Ivy Bridge i5-3470 hardware acceleration?

[gregoryacole 2]

My Emby server is an older Dell Optiplex, with an i5-3470 as the CPU.  It has QuickSync, but I'm not sure how helpful it would be on a processor that old.  The media that it serves is H.264, but it primarily functions as a Live TV source from a Silicon Dust Cable Card tuner, usually only 2 or 3 streams at a time.  I also have an Nvidia GTX 1050 ti available, but would like to keep that for other uses around the house given the way that graphics cards are priced these days!  Will enabling hardware acceleration help with only having the CPU, or do I need to bite the bullet and add in the nvidia card as well?

 

[RanmaCanada 496]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Intel_Quick_Sync_Video#Hardware_decoding_and_encoding

Your processor can hardware decode/encode AVC perfectly fine, but any encoding it will do will be  utter garbage compared to what your 1050Ti can do.  I'm going to say since it appears that the cable card tuner is external, maybe pick up an inexpensive laptop like this or even a Thinkcentre Tiny or Dell Micro.  Or drop a bit more and just get an Intel Nuc or Nuc type.  However, if you are happy with the output, then you don't need to spend anything.  Try turning on hardware and see what kind of a difference it makes.

I've personally moved my entire Plex and Emby server software to an i3-8130u laptop with quicksync, and it makes things far, FAR easier as I do not have to have separate mouse, keyboard and display.  Quicksync on the 11th gen is insane. (read the posts on these linked pages going forwards).

Edited March 14, 2021 by RanmaCanada

[gregoryacole 2]

that's kind of what I was thinking, that the version of QuickSync that I can support with this processor might not be ideal.  I've checked out that Wiki matrix before, but from a real world standpoint, at which generation of Intel CPUs did QuickSync become reliable and useful?

[RanmaCanada 496]

Well from a real world it started at Kabylake, as that is when they added HEVC decoding/encoding.  They also started winning the MSU encoding challenges, ableit with their own software packages.  If you read the link I embedded from Doom9, you'll see that Rocket Lake has added considerable quality improvements, and is probably better than Turing.  The 11th gen NUC's are not available yet, but laptops with Intel Iris XE Graphics are.  It's extremely difficult to find quicksync information, even on doom9.

[gregoryacole 2]

That's good to know, I also have a barebones i3-7100 at my disposal, so maybe that becomes my new server

[RanmaCanada 496]

The i3-7100 is essentially the same as my i3-8130u in regards to the ASICS onboard.  You should have no problems.  Byte my Bits is a youtube channel that is sponsored by Plex, and the creator talks about this type of stuff in depth on some of  his videos.  Essentially my 8130u SHOULD be able to handle 20+ 1080p transcodes without breaking a sweat.  As almost all my users direct play everything (because I'm that kind of admin haha) I haven't yet come across 10 transcodes let alone 20.