Hi All,

 

I am trying to do a budget upgrade of my CPU, mobo, and memory.  My unRAID will be mainly used as a Plex Media Server, transcoding 1080p to 2 or 3 devices.  I would like to make sure the CPU I choose is capable of Virtualization.  I plan on getting an  Intel Core i3-4330 Haswell 3.5GHz LGA 1150 CPU.  Is this good enough?  I do not need the best performance for Virtualization, as I only plan on tinkering with it.  I like this processor because of the low power consumption.

 

For mobo, I'm looking at some intel Z87 chipsets with 8 sata ports.  I'm guessing any of those will suffice.

 

Is 4gb of memory enough?  Should I get 8gb? 16gb?

 

Thanks!

 

 

Based on its passmark score of ~5000 that CPU can just handle 3 transcode streams assuming nothing else is doing much else.  If two is going to be your most likely usage with three being on rare occasions then you should be fine.  If you can't tolerate the risk of an occasional buffer I'd get something more in the 5500 to 6000 passmark range.

That CPU does not support certain virtualization features. Only you can decide if that is important to you. The motherboard question has no easy answer either.

 

There are several topics in the Virtualization subforums about this. See for example here and here.

That CPU does not support hardware passthrough for virtualization. Real virtualization can't really be done on a 'budget' unless you're looking at second hand hardware, which is an option. There are vendors on eBay that sell reconditioned server hardware that will work for what you want to do. However, to get new RAM, CPU, motherboard, controller card for your disks and a PSU if your PSU isn't supported by the motherboard you're basically looking at a whole new server. You're looking at probably $650 to $700 to get the hardware you need. If you want to do virtualization you're better off saving your money until you have some saved to afford the hardware you need.

That CPU supports VT-x but not VT-d, so it does support SOME virtualization features.  It all depends on what kind of vitrualization you are looking to do.  In a nutshell, as long as you do not planning on doing device passthrough, that CPU is sufficient.  If you are only looking to run VM's without dedicated device passthrough, VT-x is all you need (and it's only really needed for Windows VM's).

 

As for your stating the i3-4330 has low power consumption, basically all Haswell CPU's have low power consumption at idle, as they all idle down to 800MHz.  The i3-4330 will use less power at full utilization than say an i7-4770, but it also does less processing than the i7 at full utilization.  Your server will spend the vast majority of it's life at idle, so I doubt you would see any significant difference (if any at all) in your power bill between the i3-4330 and an i7-4770.

Thanks for the feedback guys.  Is 8gb memory enough?  Or should I go with 16gb?

Thanks for the feedback guys.  Is 8gb memory enough?  Or should I go with 16gb?

 

More is usually better. A rule of thumb I use is to buy 1/2 the supported memory as you can upgrade and max the board out. For example, my motherboard supports 32GB, so I bought 2x8GB sticks, and can then upgrade as I need.

 

It's impossible to say how much you will need as your requirements will likely evolve as you get deeper into virtualization, so it's always better to position yourself as best as you can for the future.

If all you are doing is UnRaid and plex then 8GB is plenty.  In fact even that is overkill.  I am running right now with 4GB and have never had OOM problems.  Even if you are going to add a few more things like a torrent client, sab-whatever, then 8G will be plenty.  In fact even if you went with a single Linux-VM 8GB should be plenty for now to run those same plugins.  Lets not forget that UnRaid itself needs very little memory (technically can still run on 512mb) and it isn't like Linux or Plex need oodles of memory.

The best CPU in my opinion, bang for Buck is a second hand i5 3470.

 

I picked one up for a smidge under £100 before xmas on eBay. It supports virtualization (vt-d too) fully and has enough grunt for everything I've thrown at it. Two or three remote plex streams and simultaneously gaming and watching xbmc. All from the same box!

 

Sent from my GT-I9505 using Tapatalk

 

 

Use the intel ark site to make sure the CPU you pick supports all the VT stuff you want (if you want full passthrough, etc)

 

http://ark.intel.com/

 

I was looking at getting (new) a haswell E3-1220v3 ($200) and a server mb that is known to support the VT features you want with the appropiate amount of expansion slots (do you want to pass through a bunch of video cards to VMs, so you need 2 or 3 pci-e 16x slots? etc). I was thinking of a supermicro board, newegg had some nice combos available.

 

I'd also go the route of getting half the max ram your board can do, so if you have 4 slots, and it supports 32gb, get 2 8gb in there now, so that if you ever want to max it out, its easiest. Don't buy 4 4gb, or something like that, since you are just wasting slots/money if you upgrade stuff down the road. If it only has 2 slots, then get as much as you think you'll ever want up front, for the same basic reasons.