Plex, NAS and OSX - will it blend?

[ppedal]

Hi guys

Total newbie here, so fair warning if what I ask is completely stupid, but here goes:

Can I make Plex Media Server work directly from a NAS using FreeNas?

My current setup:
*Media stored on NAS hard drive
*Plex Media Server running on an iMac
*Uses Plex app to watch movies on iPad - requires iMac to be online for this

My goal: To be able to watch movies from my iPad directly from the NAS without having to have the iMac on.

I was thinking that it might be possible to install/boot Plex Media Server from a USB connected to the NAS (or alternatively installed on a small partition of the NAS hard drive itself) using FreeNAS, but I’m getting lost in all the technical stuff regarding FreeNAS installation, and how it is used/what is even possible.

The NAS i have is a D-Link DNS-320 with a 500GB Seagate drive in - nothing fancy, but the guy I bought it from said he used it with Kodi - unfortunately I didn’t ask him how.

I'm pretty lost - hopefully some of you can point me in the right direction.
Cheers :)

 

[scrappy]

FreeNAS+Plex pretty much go hand-in-hand. My FreeNAS server is on 24/7 so Plex is always available to me no matter where I am. You can even watch your Plex from outside the home when configured to do so.

Unfortunately, you will not be able to run FreeNAS on your D-Link DNS-320 if that was your plan as its hardware specs are nowhere near adequate. If you are interested in getting into FreeNAS I would suggest reading up on it some more. There are many things FreeNAS can do very well, but you must use appropriate hardware otherwise you're asking for trouble.

 

[melloa]

The NAS i have is a D-Link DNS-320

I couldn't find any specs on this, so I wouldn't try.

In fact d-link is so unambiguous that in the same page says:

"This ShareCenter storage device has a storage capacity of up to 4TB" and "Supports up to 6TB storage capacity using 3TB disk drives".

I'd try to make the native DLNA work for you, until you can build a proper server.

 

[ppedal]

Ahh, darn it:(. I did have a hunch that my NAS might not be up to par - I know that some people have had success with it's bigger brother - the 320L. I'm still curious - does having inadequate hardware mean that (a) I can in theory install FreeNAS, but it will be buggy and/or the movies I will stream from the NAS will be choppy and not really watchable (b) FreeNAS won't even install on it (c) Installing FreeNAS on the NAS might actually ruin it.

 

[melloa]

(a) I can in theory install FreeNAS, but it will be buggy and/or the movies I will stream from the NAS will be choppy and not really watchable (b) FreeNAS won't even install on it (c) Installing FreeNAS on the NAS might actually ruin it.

Depending on the equipment you can have a combination of above or none.

 

[SweetAndLow]

Ahh, darn it:(. I did have a hunch that my NAS might not be up to par - I know that some people have had success with it's bigger brother - the 320L. I'm still curious - does having inadequate hardware mean that (a) I can in theory install FreeNAS, but it will be buggy and/or the movies I will stream from the NAS will be choppy and not really watchable (b) FreeNAS won't even install on it (c) Installing FreeNAS on the NAS might actually ruin it.

All of the above. Have you tried reading some of the freenas sticky threads or threads in my signature, they will explain lots.

Sent from my Nexus 5X using Tapatalk

 

[Stux]

Depending on the equipment you can have a combination of above or none.

D) I can lose my data
E) all of the above

 

[melloa]

E) all of the above

 

[danb35]

If you want to continue to look into FreeNAS, at least in the US, the best budget option at the moment is the HP Proliant ML10, which sells for under US$200 with an i3-6100 CPU. You'd need to add RAM (it comes with 4 GB, the bare minimum is 8 GB, but if you're going to be running Plex more would be better), a boot device (8+ GB USB stick is fine, or a small SSD), and of course your storage disks.

 

[Martin Maisey]

If you want to continue to look into FreeNAS, at least in the US, the best budget option at the moment is the HP Proliant ML10, which sells for under US$200 with an i3-6100 CPU. You'd need to add RAM (it comes with 4 GB, the bare minimum is 8 GB, but if you're going to be running Plex more would be better), a boot device (8+ GB USB stick is fine, or a small SSD), and of course your storage disks.

In the UK, most of these seem to be going for >£200 even in the Pentium version - isn't the IT exchange rate great :-(

If you want to go cheaper, you can get away with an HP Microserver Gen 8, which are currently going for sub-£100 with cash back - https://www.serversdirect.co.uk/p/1...n-g1610t-dual-core-.30ghz-mb-4-x-non-hotplug- . Again, buy an 8GB stick (£84) to upgrade to 10GB RAM. This will happily run Plex and allow at least one stream of HD transcoding (probably two, but I haven't tried as my non-mobile clients use Rasplex, which direct plays most content), and gives you 4 (non hotswap) bays in a NAS like configuration.

If you're in Europe, and have space somewhere you don't mind noisy fans, you might also consider a lower specced version of a refurb option I recently found, bought and am very happy with (to the extent I've just bought a second as backup server) - http://www.bargainhardware.co.uk/cheap-chenbro-storage-quad-hex-core-2u-server-configure-to-order/ . A basic configuration w/ a quad core Xeon E5620, 16 GB ECC RAM and 5 drive caddies comes up at £126 inc. VAT & UK delivery. With a full complement of 12 caddies, a second CPU and 24GB of RAM it's only £202, and that will give you plenty of room to expand and lots of transcoding capacity!

The built in RAID cards are not suitable and should be removed and ideally replaced with a SAS HBA such as an LSI SAS 9211-8i or cross flashed IBM m1015, which are £50-75 used on eBay. But you can use up to four drives via a cable like this attached to the motherboard SATA-2 ports - https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B00S7KTYPM/ref=cm_sw_r_cp_api_1KrwzbF2ZT9KA .

Cheers,

Martin


---
Chenbro RM23212-O12C 12-bay 2u chassis/backplane
2 x E5645 6-core Xeon
128GB RAM
LSI 9211-16i HBA
4 x WD RED 4TB, mirrored in zpool with Intel 320 80GB slog
2 x Kingston SSDNov UV400 120GB in mirrored boot zpool


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