for media streaming, pi's turn out to be quite weak and expensive. most people tend to go with a mini pc or thin client, as they are cheaper and better performing.
this post was submitted on 11 Sep 2026
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Raspberry Pi
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ahh okay gotcha thanks
I would agree a used Intel 8th Gen (or newer) with vPro mini pc will be cheap, reliable, low power, silent, and easy to support.
I use a RPI 5 for this purpose but it's hard to recommend it at this point. Some videos play just fine but others struggle and drop frames. Seems totally random at times. I can promise though that 4k will not play watchably. 1080p is the max you can do and like I said, even that can be iffy. It was mostly a fun project to setup but also annoying at times due to concerns with ARM compatibility, but I really wish the performance was better. If I could smoothly watch 4k without being tracked all of it would've been worth it and then some.
Edit: if anyone has a good recc for a power efficient and budget friendly mini pc, I'd love that myself.
An older orange pi for sure, you'd want to find one that has a working decoder with Armbian, but then you're off