Suggestions for Unraid Build parts list?

[kraythax 0]

I am looking to put up an emby server powered by unraid. I wont need to support dozens of people but my family probably has a dozen media devices but all are modern so not a lot of transcoding should be needed. My initial thoughts. 

 

CPU: Ryzen 7

Graphics: ???? Does Emby even support graphics card transconding? 

Hard Drives: 2x Seagate Iron wolf 10TB

Cache Drives: 2x 1tb Samsung Evo 960 SSDs (I have these extra lying around)

Board: ??? No idea here. Suggestions? Things to look for? On board in case USB slot would be good since I am using unraid. 

Case: ??? Something that can do water cooling I am thinking since I like Silent setups. 

 

Thanks in advance

[mastrmind11 717]

Seems like you're trying to build a dual purpose server/gaming rig?  If not, then that's complete overkill.  IMO, and especially since youre not trying to transcode multiple streams, is to get an old Xeon E3 and a mobo/RAM to match.  I can have 5 transcodes going if necessary and the CPU cost me like $100.  Cheap and easy.  And since you won't be crushing your box w/ transcoding, GPU acceleration is completely unnecessary and you can use the onboard video (which also supports VAAPI if you want to turn on hw transcoding) and save more money.  

[dcrdev 251]

Ryzen 7 seems like a poor choice for this, unless this is more than a media server:

• Complete overkill for a media server that "not a lot of transcoding should be needed."
• High power consumption with no gain.

Water cooling? A server? Bad bad idea - don't store anything important on it. Get a lowish tdp chip and pair it with some Noctua fans - virtually silent; I have mine in my living room and I'm using a Xeon with an 82w tdp.

 

Unraid - 2x drives? that seems redundant... 

 

Board:

Personally I'd recommend a workstation or server board that supports ipmi - a workstation grade board will last you a lot longer than a consumer one. For the Intel route - i'd suggest something with the c236 chipset, most boards with this chipset will give you plenty of sata ports for expansion and internal usb ports.

 

If you want hardware acceleration - either rely on vaapi encoding which works with the iGPU on any >= 3rd Gen Intel chip, or get an Nvidia card and use NVENC.