Couple of questions about graphics card on TrueNAS Core

[simos.sigma]

@simos.sigma , I think you went for TrueNAS Core with misguided expectations about what it is intended to be used for. What I mean to say is that somehow you were made to believe that TrueNAS Core makes a good base for multimedia stuff.

Would you mind letting us know how you came to choose TrueNAS Core...

Hm... I don't know, wherever I searched for media server etc I found articles and videos mostly about TrueNAS!!!

...what you want to achieve overall?

I mainly want to have a home media server that will serve maximum to one client. Do you have something else to propose?

Where did you get that info? I cannot find anywhere to confirm the GTX 560 (Gfx11) supports NVENC. Even Nvidia's own hardware support matrix excludes your card.

From "Bard".

 

[danb35]

I mainly want to have a home media server that will serve maximum to one client. Do you have something else to propose?

TrueNAS SCALE
OpenMediaVault
UnRAID

With any of these, you're going to need to invest some time with the docs to understand what they are, what they do, and how to make them do it. Or you could just run Plex/Emby/Jellyfin on whatever Windows PC you might have. If all you want is a home media server, TrueNAS is gross overkill for your needs.

 

[ChrisRJ]

In addition, having had "home media servers" since 2004, I would like to emphasize that this is a very broad term. Back in 2004 it usually meant a PC that would work as a digital VCR from analogue TV. Does anyone still know the Hauppauge PVR-350?

Today I use TrueNAS Core in that context merely as an SMB server that feeds a Raspberry Pi running Kodi. But there is a plethora of other use-cases out there. So the more specific you can be, the more help you will get.

 

[winnielinnie]

Does anyone still know the Hauppauge PVR-350?

I used to it record television shows to watch later on my custom-built Windows XP "Home DVR".

(I never ended up watching any of my recorded sows, and eventually we entered the convenient world of online steaming services.)

 

[Whattteva]

In addition, having had "home media servers" since 2004, I would like to emphasize that this is a very broad term. Back in 2004 it usually meant a PC that would work as a digital VCR from analogue TV. Does anyone still know the Hauppauge PVR-350?

I used a Happauge gear, but it was their TV tuner card.

Today I use TrueNAS Core in that context merely as an SMB server that feeds a Raspberry Pi running Kodi.

I did this for a while with my Raspberry Pi 4 for a bit, but I found that it's severely lacking in power especially for 4k videos. I also hate that Kodi has to run full screen on it. I switched to the 1 Liter micro PC and the experience is just leaps and bounds better.

 

[Patrick M. Hausen]

I use SMB to manage my media and NFS for read-only export. Infuse Player on every device lets me browse and play my library. It was the only solution I found that satisfyingly reads and uses embedded metadata.

 

[Whattteva]

Ah no wonder I have never heard of that player. It's an Apple only thing. I'm not a big fan of such things... funny coming from someone like me whose day job is iOS developer.

 

[Patrick M. Hausen]

I have a ton of media from ripped DVDs and BRs I own with meticulously curated metadata - actors, director, producer, cover image, episode summary ... inside the files as ID3 tags. And then Plex and Kobi and friends download arbitrary garbage from the Internet based on the file names ... WTF?

That's why I ended up paying for Infuse. Very satisfied customer.

 

[simos.sigma]

TrueNAS SCALE
OpenMediaVault
UnRAID

With any of these, you're going to need to invest some time with the docs to understand what they are, what they do, and how to make them do it. Or you could just run Plex/Emby/Jellyfin on whatever Windows PC you might have. If all you want is a home media server, TrueNAS is gross overkill for your needs.

I’m willing to do as you say, but if I want to use the particular machine that I mentioned in my signature, is it okay or is it too old to use anyway?

But there is a plethora of other use-cases out there. So the more specific you can be, the more help you will get.

I want to turn one of my old PCs, in this particular case the one with the specs you see in my signature, into a home media server that will contain my movies, music, photos, etc. But mainly movies. And I also want to have the ability to send these media to my Chrome Cast(s), smartphone(s), TV(s) etc, but only to one of them at a time...

 

[danb35]

I’m willing to do as you say, but if I want to use the particular machine that I mentioned in my signature, is it okay or is it too old to use anyway?

Whether it's to old or otherwise unsuitable for some other OS I don't know; you'd need to check with them. But it doesn't meet even the minimum RAM requirement for a base installation of CORE, much less SCALE, and certainly not with a media server running. The front-side bus is going to kill any performance, and the onboard Realtek NIC is known to be a POS. Your hardware is entirely unsuitable for any version (edit: just to be clear, this means "any version, ever," not just "any current version") of Free/TrueNAS.

 

[Whattteva]

I want to turn one of my old PCs, in this particular case the one with the specs you see in my signature, into a home media server that will contain my movies, music, photos, etc. But mainly movies. And I also want to have the ability to send these media to my Chrome Cast(s), smartphone(s), TV(s) etc, but only to one of them at a time...

Holy smokes, that thing is older than some teenagers in my family. It's older than even the last system in my signature that I have retired, and by a lot too.

On a more serious note, you can probably use OpenMediaVault on that, but don't expect miracles and I probably won't even bother with transcoding. Just use it as a file server/streamer and just let the devices render it themselves.

 

[simos.sigma]

On a more serious note, you can probably use OpenMediaVault on that, but don't expect miracles and I probably won't even bother with transcoding. Just use it as a file server/streamer and just let the devices render it themselves.

Hm, after all these answers, I thought "it was just a dream and it's gone" and I was ready to strip this machine for parts. I just saw a video about OpenMediaVault and I'm thinking of giving it one more chance before I strip it for parts.

I have three questions:

1. Can I do that using Jellyfin for OpenMediaVault or do I have to find another way?

2. Will the disk with my media files in TrueNAS Core be gone? Do I have to format the disk and transfer those files back again, or is there any trick to make them available in OpenMediaVault as they are?

3. Can OpenMediaVault take advantage of the specific GPU, it could be useful anywhere except for transcoding, or would it be better to remove it in order not to burden the PSU?

 

[sretalla]

Can I do that using Jellyfin for OpenMediaVault or do I have to find another way?

Using OpenMediaVault to run Jellyfin is probably a thing... I'm not sure what you mean otherwise.

Will the disk with my media files in TrueNAS Core be gone? Do I have to format the disk and transfer those files back again, or is there any trick to make them available in OpenMediaVault as they are?

I don't think OMV reads/operates with ZFS, so no, you'll have to get that data copied back to another filesystem that OMV can use.

Can OpenMediaVault take advantage of the specific GPU, it could be useful anywhere except for transcoding, or would it be better to remove it in order not to burden the PSU?

Depends on a lot of things... you'll probably need to try it to know for sure what's best... if you can get away without transcoding on the server side, that's always a good thing.

 

[simos.sigma]

Depends on a lot of things... you'll probably need to try it to know for sure what's best... if you can get away without transcoding on the server side, that's always a good thing.

I'll try it out, but as I see it, even if I use TrueNAS Core with Jellyfin or OpenMediaVault with Jellyfin, the thing (in my case, with this machine) is to make all my video files compatible with even the most inferior devices (such as ChromeCast, TV, etc.) at home, so to prevent Jellyfin from transcoding. Right? Why to move on OpenMediaVault then? Couldn't I do the same with TrueNAS Core and Jellyfin? Or can OpenMediaVault handle what I want to do better?

 

[sretalla]

Why to move on OpenMediaVault then? Couldn't I do the same with TrueNAS Core and Jellyfin? Or can OpenMediaVault handle what I want to do better?

If you're prepared to take the "hit" to transcode (i.e. convert) all your media to acceptable formats ahead of time, then there's no specific benefit to any OS over the other.

OMV may be better at handling the video card and making it available to Jellyfin, so that may be worth a try if you would prefer hardware assisted transcoding rather than converting all your media.

 

[simos.sigma]

If you're prepared to take the "hit" to transcode (i.e. convert) all your media to acceptable formats ahead of time, then there's no specific benefit to any OS over the other.

OMV may be better at handling the video card and making it available to Jellyfin, so that may be worth a try if you would prefer hardware assisted transcoding rather than converting all your media.

Of course, I prefer hardware-assisted transcoding rather than converting all my media... I just wanted to know if OMV can handle the video card better.

What do you think about the idea of installing Windows 10 and Jellyfin Server on this specific machine? I'm asking because of driver compatibility. What do you think would be the pros and cons, if any?

 

[sretalla]

What do you think about the idea of installing Windows 10 and Jellyfin Server on this specific machine? I'm asking because of driver compatibility. What do you think would be the pros and cons, if any?

1. probably the best chance of getting the video card involved
2. no real support for zfs (look at https://github.com/openzfsonwindows/ZFSin/releases as a potential helper to bringing over the content)

 

[simos.sigma]

no real support for zfs (look at https://github.com/openzfsonwindows/ZFSin/releases as a potential helper to bringing over the content)

It's okay, I have all these files on an external HDD (NTFS) too!!!

But I won't have a web-based UI, right? I mean, I should set up a monitor, keyboard, mouse, etc.

 

[sretalla]

But I won't have a web-based UI, right? I mean, I should set up a monitor, keyboard, mouse, etc.

Not for the OS, unless you count RDP (which would need first to be set up with those attached), but for the app(s), probably.

 

[winnielinnie]

Can OpenMediaVault take advantage of the specific GPU, it could be useful anywhere except for transcoding

Being that this GPU doesn't support hardware encoding (needed to leverage on-the-fly transcoding), you can only really get value from it as a video display, if your motherboard doesn't have an integrated GPU.

The GPU came to market in 2011 (twelve years ago). There is no documentation I could find that shows it supports hardware encoding. Nvidia's own website doesn't even list it as supported. (I'm not sure who this "Bard" is, and why they claim it does support it?)

Then you're left with the CPU for transcoding, of which it may not be powerful enough to keep up with the real-time demands of the client. Your Core2 processor came to market in 2008 (fifteen years ago). I doubt it can transcode a 4K video fast enough to keep up with a client in real-time. You're better off just "pre-encoding" your videos to be used specifically for streaming.

* If a client is watching a video at 30fps, then the transcode task itself needs to be encoding the video from one format to another faster than 30fps. Whichever software you use, you'd have to choose the fastest preset available.