Most home internet tops out at 1Gbps. Davy+ runs on a dedicated 7Gbps fiber connection through Frontier Communications. This isn't overkill — it's what allows 20+ people to stream simultaneously in 4K without a single buffer. A standard connection simply couldn't handle it.

Zion is a custom-built media server running 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. Powered by an Intel i9-13900K processor and an Intel Arc A770 GPU that converts your streams in real time so they play perfectly on any device — phone, TV, laptop, anything. This machine cost over $1,500 to build and consumes roughly $54/month in electricity. The remaining $30 goes toward eventual hardware replacement.

Davy+ currently has 60TB of usable storage with 35.4TB in use. Hard drives don't last forever — they fail without warning and when they do, the service goes down until they're replaced. A single replacement drive costs $150–300 and needs to be ordered and swapped immediately. When you lose access and want it back fast, that's what it costs. 4 additional 20TB drives are already on hand ready to expand as the library grows.

A dedicated HP machine runs OPNsense — the traffic cop for Davy+. It manages who gets access, keeps the server protected from the internet, blocks malicious traffic, and makes sure your stream data is prioritized. Without it, the server would be exposed directly to the internet. This machine cost ~$300 to set up and costs about $5/month in electricity.

All media in the Davy+ library is personally purchased — thrift stores, yard sales, estate sales, and personal collections. Physical media is ripped locally and added to the library. This is a labor of love that takes real time and real money.

Keeping Davy+ private, secure, and accessible requires a VPN service (~$8/month), domain registration for davyplus.vip (~$5/month), and various hosting and infrastructure tools that make the service run smoothly and securely.