HP elitedesk 800 G5 i5-9500t

[Manderis]

Hey, 

First time home lab builder here.

Usecase:

I want to provide a private cloud for backing up fotos from the phones of family and remove some files from my desktop pc with a single point of failure to a more redundant location. I will probably offer that to family as well via tailscale. I have not really looked into plex or jellyfin because I don't have a private library but I canceled all the streaming subscriptions this year because I didn't like the value proposition anymore, that why one of my requirements was decent decoding. Right now I am locking at a 2x4 TB for now. 

Oh, and I am looking for something very power efficient because for each Watt in idle I have to pay ~2,60 €/Year here in Germany. 

 

Option 1:

I have seen a video from Hardware Haven using the Elitedesk 800 G3 with an older Pentium processor for a jellyfin server (in the end he used a similar machine because he derped). 

The advantage of the SFF case (not the mini) is apparently that it fits 2x3.5" and one 2.5" additionaly to the m.2 drive. 

 

So my eye fell on the ebay listing HP EliteDesk 800 G5 SFF PC INTEL CORE i5-9500T (6x 2,20GHz) 16GB DDR4 256GB SSD with a coupon price of 206 € (~217 USD). 

Base on this Google list (last update sadly 2022) the 9500T has superb idle power consumption. https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1LHvT2fRp7I6Hf18LcSzsNnjp10VI-odvwZpQZKv_NCI/edit?usp=drivesdk

 

The CPU Plus the Intel UHD 630 probably can handle everything it needs to do for the next 4+ years. If I feel the need for more drives I can always print a new enclosure and use either the PCIe 3 x16 or the x4 for a nice HBA for more SATA or SAS. I am playing with the idea of using "refurbished" SAS drives because they are so dirt cheap. 

Option 2:

The other solutions I was looking at where the Asrock and Asus N100 boards, adding PSU, RAM, SSD and case I will probably be above 280 € with a significantly less powerful machine and similarish idle power consumption. 

 

Option 3:

Wendell from Level1Techs has shown the use of a mini pc plus a USB enclosure that would only be slightly more expensive. But I have trouble trusting USB for a always on solution that ideally should detect each drive 100% of the time. 

 

I would like to hear your opinions on this, I think you can already guess that the Elitedesk is my current favorite but maybe I missed something significant. 

[Mobius]

• n100 will struggle with plex/jellyfin if things like subtitles are at all important.
  • but im sure itd be more than adequate for say next cloud or immich
• usb drives are not recommended for truenas/hexos in general
• 9500t will likely serve you quite well for a long time
  • using an hba + a 3d printed enclosure sounds like a solid idea
• as of now hexos requires all drives (exccept the boot drive) to be in a pool of at least 2 drives

 

Edited December 7, 2024 by Mobius

[Dylan]

13 minutes ago, Mobius said:

• n100 will struggle with plex/jellyfin if things like subtitles are at all important.
  • but im sure itd be more than adequate for say next cloud or immich
• usb drives are not recommended for truenas/hexos in general
• 9500t will likely serve you quite well for a long time
  • using an hba + a 3d printed enclosure sounds like a solid idea
• as of now hexos requires all drives (exccept the boot drive) to be in a pool of at least 2 drives

 

Can you share what you have read/experienced that suggests the N100 will struggle? I ask because I have a NAS on order (to be shipped) that has the N100. Prior to purchase I looked at the Jellyfin documentation that shows the N100 is not only supported but recommended. Hoping I haven't overlooked something.

Thanks!

 

[Mobius]

53 minutes ago, Dylan said:

Can you share what you have read/experienced that suggests the N100 will struggle? I ask because I have a NAS on order (to be shipped) that has the N100. Prior to purchase I looked at the Jellyfin documentation that shows the N100 is not only supported but recommended. Hoping I haven't overlooked something.

Thanks!

 

i'm just going off of posts i read on reddit. N100 will work on jellyfin plex without subtitles

here is one of the threads ive seen

 

[engirugger42]

Anecdotally, but hands on, I have a minisforum with a Celeron J4125 and 8 gigs of RAM and I've had no issues with transcoding on Plex or Jellyfin for the past 2 years. Both are running on docker with hardware passthrough, though I almost exclusively used Plex. This includes hosting a watch together for which my local device could direct play the file, but the remote party had to transcode and Plex pulling subtitles via OpenSubs on the fly. Subtitles specifically have never given me any great issue, except when they weren't available altogether. I was living in Germany until recently and without fail, my bottleneck was always my Internet connection (Crappy 5G internet, but my only other option was 6 meg vDSL). Power draw of that server was negligible and it has twice the TDP of the N100. Despite the lower power draw of the N100, it will soundly beat my J4125 on any benchmark or hardware data point. Additionaly, it has newer encode hardware for h.264/5 and more audio codecs. I mention that last bit because I have seen the Celeron occasionally struggle with audio, which results in forcing a partial transcode for all parties. All that being said, I do take some care in ensuring my media is all in the most compatible formats for the devices I'm serving (Mostly Roku and Apple TV), but that's just some time in Handbrake and trolling forums for what other users have found to work well.

 

All that being said, both the n100 and  i5-9500T are fine choices for relatively low power servers. I chose my celeron for power concerns and have never regretted it. The only thing I would say you should consider is expansion. The i5, in addition to generally being the beefier processor, will be capable of handling more memory should you want to expand that down the road. Those EliteDesk style  PCs, in my experience, will typically only take a single stick of memory, but they can go full tilt on a 32 or 64 gig stick. I have a SFF PC on standby for Hex that can take 2 sticks, so ymmv. For those reading this wondering if they goofed by getting a n100 instead of an older i5, I would say you have nothing to worry about, the nice thing about this category of home server is there are very few wrong answers, just caveats that may be worth considering. A far cry from my early days of tinkering where the best I could get was a Pentium 3 with 128 megs of RAM. It's a good time to be an enthusiast.

[Dylan]

2 hours ago, Manderis said:

Hey, 

First time home lab builder here.

Usecase:

I want to provide a private cloud for backing up fotos from the phones of family and remove some files from my desktop pc with a single point of failure to a more redundant location. I will probably offer that to family as well via tailscale. I have not really looked into plex or jellyfin because I don't have a private library but I canceled all the streaming subscriptions this year because I didn't like the value proposition anymore, that why one of my requirements was decent decoding. Right now I am locking at a 2x4 TB for now. 

Oh, and I am looking for something very power efficient because for each Watt in idle I have to pay ~2,60 €/Year here in Germany. 

 

Option 1:

I have seen a video from Hardware Haven using the Elitedesk 800 G3 with an older Pentium processor for a jellyfin server (in the end he used a similar machine because he derped). 

The advantage of the SFF case (not the mini) is apparently that it fits 2x3.5" and one 2.5" additionaly to the m.2 drive. 

 

So my eye fell on the ebay listing HP EliteDesk 800 G5 SFF PC INTEL CORE i5-9500T (6x 2,20GHz) 16GB DDR4 256GB SSD with a coupon price of 206 € (~217 USD). 

Base on this Google list (last update sadly 2022) the 9500T has superb idle power consumption. https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1LHvT2fRp7I6Hf18LcSzsNnjp10VI-odvwZpQZKv_NCI/edit?usp=drivesdk

 

The CPU Plus the Intel UHD 630 probably can handle everything it needs to do for the next 4+ years. If I feel the need for more drives I can always print a new enclosure and use either the PCIe 3 x16 or the x4 for a nice HBA for more SATA or SAS. I am playing with the idea of using "refurbished" SAS drives because they are so dirt cheap. 

Option 2:

The other solutions I was looking at where the Asrock and Asus N100 boards, adding PSU, RAM, SSD and case I will probably be above 280 € with a significantly less powerful machine and similarish idle power consumption. 

 

Option 3:

Wendell from Level1Techs has shown the use of a mini pc plus a USB enclosure that would only be slightly more expensive. But I have trouble trusting USB for a always on solution that ideally should detect each drive 100% of the time. 

 

I would like to hear your opinions on this, I think you can already guess that the Elitedesk is my current favorite but maybe I missed something significant. 

I bought THIS DEVICE specifically to run HexOS as I too am only looking to stream movies/shows, store photos etc. It also has the N100 but it I did upgrade the RAM to 32GB and suspect that I'll have a more than sufficient system for my needs and beyond (with in reason). I think @Mobius is probably right to call out that the N100 is likely the minimum CPU you'd want for a fully functional NAS. However your post is pretty clear that your requirements are small along with consideration for power consumption and I think the N100 meets those needs.

Good luck!

[engirugger42]

That's a really cool device and good price point, it seems like we're seeing more and more of these purpose built general home server/NAS boxes popping up. And it brings up another good point. Consider that most QNAP boxes, for a readily available comparison, are running something comparable to a N100 and they're advertised to run Plex. Y'all are going to have fun with your setups.

[Dylan]

1 hour ago, engirugger42 said:

Anecdotally, but hands on, I have a minisforum with a Celeron J4125 and 8 gigs of RAM and I've had no issues with transcoding on Plex or Jellyfin for the past 2 years. Both are running on docker with hardware passthrough, though I almost exclusively used Plex. This includes hosting a watch together for which my local device could direct play the file, but the remote party had to transcode and Plex pulling subtitles via OpenSubs on the fly. Subtitles specifically have never given me any great issue, except when they weren't available altogether. I was living in Germany until recently and without fail, my bottleneck was always my Internet connection (Crappy 5G internet, but my only other option was 6 meg vDSL). Power draw of that server was negligible and it has twice the TDP of the N100. Despite the lower power draw of the N100, it will soundly beat my J4125 on any benchmark or hardware data point. Additionaly, it has newer encode hardware for h.264/5 and more audio codecs. I mention that last bit because I have seen the Celeron occasionally struggle with audio, which results in forcing a partial transcode for all parties. All that being said, I do take some care in ensuring my media is all in the most compatible formats for the devices I'm serving (Mostly Roku and Apple TV), but that's just some time in Handbrake and trolling forums for what other users have found to work well.

 

All that being said, both the n100 and  i5-9500T are fine choices for relatively low power servers. I chose my celeron for power concerns and have never regretted it. The only thing I would say you should consider is expansion. The i5, in addition to generally being the beefier processor, will be capable of handling more memory should you want to expand that down the road. Those EliteDesk style  PCs, in my experience, will typically only take a single stick of memory, but they can go full tilt on a 32 or 64 gig stick. I have a SFF PC on standby for Hex that can take 2 sticks, so ymmv. For those reading this wondering if they goofed by getting a n100 instead of an older i5, I would say you have nothing to worry about, the nice thing about this category of home server is there are very few wrong answers, just caveats that may be worth considering. A far cry from my early days of tinkering where the best I could get was a Pentium 3 with 128 megs of RAM. It's a good time to be an enthusiast.

Really appreciate your post and the specific examples you provide - well done. I also like what you said about being mindful of curating your media to enable your device to remain performant - not asking it to do more than it may be able to handle. One of the things I need to spend some time to validate is the N100 memory issue. While Intel only supports 16GB there are several reports of 32GB working just fine. This mostly appears to be mobo/bios/HW specific. In my case, the vendor does sell a 32GB version but isolating whether this is a single 32GB stick or 2x16GB I'll have to chase down.

But, you're right - it's a great time to be an enthusiast Cheers!.

[Mobius]

Yeah i defintely look at things through my own lens a lot. I love watching anime with subtitles so its important to me to bring up where things might go wrong with it but i do try to also be objective

[Manderis]

8 hours ago, engirugger42 said:

Those EliteDesk style  PCs, in my experience, will typically only take a single stick of memory

That is the fun thing. If I did my research right this one takes 4 sticks! 

 

I also looked at the Aoostar WTR Pro, but in the end I feel like I can do better price to performance if I go used. I will probably end at the same price with drives compared to the prebuild without drives. 

And the 200 $ 2 bay option is a bit to limited for my taste