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Fine I'll start | My Antsle Setup So Far

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Hello.

Are you satisfy with Plex on your antsle? Do you transcode a lot?

I'm looking to migrate from a dell server to antsle but Plex is very important and I'm not sure about plex on antsle.

Very helpful thread, I would be curious to know what hardware configuration for the Antsle everyone is using.

lancem has reacted to this post.
lancem

This is quite fun.

Myself, I've got, um - fifteen permanent antlets - all Debian LXC containers unless otherwise specified - not counting dev ones that come and go, although the two last ones are very rarely run:

  • alathciera: A DokuWiki instance. I write books, and this is where I keep all my notes. They're not actually stored on the Antsle, though - I already had a NAS that all set up with lots of space, heavy RAID, and automatic backups, so the antlet runs the DokuWiki against a data directory shared from the NAS.
  • bookie: To store my web bookmarks somewhere persistent and easy to get at, using this software.
  • calibre: A web front-end for my e-book library, also stored on the NAS.
  • corical: Windows Server 2016 in a VM; a second domain controller for the network, just for backup.
  • distributed: An IPFS content-hosting node and local gateway.
  • etcd: an instance of just that. Not using with a cluster, though - it's a key-value store for various home automation and electronics projects around here.
  • experimental: Spare antlet I use for mucking about and trying things out. Also serves to check upgrades before applying them to production.
  • huginn: This online-agent application as part of the above home automation system, and sending me puppy pictures to go with my morning coffee.
  • jupyter: Jupyter Notebook, in which I do back-envelope calculations with Python, and thanks to Antsle USB passthrough, play with microcontrollers using CircuitPython.
  • ming: MongoDB, which various projects use for various things.
  • nodal: A Node-RED instance. It's not the one I use to run the home automation, which is a Raspberry Pi plumbed into said automation; but it is the one I use to develop the flows that will eventually run on that one.
  • unifi: Tiny antlet to run the controller software for my Ubiquiti WiFi kit.
  • vpn: Tiny antlet to run OpenVPN, for remote access to my network.
  • x-ubuntu: Ubuntu in a VM; only run to update it, since it's there as a template.
  • x-win10: Windows 10 in a VM; also only run to update it, for the same reason.

All this on an Antsle One XD! There would have been a Plex instance there, too, except that the NAS had that built in and I didn't feel like migrating just to migrate. And something like Gogs may be next, if I can get it to keep its data on the NAS back-end.

Alistair

barduino and sean.rearviewmirror have reacted to this post.
barduinosean.rearviewmirror

[Edit - I tried to do it all from memory.  Didn't quite get it right]

Here's my 2 cents: A Gold Antsle one (4 cors, 8 GB RAM, 2x250 GB SSDs) -- [got it during the Amazon Black Friday/Cyber Monday sale $200 off.  Figured I could splurge $600 since it was on sale and I'm worth it!]

  1. Ubuntu 16.04 LXC with JIRA, Confluence, Service desk (configured with 1 CPU and 6GB RAM)
  2. Windows 7 Pro KVM -- this was my father-in-law's computer. After he passed away, I used disk2vhd to virtualize it in Windows HyperVisor so we could access any files he had without keeping a physical computer around.  After I got the Antsle, I imported it as an antlet. It's set to 1 CPU and 4 GB RAM
  3. Ubuntu 16.04 LXC for Plex Media Server.  I connected an 8 TB USD drive to the antsle and mount it in this antlet for storing media to serve.  Not using much yet, but slowly converting our old Hi-8 and VHS videos to digital.  I also setup Samba on this so I can copy media to the USB from my other Windows computers (where I convert the video tapes to digital).  I give it 2 CPUs and 8 GB RAM for max performance.
  4. Ubuntu 18.04 LTS Server KVM with SQL Server for Linux.  I tried to do this as an LXC, but MS SQL didn't like the zfs file system.  This is used mainly for the database for the Atlassian products (from #1).  Since I don't seem to have any control as to the startup order of the antlets (if the Antsle reboots), I put a 3 minute sleep in the cron that starts JIRA to ensure this instance is up and running beforeit.  2 CPUs and 4 GB RAM
  5. Ubuntu 16.04 LXC with Wordpress (and MariaDB).  I use this is a "test" website for my wife's business (vet clinic).  The prod site is on Amazon Lightsail and I had a separate instance in Lightsail for the test site.  Now I don't need the Lightsail instance!  1 CPU and 3 GB RAM

They all seem to run fine.  The Windows instance uses the most CPU at "idle" (10 - 20% using top on the antsle itself).  The Plex server gets it up to 80%+ when I convert a new video tape to digital while Plex does its thing.

Now that I've gotten used to it, I wish I had gotten a bigger Antsle (moar cores! moar RAM! moar SSD!), but maybe for my birthday...

My next project will be a POC to setting up a bigger one of these at my wife's clinic and replacing her workstations with thin clients.  I got a Dell Wyse Zx0Q-7020 from NewEgg for < $80 as a test unit (haven't had time to hook it up yet).  But I think it may be more cost-effective (and easier to support) to replace her 3 workstations (one of which is also a SQL Server) with antlets (and a  separate antlet for the SQL Server).  I also need to figure out the Windows licensing for such an arrangement.  Earlier this year, her main "server" died (4 year old HP Windows) and, while we had good backups, it was still a pain to 1) get a new computer 2) install all the software 3) re-configure the settings that are in the Windows Registry, etc...  all while the business owner is wanting to do business.  It would be nice to get them setup as antlets and do baseline snapshots. Also quicker setting up a new 4th workstation (when that time comes).

(sorry, that was more than 2 cents)

@fjoois, I'm one of the forum admins and haven't seen anything come in from you. There are no rules set up for locations. You should be able to create a forum post. Can you take a screen recording using loom (it's a free chrome plugin) or take some photos and send them to marketing@antsle.com?

We'll try to figure out why you're not able to post.

Folks who have set up Plex on their Antsles: how large a VM have you dedicated to it (vCPUs, RAM)?

I see some are using Linux, some Windows for Plex servers; why did you make the choice you did? I'd be good doing either, but I'm curious if there's an advantage, realistically, of one over the other (beyond not having to pay for a Windows license).

Thanks!

@mshappe, I am running mine on a Linux LXC antlet with 8 GB allowed RAM and 4 vCPUs. I've never had a performance issue, but I think those numbers are also definitely overkill. I chose Linux primarily because it's my default and it's easier to spin up. Plex is technically built for Windows compatibility first but nowadays it works on Linux (or at least Ubuntu 16 & 18) just fine.

mshappe has reacted to this post.
mshappe

In case anyone's curious, here's my updated list of antlets as of January 2020. All of them are Ubuntu 16/18 LXC unless otherwise specified.

  • NetworkShare: An antlet with a samba drive accessible within my home network. All my computers/antlets have it mounted/mapped for easy file transfers between machines and antlets. Tied to an 8TB external HDD for endless storage.
  • Seafile: Running an instance of Seafile. This is what I use as a replacement for Dropbox to share files with friends and family or between my personal and work computers. Uses the same external HDD as the NetworkShare antlet.
  • SSL: A tiny antlet dedicated to LetsEncrypt SSL certs. All the other antlets that run web-based services use the certs generated and stored on this antlet.
  • Git: Running an instance of Gitea. This is what I use as a replacement for Github private repos.
  • AMP: Running an instance of AMP. This is currently only used for a Minecraft server, but is great hosting software for a whole suite of self-hosted-server multiplayer games.
  • Plex: Running an instance of Plex. Hosts my entire movie collection via the external HDD so that I can watch them from any device in my home. Plex has apps for phones, computers, and Roku.
  • TeamCity: Running an instance of TeamCity. I do a lot of home development so TeamCity serves as my CI server.
  • MongoDB: Running an instance of mongoDB. For apps that use mongo as the backing database.
  • RethinkDB: Running an instance of RethinkDB. For apps that need real time subscription-based DB updates. Think self-hosted alternative to Firebase.
  • VPN: A tiny Debian KVM antlet running OpenVPN so that I can access my home network from anywhere.
  • Web*: Three small antlets that serve as simple web servers. One is larger than the others to handle a little more traffic but they're all pretty lightweight, primarily temporary serving platforms until I scale enough to need a bigger/dedicated server.
mshappe has reacted to this post.
mshappe

I also have a Plex antlet as an Ubuntu LXC.  I've only "allocated" 1 CPU and 1 GB, but when I ssh to the antlet, I see all antsle CPUs and all antsle RAM.  I've looked around google and can't really determine if the CPU/RAM limits in the antlet config screen really affect LXCs.

I will say that, presuming the CPU/RAM limits don't apply to LXCs, I create LXCs when I can so I don't have to worry about an antlet running out of resources -- they get the whole server and the antsle (or, maybe more correctly, the virsh processes) manage those resources.

In my case, I only use KVMs for

  1. Windows
  2. Linux where I have to (such as my MS SQL Server on Linux that cannot be installed in an LXC)
mshappe has reacted to this post.
mshappe

Well now according to this ( which is from 2015):

https://serverfault.com/questions/680963/lxc-container-shows-hosts-full-ram-amount-and-cpu-count

I shouldn't trust top to measure CPUs/memory for my LXCs.

Now I feel bad I've been restricting them all this time...

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