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Will avatar Ubuntu

Server vs desktop edition for a minecraft server

id flag
Will

I appreciate this is at risk of encouraging opinion based answers, but I hope it doesn’t get closed.

I have a 12 year old Dell XPS-8300 (64 bit, Intel i5-2400, 3.1GHz; total 12GB DDR3 RAM (1333MHz); 1TB SSD). Windows 10 ran at a glacial pace but Ubuntu 20.04.3 LTS desktop worked fine so I gave it to my 12 year old son. We then spent Christmas building a new PC (great fun! - and I was really chuffed that he uses Ubuntu in preference to Windows 11 on this dual boot system) and thought we’d use the old one for a Minecraft Java server for him and his friends which works well. Its only use is as the MC server; I might put a MC bedrock edition server on it at some point too but nothing else planned.

When I put the SSD in to replace the old spinning HDD, I thought I’d try Ubuntu 20.04.3 LTS server edition; in all honesty, I think I’d have managed but it was going to take so much longer than I had, that I ended up giving up and using dd to clone the HDD onto the new SSD and it’s all working well and a bit faster / less laggy with the faster hard drive.

So my question is – how much benefit would I expect from using Ubuntu server instead of Desktop? It’s now headless so we don’t use the GUI at all (we ssh in to it to start and stop the server / backup / shutdown etc.) … but it would take me a bit of effort to understand fully how to install Java JRE / the server itself etc. without any of the GUI tools. If it is likely to make a massive difference then I’d do it.

In terms of pinch-points in the system, I suspect the 12 year old processor is the main factor - the memory is big enough but possibly a bit slow, the SSD is huge for this purpose and good, the ethernet connection is pretty good.

The related question I guess is – would it be better to install server edition and install a GUI (which I could then remove)? I'm just not sure how much system resource the GUI (and any other things on desktop that aren't present on server) takes up.

Thank you.

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user535733 avatar
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user535733
I think you will see no discernable difference. I have run a Minecraft server on older and lower-spec hardware than that...but it generated a lot of heat and consumed a lot of power. On newer hardware, heat and power consumption are negligible. The MC server does not require a GUI and is easy to run without a GUI.
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Will avatar
id flag
Will
That's very helpful, thank you. Haven't had any heat issues so I'll probably leave it as it is. Much appreciated!
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Will avatar
id flag
Will
@user535733 - if you wan to post that as an answer, I'd be happy to accept / upvote - it certainly gave me the information I needed.
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user535733 avatar Ubuntu
cn flag
user535733

I think you will see no discernable difference.

I have run a Minecraft server on older and lower-spec hardware than that...but it generated a lot of heat and consumed a lot of power. On newer hardware, heat and power consumption are negligible.

The MC server does not require a GUI and is easy to run without a GUI.

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