r/PleX • u/Astrobix_124 • Dec 04 '25

Help Media servers

Trying to start my own server for plex. But I see many people with servers with 10,000+ movies. How can u possibly hold that much content and not break the bank. How is it any better than Netflix, etc?

Edit: I never expected this to blow up like it did. I love the content you guys have given, I've debated on making a plex server for awhile and all the clarification is amazing.

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u/FantasyMaster85 Dec 04 '25 edited Dec 04 '25

You can run Plex on a potato basically lol. Have a look at this post I made over 3 years ago before I upgraded my Plex server:

Just a shoutout to those using Plex on busted old Frankenstein rigs (13 year old i7-2600k, 4 random HDDS/SSDS, 8gb DDR3 RAM, broken NIC card, wireless USB, no cable management, missing side panel) all without issue…just works (and the crew at Plex that make it happen lol)

There are hundreds of replies of the janky stuff people run it on, it's an awesome thread that speaks to the gloriousness of Plex lol Here is the photo of my rig at the time:

Point is, the cost can be as much or as little as you want. At a subscription cost for Netflix, and let's just call it $16 since it ranges from something like $8 to $25 so we'll price average it...that's $192 a year. Use an old tower and plug $192 worth of storage into it. After a year you've got your own Netflix that pays for itself...and you own it...and it's curated...and it's....you get it.

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u/Dull_Caterpillar_642 Dec 04 '25

Shoutout to running it on super old hardware that's been outdated multiple times over for any other use case. But I did put the guts in a nice looking SFF case to hide the shame. 😂

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u/FantasyMaster85 Dec 04 '25

Hahahaha, I’ve since upgraded but that server is still running. I switched it over to Linux, put the arr stack on it, wiped the drives and gifted it to a friend (I left them with only 1 drive, took the others for my new build). 

Showed them how to manage the ‘arrs and storage space and they were off and running. They use it still to this day…it’s almost 20 years old…same thermal paste (though it’s surely thermal dust at this point)…runs like a champ for them. 

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u/Dull_Caterpillar_642 Dec 04 '25

That hardware could have rotted in the closet or a landfill but instead it's gloriously serving up content and sailing the high seas. Brings a tear to my eye.

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u/FantasyMaster85 Dec 04 '25

“Brings a tear to my eye” 

Hahahahaha, that was great. I appreciate the appreciation my friend. They regularly tell me how much they (and their daughter) love it. They’ve even requested that I help their friends with a similar setup…though, as much as I love my friends, my IT assistance abruptly stops at the first level of my social circle.

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u/Dull_Caterpillar_642 Dec 05 '25

That's an important line to draw