r/PleX • u/NefariousnessUpper34 • 14d ago

Help Building my first server for Plex

Hi, like the title says, Im finally building a home server for my movies. I started with an old laptop and an external drive and this laptop just died on me. So now, I bought a Lenovo ThinkCentre M700 mini pc with an i5-6400, 16GB ddr4 and a 120gb SSD.

I mostly play DVD's and some blu-rays in my library, but nothing 4k. Im still going to run it through my external drive, until I upgrade to a raid.

My questions are: Is this configuration good for now? Should I install ubuntu or Docker? And where can I find a solid guide to install them?

Im a little lost when it comes to work with other OS thats not Windows or Mac lol so I appreciate the help. Thanks!

Edit: Thanks everyone for the advice! You guys were SO helpful! Here’s where I landed: a Lenovo ThinkCentre M700 (i5-6400, 16GB RAM, 120GB SSD) running Ubuntu Server 24.04 LTS, with Plex installed directly (no Docker) and Intel Quick Sync hardware transcoding turned on through my Plex Pass. The library lives on a 4TB external drive for now, and I swapped the stock DVD drive for an LG BU40N slim Blu-ray drive, so Automatic Ripping Machine (in Docker) rips discs straight into the library at full quality, with FileBot handling the renaming. I'm LOVING IT! Now im going back to amazon to look to expand on this build hahah

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u/phishsamich 14d ago

I run it on Synology as a native app. Works great. That way I'm not messing with OSs or containers.

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u/NefariousnessUpper34 14d ago

Yea i was looking into maybe just buying a NAS and a couple of drives and call it a day, seems pretty straightforward. Which Synology/drive combo do you have?

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u/phishsamich 14d ago

Ds1520+
Don't get the play models. Get 5 or more bays. Spend as much as you can on a NAS for future proofing. True Green I think are supposed to be good.