You need to be deaf to not hear an HDD, and Helium one are generally very noisy.
I don't use Plex, but for what i know:
" Limitations
When relaying a connection through us, there are limitations for the streaming qualities you can use:
- Free users are limited to 1 Mbps maximum for streams
- Plex Pass subscribers are limited to 2 Mbps maximum for streams
If the content you’re trying to stream has a higher bitrate, then your Plex Media Server will need to transcode the content down to fit the limitation. "
https://support.plex.tv/articles/216766168-accessing-a-server-through-relay/
Anyway, those are all stuff an integrated iGPU can do, for a much lower power consumption. The point is, it's preferable avoiding spending more money in electricity bill and on HW to buy an external GPU.
All consumer Nvidia cards are limited by software to 1. Even a 4090. You need to hack the firmware and modify it to get more than 1 at the same time. Then with a Quadro card you are limited by the power. But it's not worth getting a 200€ GPU for 5 transcodes when you can have an 80€ CPU that does the same with the integrated iGPU. Not only, why do I need an external GPU that idles at 20/30W more when my Intel CPU can idle at 1/2W.
External transcodes are limited to 720p, so it's obvious your GPU is doing it fine. A G5400 can do around 21x1080p transcode at the same time, so 720p is probably double, for comparison.
You can switch to a generic desktop PC with a desktop Intel CPU. Or change your server for a generic chassis and popolate with a desktop motherboard and CPU from Intel.
Don't worry, they have a lot of shelves too.
Are you living in the 90'? Hardware transcoding is a thing of the present.
You don't need another GPU, you already have one, and a very good one as decoder and encoder. The iGPU on the Intel CPU.
Anyway, if you don't plan to have VMs, the i5 is overkill, if you need a new system, the i3 still overkill but better, a G7400 would be another alternative. A dual core is fine, with 16GB of ram, 32 are overkill. Both the i3 and the G7400 would be fine, and would give you space for HW transcoding with the iGPU. For reference, an i3 13th gen is capable of 5/6 4k stream at the same time. External GPU like Nvidia desktop are limited to 1 transcode at the same time, you need an expensive Quadro to match the iGPU capability, no worth the money, and you would just add more power consumption for nothing.
Nice PSU, finally someone that understand that you don't need 800W to run a NAS that idle a 10W.
As OS, i suggest to look into unRAID, is a Hypervisor that run on RAM, very light, easy to setup and maintain. It's a pay software, but you can try it free for 30 days.
It is a meme post?
It's an enterprise server, with dual sockets, a lot of cores and ram. Not built with power saving in mind. And not built to be used on a home.
Have you done any research before buying it? Probably no.
That is normal power consumption behavior. And you are lucky that it consumes not that much for what it has.
Sell what you have and buy a generic desktop computer. Voilà. If you already have a desktop or laptop that you don't use at home, use it as your server and turn off the enterprise stuff.
Of course. But there are situations of people posting about some very old stuff, that even for free or for tinkering, wouldn't be good. We are talking about vintage stuff, maybe good if you want to make an old homeland, to run just old stuff. What can I say in those situations other than that.
If someone asks for advice before buying, no problems, there are already people asking for those and we are mostly polite about those, saying why an old server wouldn't be the best solution.
But for someone that already has one, and post of it, I can only make some satire about it. We are talking about vintage stuff. And, I need to admit, I'm the first to love that old stuff, but I would compliment someone if it posts it on a vintage sub, but on Homelab we need working stuff, with real benefits, it's a different manner.
L O L
What can I say to someone that gets an OLD IBM with a dual socket 4 cores CPU, with 2 GB of ram and thinks he hit a jackpot, for 100€, with a system that idles at 200W and has the power of an i3 first gen.
Of course it's a heater, or a door stop, what other things you can do with that system.
Would be better if those people maybe posted before buying those systems, for shopping suggestions. That's a topic. Not your complaints.
RPI zero? Without Ethernet ports? How? Just that is enough of a deal. Without thinking about the cpu power and the fact that pfsense, the free version, doesn't work on arm.
That's a nice heater! And a very good door stop. Nice catch.
That's a good way to kill a disk. Don't use NTFS and you are fine. Go for Btrfs and similar.
Do you plan having VMs or only Containers? Because Plex, alla ARR stuff and NVR can work on containers. In that case the i3 is extremely overkill too, but if you plan to run a lot of VMs, the i5 of course have more core.
In terms of power consumption, both idle around 25W (generic system with no GPU and Idling HDD), the i5 would peak more, but depend on the usage, generally server idle 99% of the time.
TDP doesn't mean Power Consumption for Intel, but is related to Thermal Dissipation. The i3 would consume the same as i5 idling, because of C-state and the ability to almost shut off the unused cores, then on peak power, having more cores and frequency, mean more power consumption, but peak mean burst of 1 second at max.
I regret not having enough money for everything i want.
My NAS build is perfect for my need, and i think it's perfect for most of us, i'm sure there are tons of people that take my suggestion and take some hints from them.
The only real regret i have, is having just 8 GB of ram, for folder caching, 16GB would be better, but i can upgrade, so no problem.
The, of course there is possibility for improve, like ECC, IPMI, better case, bigger drives etc, but those things cost too.
If someone have the capability of troubleshooting and DIY, this remains the best solution for money and performance. Prebuilt are good mostly for company and people that don't want too many problems.
Sorry, i don't understand.
You have a switch, right? Just connect everything to the switch and everything would talk with everything. I don't see the problem.