Best Lower Power setups (specifically CPU)

I wanted to get opinions on cheap/lower power serviio boxes other users have had success with. I am new to the game but have a fairly lower power mini-ITX box using an AMD Dual-Core Processor E350 and the CPU seems to be the bottleneck. It that runs most things very well but chops on some 1080p content when playing to the PS3/Xbox/other. I notice that the CPU hits 100% frequently but RAM never comes close to MAX utilization. I have considered replacing the Motherboard/CPU and hopefully reusing everything else but would prefer not to overspend. What options are others using for HQ video and no chop? Also if you have a lower end CPU thats running well what are you streaming too (not sure if there is a difference streaming to a 30" TV vs a 65" using the method (PS3 generally for me).

[atc98092]

What is going to matter most is if your media requires transcoding for your playback device. For example, my Sony Blu-ray players can play almost everything without transcoding, and as such the Serviio box could be extremely low power. However, my Roku boxes will only play mpeg-ts and mp4 native, so all my MKV files need transcoding. I am unsure what the PS3 supports, but I believe it's not a wide variety of media.

I have two Serviio boxes (use one for experimenting). My primary server has a quad core and 8 gigs of RAM. It can transcode HD video and audio for the Rokus without hiccupping, even at 99% CPU. The other is a Athlon II X2 245 with 4 gig of ram. It can stream HD to the Sony no problem, but it can't keep up with transcoding for the Roku. My guess is your issue is core count, not CPU power. Of course, your CPU is 1.6GHz speed, while mine is 2.9 GHz and my quad core is 3.4 GHz. Speed does help!

I did a quick search on your CPU, but I can't see if it fits a standard AM3 motherboard, or since it's a mobile chip it might not be upgradable. Would be nice if you could just pop a faster CPU in there.

I have confirmed that some don't require transcoding by turning off "Enable Transcoding" and restarting the server. One example is an mp4 with a frame rate of 800, data rate of 2133, total bitrate of 2226 kbps frame rate of 23 frames/sec and it chops no matter what I do. I have some mkv files that I don't know how to pull the same info from and some chop and others play fine.

My motherboard can NOT upgrade the CPU because its integrated so I would have to replace both. It has 16 GB of RAM though and a solid state drive though (which seem to be underutilized) I am considering replacing with an i3 Haswell CPU and compatible Mobo as they are still fairly good on power usage. Im looking at

ASRock H61MV-ITX LGA 1155 Intel H61 HDMI Mini ITX Intel Motherboard
Intel Core i3-4330 Haswell 3.5GHz LGA 1150 54W Desktop


the motherboard would take my same memory (2x 8GB DDR3 1600), and only costs $50. I would love it to have 6 SATA ports, but for the price I can live. The CPU is more than I would like though at $140. At that price point is it worth the extra money to just get a slightly lower speed quad core i5 for another $40/50?

[atc98092]

Well, I'm a fan of AMD for the best bang for the buck. As you noted, the Intel motherboards are inexpensive, but the CPUs are not.

There is a program called MediaInfo that will tell you everything about a media file. It's freeware, and works well http://mediaarea.net/en/MediaInfo

That MP4 should be no issue for your box to stream. My test server (the lower powered one) can stream HD video easily for a file that doesn't require transcoding, and that's a total bitrate over 20000 kbps average, with peaks approaching 50000. Your file isn't even reaching the bitrate I see with a DVD rip, which is usually 6-8000 kbps. I don't know what is causing your bottleneck, but there's sure one there somewhere.

[DenyAll]

It could be the h264 profile - MediaInfo will assist you to find that out. Anything over Level 4.1 will cause the file to be transcoded by the PS3 Profile in Serviio (and if playing it without transcoding may be too much for the PS3 CPU to decode natively). Post the MediaInfo detail of a troublesome file if you want and we can take a look at it.

Note that all MKV's are remuxed by the PS3 profile (and have to be as the PS3 cannot play them natively). What I do is remux my MKV files to MP4 - this then allows them to be played natively. If you are a Windows user my tool here can assist with the remuxing: viewtopic.php?f=17&t=12136 (shameless plug).

For the PS3 profile, the only [what I call] mainstream video type that gets transcoded is for h264 profiles above 4.1. Most other mainstream video types only get remuxed if they can't be played natively. Streaming natively doesn't take much processor grunt. Remuxing pushes the processor a bit harder (still not normally enough to cause stuttering) but video transcoding is an intense user of CPU - the more cores the better. Alternatively, you avoid transcoding by selecting files that can be played natively (for the PS3 - most MP4's and AVI's. If you remux your MKV's to MP4 then you pretty well have the mainstream covered).

You may want to test that its not something else causing the problem b4 outlaying the cash for a new rig. Can you get temporary access to a more powerful PC - perhaps install a copy of Serviio on it? The next likely candidate (after CPU due to transcoding) is network throughput. Is your PS3 connected wirelessly or via ethernet cable? Also. some users have reported issues that turned out to be their SSD - if possible try setting the transcode temporary folder (under Delivery) to a non-SSD location.

<edit> oh! and yes the extra for an i5 is certainly worth it. 2 extra cores, and for video encoding, cores count.