Home Media Newbie Help

[Blufire]

Hello!

I'm moving soon and in the process upping my home media setup and have been looking into a couple things, but a lot of what I've found seems to be scattered and possibly outdated, so I figured I'd post here and see if my current plan is solid, or if there's anything I should change or just keep in mind.

Setup: (Don't currently have either TV or Client)

• Server PC: Windows machine, 7800x3d and Radeon 7900xtx for transcoding (Personal PC currently, planning on setting up a dedicated linux-based server at some point)
  
• TV: Samsung S90c
  
• Client: Nvidia Shield Pro
  

Primarily, I'm interested in knowing how well this will be able to handle my growing collection of 4k HDR content. Most of this is encoded as HEVC/H265, saved as .MKV files, some also have Atmos, for what it's worth.

I've seen a bit of conflicting info, or mixed results regarding these. Initially, I was looking at getting a Chromecast Ultra or Chromecast+TV, but after looking into that it seemed like neither chromecast support MKV format particularly well?

I think most of this stems from running into a thread saying that transcoding HDR wasn't supported yet, or was iffy, so files had to be streamed directly to let the TV/Client process it, and as such that's why the container mattered?

My questions at this point are:

• Will the setup listed above have any issue with 10bit HDR bluray rips in either MKV or MP4 formats?
  
• Would a chromecast (Either version) work instead of the shield?
  
• Would I even need a client if I just used the web interface on the TV or went through the pain of sideloading it? (I tried to do this on my current samsung TV and nearly ripped my hair out, but I'll try it again if it's viable lol)
  
• More out of curiosity, would I run into any issues if I decided to re-encode my library into AV1 on either the hardware or software side?
  

Sorry if anything is completely wrong or a very poor understanding of what's going on. Up until this point I haven't had a TV good enough to particularly care about HDR or even 4k to be honest, so this is my first time looking into a lot of this. Any help or clarifications are greatly appreciated!

[TheDreadPirate]

My questions at this point are:

• Will the setup listed above have any issue with 10bit HDR bluray rips in either MKV or MP4 formats?
  

That setup is fine in terms of performance, but AMD lags a bit in terms of quality.

• Would a chromecast (Either version) work instead of the shield?
  

All the "dumb" Chromecasts are EOL and Jellyfin's casting functionality is a bit jank anyway.  Stick with the Android TV Chromecast or some other Android TV device.  I have two of the CCwGTV 4K models and am pretty happy with them.

• Would I even need a client if I just used the web interface on the TV or went through the pain of sideloading it? (I tried to do this on my current samsung TV and nearly ripped my hair out, but I'll try it again if it's viable lol)
  

I'd choose an Android TV/Roku dongle/box over using anything directly in the TV every day of the week.  It will be a much better experience.

• More out of curiosity, would I run into any issues if I decided to re-encode my library into AV1 on either the hardware or software side?
  

There are a few quirks in 10.8 that cause AV1 to be converted to HEVC or H264 unnecessarily.  But 10.9 is around the corner and that issue is resolved.  A surprising number of mobile devices support AV1, but a surprising number of TV dongles/boxes don't support it yet.  Unfortunately the current CCwGTV 4K doesn't, but the HD model does but no HDR.  But an updated CCwGTV 4K is rumored to be out soon and will support AV1 AND HDR.

I have been encoding my library with AV1 to A) save space and B) save bandwidth (only 40Mbps up).

[Blufire]

Thank you so much! That answers pretty much everything I had! Definitely feel better about my plan and will probably try to speed up getting a dedicated server with a lower end nvidia or intel card to handle AV1 and better quality.

[TheDreadPirate]

Intel Arc all the way. Much cheaper than Nvidia GPUs and Intel QSV is still the king in terms of quality for the bit rate. Though NVENC in RTX 4000 is very close, but have you priced one of those GPUs lately?!