Upgrading server to Alder Lake i7 12700K....how much memory?

[Ronstang 202]

I'm going to go get  a processor and mobo tomorrow to upgrade but I was wondering how much DDR5 I need.  I am not sure if I will be doing much transcoding if any but that may change now that I am going to have current technology instead of 10 year old machines.  Since the DDR5 is pricey at the moment I don't want to buy a lot if I am not going to be using it as I can upgrade later if the need arises.  I won't get less than 32 GB and that is in the $100-150 range depending on speed etc.  I am only getting the 4800 because I don't plan on overclocking it as I do not game.

I'm just curious if getting 64GB is worth it now since all my content is really nice HEVC but usually only comes in around 2 MB/S bitrate so and none of it requires transcoding.  I will probably use an nVidia card in this machine at least until I get caught up on encoding all my backlogged content which could take 6 months to a year.  After that I may leave it in or not....depends on needs.  If I decide after I'm caught up to pull the nVidia card then I asssume memory amount needs may change, especially if at that point I have content that needs transcoding.  

So if I start out at 32GB for now, and find later on I need more would 96GB be enough?  Because that is the most the system would hold unless I replaced the 32GB and that is a waste in my opinion.

Thanks

[GrimReaper 3308]

5 minutes ago, Ronstang said:

as I do not game

 

5 minutes ago, Ronstang said:

I will probably use an nVidia card in this machine

If you're upgrading to i7-12700K why would you invest in discreet GPU in the first place? 

7 minutes ago, Ronstang said:

So if I start out at 32GB and find later on I need more

Not sure you'd ever need more, how many users do you have? 

[Ronstang 202]

17 minutes ago, GrimReaper said:

If you're upgrading to i7-12700K why would you invest in discreet GPU in the first place? 

I'm not upgrading, I have two....a 1650 Super and a 2070.  The only reason I use them is because they have Turing Cores for HEVC encoding.....and the only reason I still use those is because it took me a long time and a lot of experimenting to get an FFmpeg profile that encodes movies to my liking....small with really good quality.  I don't know anything about  Intel's Quick Sync so I have no idea how to create a profile that would get me the same results.  

[GrimReaper 3308]

2 minutes ago, Ronstang said:

I have two....a 1650 Super and a 2070

I reckon UHD770 in 12700K would run circles around both of those, but IIRC @rbjtechhas one of those in his machine so he might give you more exact real-world performance metrics. 

[Ronstang 202]

Oh, I'm sure the performance is better....but like I said what is important to me at the moment is my FFmpeg HEVC encoding profile as I have a lot of content to still get on this server and I am willing to trade time for quality here.

Now, if there is an expert on HEVC encoding with both Nvenc and Quick Sync that could help me build a profile that would let me use the Quick Sync then I would be eager to switch over.  I don't necessarily want discreet GPU in either of my servers but have them based on need at the moment.

And with the Turing Core it doesn't matter whether it's a 1650 Super or the latest card.....performance and speed is almost identical.  Which is why I use older cards.

Edited March 21, 2023 by Ronstang

[rbjtech 4284]

30 minutes ago, Ronstang said:

Oh, I'm sure the performance is better....but like I said what is important to me at the moment is my FFmpeg HEVC encoding profile as I have a lot of content to still get on this server and I am willing to trade time for quality here.

Now, if there is an expert on HEVC encoding with both Nvenc and Quick Sync that could help me build a profile that would let me use the Quick Sync then I would be eager to switch over.  I don't necessarily want discreet GPU in either of my servers but have them based on need at the moment.

And with the Turing Core it doesn't matter whether it's a 1650 Super or the latest card.....performance and speed is almost identical.  Which is why I use older cards.

Yep - and that's fair enough.

Yes the UHD770 will be more performant than the discreet GPU's at the same quality/size - BUT getting to that balance is, as you say, the challenging bit.

You may even be able to do some combined qsv decode and hevc nvenc encode if you are handy with ffmpeg.

But going back to your memory question - DDR4 is also an option for the 12700K as long as the Mobo supports it.  This is the route I took - I went with 64Gb as it was the same price as 32Gb of DDR5 at the time (this was a while back).   For what I needed the machine for (media), DDR5 is not going to make much, if any, difference, so I opted to double the memory.  I also went with 4 x 16Gb DIMMS, so they can be re-used in other machines should the need arise.    32Gb DIMMS may not work in older machines.

btw - my emby is sitting in ~400MB of memory - so you really don't need much at all ..  

Edited March 21, 2023 by rbjtech

[Ronstang 202]

I thought about getting a mobo with DDR4 but at the moment the ones in combos at my local Microcenter are hard to beat price wise and it's a choice of the ASUS Z690 TUF Gaming for DDR4 and the ASUS Z690-A Prime for DDR5 and it seems that the Prime is a little better board....but if the memory speed difference between the DDR4 and DDR5 isn'g going to make much difference for emby and video encoding/transcoding maybe the TUF Gaming is a better choice.  I hate these kind of choices.  At the moment 64 GB of DDR4 is more expensive than 32 GB of DDR5 by about 20% or more depending on how fancy you get.

 

[rbjtech 4284]

4 minutes ago, Ronstang said:

I thought about getting a mobo with DDR4 but at the moment the ones in combos at my local Microcenter are hard to beat price wise and it's a choice of the ASUS Z690 TUF Gaming for DDR4 and the ASUS Z690-A Prime for DDR5 and it seems that the Prime is a little better board....but if the memory speed difference between the DDR4 and DDR5 isn'g going to make much difference for emby and video encoding/transcoding maybe the TUF Gaming is a better choice.  I hate these kind of choices.  At the moment 64 GB of DDR4 is more expensive than 32 GB of DDR5 by about 20% or more depending on how fancy you get.

 

ah ok - so the price of DDR5 is coming down then - it was over double when I bought mine about last year.  Hmm - Assuming your board had 4 slots, I'd probably go with the 32Gb of DDR5 then - as you always have the option of upgrading to 64Gb by adding a further 32Gb should you really need to .. 

[Ronstang 202]

DDR4 is not half the price of DDR5 anymore although it is cheaper but this is my first NEW processor/mobo since 2015 and I am only buying the memory here as the mobo/processor is a present from some friends for my Bday and wedding present so my thought was get the DDR5 since it's the newer technology for future proofing and more total memory with more RAM per stick....if you need that much.

At the base clock value level TeamGroup DDR4 is $60 and DDR5 is $100.....when you get to more expensive RAM the price gap closes but for what we do with emby and media files with no gaming it doesn't make sense to spend more on fancy heatsinks since neither DDR4 nor DDR5 need the heatsinks since they run at a much lower voltage than RAM of yesteryear....unless maybe you overclock and that is of no real benefit for what I do at the cost of shorter component life.

Edited March 21, 2023 by Ronstang

[justinrh 174]

Assuming the OS is Windows, what is the proper amount of RAM for an Emby server, and what determines that number?  Does number of concurrent users make any significant difference?  Does Emby use RAM for transcoding or buffering a direct stream?

[rbjtech 4284]

9 hours ago, justinrh said:

Assuming the OS is Windows, what is the proper amount of RAM for an Emby server, and what determines that number?  Does number of concurrent users make any significant difference?  Does Emby use RAM for transcoding or buffering a direct stream?

It's mainly the DB size and it's cache - but emby is very lean on memory to be fair.  You can easily get away with 4Gb of memory, even on Windows - but I'd say the comfortable minimum is 8Gb.