Dell setup

Hey everyone, I’m looking for some solid advice on putting together a decent Dell setup for my home theater. I’m torn between just picking up a pre-built machine or if it’s actually worth the effort to custom-build the whole rig myself. The main thing is that I need it to handle streaming 4K content smoothly, so I’m wondering just how much of a heavy lifter the graphics card needs to be in this equation. I’m actually planning to upgrade my Radeon HD 7970 pretty soon, so I was thinking about repurposing it for this HTPC. If I go that route, I’d still need to hunt down a motherboard, a processor, a power supply, and some RAM, though I feel pretty confident about picking out my own case and Hard Drives 😁
My vision is to tuck this little machine away in the basement, hooked directly into the modem, and then networked over to my main desktop upstairs—where I'll do all the heavy lifting of organizing files—and finally to the TV, since everything will be streamed exclusively through a Plex server.

A Radeon HD 7970 and a Dell desktop are two things that just don't belong together. First off, the physical size—it’s not a low-profile card. But even if you tried to force it into a small ITX case, there's really no point in putting a former high-end monster with a 250W TDP inside a machine like that. Honestly, you should just sell it.

Regarding the configuration, drop a link to whatever shop you're looking at over in the States, and let me know what your budget is. Also, are you specifically looking for HEVC support?

You can find everything you need right over at http://www.mylemon.at/ ... since I'm running a 4K TV, having HEVC support is an absolute must-have for me. As for the budget, I don't really have a strict limit set in stone; I'm honestly not quite sure what kind of price tag we're looking at here. It doesn't necessarily need to be some top-tier, high-end monster, but like I mentioned, it needs to be able to handle 4K material without breaking a sweat—especially if I need to encode something because the TV doesn't play nice with a specific AV format.

If you have the know-how, it’s always better to just build it yourself, isn't it? Any decent graphics card—even a basic Intel integrated chip—can handle 4K playback without breaking a sweat. However, when it comes to hardware-accelerated HEVC decoding, we're pretty much limited to the GTX 900 series if I recall correctly; otherwise, you're stuck relying on software, which means leaning heavily on your CPU. And let's be honest, when dealing with HEVC at 4K resolution, you really need a beefy processor, or else you'll be staring at a stuttering mess. (I'm not entirely sure where things stand regarding transcoding within Plex, but I can almost guarantee that's going to be just as demanding.)

If the GTX 950 actually handles HEVC, then it’s basically the most budget-friendly way to go, probably sitting around $160 or so, while a GTX 960 might run you closer to $190. It really makes you wonder, though—is it actually worth shelling out the extra cash for a dedicated graphics card, or would I be better off just investing that money into a beefier processor that can tackle all that heavy lifting through software instead?

Skylake handles HEVC hardware decoding, so you probably don't even need a dedicated GPU. From what I've been reading online, it seems to work pretty smoothly:

https://www.reddit.com/r/htpc/commen...h265_decoding/
http://forum.doom9.org/showthread.ph...14#post1735714

Well, it looks like the Skylake 530 actually pulls it off... my 520 struggles quite a bit when it comes to 4K HEVC, though I suppose that’s hardly surprising given it's just a laptop processor. Still, there is the catch: if you happen to need HDCP 2.2, then that integrated graphics chip is basically useless.

The GTX 950 isn't the only one
The RX 480 and whatever comes next also support HEVC

Do I actually need to worry about HDCP 2.2 if I'm planning to use this PC strictly as a dedicated Plex server? Also, looking at the CPU side of things, would an Intel Core i5-6600K be enough to get the job done?
Since my current office setup is running an Intel Core i7-4770K, which performs pretty much right in the same ballpark as an Intel Core i5-6600, I'm wondering if it's worth dropping an extra $100 to go with an Intel Core i7-6700K and a brand-new motherboard. I could always repurpose the Intel Core i7-4770K by moving it over to my old ASUS Z87-Pro, or am I just throwing money away on something I don't really need?

Where on earth did an i5 come from in this conversation?

Jack Alvarez said:Do I actually need to worry about HDCP 2.2 if I'm planning to use this PC strictly as a dedicated Plex server? Also, looking at the CPU side of things, would an Intel Core i5-6600K be enough to get the job done?
Since my current office setup is running an Intel Core i7-4770K, which performs pretty much right in the same ballpark as an Intel Core i5-6600, I'm wondering if it's worth dropping an extra $100 to go with an Intel Core i7-6700K and a brand-new motherboard. I could always repurpose the Intel Core i7-4770K by moving it over to my old ASUS Z87-Pro, or am I just throwing money away on something I don't really need?

They aren't really "in the same ballpark," are they? You see, the Intel Core i7-4770K doesn't support HEVC, meaning you'll be stuck decoding everything via software rather than leaning on the integrated graphics.

If you want to find out if your current hardware can even handle the load—and just how much of a struggle it will be—you might want to check out this link from fadedorca66:
http://forum.doom9.org/showthread.ph...14#post1735714

At the end of the day, isn't it probably wiser to just pick either a dedicated graphics card or a newer processor that handles the heavy lifting natively? It really comes down to whatever is more practical for your specific workflow and, more importantly, your budget.

I have a feeling that the system can handle it quite easily, especially when you look at the specs for

Code:

there aren't any issues at all, though I'm honestly not sure how it manages to "process" it all so smoothly

To be perfectly honest, I'm a bit out of my element here and don't really know what to pick, which is why I'm reaching out for some advice. If someone could suggest a configuration where everything just works seamlessly, we can then dive into the actual costs and see if there's anything we might need to swap out or adjust.

Look, if you aren't interested in a dual-core Pentium paired with Intel HD Graphics 530, then just go all out and grab an i3-6100 along with a motherboard featuring HDMI 2.0 or DisplayPort 1.2 (you can find all those options in the links fadedorca66 provided). Honestly, I don't think you need anything more than that. Just keep in mind that the CPU isn't going to be doing the heavy lifting here; the integrated graphics will be handling the actual workload.

So, I think this should be more than enough to get things moving...



Plus, maybe throw in two extra HDDs... though I'm wondering if an SSD is actually necessary here?

Edit: Also, do I really need a motherboard equipped with HDMI 2.0 and DisplayPort? Honestly, I don't see the point in ever hooking this rig up to a TV since everything is handled through streaming anyway—it just doesn't seem practical to me.