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Stick PC for a media client? (lemmy.zip)
submitted 1 week ago by eyesaremosaics@lemmy.zip to c/selfhosted@lemmy.world
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Are mini stick PCs practical to set up as a media player, eg with jellyfin? Some advantages are the small form factor that plugs straight into the HDMI port, and flexibility/privacy vs using a dongle from a shitty company like amazon/google/roku.

Are there any things to watch out for to ensure it has enough compute power and hardware decoding? I just want it to play HD video with a jellyfin app/browser page.

I'm assuming it's no big deal to install Linux on (x86 hardware?), do you need to watch out for specific device support? Thanks

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[–] SuspiciousCarrot78@aussie.zone 1 points 1 week ago* (last edited 1 week ago)

My main bedroom pc is a stick pc (Intel compute stick; the M5 version). I can run Fallout 3 on it (though it currently runs Linux mint and isn't set up for gaming)... I'm pretty sure it can handle JF.

I also had a gen 1 or 2 I donated recently - that struggled with basic, lightweight Debian 11 / YouTube playback; hard to say how it would handle JF.

The thing is tho, the compute sticks are x86...and outside of them or rolling your own (via a Pi zero 2W and HDMI case) most of the ready made compute sticks are 1) android 2) of dubious provenance (rebranded Xiaomi etc).

Compute sticks sit in an awkward middle ground - too much grunt for pure media streamer, not quite enough for serious computing. Though I suspect the m5 could actually act as a JF server (assuming no transcode)

But it depends. Which one were you thinking of getting? And are we talking client or server?

PS: my raspberry pi 4, 4B was my main JF server for several years. No transcoding... but quite capable of serving up to 6 or more simultaneous streams (720/1080. 4K it could barely do 1). Something older (like an old Wyse thinclient?) should be able to do same. Last I looked they went for around $40 USD