Help picking CPU + Mobo for Plex + NVR + HA + VMs?

[Greywall]

Hey everyone, Moving to a new house and thinking it's about time I upgraded my old server. It's been running for the last 6 years on an older i7-3770K CPU and doing some light Plex work during this time. Looking to put together a new server with new cpu/mobo/case/ram/etc.

At the new place I need the server to support:

 

• Plex + hardware iGPU transcoding
• Docker containers related to Plex
• Occasional image processing win10 VM (CPU + CUDA dependent)
• Home Assistant + DB (docker)
• NVR for IP camera recording (probably Frigate)
• Minecraft Server for the kiddos

 

Hardware wise, I only want to keep my current drives. Everything else is going to be new. I have a 1070 I can add to the setup for CUDA support, but trying to nail down cpu/mobo combo to support the above.

 

Started looking at a 12700k + Z690 combo. Something with DDR4 ram, 6 SATA onboard, NVME for cache, and a few PCIE slots. I've been buying Asus mobos for my desktop setups, but open to looking at others to get the right number of ports and slots.

 

Appreciate a quick look to see if I'm headed down the right path. At the same time I'm wondering if I'm going to be throwing too much at a single setup. Also if I can downgrade components, it would be nice to reduce the power draw. (probably not though with the 1070?)

 

Recommendations? Thoughts?

 

Thanks!

 

[etnicor]

I use Gigabyte MW34-SP0 workstation board.

8x sata ports

ipmi

4 nvme slots

ECC memory

Intel core cpu, buy revision 1.1 for 13th gen support.

 

[Lolight]

On 7/31/2023 at 3:30 AM, Greywall said:

Started looking at a 12700k + Z690 combo. Something with DDR4 ram, 6 SATA onboard, NVME for cache, and a few PCIE slots.

https://pcpartpicker.com/list/

 

The 12700K or any similar 12th Gen is fine as long as it has enough of cores for your use case to share with the VM.

No need to pay any extra for the "K" SKU if it carries a premium in your market.

 

This particular one comes with the UHD 770 iGPU which is more than enough for light Plex transcoding.

But the lesser UHD 730 would also be sufficient for a few 4K transcodes.

 

And you'll likely need to keep the 1070 for your VM and CUDA.

 

If you're absolutely sure that you won't be running more than 6 HDDs then you can pick any of the "big 4" brand mATX mobos with 6 SATA ports.

As for the NAS case, there aren't many in the mATX form factor. The most recommended by far is the Fractal Node 804.

But if you think that you will need some room for expansion then you should get an ATX motherboard with 8 SATA ports and a bigger ATX case (from the Fractal Meshify or Define series).

 

Don't try to save on a PSU - get at least a Tier B, Mid-Range PSU: https://cultists.network/140/psu-tier-list/

 

You might want to check this post for tips on power consumption: https://unraid.net/blog/energy-efficient-server.

Also this thread:

Edited August 6, 2023 by Lolight

[Greywall]

Thanks for the insights. I ended up going with the following:

 

 

Got the ASRock for its 8 SATA ports. It would give one up if I end up adding a 3rd NVME disk on the mobo, but don't see a reason why I'd need one.

 

Went with the i5-12600k paired with the ASRock for a combo deal. Ended up being a much better price point than the 12700k. Should be decent for transcoding with the UHD 770 iGPU.

 

Lots of recommendation on Fractal's Meshify 2XL case. Surprised me with its height, but it's been a joy to work with. Right now have the drives from my old box mounted: 1x 6G parity, and 2x 4G drives. Will adjust drives as needs evolve.

 

Had a good experience with Thermaltake GF A3 power supply on a recent desktop build, got the same again. Agree with not skimping on power supply, everything else benefits from solid power delivery.

 

Held off for now on the addition of the 1070, as my CUDA use case is a year out. Will see what makes sense at that time. Besides no sense drawing the extra power if it's not going to be used just yet.

 

Good leads on power consumption, will go through and check them out. Thanks!

 

 

 

 

 

[Lolight]

10 hours ago, Greywall said:

Got the ASRock for its 8 SATA ports. It would give one up if I end up adding a 3rd NVME disk on the mobo, but don't see a reason why I'd need one.

Actually as long as the third .M2 SSD is of the NVMe type you will not loose that SATA port.

It will only be disabled if you add a SATA type of the .M2 drive.

[underdeveloped-will8428]

On 8/14/2023 at 12:31 PM, Greywall said:

Thanks for the insights. I ended up going with the following:

 

 

Got the ASRock for its 8 SATA ports. It would give one up if I end up adding a 3rd NVME disk on the mobo, but don't see a reason why I'd need one.

 

Went with the i5-12600k paired with the ASRock for a combo deal. Ended up being a much better price point than the 12700k. Should be decent for transcoding with the UHD 770 iGPU.

 

Lots of recommendation on Fractal's Meshify 2XL case. Surprised me with its height, but it's been a joy to work with. Right now have the drives from my old box mounted: 1x 6G parity, and 2x 4G drives. Will adjust drives as needs evolve.

 

Had a good experience with Thermaltake GF A3 power supply on a recent desktop build, got the same again. Agree with not skimping on power supply, everything else benefits from solid power delivery.

 

Held off for now on the addition of the 1070, as my CUDA use case is a year out. Will see what makes sense at that time. Besides no sense drawing the extra power if it's not going to be used just yet.

 

Good leads on power consumption, will go through and check them out. Thanks!

 

 

 

 

 

@Greywall I'm putting together almost the exact same build! Thinking about putting it in a rack case though.

 

It's been a few months, what are your thoughts now? Anything you'd change?

[Greywall]

@underdeveloped-will8428 It's been a rock solid build, pretty happy with it so far. That case is huge though, we moved and it surprised me how heavy it was once I had everything in there. Although, I'm still running it without a GPU, just been using the Intel iGPU/QSV for plex and transcoding.

 

One minor thing I'm running into is on heavy file I/O activities like media processing, the NVME's throw too hot notifications. Hitting temps around 50c. The mobo did not have a heat sink for the 2nd NVME so I added one, but all that did was get both NVME temps to sync up. It's something I suspect I need to tune with my cooling settings. Thinking since the fan control is tied to CPU temps, I suspect fan speed isn't increasing on SSD temp spikes. In situations when you have high SSD I/O but low CPU load, I think it can lead to less than sufficient cooling. Something I need to dig into when I can shut the server down and get into the BIOS.

 

Also, this was my first foray into the VM features of Unraid. I wasn't aware that you needed to dedicate specific cores to each VM. With this in mind, I'd have splurged for something with more cores just to not have a limitation on VMs. Although for right now, I'm only allocating 2 cores for a HomeAssistant VM so it's not really an issue. Just a thought on future extensibility on the VM side.

 

[underdeveloped-will8428]

@Greywall Awesome thanks for the feedback, you're definitely backing up my thoughts on this build! Will need to do some more research on the NVMEs. I currently only have 1 in my current build but have been considering getting a second to mirror my Cache drive.

 

Quote

Also, this was my first foray into the VM features of Unraid. I wasn't aware that you needed to dedicate specific cores to each VM. With this in mind, I'd have splurged for something with more cores just to not have a limitation on VMs. Although for right now, I'm only allocating 2 cores for a HomeAssistant VM so it's not really an issue. Just a thought on future extensibility on the VM side.

I'm planning to use HA and possibly something like BlueIris for cameras so this is something for me to think about. Do you think you'll go with something like a 13600k? Maybe a 12900k? Think 4-6 additional cores is worth the extra $$? My general use case would be Plex, aars, HA, BlueIris (or some kind of IP Cam software) and a data/photo backup server.

 

I'm planning to wait until they announce the 14th gen then grab a deal on 12th or 13th gen intel.

[Greywall]

2 hours ago, underdeveloped-will8428 said:

Awesome thanks for the feedback, you're definitely backing up my thoughts on this build! Will need to do some more research on the NVMEs. I currently only have 1 in my current build but have been considering getting a second to mirror my I'm planning to use HA and possibly something like BlueIris for cameras so this is something for me to think about. Do you think you'll go with something like a 13600k? Maybe a 12900k? Think 4-6 additional cores is worth the extra $$? My general use case would be Plex, aars, HA, BlueIris (or some kind of IP Cam software) and a data/photo backup server.

 

I'm planning to wait until they announce the 14th gen then grab a deal on 12th or 13th gen intel.

 

Your use cases pretty much match mine, so I think you'll be good with the build. No NVR yet tho, I have to get some cameras and get them installed first.

 

I bought the i5 since it was on sale with the mobo as a bundle. But I chose to go with 12th gen mainly to stay with DDR4 memory. Didn't feel like the extra cost of DDR5 was worth the minor performance increase. Now if this was my gaming rig, I might have. My current gaming setup has a 12700k + DDR4 and I'm very happy with its performance.

 

[Lolight]

12 hours ago, Greywall said:

the NVME's throw too hot notifications. Hitting temps around 50c.

The 50C warning is for HDDs only.

Those temps are not considered to be too hot for active NVMe's.

You can adjust the warning value higher in the main tab by clicking on the device.

[Greywall]

Thanks @Lolight, bumped up the values by 10 degrees. Seems to have quieted down the warnings for now.