Hello, I'm currently running a laptop and USB 3.0 hdd with full plex pass. Streams fine for me, family also login and stream. It's i7 3610qm, 8GB. Does the job, but laptop is always on. I think a PC would be better would live in study or under stairs cupboard.
Looking at i7 4790s (bench 9997) or a small server running dual Xeon x5670 (bench 12700)
Similar prices, running windows 10 64bit. Would are thoughts on these two, I'm not familiar with xeon processors I'm guessing if it's dual process will consume more power.