I have a small Ryzen-based server that’s functioning as my NAS as well as hosting various docker services. However, I wanted to start doing more with Jellyfin and my server doesn’t have a GPU for transcoding. I was consider getting an Intel NUC anyhow because I wanted to have some dedicated hardware to run a hypervisor like Proxmox, so I figure I’ll run Jellyfin as a VM and it can pull from my NAS server where the video files are stored.

I’m curious what kind of specs I should be looking for on a NUC and which generation? Here’s some of my rough requirements:

  • Running Proxmox with maybe a handful of VMs
  • Jellyfin transcoding for no more than 3 simultaneous users, and in reality, 1 on average
  • Typically prefer more modern, power-efficient hardware