I have a QNAP TS-253D (Celeron J4125, 4GB RAM) hosting all my files. I used to have Jellyfin running on it in a Docker container, but it performed really poorly (which is expected ig). It used to take forever to stream a 1080p movie, and seeking back and forth would freeze the whole thing.

Then I moved my Jellyfin setup to my desktop PC (i9-10850k, 16GB RAM, 2080 Super), the files are still on my NAS. It performs much better now, streaming is a breeze and it almost never freezes or anything.

Problem is, it eats up all my RAM. My RAM usage is 99% almost all the time someone uses Jellyfin and it significantly hampers my regular work on my desktop. I can upgrade my RAM to 32 or 64 GB, but would that solve the problem?

If not, what is the cheapest mini PC or home setup that I can do that’d free up my desktop but still give me similar or at least good enough performance?

Thank you for your advice.

  • GolemancerVekkBEnglish
    1·
    1 year ago

    How is your RAM being used? Look at CPU-X in the “System” tab. If the memory is mostly used for buffers and cache then it’s not a problem, you want it to be used like that.

    I ran my NAS for years off an i5 (Kaby Lake) with 4 GB of RAM and 32 GB of NVMe storage and it handled any of the usual media servers just fine. I’ve used them all, Plex, Emby and now Jellyfin.

    Have a look at this table, get the cheapest used Intel CPU you can find that fits your transcoding requirements, slap it on a board with enough SATA connectors and 4 GB of RAM and you should be good to go.

    Docker should not have a large impact, I have 15 containers running right now and they only use 2.5 GB of RAM in total (for reals, without buffers/cache).