Looking for cost friendly suggestions. Any that are under $100 that are good?
$120 after the coupon applied. I can vouch for it as I run it as an additional server in my RV. I ditched the windows and Installed Ubuntu. If 256gb of storage is enough this is a solid pick.
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I've been running this ATOPNUC MA90 as the DVR server for the past 4 months. Works fantastic out of the box with an added USB HDD. I opened it up and installed a 2TB SSD inside just to reduce the footprint. Channels DVR Server runs stable as a rock on this box. My clients are Shields.
They had another model, ATOPNUC MX30 that had a beefier processor and came with Win 11 Pro. I bought one of those also and it is very nice. I would actually recommend that one instead, however problem is, its been unavailable for a couple weeks.
I was just looking and they have an alternate version of the MA90, the MA91 that has the same 8GB RAM & 128GB SSD, but instead of 2 HDMI ports it has 2 Ethernet ports and a $20 coupon that makes it $79.
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Will he have to use CPU encoding/decoding with the AMD processor?
Hardware transcoding is supposed to be working.
I tried using one of those cheap mini PCs with a recent Intel N100 at first and it worked fine if all you wanted to do was basic TVE and HDMI recording, but I also wanted to use the Chrome encoder and it was totally useless for that. Way too much CPU being used.
Swapped it out for a Beelink Ryzen 7 5800H and it's a beast, can do anything. Of course it cost a couple hundred dollars more lol.
Well that is expected if you want to use Chrome Encoder ... but very few use it.
Refurbished HP Elitedesk G2 800 Mini .. ~$100 on amazon. 4 core i5 6500T -- burns about 35 watts. Add a spinning HD for $40, install your preferred linux distro or use WIn10. Transcodes and comskips very rapidly. Only need 8gb of memory. 4 will also suffice just fine.
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Find a Mac Mini M1. They are pretty low in price now...Well, low relative to Apple Products...Or splurge and grab a M2 Mini...
Whatever you can afford anything with an Intel GPU will most likely use QuickSync for transcoding. Running Channels DVR is really not that CPU Intensive all it is really doing is Copying a Stream to your Hard Drive/ Or Reading from your hard drive ... unless you want to use some of the other gimmicks.
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As noted above, some of the Beelinks with Intel CPUs work great for Channels including Quicksync transcoding. TVE and OTA works very well and no appreciable load. It will run some of the docker projects as well like the PBS ones and others like it without issue. And if you get a new one (amazon?) you can return it if you don't like it.
And to expand on the prior comments, if you plan on specifically the Chrome Cast for Channels (CC4C) project on the same box, CC4C will run, but not smoothly. CC4C is not for everybody - mostly the tinkerers and requires waaay more horsepower to run smoothly.
Does the transcoding that a mino PC does help with picture quality at all? Or just eliminates the choppiness? In what ways does a mini PC improve the viewing experience?
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For the best experience quality wise (and on your local network) use original quality which is no transcoding. Only use transcoding if you have external clients where you want to limit their bandwidth or the clients have limited throughput. I dont use transcoding at all in my environment even over cellular. I have unlimited data plans, 5gUW coverage as well as no upload caps on my fiber isp.
Where do you set for "no transcoding"? On the mini PC itself? If I turn it off, what will it do to the picture quality? Look alot better?
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On your playback device (apple tv, shield, etc). Transcoding is going to cost you CPU cycles and it is not necessary especially on your local network. Original quality is always best picture wise
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I thought that the DVR server only transcoded video that you are streaming to devices outside your local network and over the Internet. I remember seeing posts stating that if you are not using remote DVR access, don't worry about server transcoding.
@ssolitis
Transcoding is used to reduce the data rate required to stream the video over the Internet.
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