Build #3... How much memory for Plex?

[rvassar]

I've collected enough pieces to start build #3, and hopefully escape from the howling fans and 120+ watt CPU's of 2008... I have a nice little Supermicro X9SCL, and the i3-2120 from build #2 (upgradable later to a Xeon E3-12xx). I picked up an inexpensive Cooler Master HAF 912 mid-tower case, which should give me room for ~9 x 3.5 drives, and a couple SSD's. The hangup at the moment is RAM. I'm one of those ham radio "junk box" types. I collect and keep all manner of electronic things that might be needed in the future. RAM is one of those things I try to meticulously strip from anything that's heading for the recycle bin, but I've only got 7 sticks of DDR3 ECC UDIMM's, and they're only 2Gb each. Motherboard only takes 4 x DIMM's, so I'm right at the 8Gb minimum for testing & burn-in.

My workload is almost exclusively NFS, with a small CIFS component, and I run Plex in the usual jail. I have two small Linux VM's configured, but they can go live elsewhere until I can get more RAM. My question: How much RAM does Plex need? Is there any headroom for it in the 8Gb mandatory minimum, or should I be patient and put up with the howling fans of the SC1430 until next payday? :)

 

[Jailer]

I thought I read on the plex forum once that it needs at least 2GB of RAM to function properly for transcoding. I would hold off until you can get more RAM.

 

[Chris Moore]

Is there any headroom for it in the 8Gb mandatory minimum

There is no room in the minimum for anything beyond FreeNAS. Any jail or VM that you run on top, that makes you need more RAM. That is the reason I upgraded platform from E3 to E5 so I could have more memory for the virtual.

 

[rvassar]

There is no room in the minimum for anything beyond FreeNAS. Any jail or VM that you run on top, that makes you need more RAM. That is the reason I upgraded platform from E3 to E5 so I could have more memory for the virtual.

That's what I thought. I have a separate ESXi box... I can move Plex there, but it's a bit of work.

This RAM production shortage is starting to get annoying.

 

[Chris Moore]

That's what I thought. I have a separate ESXi box... I can move Plex there, but it's a bit of work.

It would not be very efficient to run a full VM in ESXi when you can run a light-weight jail instead.

This RAM production shortage is starting to get annoying.

This is the whole reason I went to a Xeon E5 v2, so I could get the fairly inexpensive and plentiful registered DDR3 on the market.

 

[rvassar]

It would not be very efficient to run a full VM in ESXi when you can run a light-weight jail instead.

Well... I have some headroom on the ESXi box, and it's running anyway. The question would be is it going to interfere with the other chores the ESXi VM's are tasked with?

This is the whole reason I went to a Xeon E5 v2, so I could get the fairly inexpensive and plentiful registered DDR3 on the market.

What interesting is, the market is reacting to the RAM shortage by impacting the prices of the used motherboards & CPU's. Yes, I can get cheap DDR3 registered ECC memory, but the Xeon's that are getting Meltdown/Spectre fixes, and the motherboards they fit in, are priced at a premium.

 

[Chris Moore]

The question would be is it going to interfere with the other chores the ESXi VM's are tasked with?

It can be quite CPU intensive when Plex is transcoding. If your ESXi system has room for a video card that you can pass into the VM, and you use Linux for the OS, you can configure Plex to use the GPU to assist in the transcode. I have been told that it doesn't produce results that are as nice, but it does offload the CPU to some extent. If your video is able to direct play, without transcoding, the CPU load of Plex is not very much, sometimes it barely even registers on the graph in my FreeNAS system, but for other videos I have seen it as high as 30%.

Yes, I can get cheap DDR3 registered ECC memory, but the Xeon's that are getting Meltdown/Spectre fixes, and the motherboards they fit in, are priced at a premium.

I did a comparison before I bought mine and found (at the time) the lower price of RAM made up for the increased price on the system board and CPU. If you can find a very good deal, which are not always available, you can get the system board, processor and memory all in a package together. In the early part of this year, there was a company selling of surplus servers that had been retired from a data-center that were equipped with dual socket boards capable of around 700GB of memory per socket that were equipped with 128GB of memory, and two 2.6 GHz six core processors. They were perfect in every way by my reckoning because they had SAS2 expander backplanes for up to 24 drives, SAS HBA cards (already in IT mode) and they had the platinum rated SQ (super quiet) power supplies. If I could have done, I would have bought two of them myself.

Just reminiscing. I am not trying to get you to buy anything.

 

[rvassar]

Just reminiscing. I am not trying to get you to buy anything.

No worries... I'm going to have to buy something. The fans on this SC1430 are driving me nuts! I've been on calls for work and had people ask if I was at our Datacenter...

I just can't bring myself to drop $300 for 32gb (4x8gb) DDR3 ECC UDIMM's and put them in a $50 motherboard with a $20 CPU.

 

[Chris Moore]

I just can't bring myself to drop $300 for 32gb (4x8gb) DDR3 ECC UDIMM's and put them in a $50 motherboard with a $20 CPU.

https://www.ebay.com/itm/32GB-4x8GB...ver-Memory-RAM-Upgrade-Kit-RDIMM/201537044180

 

[Chris Moore]

I looked at the cost of DDR4 where I would need a new system board and processor to go with it, vs the price of registered DDR3 and a used system board and processor. I wanted to go to 64GB of memory and it was $200 ish less expensive for me to get the old gear than to go with the newer generation E3 that would have caped my memory at 64GB where I now have availability to go to a 10 core processor or 256GB or RAM or both.

 

[rvassar]

https://www.ebay.com/itm/32GB-4x8GB...ver-Memory-RAM-Upgrade-Kit-RDIMM/201537044180

I swear you have mad black-belt "eBay Kung-Fu". I was actively searching at the same time you found that!

I pulled the trigger on two different 2 x 4gb deals a few minutes before you posted that, totalling up a bit less than $60. So I should be at 16Gb ECC for build #3 a week from now, but have room for 2x as many drives, and have an upgrade path to an E3-12xx Xeon. Hopefully I can live with that for a year or three...

 

[rvassar]

I swear you have mad black-belt "eBay Kung-Fu". I was actively searching at the same time you found that!

I stand corrected... Those are registered. The Supermicro X9SCL only takes ECC uDIMM's. But I see your point. I'll almost certainly go that route if I outgrow my current ESXi box.