NAS is on the way!!! C'mon, share what the heck you are doing!!

GospelTruth

The issue with the Synology is the processor. It's a pretty simple processor and not as powerful as a PC CPU. You might even be able to use your antiquated PC (and I have one very similar) for running Plex. I'm pretty sure that processor should be able to do the transcoding you need.

The Amazon Fire sticks would support the H.264 file type with uncompressed audio according to the Amazon site. It's the Fire tablet that won't support the uncompressed audio that needs the transcode from what I just found out for the Synology.

If you want to do a new build, you might want to look at the Intel NUC boxes. Keeps the form factor smaller but you would have to hook up an external drive if you wanted something really large. Just a thought in your NAS journey. Any of new "i" processors should be more than enough for running a Plex server.

Michael

EndersShadow

mrbiron wrote: »

Plex is on the kindle, one, and fire tv now. CHECK
Now I need to get my read on about a processor. It's the starting point of this whole build. I would like to go with the latest and greatest socket build but know that might cost more dinero.

Still an AMD fanboy at heart...but will convert for the right price/performance ratio.

For Plex, you normally want horsepower over graphics... Intel dollar for dollar has better pure horsepower than AMD (trust me I'm a AMD boy myself). If you were talking graphics at all, then I'd harken to AMD, but when your using it to send the video to another device, the horsepower of the chip matters more, and thats where Intel is just one of the best...

The 1150 socket is a bit older, but it wont be going away just yet.... I'd get your read on with Ryan's build and then mine... we both talk a bit about processor.. He fails to mention he moved from the Pentium chip to the i5 I suggested... and I'm now using his Pentium with no issues streaming to just one device at a time... haven't done 2 at the same time yet....

But I'm also watching the prices on that same i5 as a eventual upgrade for myself so I can know I will be able to add additional clients and stream from mutliple devices in the future without fear.

Also read this thread on the actual what software I use, how to do it, etc...

Note Handbrake is a program I'm aware of but haven't ever used... maybe I should look into it again to save myself some space, but I'm rocking 8 TB right now and with kid movies on one drive and non-kid on the other I've still got about 2 TB free on each drive right now...

westmassguy

Handbrake is excellent, but it's not as user friendly as most of the commercial encoding software out there. It has multiple presets, and you can create your own. It also has pass-through for AC3 and DTS. I get anywhere from 30-50% reduction in file size using HEVC versus AVC, with no perceived loss in quality.

D'prived

billbillw wrote: »

As I said, always a tradeoff. I take about 1-hr to encode my movies. That takes them from 30GB to usually less than 10GB. I don't care how cheap storage is, I'll take a 3-times the storage any day for an hour per movie.

I haven't had a botched encode job since I started using the combination of MakeMKV and Handbrake. Not a single noticeable video artifact in more than 3 years and well over 100 movies. I did see artifacts way back when I used Nero Re-code.

Ditto.
When I Handbrake I usually go about 50% of the original file size.
I've been using MakeMKV and Handbrake for about 3-4 years now and never had any issues with video playback. Every movie I have is MKV and I stream from a QNAP NAS to a Dune HD Base 3D.

D'prived

mrbiron wrote: »

All I'm looking to run video to is one of 4 items in my house.
Xbox One
2 Amazon Fire Tvs
Amazon Fire Kindle

So I'll have to figure out the common format or the HTPC will transcode and I won't have a problem?

I should note, I ran cat5 to all bedrooms, living and man cave, when I first moved in, so I shouldnt have to worry about bandwidth issues......shouldnt.

I have two Amazon Fire TV's and run Plex and Kodi on both with no issues. You should note that there is a one time fee of 5 bucks to "activate" Plex on each Fire TV.

EndersShadow

Post up your guys settings for handbrake then and maybe I will give it a shot......

All I care about is it keeps it at 1080p and keeps either 5.1 or DTS/TrueHD audio without downsampling....

mrbiron

GospelTruth wrote: »

If you want to do a new build, you might want to look at the Intel NUC boxes. Keeps the form factor smaller but you would have to hook up an external drive if you wanted something really large. Just a thought in your NAS journey. Any of new "i" processors should be more than enough for running a Plex server.

I looked at the Nuc but the biggest downside would be having a village of externals stacked next to it, all with their own power cords spaghetti'd together.

EndersShadow wrote: »

The 1150 socket is a bit older, but it wont be going away just yet.... I'd get your read on with Ryan's build and then mine... we both talk a bit about processor.. He fails to mention he moved from the Pentium chip to the i5 I suggested... and I'm now using his Pentium with no issues streaming to just one device at a time... haven't done 2 at the same time yet....

But I'm also watching the prices on that same i5 as a eventual upgrade for myself so I can know I will be able to add additional clients and stream from mutliple devices in the future without fear.

Would the i3-6100 have the power to accomplish the goal? what i like is the 35w power draw with a guess of being in the single digits at idle. The on board graphics should be fine meaning an individual graphics card isn't needed....right?

billbillw

EndersShadow wrote: »

Post up your guys settings for handbrake then and maybe I will give it a shot......

All I care about is it keeps it at 1080p and keeps either 5.1 or DTS/TrueHD audio without downsampling....

Here is the thing with Handbrake. It is easy with DTS/AC3/DTSHD. But it is not with TrueHD (or ATMOS).

For now, lets just stick with a basic DTSHD 1080p movie, ripped with MakeMKV. Keep only English DTS-HD soundtrack and English subtitles when ripping.

Here is what I do. Open Handbrake. Select source file. I don't change much from default settings. On aspect ratio, it defaults to loose, I select Strict. On audio settings, I chose DTSHD Passthru on the output. In subtitles, I add each of the english subtitles
(sometimes there are multiple), just add English 1, 2, etc.

I tend to save the file as MKV (it defaults to MP4), but that's because I use Kodi exclusively. MP4 is compatible with more devices.

That's it. Make sure in the chapters tab is it checked to add chapter marks.

In the video settings, there is a slider for quality. I think it defaults to 20. I don't change that. I'm happy with default quality and H.264. I watch mostly on a 100" projection screen and I don't find the image to be too soft or pixelate.

Now, if you have a TrueHD/ATMOS soundtrack, you have to encode without the audiofile, then use MKVtoolnix to remux the smaller encode with the audio file from the original rip. Sounds tough, but it is really easy and only take 3-5 minutes extra for that step.

westmassguy

When using pass-through, Handbrake doesn't alter the Dolby or DTS track, it remuxs it with the new video file.

mrbiron

So, i suppose i should try MakeMKV and Handbrake tonight for a trial run because a lot of this lingo is foreign at this point.

westmassguy

mrbiron wrote: »

So, i suppose i should try MakeMKV and Handbrake tonight for a trial run because a lot of this lingo is foreign at this point.

Yup, and with Handbrake, you can generate a preview of the video, and compare it with the source. Will also give a good idea of how long it will take.

mrbiron

I hope my tired, 6 year old laptop is up the task!
I will most likely be on here rambling off questions at lightning speed when it takes place.

westmassguy

mrbiron wrote: »

I hope my tired, 6 year old laptop is up the task!
I will most likely be on here rambling off questions at lightning speed when it takes place.

Laptop? Breakout the Red Bull or take a nap

billbillw

mrbiron wrote: »

I hope my tired, 6 year old laptop is up the task!
I will most likely be on here rambling off questions at lightning speed when it takes place.

Yeah, I wouldn't plan on doing that too much. With Handbrake, all cpu cores/threads hit 100% CPU usage and stay that way until the job its finished. You'll have a little oven going inside that laptop. 6 years old? What cpu is that?

For encoding with handbrake, you really need a solid performing desktop system with good cooling. Intel Core i5/i7 or hex/octacore AMD would be the minimum I would recommend.

mrbiron

DAH!...That means you just drove up the price of this build by another $40!

Whatever i build will have a bluray drive and will need to be able to perform these tasks while the laptop either gets retired or relegated to other duties. I was just going to take a stab at 1 (one) movie just so i could follow what you guys were going back and forth on.

mrbiron

billbillw wrote: »

Yeah, I wouldn't plan on doing that too much. With Handbrake, all cpu cores/threads hit 100% CPU usage and stay that way until the job its finished. You'll have a little oven going inside that laptop. 6 years old? What cpu is that?

For encoding with handbrake, you really need a solid performing desktop system with good cooling. Intel Core i5/i7 or hex/octacore AMD would be the minimum I would recommend.

My aged laptop has an old i3 which just so happens to be the CPU i was thinking of using for this build except newest gen (6th) for power consumption and really only being a media/NAS.

What is your suggestion with a CPU starting point?

I should really, probably start a new thread with this as i have already mucked the buck out of this one.

westmassguy

Sometimes there's no substitute for brute force.

mrbiron

westmassguy wrote: »

Sometimes there's no substitute for brute force.

That was my pickup line in college.....100% of the time, it had 0 to no effect.

westmassguy

Really? I'm shocked and offended

billbillw

mrbiron wrote: »

billbillw wrote: »

Yeah, I wouldn't plan on doing that too much. With Handbrake, all cpu cores/threads hit 100% CPU usage and stay that way until the job its finished. You'll have a little oven going inside that laptop. 6 years old? What cpu is that?

For encoding with handbrake, you really need a solid performing desktop system with good cooling. Intel Core i5/i7 or hex/octacore AMD would be the minimum I would recommend.

My aged laptop has an old i3 which just so happens to be the CPU i was thinking of using for this build except newest gen (6th) for power consumption and really only being a media/NAS.

What is your suggestion with a CPU starting point?

I should really, probably start a new thread with this as i have already mucked the buck out of this one.

Honestly, I'm of the opinion that the HTPC (or in your case NAS media server) and the encoding system should not be the same. Server/HTPC should be low power, quiet, etc. Encoding system is full blown, high power, who cares about the fan noise, get her done as quick as possible!!

Dunno, maybe that's just me. I love to build PCs and at one point had as many as 5 custom built PCs and 3 laptops! (that included 3 dedicated HTPCs). Yeah, I'm crazy at times. I currently only have two PCs and two laptops right now (plus two Chromebox-Kodi units).

Honestly, if you weren't worried about how long it took, the i3 would probably be OK for encoding as long as it had hyper-threading (to simulate quad core). I just wouldn't plan on streaming any movies while it was busy encoding.

nguyendot

D'prived wrote: »

mrbiron wrote: »

All I'm looking to run video to is one of 4 items in my house.
Xbox One
2 Amazon Fire Tvs
Amazon Fire Kindle

So I'll have to figure out the common format or the HTPC will transcode and I won't have a problem?

I should note, I ran cat5 to all bedrooms, living and man cave, when I first moved in, so I shouldnt have to worry about bandwidth issues......shouldnt.

I have two Amazon Fire TV's and run Plex and Kodi on both with no issues. You should note that there is a one time fee of 5 bucks to "activate" Plex on each Fire TV.

I paid the yearly fee - with Plex Pass you can activate Plex on any and all devices you choose with no fee.

Also, the FireStick doesn't natively decode a lot of stuff. The Plex interface on the stick is pretty slow. I'd go with a full blown FireTV personally.

I run an i5 750, 16 gb ram on FREENAS + 12TB of space. Plex sits as a plugin on top of that. My clients range from PS3/PS4, Xbox One to FireStick, laptops, all tablets IOS/Android, every phone, all my HTPCs, etc. Upgrade time is soon.

mrbiron

billbillw wrote: »

Honestly, I'm of the opinion that the HTPC (or in your case NAS media server) and the encoding system should not be the same. Server/HTPC should be low power, quiet, etc. Encoding system is full blown, high power, who cares about the fan noise, get her done as quick as possible!!

Dunno, maybe that's just me. I love to build PCs and at one point had as many as 5 custom built PCs and 3 laptops! (that included 3 dedicated HTPCs). Yeah, I'm crazy at times. I currently only have two PCs and two laptops right now (plus two Chromebox-Kodi units).

Honestly, if you weren't worried about how long it took, the i3 would probably be OK for encoding as long as it had hyper-threading (to simulate quad core). I just wouldn't plan on streaming any movies while it was busy encoding.

The issue is money........I'm trying to be cost effective.

I'm going to check the specs on my wife's iMac when i get home. If i can use that for the encoding, then i can save on the server side.

Stay Tuned.

westmassguy

They make a version for Mac, however it has some issues, so read the notes https://handbrake.fr/downloads.php

GospelTruth

I've been using handbrake on an old laptop that's older than the one you have. Sure it takes about a little over an hour to do an encode, but I'm fine with that right now. I just queue up 6-7 a night and let them go. I've been converting all my .iso movie files to .mp4 to save space on my NAS. I was almost out of space, but since running handbrake have shrunk movies down to 1.8GB-2.5GB rather than 6-7GB per movie.

I think you'll get an idea of running handbrake even on just your existing laptop. I use my laptop (8+ years old) to rip and encode and the Synology to serve up the media. It's not state of the art, but it works just fine. It's an older Intel Duo with 4GB of RAM and a 120GB SSD if that matters. Someday I'll upgrade my desktop machine, but in the meantime this works just fine for what it is.

mrbiron

Sooooo......as luck would have it, windows will not recognize the drive at all. I have run through a number of drivers and rollbacks but still get the exclamation point off the drive in my device manager. Last known driver update was back in 06. I bought this thing in 09.... Very frustrating!

There's an hour I will never get back. So its decided, I am starting a new thread and we are going to start building a new computer.

Haddock

You tried Digiber converter? That always used to be a reliable converter whenever I tried it. Just converts videos from one format to another, along with some interesting configuration options. http://www.digiber.com