Hardware recommendations for upgrade

[sleeper52]

I'm looking to upgrade my TrueNAS server (specs in signature). My use case involves a lot of transcoding as a Plex server (remuxed 4k HDR DV), VMs (Windows server and couple of Linux distros), Docker (ie. Pihole, Nginx Proxy Manager for webhosting, etc.), and a homelab.

I'm thinking of getting a Ryzen 9 5900x since I like having a lot of cores but I'm thinking of undervolting for lower power consumption.
What would be good motherboard recommendations with IPMI that allows me to do this and has a bunch of SATA ports (currently have 3x ssd, 7hdds with +3hdds on the way)?

Since the 5900x does not have integrated graphics, should I be getting a cheap graphics card for this purpose as I would sometimes have 2,3, or 4 users streaming Plex simultaneously? Would something like a AMD 6600 XT be a good choice (from what I understand the 6500 XT does not have encode/decode for H264, HEVC and AV1 support)?

 

[DigitalMinimalist]

Asrock Rack X470 / X570 line

 

[firesyde424]

If AV1 decode\encode support is not a requirement, you can look into the Ryzen 5000 series APUs such as the 5700G. 8 cores instead of 12, but you'll be drawing less power and be more heat efficient as well as cheaper. The Vega 8 cores included will do H264 and HEVC but not AV1.

 

[ChrisRJ]

Would adding a GPU and perhaps a bigger CPU to your current system be an option?

 

[sleeper52]

Asrock Rack X470 / X570 line

ill check those out. I've only had experience with Supermicro boards.

If AV1 decode\encode support is not a requirement, you can look into the Ryzen 5000 series APUs such as the 5700G. 8 cores instead of 12, but you'll be drawing less power and be more heat efficient as well as cheaper. The Vega 8 cores included will do H264 and HEVC but not AV1.

Yes I'm currently debating between 5700g and 5900x. Though 12 cores would be more headroom for some measure of future proofing. Just too bad AMD didn't release an 5000 series APU with 12 cores. I was hoping to get the new 7000 series since all of them come with integrated graphics but the power draw is way too much coupled with the cost of entry with DDR5 memory.

Would adding a GPU and perhaps a bigger CPU to your current system be an option?

Adding a GPU would be fine but from what I understand my motherboard (X10SL7F) only accepts up to Xeon E3v4 CPUs which only have 4 cores / 8 threads.