Is dedicated GPU required?

[Kassad 0]

I currently use a Hades Canyon with Windows 11 for my Emby server.  So far no complaints and I stream 4k HDR blu ray mkv's.  It does have a GPU - AMD Radeon RX Vega M GH and an i7-8809G CPU, and 32GB RAM.  I really like using a NUC and down the road when I replace the Hades I will look at another NUC or a similar sff.  My question is how important is the GPU for Emby?  Can I get a NUC with a high end CPU and not worry about a dedicatad GPU, or does Emby or Plex run much better with a dedicated GPU?

[caffeineshock 18]

you dont need one at all UNLESS you want hardware enabled transcoding.

it only if your client does not support the format, like 10bit h265 hdr, in any browser other than microsoft edge, your server will have to transcode into the right format (if enabled, ofc. you can disable transcode). with no hardware dedicated to transcode, software transcode kicks in, means, the cpu will transcode the video, which can be problematic due to the lack of performance in such tasks. maybe the cpu is not even fast enough to transcode in real time.

BUT if oyu have a cpu with onboard gpu, like any intel with iris iGPU you will have extra hardware dedicated for this task on the chip. in this example it will be intel quicksync which is very quick and effcient.

but you should not expect an average cpu to be able to transcode high bandwith data in realtime on its own

Edited November 2, 2022 by caffeineshock

[rbjtech 5284]

You do not need a dedicated GPU at all.  

Latest generation Quicksync is quicker than up to the 30 series Nvidia cards.

To note this chip also has an iGPU - a Intel® HD Graphics 630 (last generation, so not that quick.. but useable).

So it should easily be able to cope with multiple (6-8) 1080p quicksync transcodes - 4k is going to give it a workout though - so maybe only 1-2 streams here - but still removes a high % of the workload from the CPU.

If you don;t see the HD630 in emby, then you may need to enable the iGPU in the BIOS.

 

 

Edited November 3, 2022 by rbjtech

[Q-Droid 989]

Yes, often have to force enable the multi-gpu option in BIOS, sometimes shown as IGD Multi-Monitor.

Regarding the HD630 I've tested 4 simultaneous 4k HEVC HDR TrueHD transcoding streams with my i3-8100. So it's not exactly a slouch but it's definitely pushing it to the limit.

 

 

[RanmaCanada 494]

As others have mentioned, no, you do not need a dedicated GPU as long as you have an Intel processor with an iGPU.  Intel quicksync is superior to everything in regards to hardware encoding, and you will have no almost problems with any modern intel processor.  Even my old i3-8130U could handle 3 4k trancodes before it threwup and my current i3-1115G4 can handle more.  Yes I use a laptop as my server.  Any modern NUC be it Adler Lake or Raptor will easily be able to handle your needs.

[MagicDoubleM 121]

Dedicated GPUs will become interesting again once emby allows transcoding to AV1 and/or maybe if we can do fancy stuff like DV to HDR10 live-transcoding in the future, but the current stuff is easily covered by a half-modern intel CPU with iGPU. QSV has become really great.