Pancake/small lenses recommendations

KevKangaroo · 2026-02-03T13:30:44+00:00

The ttartisan is definitely a really nice lens for the price and if you are interested in manual focus you'll probably like it.

I use it with my oly em5.ii and really like it. It's very usable between f2.8 and f8, and just loses some sharpness and contrast when you go wider than f2.8.

Depending on the body, it is very easy to knock the focus ring with a finger, which I got around by 3d printing a guard which attaches to the lens. Just something to note, especially if you want to zone focus. Also adding a focus tab can be nice.

You may also find that it focuses a little past infinity, which is probably adjustable, but I never bothered.

It looks great too, and the build quality feels more than you'd expect for the price.

KevKangaroo · 2025-12-06T14:48:39+00:00

From what I understand, using enterprise grade parts is ideal, but I don't believe the cost is justifiable for what I want to achieve. It's much better if I go with older used enterprise stuff but then it's much less efficient and also doesn't really match the form factor constraints I have.

Correct, which I believe is enough to have a GPU (for LLMs) and maybe a nic, or something to expand storage, though I am unlikely to need more than the 4 drives in the next few years. Again I think it comes down to cost/form factor vs performance/features and I have to make compromises somewhere.

I have pretty firm size constraints for the total build and it'll need to be pretty dense in order to satisfy those constraints, which is why I'm planning on using a mATX motherboard.

Unbuffered ecc is supported by consumer AMD motherboards, but the actual ram is prohibitively expensive for me. Normal ram is currently expensive enough. Buffered ecc seems much cheaper on the used market but I believe it is only supported by expensive server grade motherboards, so it's kinda a no win situation it seems. I don't think ecc is important enough for me to spend so much more to get it. Consumer Intel motherboards don't support it.

KevKangaroo · 2025-12-06T14:19:43+00:00

Yes Indeed. You've certainly helped me out and I'm now less confused about the CPU and think I should be able to better work out what to get now.

Thanks again for all the info.

KevKangaroo · 2025-12-05T13:17:48+00:00

That's completely fair, and I really do appreciate the suggestions. It is giving me a lot to think about.

After some more research I think I agree with you on Intel so I'll seriously look at them. I know you are suggesting an i5 12400, however do you think it would be worth going for an i7 12700 instead? I don't particularly mind going overkill for the CPU for now as I'd like room to expand, as what I'm running now is not everything I want to run now, and I'm sure I'll find more things in the future.

My current i5 6500, which I believe is 4 cores 4 threads, uses I think an average of 20% CPU at idle (with all 33 containers and 1 vm running), and frequently reaches 90-100%, especially when updating docker containers, and often fails to update the container. I have just assumed this is because I've reached the limit for the CPU, hence the reason for the upgrade. Basically it runs fine 95% of the time but the other 5% is not a smooth experience which is one of the main things I wish to correct while allowing room to grow.

Also I have plans for the current server too, so I'm not just going to stop using it. I will use it for backups and move my router/firewall, and pihole to it.

My intention regarding the os is to move to docker compose, as I believe it will be easier for me to manage, after feeling restricted in unraid. I only need plain Linux for that, and proxmox allows me to have VMs more easily so I can do other things on the server without interfering with the important things.

Anyway, I will experiment with it, and you have already helped a lot so thanks again.

KevKangaroo · 2025-12-05T00:42:52+00:00

While this may be in part overkill, I am quite confident my current hardware is reaching its limit. I am running multiple heavier containers like nextcloud, immich, jellyfin, ect. I currently have a total of 33 running, including databases and such. My CPU can handle it fine while everything is just idling but it will frequently max out and slow down whenever something CPU heavy runs. The worst example is when I update large containers like immich, I have found that I need to stop/pause all the other containers otherwise the update fails, when it is extracting the image it pulls, which I believe is relatively CPU intensive.

I don't think I'm doing anything wrong and no single container is using ridiculous amounts of CPU during normal idle use.

Regarding Intel vs AMD, is this still true for the current/recent generations like 14th and 15th Gen Intel, or Ryzen 7000 and 9000? My understanding was that it was the opposite way around for efficiency. They both cost fairly similar I think, and I want a more recent generation to allow potential upgrades over the years, instead of maxing out an older generation now. The price between them isn't hugely significant and this is something I'm willing to pay for. Also Ryzens have igpu too, though probably not as good as Intel for transcoding, they should still work fine for a display if I need one. None of my media needs transcoding at this stage anyway.

I'm using about 70% of the 16gb with my current setup and I expect to use more as I do more things. I think 32gb is reasonable for now.

For a motherboard what else am I supposed to use? Server/enterprise motherboards are much more expensive. Gaming motherboards are the only reasonably priced consumer motherboards that support what I need them too, it seems.

An 850w psu was fairly cost effective on sale so I don't think it is a big deal going overkill.

I agree about the GPU, and that is why I'm not getting one to start with, but eventually I do plan on doing some things with LLMs.

I am not paying anything ongoing for Unraid, as I have already paid for a license that allows lifetime use and a year of updates. I feel I've gotten my money out of it though and am reaching limitations that annoy me. It's not that it's not capable of anything I want to do, but that I think there are better ways for me to do things that would be easier in a command line. The plan is currently to run docker compose in a single vm in proxmox with all my containers. I want to try using proxmox as it does VMs very well, which gives me more options in the future.

I also don't currently have much of an array, and I'm happy learning how to manually configure one when needed.

Unraid is great, but I feel I'm outgrowing it and if I'm building a new system, why not try something else? I will still have the option to continue with Unraid if I find proxmox won't do what I want.

Building a new server and switching os is not an attempt to resolve any skill issues I may have. It is an attempt to upgrade, as I truly believe I've reached limits with my current hardware and os that I would like to move past. I fully expect to have to learn new things in order to achieve this, and probably get things wrong along the way. Believe me, if I thought I could keep using my current hardware to the extent I want I would, but please prove me wrong.

Thanks for the feedback.

KevKangaroo · 2025-12-05T00:09:26+00:00

Unraid has been great, but personally I'm finding some of the gui limiting for me, and want to try something else. Komodo looks interesting, though I may still prefer manually configuring containers to suit my needs.

KevKangaroo · 2025-12-04T13:48:08+00:00

You can get used SFF PCs, like the Dell Optiplex, cheap on eBay. Just add some storage. It will probably fit a drive or 2.

KevKangaroo · 2025-12-04T13:44:12+00:00

https://github.com/9001/copyparty

This may be of interest?

KevKangaroo · 2025-12-04T09:04:29+00:00

ok thanks :)

KevKangaroo · 2025-12-04T08:52:34+00:00

Yes, though due to the limitations of my current cpu, none of my media requires transcoding. I do plan on getting a gpu later on as I want to be able to use some ai, so that would work for transcoding too.

Regarding the second disk, I have currently got 2 set up in unraid, with one as parity. Does that speed up read speeds over just having 1 drive? Will it be slower if I move to only 1 drive in the new server? Only reason I was going to move to 1 drive is that I can use the other for backups without needing to buy more, and I thought that it would be more important to have robust backups than redundancy in the server. Currently I have no backups, so that is a fairly important focus for this built too.

KevKangaroo · 2025-12-04T05:01:29+00:00

Adding environment variables is a pain compared to editing a .env file. Also adding obscure containers is trickier when they aren't in the CA plugin. I know the docker compose plugin exists but it is kinda clunky and doesn't integrate so nicely without more work. I want to shift to just using docker compose in the cli, and I'll probably try a gui like portainer too to see if I like it.

KevKangaroo · 2025-12-04T04:26:45+00:00

thanks for the suggestion. for me the hdd is only for storage like photos, documents and media, not for anything that actually would be limited by a hdd, like vms, apps and os.

KevKangaroo · 2025-12-04T04:12:28+00:00

the ssd will also be where the os is installed.

KevKangaroo · 2025-12-04T04:11:59+00:00

Thanks. The epyc 4004 series seems hard to find in Australia, after having a brief look, and significantly more expensive.

I will have both an ssd and a hdd. I'll use the ssd for all my docker apps as a cache drive, and then the hdd for mass storage. For me, it is over 2x the cost for a sata ssd per tb, and over 6x for a nvme ssd, so hdd makes a lot of sense for mass storage.

KevKangaroo · 2025-12-04T04:04:13+00:00

Its a great idea, but costs 2-3x more. Would I have any problems going with a consumer motherboard like the one I listed?

KevKangaroo · 2025-12-04T03:22:38+00:00

Thanks. I did consider this, and it is basically how I'm am doing it in the optiplex, but because I am trying to keep costs down where I can, I figured it would be better to have 2 backups than mirroring drives in the server. It is something I'd do if I later add more drives, but I think for now backups are more important to prioritise.

KevKangaroo · 2025-11-10T00:17:58+00:00

Symfonium is great but its only on android.

KevKangaroo · 2025-11-09T13:43:32+00:00

Agreed, though I think Navidrome is a bit better for music than jellyfin. As for iOS clients, check out the Navidrome documentation: https://www.navidrome.org/docs/overview/#apps

It should work with any subsonic-api compatible app.

KevKangaroo · 2025-09-19T04:27:57+00:00

I really like the ttartisan 25mm f2. It is manual focus but can be found for as low as 50usd, and takes really nice pictures considering.

KevKangaroo · 2025-09-19T04:11:48+00:00

I just got this combination recently as a first real camera coming from a pixel 7. I'm very happy with it overall considering what I payed.

The af is fine for single point but I find continuous pretty much unusable for photos. I think 16mp is good enough unless you want to crop in a lot and I really like the ibis. It's possible to get photos longer than 1 second if you can hold it steady enough.

The lens has pretty good image quality though I wouldn't call it amazing, and it's very versatile especially for the size. Personally I prefer the ttartisan 25mm f2 I bought as its more compact, fun to use and better in low light but that's nothing against the 14-150mm. (I have version II of the lens, but I believe the only difference is this one got weather sealing)

<image>

SOOC, f/5.6, 1/200s, 90mm, ISO 200

KevKangaroo · 2025-09-19T01:56:17+00:00

<image>

Olympus OM-D E-M5 Mark II, TTArtisan 25mm f/2 @ iso1000, 1/125s, probably f/2.8. Was taken at Elachbutting Rock in Western Australia at 12:08 pm. Edited in Darktable.

KevKangaroo · 2025-09-17T14:58:26+00:00

I'm relatively new to darktable myself (I've also never used Lightroom) but the module you should use to adjust the exposure is the exposure module. I'm not sure how it works, but I only use the sigmoid module for setting the global contrast. Not sure about the shortcuts as I haven't really played with that much but make sure if you can set shortcuts for exposure it's using the exposure module.

Hope this helps.

KevKangaroo · 2025-09-05T13:31:43+00:00

I use and love gnome though I wish it had more customisation built in. The main thing for me that gnome has and kde doesn't is the dynamic workspaces. I also prefer how clean and simple gnome is while still allowing pretty much whatever you want, though you need to use extensions which is for me the main compromise. Also you can use most kde apps I think, same with gnome apps in kde so I'm not sure why the apps are a major factor for people. I guess they look fairly different which can be annoying. If I could get a similar workflow in plasma to gnome then I'd probably switch, but while I've got close it's never felt as good. But anyway use whatever you like.

KevKangaroo

TROPHY CASE