I got a Qnap that is on sale for about 440 right now and it's dual core, comes with a Crucial 2GB RAM upgrade, and has an HDMI out for direct to TV Plex (or whatever).
Snology came out with an update for a security flaw last spring. Just a FYI to ya
Taipei, Taiwan—February 14, 2014—Synology® confirmed known security issues (reported as CVE-2013-6955 and CVE-2013-6987) which would cause compromise to file access authority in DSM. An updated DSM version resolving these issues has been released accordingly. https://www.synology.com/en-global/...gy_Fixes_Vulnerability_in_DiskStation_Manager
buying synology is easier, yes.
guilty here, I bought pre-made servers.
But most premades ones aren't powerful enough for on-the-fly transcoding, that's why I asked if he was going to do any transcoding.
And you can save a few bucks if you build it yourself.
Wasn't going to build a quad core tiny box that could fit behind my TV and hold 4 HDDs for 400 bucks. I use it for TV shows that are 720p and it works fine. If I want to do movies I just cast from my PC anyways.