Newbie. Need suggestion on build. OMV + SnapRAID + Plex

iiwvia · 6. März 2017

So I've been wanting to build a media server for a while, but have been putting it off. I'm unfamiliar in this territory, so I have some questions and could use some suggestions.

I'm thinking of running OMV + SnapRAID + Plex. This server is going to be simple and dedicated to media only. The files mainly won't change, but I plan on dumping in large chunks of data at a time.
I'm going to be re-purposing a 'old' desktop computer in a node 304 case, so I'm limited to drive space. I am thinking of running 3x WD 6TB to start (1 parity, 2 data), and expanding it to 6x 6TB (2 parity?) and running OMV off USB (w/ flashmemory plugin)
How should it be configured? Any suggestions, or recommended plugins I should also take a look at?
Also I'm curious if there is a way to create a share which contains files from different drives seamlessly? Or have multiple drives act as a single volume like Raid0 without striping?

More of a Plex questions, but if anyone is familiar, how would Plex work since OMV is booting off USB? Would on-demand transcoding cache happen in RAM? Is there a better solution?

Nibb31 · 6. März 2017

First, beware of using an 'old' computer for Plex. A media server is typically switched on 24/7 and old computers often use a lot of power. Over a couple of years, it might be cheaper to simply buy a more economical server.

Second, if you are going to need transcoding in Plex, check the passmark value for the CPU. You need at least a score of 2000 for one 1080p stream.

Other than that, it sounds fine. Although 6TB drives aren't cheap, and you will be wasting a whole 6TB for Snapraid Parity. You might be better off with (4+1)x3TB or (3+1)x4TB if you have enough space in the case.

People often pair SnapRAID with MergerFS (the omv-unionfilesystems plugin) in order to make the array appear as a single filesystem, which seems to be what you want.

Plex requires disk space for transcoding. The Plex plugin installs everything on the data drives, so I don't think that using USB will be a problem. I would probably rather install OMV on a small SSD though. You can get 32GB one for less that 20 euros/dollars.

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