where to start? building a linux transcoding machine

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checktravis

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Jul 12, 2014
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i have a goflex home nas that i have hacked to near perfection (for my needs) with arch linux, transmission bittorrent client, and minidlna.

the only thing it lacks is the processing power to support transcoding. so, i think i would like to keep it as a file server and build a dedicated, headless, transcoding dnla server. ideally, it would be fast enough to transcode and stream 1080 video to multiple clients simultaneously. i would leave the torrent and file management on the goflex and use this new server for media streaming and maybe owncloud.

i have read many interesting guides like this one http://www.zdnet.com/blog/gadgetreviews/how-to-build-a-300-diy-nas-device-with-ikea/2006 but i'm a bit overwhelmed by the options available.

i would like some advice on what processer i need. i apologize if this question is too general, i just need a nudge in the right direction. my budget is $500, but $300 would be nice :)

thanks
 
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Your example in the link you provided is for a NAS, not a video transcoder. 2 GB of RAM is not going to cut the mustard for transcoding video.

For video encoding you will need CPU horsepower, and you can't get much for $500. I do video encoding from blu-ray and TV recordings (MPEG-2) to MPEG-4 (H.264) with the open-source HandBrake, and it will use as many threads (logical CPU cores) as you can provide.

Personally I would stick with Intel CPUs, but there are some eight-core AMD chips that, while the CPU isn't as powerful, there are somewhat better at highly threaded workloads like video encoding.

What does your budget include? Everything to build a PC, or do you already have some items such as a case, PSU, hard drive, etc.?

EDIT...
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mbreslin1954

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Nov 27, 2010
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Your example in the link you provided is for a NAS, not a video transcoder. 2 GB of RAM is not going to cut the mustard for transcoding video.

For video encoding you will need CPU horsepower, and you can't get much for $500. I do video encoding from blu-ray and TV recordings (MPEG-2) to MPEG-4 (H.264) with the open-source HandBrake, and it will use as many threads (logical CPU cores) as you can provide.

Personally I would stick with Intel CPUs, but there are some eight-core AMD chips that, while the CPU isn't as powerful, there are somewhat better at highly threaded workloads like video encoding.

What does your budget include? Everything to build a PC, or do you already have some items such as a case, PSU, hard drive, etc.?

EDIT: You can build your device on the cheap, it will just take you longer to encode the videos. When you say "transcoding", does that mean that you intend to encode and stream the data at the same time, or will you encode the video into another file, then stream it later?
 
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