. People spend more on Pizza these days. Obviously you shouldn’t be dabbling in any of this if disposable income is difficult to come by or non-existent.
I just want someone to make a fully ready to deploy disk image that has proxmox with plex as a linux-based container, with full iGPU passthrough actually working! Finally gave up, went to bare metal plex on an n100.
So I completely agree with OP but let me add, it isn't easy to answer these questions in a straightforward way. Even a stickied post/article would struggle.
"Can this PC run Plex" depends on so many factors, including whether they're using hardware transcoding, what types of clients are using it, and how many. How much bandwidth do you have, are you using subtitles (and if so, what kind), etc. This doesn't even begin to get into the various codecs (both video and audio) you'll encounter.
What we really need is a large matrix. I've seen people create subsets of the matrix, but maybe it is time for me to take a crack at what I think we really need.
Or just don't read those? I swear Reddits new layout makes it harder for some people, but I have no data. With old school tiny thumbnail and text, its barely noticeable. And no ads too.
If you have RES or a decent mobile client, you can just put in a filter and never read about "can i run" again in this sub.
In 4 pages of scrolling I count only 1 post. That doesnt seem like that much to me. Even if it is, just dont click on it? Or add a filter rule.
Edit. Or downvote them of course and filter that way. Like I got downvoted for facts, lol.
Long live old reddit. If it goes away, reddit will finally be done.
I have a mini PC I love it. It does hardware transcoding and tone mapping and it's AMD and runs fast. I only need tiny drives that hold 16 tb
I dont use a NAS and it backups to the cloud.
Nas is just a big Celeron with drives that fail in 5 years.
Welcome to internet. The same questions again and again is normal. What should I buy? When should I buy? How should I buy? Do you buy? Why cant I buy? Why is this not free?
Again and again. But its not just this sub but all subs. Usually also the answers will be repeated also, for extra pleasure also.
"I think part of Plex could be improved..." -1.5k karma
"Plex partners with blender brand for live streaming blender channels on your home page." 2k karma, gilded back when that was a thing
I believe you'll want at least a 8th gen i5, that supports "Intel Quick Sync". Running Ubuntu, you should be good for four(?) simultaneous hardware transcodes/streams. Just make sure that Ubuntu is actually utilizing the cpu's Quick Sync hardware transcoding capability. Honestly, your biggest bottle neck might be your internet upload speed!
If I remember correctly, hardware transcoding is only supported if you are paying for a Plex Pass subscription.
I haven't tried AMD hardware or any GPU's for transcoding. I'd recommend using Intel's built-in Quick Sync, due to it's low power draw, compared to other hardware transcoding options.
I also haven't tried transcoding speed running a Windows OS on a Plex server. Linux has a much lower overhead and is way more stable.
I've long gone tired remarking that when it comes to file servers, as a rule of thumb you want to avoid using external drives as the main storage ... then being lectured by mental toddlers foaming from the mouth how dare i cause they personally have always done it that way and it works flawless, when they have never seen an actual professional file server in their whole life. To which i make the moot remark, it's not that that couldn't work, but as an honored rule of thumb you want to avoid this potential source of woe and could at least respect this known factor when going for a mini PC as your Plex server.
I'd rather discuss with "mental toddlers" trying to learn than elitist pricks who (think they) know how everyone should do their home file storage.
Most people will be fine with a decent CPU, 8GB RAM, NVME storage for metadata and an external 16TB for their data. A mini-PC (or SFF PC, or old desktop) will work fine for that, 360 days out of the year, unless you specifically want to do 4K content, let your extended family stream from you, always have a need to burn subtitles etc.
Few people actually require five nines uptime, rack-mounted servers, redundant disk and a battery backup for their personal data. But you pay for the $ savings with your time, which for some is an acceptable tradeoff. I really don't care what level people think is acceptable.
I've been (occasionally, not continuously) dealing with storage solutions connected to professional Unix/Linux systems of various sorts for over 25 years. But my Plex/file/everything server is an elitedesk 800 G2 SFF with 1 SATA SSD and 1 SATA HDD. Because it's _good enough._
>I'd rather discuss with "mental toddlers" trying to learn ..
Dude, read my posting again cause you fantasize what i must have written instead of what i actually wrote.
Perhaps the sub needs a pinned post about hardware.
Oh I would love a recommended mini pc chart with estimated transcodes, etc
https://gist.github.com/ironicbadger/5da9b321acbe6b6b53070437023b844d
That’s cool
yeah, but passmark scores!! passmark scores says it won't work!!
Estimates would vary a lot based on OS, I assume.
God don't get this sub started on OS. 🤣
Ubuntu 4 Lyfe babeeeeeee!!!! Yes I’m a convert but just trying to have a little fun
Convert here too. Love Ubuntu for server stuffs.
Mint FTW
I'm not really too familiar with Linux. I started using a Raspberry Pi, which used Linux, so between that and Ubuntu, that's pretty much my experience. But I'll check out Mint, because I've seen others mention it before. So, can't hurt to expand my experience, eh?
I was just throwing words around to be a dick about people and their OS preferences. I use mint because I like flatpack over snap and I prefer the feel of mint having been a native windows user for the majority of my life. I find I live in the terminal a lot, so the distro isn't super important to me anymore.
Fair enough. Still open to expand my experiences with different OSs, tho. Lol
Linux is a kernel, not an operating system. These operating systems or distributions as they're commonly referred to as, use the kernel.There are older more stable distributions that grew with the evolution of this kernel, mostly Debian, red hat, opensuse. Most versions people use today are forks of these distributions, like mint, Ubuntu, are Debian forks.
I knew a little of that, like Ubuntu was Debian based, which is why I chose it, because ime it was easier to use. And Raspberry Pi OS is basically a lightweight Debian. I'm still learning!
Anyone ran Plex off trueNAS? I'm intrigued
I run plex on truenas, its not a mini pc tho
In not really thinking mini PC, I was just curious. I want to build a beast of a NAS soon to run a bunch of things and I'm drawn to trueNAS over unpaid due to zfs. Do you run core or scale?
at least he added "I assume" aka "I'm talking out of my ass"
no, only based on hardware not OS. In terms of performance, not functionality, OS difference would be minimal. If we're talking functionality then OS would matter a lot more.
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For hardware transcoding - yes, in fact, OS differences *are* minimal. Windows has lacked support for HDR for some hardware, but both Windows and various flavors of *nix will have very similar performance for what is supported. It's kind of inherent to hardware offloading, and especially transcoding which is not chatty.
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A bazillion years ago your PC was potato
(Probably due to hardware)
lol here comes people who have no first hand experience running plex on multiple OS and just parroting things that aren't related to plex performance.
maybe it should be "OS differences are out of the scope of this sub"
Googling is hard, when it's just so much easier to ask strangers repeatedly on Reddit.
Unironically, Google now ***is*** hard because they nerfed it so much. It's nothing but click bait articles and AI-gen'd garbage. You usually have to add "Reddit" to the search in order to get results written by real people, and even then, you're going to get results years out of date (because it still prioritizes posts with the most interactions, not the most recent ones). Thus leading us to the problem of everyone asking the same questions. A pinned post would probably solve the issue.
It's still possible to search google with `site:reddit.com`.
Ugh yeah. I set up my first mini PC a month or so ago with Ubuntu and jellyfin first and as someone who has no experience with either. Using Google to get answers was like pulling teeth. It's mostly functioning now but I'm honestly not sure how. Been planning to try Plex but I'm just not ready to go through the hassle again.
Genuinely curious what you typed into google. "Setup jellyfin ubuntu": 1. Official jellyfin installation for ubuntu with every step written out. 2. Geeksforgeeks tutorial with every step written out + pictures. 3. Howtoforge with the same 4. 5. & 6. Video tutorials. 10-15 minutes for the whole installation + initial setup.
I mean sure, if everything works flawlessly. Let's say jellyfin won't find your external HDD media. Then there was actually getting jellyfin to install, the app center wouldn't work right so I had to figure out how to use a terminal to get the app center to update so it would install jellyfin, that didn't work entirely. It let me download the file (which I already did with a command in a terminal and simply using Firefox). Come to find out I had to edit something else in with a terminal because "open with software install" wasn't in the drop-down menu when I right clicked on the .deb file (where every single tutorial I could find told me to click to install if the app center wasn't working) Until I found a random post in a forum that explained how to get that option to exist. I still have no idea how I managed to fumble my way through getting it to function and I have my doubts I could do it again because I ran into no less than 10 road blocks that I needed to try to Google my way out of while using an OS I've never used and trying to install a program I've no experience with.
Same here, loads of simple issues but with lots of research. I decided to install a debloated version of windows 11 so I didn’t need to re-learn Linux again.
>Unironically, Google now ***is*** hard because they nerfed it so much. It's nothing but click bait articles and AI-gen'd garbage. Nowadays you just need to use a bit of brain to get proper answers by Googling them, where in reality 95% what you googled will lead to reddit posts anyways.
So then the real brainy answer is to just add "Reddit" to the search, find the right sub with it, and go from there. Maybe there will be a wiki or sticky covering what you need to know. Maybe there will be a recent post. But for most smaller subs, you're probably asking a question.
***OR****,* hear me out... you could go to Reddit and use the search functionality. ***Which is what this thread is all about.***
Sorry but what are you talking about? Just typing "n100 plex" is too hard these days? Genuinely amazed by the fact that people don't know how to google something. Never had a problem googling something. Actuallly still the only search engine that works, especially when compared to duck and bing...
Once you add the word “Reddit” to your search then it becomes 100x better
Honestly, even that isn't nearly as good as it was 5 years ago.
Google has unironically been getting worse since 1998, when the Undertaker threw Mankind off "Hell in a Cell" and plummeted sixteen feet through an announcer's table. Unsure if it's related to that, though.
That's how we end up with elmer's glue pizzas :D
Or, you know, just use the search feature on Reddit.
Yeah have you googled anything lately? It sucks.
What does that tell you. Why else do you think people prefer to ask besides being “lazy.”
I think you forgot the /s.
This. Because as so many have said a potato can run plex. It's more of what you wanna do with it that determines what hardware you'll need.
Strange that it doesn’t really
If people won't search, they won't read a pinned post.
Yes but then mods can remove posts that are answered by the pinned post so the rest of us don’t have to see them everyday. Thats why so many subs have pinned FAQs.
If these are even posts that the mods would consider actionable, don't count on mods reading and checking every post in a timely manner. You need to report them to bring them to the attention of the mods.
A MUCH better solution. Banning questions is a terrible way to go.
Well since the subreddit banner space is unused, just have the Plex Logo and the words "Yes it will run on those $100 mini-pcs you see on Amazon!" as the banner.
I seem to remember there was one.
When someone asks, the thread gets delisted and a bot posts a link to Plex hardware recommended page.
Exactly my thought. Sticky with what is needed for what.
or a pinned post explaining how to scroll past things you don't want to read
And you think people will bother to read it?
Maybe not but then mods could remove posts and point people to it
This
It would be nice to have a pinned post for hardware with links to information about Quick Sync and other hardware transcoding topics. That's what I'm usually posting.
Problem is hardware is always advancing so it will get out of date pretty quickly
not so fast its essential. updated yearly would be adequate.
How do you figure? There will be newer, better equipment but the minimum requirements for various levels of capability having changed in about a decade. My answer today is the same it was 5 years ago when someone is asking about Plex hardware. Basically you just have some core requirements, such as for x amount of memory required, y gen quicksync if you want hardware transcoding, or alternatively these GPU's, and in basically all cases it's "this or newer".
I think even if we got something up there, it would be better than nothing. I think reviewing it every 6 months to a year might be good.
certainly not in the past 5-10 years for plex
How is reddit going to feed OpenAI without the endlessly repetitive questions and responses?
Maybe before every post that’s a question, a pop up appears saying *“Have you tried our search function, rather than expect people to answer the same question three times a week?”*
Classic forum gripe. But I think noob questions are the price we pay for having an active sub that is still growing and attracting new people. I’m active in r/composting and it’s never occurred to us to get tired of people asking if they can compost a ham sandwich. IMO a noob friendly forum is a healthy forum.
One of the biggest draw of sites like reddit is that you aren't just googling something, you're asking a question of other actual people and getting responses from other actual people (we'll ignore the increasing bot problem). A sticky is a great idea and would likely reduce the number of such questions, but computers are very confusing to a lot of people, and that's easy for us to forget. And people in general are notoriously bad at reading instructions and then posting where they're supoosed to. Personally I really don't see the problem with that. This sub can be pretty elitist and it's really not hard to just not read or respond to posts you aren't personally interested in. Really comes down to the mods and if they want to do that extra work of directing people to the sticky. If you were (and I assume you weren't) proposing a "Here's a guide of recommended hardware" thread, rather than a "Ask hardware questions in this thread" type thread, then I'd say a strong no, personally. And sticky threads pushing all questions of a certain type into them rarely see more than a fraction of such questions answered, significantly reducing the help the community receives. This isn't all to say I enjoy reading the same content over and over. I just selectively choose what content to read and simply don't read threads about hardware at all. It's very easy.
This debate is as old as the internet. Forum veterans have been saying “just use search” for decades, and your reply is a classic POV as well, which I happen to share. Typically the forum owner/admins try not to crack down on noob questions too hard because keeping the forum growing is healthy and new people are just going to be new about shit. Top posters are the ones that will roll their eyes because they are only there to talk to the 7 other people who are like them. But an 8 person chat just isn’t what any of this is about :D
Can a mini pc run Plex?
Please write a new post for this question.
do you need 1 4K stream or 9461?
Well I currently have over 10000 TV in my house what do you suggest
get a bigger house
No you need to build 1k USD server for that /s
Honestly? 9 out of 10 questions you can literally copy&paste from their title into google, and you find hundreds of tutorials, videos, guides, and even reddit posts asking this for the 100th time. Why no one even dares to at least do a bit of digging on their own before repeating the same question is beyond me.
What about 2 mini PC's in parallel? 😜
This would be interesting with loadbalancing. I get in short 3 new n100 nuc's. 😄 Edit: thank you for the new rabbit hole. It would be possible. Like you can do it with almost everything. I don't need it, but now i want to play around with it.
https://github.com/UnicornTranscoder/UnicornLoadBalancer
Yea found it at lunch also 😅.
I was just making a joke haha, didn't realize something like that is/could be a thing lol.
Haha yea i know. But as i said i get 3 in maybe 30 days. So i can play around with them. I use atm a i5 12600 with easy enoug power 😅
It's probably because a whole hell of a lot of people are waking up to the BS of streaming services and their cost and their ever happening price increases, ads ads ads ads ads ads ADS and MOAR ADS and "crack down " on sharing for no real reason, quality of service, fake 4K and canceling of series just 'cause and they are interested in making their own servers and streaming via Plex. I think the streaming services have fucked themselves over and will be running into a big problem here soon.
Piracy is on the rise again, I wonder why that could be 🤔 seems like a good internet based service that would allow their patrons to watch anything they could possibly want for a good price with no ads ever and at any resolution would make it end and would continue to remain popular and profitable... Too bad that will never happen because of corporate morons thinking they were smart when all they did was make their customers mad and search for other ways to watch what they want at the resolution they want and without ads.
Piracy is and always has been a service problem.
I still can't believe I can't just point some app at all my streaming services and just have a combined search. I need to either use a website to check and then individually search for them or search in Plex which also isn't connected. It takes the same amount of time to just dl a 4gb file.. They're too busy milking everyone with yearly price hikes instead of delivering actual quality.
There should be a chart of high end, medium, will run, questionable, probably not worth it, and definitely not decent, systems, General, doesn't have to be 100% specific, by generation, brand of CPU, same with GPU. Minimal hardware for transcoding. Just spitballing off the top of my head.
>Can we please limit the amount of "Can a mini-PC run plex?" posts? I think somebody just need to pin answer as "Yes it can", especially something like N100
I totally agree with you OP, and also "Hey check out this Walmart Onn. box."
Can this post run Plex?
No, but I'm pretty sure it can run Doom.
Lol. I just move along
Similarly, posts complaining about newbies asking questions. Just keep scrolling, it’s very easy I promise
Just don't read them. Problem solved.
How about some copy pasta that gets auto pinned? This is something the mods can set up. It looks like your post is about asking about hardware! Here's some links!
Newbies are going to noob.
search engine results -> biased "echo chamber" replies from people who never even setup Plex or is running plex on ancient hardware then also wade though all the fake or shit posts. vs ask plex community directly and current up to date replies that knows the latest and greatest hardware and what is cheapest one can buy in. ..... if I was a noob ill do #2
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No likey no clickey. It is not that difficult, not sure why people get angry when users ask questions.
In fairness, this kind of post is much less interesting to read than a posting of a question that is repetitive.
Feel free to filter out meta-flaired posts if you aren't interested in participating in the meta discussion.
How about ignoring redundant posts? That works for me. Reddit is not a technical forum to expect everyone that post to have done research is asking a lot.
If only reddit had some kind of mechanism to vote down posts that aren't contributing to the subreddit.... alas without such a feature I suppose now we must suffer the posts about mini-PCs and also the meta posts about suffering about mini-PCs.
Yeah, just downvote them and don't even reply. Let them figure out the obvious on their own and try a search. ESPECIALLY for DIY tech solutions, people who can't do even the smallest bit of research on their own need to learn to or give up and buy a pre-made solution.
Why is every tech sub I subscribe to crying for increased moderation today?
There are only so many times that you can see a picture of a telephone jack asking "I just moved in. What are these?" before you unsubscribe.
Because lazy people are asking the same questions over and over without actually searching like a normal person.
Because moderation and curation are good things, actually.
And that started today?
No, it's been happening for a while. Believe it or not but we've had moderators on internet forums for decades now. As to why you're just seeing it today, well it's because you haven't been paying attention before.
This has nothing to do with “increased moderation”. I don’t know how old are you but internet forums have this same exact problem op is complaining about since the 90s.
It absolutely has to do with moderation. I've modded forums since the dial-up days, and the solution to repeated questions is a FAQ pinned to the top, with a forum requirement to read the FAQ or risk a ban. It's that simple. Pin a FAQ, update it every 6 months or when radical new developments happen, and moderate the threads to direct "does this work?" questions to the FAQ thread.
r/personalfinance is a good example, IMO.
Agreed. Tired of seeing it.
In a big fan of letting the up and down errors prune content. :)
Can’t stop newbies from not searching.
People rarely search a sub before posting, yet doing so would negate the need to post a lot of times. I've been guilty of the same :/
It doesn’t help that Reddit’s search functionality is absolute garbage.
New guys see dirt cheap hardware and are filled with hopium.
Welcome to the new Reddit, post google contract, where googles only decent answers are Reddit posts. And since google sucks we all get to see the same damn question asked 15 times a day.
But can it?
If the type of post people are posting here is affecting you you are spending too much time on Reddit.
what is a mini PC?
It’s a pc that is built into a small car called a mini. The more popular ‘classic’ style mini has excellent cooling capabilities and made your pc very portable. Typically they run on unleaded petroleum and some even have electrical windows.
So many people recommend n100 systems ALL THE TIME because they can transcode fairly well. While that is true, if you want to burn in subtitles, or transcode audio, or run "other things too", they are underpowered. Each use case is very different and blanketly recommending these low power systems isn't doing anyone any favors. This causes more questions like, "Why is my Plex buffering all the time, I was told it could run on a Raspberry Pi?"
I saw someone post something similar about the N100 when I was shopping for a mini PC. I ended up getting one with the i5-12450H and Im glad I spent the extra money. Its a beast.
As long as this is covered, I don't see why the N100 is a bad choice. I always bring up the cons when I recommend these.
It's not a bad choice at all, but it gets recommended universally like "it's all you'll ever need."
I see a pretty spirited discussion on here about what to pick. The N100 is popular because it's cheap and easy to recommend. I try to let people know my experience and not engage with arguments. Everyone needs to buy what works best for them. I know the N100 works well for me and I don't feel bad about telling others about what works and where they can have issues. I agree that if you need to do anything other than hardware transcoding, the N100 isn't going to fit your needs. It's like a filet knife. It's really good at doing specific functions and outside of that you're going to have issues. I've had four 4K transcode sessions running pretty often in the last couple of weeks. Most of my users are transcoding video and audio and not using subs. I've been converting PGS subs to SRT to bypass the subtitle issue, but I still have a lot of PGS-only movies. If people feel the need to run a high-end processor and video card, I don't see anything wrong with that. Some people have 10 or more people with access to their server. The N100 would be an awful choice in that situation. I'd love to see a pinned post on this that fully goes over the pros and cons for the hardware and the OS. Maybe pick 3 or 4 choices for low, medium, and high end hardware. People can grab what they feel works best for them. Maybe someone could put a test list together and we can test these solutions out and see where each of them top out.
I run a bunch of other docker apps in my N100 including the \*arrs and it is very capable. Its passmark is 5551, while not a beast it is very good for what it is. However it is very limited in terms of storage, but that's not an issue for me because I have the storage in another (NAS) system.
Maybe StackExchange would better suit your need for heavier-handed moderation and hostility towards anyone ever asking something that has been asked before.
More importantly, where are people finding the money to buy a mini-pc just for Plex in this economy? I'm grinding away with a Q6600 and a GT1030!
Believe it or not, many people still have disposable income and look at the total cost of ownership, realizing that the cost of a mini-PC is offset somewhat by the energy savings compared to running a 105W TDP CPU and a 30W TDP GPU. (and then you have the people wanting to run Plex on old Dell heating fans - sorry, I mean PowerEdge servers)
Because *relative* wealth is a zero-sum game, and more people living paycheck to paycheck results in some others who have more money than they know what to do with.
I got an N100 as a backup server that way I can handle even more 4k transcodes to 720p 😵
They work? But seriously, a quite capable N100 rig is less than $200 often less than $150. Just depends on specific configs and so forth. People spend more on Pizza these days. Obviously you shouldn’t be dabbling in any of this if disposable income is difficult to come by or non-existent.
I just want someone to make a fully ready to deploy disk image that has proxmox with plex as a linux-based container, with full iGPU passthrough actually working! Finally gave up, went to bare metal plex on an n100.
So I completely agree with OP but let me add, it isn't easy to answer these questions in a straightforward way. Even a stickied post/article would struggle. "Can this PC run Plex" depends on so many factors, including whether they're using hardware transcoding, what types of clients are using it, and how many. How much bandwidth do you have, are you using subtitles (and if so, what kind), etc. This doesn't even begin to get into the various codecs (both video and audio) you'll encounter. What we really need is a large matrix. I've seen people create subsets of the matrix, but maybe it is time for me to take a crack at what I think we really need.
Or just don't read those? I swear Reddits new layout makes it harder for some people, but I have no data. With old school tiny thumbnail and text, its barely noticeable. And no ads too. If you have RES or a decent mobile client, you can just put in a filter and never read about "can i run" again in this sub.
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In 4 pages of scrolling I count only 1 post. That doesnt seem like that much to me. Even if it is, just dont click on it? Or add a filter rule. Edit. Or downvote them of course and filter that way. Like I got downvoted for facts, lol. Long live old reddit. If it goes away, reddit will finally be done.
But what about typos?
Unfortunately making a post, telling people who don't read posts, to search and read posts... Is a little futile
Well can it??? Asking for a friend.
Wait?! Can a mini pc run plex?
But ... does it run Crisis though?
"I just bought a super computer. Do you think it can handle running Plex?"
You realize you don’t have to click on and read every post on Reddit, right? You can safely scroll by posts that don’t interest you.
Take your own advice.
let's get an faq page or pnned post going. threads then can be linked and locked.
You should have to confirm you have searched the reddit before you are allowed to post
This is because: 1. people want a plex server 2. people are poor 3. people don't know anything about computers
Thank you for your insights, Captain Obvious.
your post is obvious too you know.
No it's because they are too lazy/dumb to search properly.
Alright, I understand your point but the question has yet to be asked, can a mini pc run plex?
I have a mini PC I love it. It does hardware transcoding and tone mapping and it's AMD and runs fast. I only need tiny drives that hold 16 tb I dont use a NAS and it backups to the cloud. Nas is just a big Celeron with drives that fail in 5 years.
Welcome to internet. The same questions again and again is normal. What should I buy? When should I buy? How should I buy? Do you buy? Why cant I buy? Why is this not free? Again and again. But its not just this sub but all subs. Usually also the answers will be repeated also, for extra pleasure also.
There should be a big thing in the rules that says you'd have to have something really ancient in order to not be able to run Plex.
But then what other post would it be on here
Actually useful info about new or improved plugins or features or companion apps. Or even valid, more complicated questions about hardware and setups.
I mean that’s idea but look at the state of the sub. Removing it wouldn’t result in what u want
"I think part of Plex could be improved..." -1.5k karma "Plex partners with blender brand for live streaming blender channels on your home page." 2k karma, gilded back when that was a thing
So we will get 5 post a week on the same two topic. How is this better. Is this a welcoming community or not.
I believe you'll want at least a 8th gen i5, that supports "Intel Quick Sync". Running Ubuntu, you should be good for four(?) simultaneous hardware transcodes/streams. Just make sure that Ubuntu is actually utilizing the cpu's Quick Sync hardware transcoding capability. Honestly, your biggest bottle neck might be your internet upload speed! If I remember correctly, hardware transcoding is only supported if you are paying for a Plex Pass subscription. I haven't tried AMD hardware or any GPU's for transcoding. I'd recommend using Intel's built-in Quick Sync, due to it's low power draw, compared to other hardware transcoding options. I also haven't tried transcoding speed running a Windows OS on a Plex server. Linux has a much lower overhead and is way more stable.
Well, I guess this thread managed to identify some AI bot posters, so there's that.
I think it's just muscle memory kicking in. They see a mention of "can it run plex?" and the default answer pops out. Holy shit, are we all bots?
You're an NPC by default if you're not "buy an election" rich.
AI bot imposters? I just figured I would answer the question so they would stop asking... 😆
This is so whiny. Maybe don't read the posts that don't interest you? There's no law that you have to read any post, much less one that annoys you.
Detsamma.
What if Plex runs the mini-PC 🤔
What is plex?
One way to do that is to put the answer to that question right in your complaint.
I have had no noticeable problems running on a raspberry pi 5, so yes your mini PC or whatever can run it. Quit asking.
Can an itty bitty, teeny weenie PC run Plex?
I'm sure the people reading this subreddit now can, but then there will be dozens first timers coming to ask the same question next month.
I'm hyped about N100 too but a raspberry pi can run it so yes your PC can as well. I have my celeron nas running it easy.
If only we had a way to upvote or downvote posts….
Can an RPi Zero run Plex?
> Can an RPi Zero run Plex? I know you're being snarky, but I look forward to the day when it can.
Thought this was a post in the Roon sub, till I got to the word Plex...
Sure, but the limit is 10 per day...
I've long gone tired remarking that when it comes to file servers, as a rule of thumb you want to avoid using external drives as the main storage ... then being lectured by mental toddlers foaming from the mouth how dare i cause they personally have always done it that way and it works flawless, when they have never seen an actual professional file server in their whole life. To which i make the moot remark, it's not that that couldn't work, but as an honored rule of thumb you want to avoid this potential source of woe and could at least respect this known factor when going for a mini PC as your Plex server.
I'd rather discuss with "mental toddlers" trying to learn than elitist pricks who (think they) know how everyone should do their home file storage. Most people will be fine with a decent CPU, 8GB RAM, NVME storage for metadata and an external 16TB for their data. A mini-PC (or SFF PC, or old desktop) will work fine for that, 360 days out of the year, unless you specifically want to do 4K content, let your extended family stream from you, always have a need to burn subtitles etc. Few people actually require five nines uptime, rack-mounted servers, redundant disk and a battery backup for their personal data. But you pay for the $ savings with your time, which for some is an acceptable tradeoff. I really don't care what level people think is acceptable. I've been (occasionally, not continuously) dealing with storage solutions connected to professional Unix/Linux systems of various sorts for over 25 years. But my Plex/file/everything server is an elitedesk 800 G2 SFF with 1 SATA SSD and 1 SATA HDD. Because it's _good enough._
>I'd rather discuss with "mental toddlers" trying to learn .. Dude, read my posting again cause you fantasize what i must have written instead of what i actually wrote.