What is needed to get jellyfin running as a server? (lemmy.world)

submitted 11 months ago by LifeOfChance@lemmy.world to c/jellyfin@lemmy.ml

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I'm working on learning about servers and such but it's a lot to take in. I'm looking to get a 5tb hard drive and install it into a network attached storage tower. What else would be needed to make this work? Links provided are what I'm thinking

QNAP TS-233-US 2 Bay Affordable Desktop NAS with ARM Cortex-A55 Quad-core Processor and 2 GB DDR4 RAM (Diskless) https://a.co/d/725WsHM

Seagate Portable 5TB External Hard Drive HDD – USB 3.0 for PC, Mac, PS4, & Xbox - 1-Year Rescue Service (STGX5000400), Black https://a.co/d/fClqYLT

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[-] peasntanks@lemmy.ml 9 points 11 months ago* (last edited 11 months ago)

To directly answer your question, what you need to run Jellyfin is a computer with sufficient CPU, RAM, storage, and networking. Many NASs can fill this role as can Single Board Computers (e.g. Raspberry Pi).

The QNAP you listed here doesn't seem to have Jellyfin as an app, but it does have Plex. You can find this information on the manufacturer Website.

Hardware: https://www.qnap.com/en-us/product/ts-233

Apps: https://www.qnap.com/en-us/app_center/?os=qts&version=5.1.0~5.1.3&II=616

The type of hard drive required for this NAS is 'internal', what you have linked as your hdd is an external USB drive, it wouldn't work the way you are intending. You need an internal SATA drive. Two would be ideal.

Internal SATA NAS drive: https://www.amazon.com/Seagate-IronWolf-Internal-Hard-Drive/dp/B084ZV4DXB/qid=1700590050

With a 4-core ARM cpu and 2GB of non-expandable RAM, I'm not convinced it would be a good Jellyfin experience. It could at first, maybe for one user at a time; but if you wanted to expand its capabilities (eg. have two streams at the same time), you might not be able to. YMMV

Rather than this QNAP unit, you could go with something that has expandable RAM and the Jellyfin app available to the OS. As mentioned in other comments, Synology is a well-known brand with lots of community support.

Hardware: Synology DS224 https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0C6927XPX/ref=twister_B0CLWLQCT6

Internal SATA NAS drive: https://www.amazon.com/Seagate-IronWolf-Internal-Hard-Drive/dp/B084ZV4DXB/qid=1700590050

Which very nearly doubles the price of the QNAP, but has expandable RAM up to 6GB.

If you're willing to learn a little bit of Linux and CLI, for the price, you can't beat a Raspberry Pi 8GB. It already has more RAM than either of those units can provide, is cheaper to boot, and would use the External HDD you selected. There was a shortage for a couple years with COVID, but with the release of the RPi 5, these are becoming available.

https://www.pishop.us/product/raspberry-pi-4-model-b-8gb/

There are MANY guides on setting up Jellyfin on Raspberry Pi, like this one: https://pimylifeup.com/raspberry-pi-jellyfin/

[-] LifeOfChance@lemmy.world 4 points 11 months ago

Wow this was such a great learning experience. For what I'm trying to achieve it would seem the PI option would be best. Trying to keep it budget friendly and only need to stream to 1 device. I've also been trying to justify buying a PI for awhile. The plethora of guides will make it pretty easy to set up based off what you provided and a quick bit of research. I should be able to learn Linux and CLI enough to set it up as well. Thank you for all of this information!