The Hell Is CorFlix?
The media server, or “CorFlix” as it’s been named by its users, had a very unimpressive and humble beginning. Long before the MK (mark) naming system, and even before it had been dubbed CorFlix, the server was literally a shoebox computer running on a POS Intel Atom board with Plex installed on it. Since then, the CorFlix user base and capabilities have increased immeasurably. This all started as a hobby, because I’m a huge nerd. And continues because I still am, and now obsessed with building the most kickass media server ever for my friends and family.
The name ”CorFlix” was actually given to the server by a very close friend of mine. Her and her husband had an account on the server, and anytime she wanted something added, she would refer to the server as CorFlix. It stuck. The MK (mark) version naming scheme didn’t start until MKIII, when I was supporting a handful of users. I wanted the name to stand out in the Plex Interface, and also wanted to make it apparent that this was not the first iteration, or the last.
A Journey Through The Ages
Media Server (Project BlecCube) – MKI
A crappy Intel Atom APU setup that ran on an even crappier integrated ITX board. It had 4GB
of LP memory and a pair of 1TB HDD’s in shitty software RAID0. Literally everything about
this version sucked. No management system, no request system or automated everything.
Every. Single. Thing. was don’t by hand in the command line. I started with my own library of
RIPs that consisted of maybe 250 Movies and a handful of incomplete TV series.
CorFlix – MKII
This is when i decided to start taking things a bit more seriously. I invited a couple friends to
enjoy the content, with everything still being managed by hand. The media array now consists
of four 1TB HDD’s in RAID0 running off a 4 port RAID card .By this point, the library is up to
about 300 Movies and a slightly larger handful of slightly more complete TV series.
CorFlix – MKIII
A few more, slightly larger, steps in the right direction. Now, the server is virtualized on a much
more robust piece of hardware. Now it rocks access to all 8 logical cores in a hyperthreaded
Xeon, 8GB of memory and 4TB dedicated out of an UnRaid array. This is where i started
experimenting with applications like Sonarr and CouchPotato to index and manage my media
for me. After a short time, and roughly 10 active users, the server hits 450 Movies and about
20 nearly complete TV series.
CorFlix – MKIV
MKIV was by far the most advanced platform jump pre-MKV. Around this time, i discovered a
TON of source code online that helped build the framework for what makes MKIV run
autonomously. With the help of over a dozen custom scripts and application API’s, MKIV acts
on its own accord to find, download, maintain and manage all of the media. Speaking of the
media, at the time of writing this, the library has reached nearly 900 Movies and about 120 TV
Series consisting of close to 4000 episodes. All of this lives on a six drive RAID10 array with
9TB of capacity.
CorFlix – MKV
One of the biggest undertakings of planning and engineering in the history of CorFlix. It took
many months and several people to get here. The first cluster platform, with virtually
unlimited expansion capabilities, and the first version not stored on a single box. MKV began
its life on a dedicated dual E5 Xeon blade server running all the logic. The media array
composed of a dual parity protected 24TB array, and has expansion capabilities to a whopping
80TB. Minor changes to the service and indexers took place to streamline the fetching
process. The real jump here was the horsepower and shear volume of the media array.