This page covers how to design and build the physical machine that runs Plex Media Server and Unmanic optimization services in the Trash Panda ecosystem.
This guide is intentionally focused on hardware selection and base OS installation only. Application configuration is covered elsewhere.
The target audience here is someone building their first serious Plex environment who wants:
Before talking about hardware, it’s worth answering a common question:
Why not just run Plex on the NAS or inside a VM?
Running Plex directly on a NAS can work — until it doesn’t.
Limitations commonly encountered:
For light, single-user setups this may be acceptable. For shared libraries and automation, it becomes a bottleneck.
Virtualizing Plex introduces a different set of tradeoffs:
VMs shine for control-plane services. Plex is a data-plane workload — latency and throughput matter.
A dedicated physical host:
In this ecosystem, Plex and Unmanic are the only services that truly benefit from bare metal — so they get it.
Why Ubuntu:
The OS should exist solely to support Plex and Unmanic.
When sizing this machine, prioritize:
1. Transcoding efficiency
2. Fast I/O for caching and processing
3. Thermal stability under sustained load
4. Headroom for spikes, not averages
The media lives on the NAS. This machine exists to process and serve it.
This section intentionally adds a bit of pragmatic subjectivity. There is no single perfect answer for every build, but there are choices that consistently produce better real‑world results.
The guidance below balances performance, efficiency, cost, and long‑term usability for Plex and Unmanic workloads.
For a dedicated Plex + Unmanic server, what matters most is:
Once you are past ~6 quality cores, transcoding performance is driven far more by hardware acceleration than raw CPU power.
Both Intel and AMD CPUs can work extremely well in this role:
Rather than chasing a brand, focus on:
While integrated graphics can work, this guide recommends a discrete GPU for most builders.
Objectively, discrete GPUs provide:
Integrated GPUs share power and thermal budgets with the CPU. Under real‑world Plex and Unmanic usage, this frequently becomes the limiting factor.
The goal is not maximum shader performance — it is efficient, reliable video processing.
Pros
Cons
Best for: Builders who want headroom, future growth, and minimal compromise.
Pros
Cons
Best for: 1080p‑heavy libraries with modest concurrent usage.
Modern AMD GPUs include capable video engines and are increasingly well supported by Plex.
Pros
Cons
AMD GPUs can be an excellent choice if you are comfortable verifying codec support for your specific workload.
| Component | Recommendation |
| ————- | ——————————————– |
| CPU | 6–8 physical cores / 12–16 threads |
| GPU | Discrete GPU (midrange NVIDIA preferred) |
| RAM | 16–32 GB |
| Storage | Fast local NVMe/SSD for OS and cache |
Discrete GPUs reduce guesswork, isolate thermals, and deliver a smoother Plex experience — especially as libraries and user counts grow.
Plex itself is not memory-hungry, but cache is king.
This allows:
Excess RAM is rarely wasted in this role.
This system should use local NVMe SSDs only for the OS, applications, and all transient workloads.
Media libraries live on the NAS. Local storage exists to make everything fast and responsive.
For best results, use two separate NVMe SSDs:
1. OS / Application Drive
2. Transcoding & Cache Drive
This separation improves performance, simplifies troubleshooting, and reduces wear-related surprises.
This drive benefits from fast random I/O and consistent latency. NVMe ensures system responsiveness even under load.
Why this matters:
If you can only afford one NVMe drive initially, this configuration still works — but two drives is the recommended and future-proof layout.
Those belong on the NAS.
Fast local NVMe storage is one of the highest-impact upgrades you can make to a Plex server. It directly improves startup time, transcode speed, and overall system responsiveness.
The media server should have two physical NICs:
1. NFS VLAN NIC
2. DMZ VLAN NIC
This mirrors the segmentation strategy used across the ecosystem and keeps storage traffic isolated.
Transcoding is sustained work. Thermal throttling undermines everything else.
If possible:
This machine is the engine of the entire Plex experience.
A well-built physical media server:
By dedicating hardware to Plex and Unmanic, you remove guesswork, isolate risk, and create a system that simply does its job — day after day.
That reliability is the real optimization.