It's just for a client, the current approach I've been trying on a pi 2B isn't working well enough so a bit more power would be good. The 2B only has H264 hardware decoding but osmc+Kodi+jellyfin/jellycon doesn't seem to allow transcoding and the 2B just doesn't have enough power to play other formats.

Maybe another option is to run the dedicated JF desktop app in a GUI, because at least you can tell the server to transcoder to a suitable format that the pi can play. With the stick PC a full wipe and install of some lightweight Linux system would hopefully also work

If you're talking about running a jellyfin client, not a server, get an android tv box. I have two tiers of ONN android boxes, 4k and 4k pro. I installed projectivy and smartube, as well as a client for navidrome and jellyfin. NO ADS EVER. I'm head over heels. The jellyfin client on the 4k was weird for a while, but I disabled a bunch of metadata plugins on the server and it straightened up.

I suspect as long as you're just playing things off the server and there is no transcoding or whatnot going on, you should be fine.

My main bedroom pc is a stick pc (Intel compute stick; the M5 version). I can run Fallout 3 on it (though it currently runs Linux mint and isn't set up for gaming)... I'm pretty sure it can handle JF.

I also had a gen 1 or 2 I donated recently - that struggled with basic, lightweight Debian 11 / YouTube playback; hard to say how it would handle JF.

The thing is tho, the compute sticks are x86...and outside of them or rolling your own (via a Pi zero 2W and HDMI case) most of the ready made compute sticks are 1) android 2) of dubious provenance (rebranded Xiaomi etc).

Compute sticks sit in an awkward middle ground - too much grunt for pure media streamer, not quite enough for serious computing. Though I suspect the m5 could actually act as a JF server (assuming no transcode)

But it depends. Which one were you thinking of getting? And are we talking client or server?

PS: my raspberry pi 4, 4B was my main JF server for several years. No transcoding... but quite capable of serving up to 6 or more simultaneous streams (720/1080. 4K it could barely do 1). Something older (like an old Wyse thinclient?) should be able to do same. Last I looked they went for around $40 USD

It's more expensive, but I grabbed a vero 4k a couple years back and have been really happy with it. They've since put out a new model with av1 support. https://osmc.tv/vero/

It's just about the best possible dedicated jellyfin client box out there, so I felt it was worth the extra squeeze when I got it. (HDR support even!) It's all open source though, so support for things like YouTube, netflix, or any other streaming doesn't really exist in user friendly manner.

A used laptop with a messed up screen will work as well.

I got a Minis forum S100 PC stick. It does work well with kodi. But! It can be a load of work to get going. This device is using a UFS storage chip. So not all distros will install on it by default and require some tweaks to load kernel modules at boot. I use the device with alpine Linux and kodi GBM on top (libreelec doesnt see the storage device).

Also keep a eye out for what the CPU supports on these lower end chips. Not all of them have great hardware decoding support.

I run an older Raspberry Pi (B?) with Kodi + Jellyfin on it as my client for my TV. I know Pis specifically aren't a great value proposition anymore, but the hardware is really unimpressive and it works just fine - so you don't need much.

Get a raspi or some thinclient. Every of those sticks I've touched was totally crap. Slow, awful software, some come with malware preloaded and the whole experience is crap. There is enough space behind your TV for a raspi.

I found this one on amazon

https://a.co/d/05wDgslY

it advertises linux compatibility. So, I'd agree with you, installing shouldn't be a problem. I've heard about a project called Plasma Bigscreen, might be exactly what you're looking for. I've also heard flir remotes work pretty will with linux tv boxes. Those plug pcs have usb slots, you might want to figure out if you need an extension cable so the ir can reach the dongle.

As a media client, totally. Lots of people run jellyfin on Android TV sticks and things like that.

~~I don't run Jellyfin, so take this as is. From what I understand tho, Jellyfin does take a fair amount of resources to run in an ideal situation. Meaning it takes some RAM for multiple simultaneous transcodes, several users, large libraries, etc. A lot of the cheaper Stick PCs come with less than stellar specs. The Stick PC I just randomly picked because it was 8 GB RAM is a MeLE Business Grade PCG02 Fanless N100 Mini Stick PC 8GB. It retails for $350 USD. For half of that price, you could opt for an SFF Optiplex, bump the DDR3 RAM to max the mobo, and DDR3 is fairly cheap, and still have resources to run other Docker containers if you wanted. For example I run an Optiplex SFF with the i7-4790 chip and 32 GB DDR3 RAM. Currently I have 53 total containers running and it really doesn't break a sweat. Total cost of the box plus RAM was about $175 USD.~~

~~If you are going for the portability aspect, that's where I think a Stick PC would function best. All that being said, you have options just depending on what your criteria are for running Jellyfin.~~