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SABnzbd in Container Manager on a Synology NAS

Important or Recent Updates
UpdateDate
New guide update for DSM7.2 and Container Manager06/05/2023
Moved from UI setup to Project Setup which is more flexible and easier to maintain.21/10/2023
Added an addition element to the compose to restrict the container from gaining additional privileges and also umask environment variable25/10/2023
Historic updates.


What is SABnzbd?

SABnzbd is a binary newsreader, it is used to download files from Usenet, and where required will also repair and extract releases. It works on its own or in conjunction with other tools such as Lidarr and Radarr.

Let’s Begin

In this guide I will take you through the steps to get Sabnzbd up and running in Container Manager. We will be using the new Projects (Docker Compose) feature to get this running as it will save you time vs manual setup using the normal UI

In order for you to successfully use this guide please complete the three preceding guides

Folder Setup

Let’s start by getting some folders set up for the containers to use. Open up File Station create the following.

Folders
/docker/projects/sabnzbd-compose
/docker/sabnzbd

Container Manager

Next we are going to set up a ‘Project’ in Container Manager. Open up Container Manager and click on Project then on the right-hand side click ‘Create’.

In the next screen we will set up our General Settings, enter the following:

SectionSetting
Project Name:sabnzbd
Path:/docker/projects/sabnzbd-compose
Source:Create docker-compose.yml

Next we are going to drop in our docker compose configuration, copy all the code in the box below and paste it into line ‘1’ just like the screenshot.

YAML
services:
  sabnzbd:
    image: linuxserver/sabnzbd:latest
    container_name: sabnzbd
    environment:
      - PUID=1234 #CHANGE_TO_YOUR_UID
      - PGID=65432 #CHANGE_TO_YOUR_GID
      - TZ=Europe/London #CHANGE_TO_YOUR_TZ
      - UMASK=022
    volumes:
      - /volume1/docker/sabnzbd:/config
      - /volume1/data/usenet:/data/usenet
    ports:
      - 8080:8080/tcp
    network_mode: synobridge
    security_opt:
      - no-new-privileges:true
    restart: always

Environment Variables

We are now going to amend some key variables to make sure the container has access to our folders and also knows where we are in the world. Don’t change any other settings other than those I mention.

VariableValue
PUID(required) The UID you obtained in the user setup guide
PGID(required) The GID you obtained in the user setup guide
TZ(required) Your timezone wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_tz_database_time_zones

Once you have made the edits you can click ‘Next’

You do not need to enable anything on the ‘Web portal settings’ screen click ‘Next’ again.

On the final screen click ‘Done’ which will begin the download of the container images and once downloaded they will be launched!

The image will now be downloaded and extracted. You should see ‘Code 0’ when it has finished.

Firewall Exceptions

(Skip if you don’t have the Firewall configured)

If you have enabled and configured the Synology Firewall you will need to create exceptions for any containers that have a Web UI or have any incoming or outgoing connections. This section covers the basics of how to add these. (Please note this is a generic section and will not show the specific ports used in this guide however it applies in the same way)

Also, I would like to refer people to the great guide on getting the Firewall correctly configured over on WunderTechs site.

Head into the Control Panel> Security > Firewall, from here click Edit Rules for the profile you set up when you enabled the Firewall.

Next click on Create and you will see the screen below. Source IP and Action will be automatically selected to All and Allow, I will leave it up to you as to your own preference on whether you want to lock down specific Source IPs from having access. In this example we will leave as All.

You will now choose ‘Custom‘ and then the Custom button

Now select Destination from the drop-down menu, most web based containers require TCP access but check the guide as it will show the port and protocol. Then add comma separated ports. Then press OK.

Click OK a couple of times to get back to the main screen. You will see by default the new rule is added to the bottom of the list. You must always have your Block All rule last in the list as the rules are applied top down so move your container up.

You have now completed the Firewall changes and can continue with the guide.

Some final steps

SABnzbd will now be running on port 8080 you can connect to it by going to the IP address of your NAS with that port

e.g. 192.168.0.40:8080

Once you have completed the setup wizard, go into the settings and amend your folders to the following

SettingPath
Temporary Download Folder/data/usenet/intermediate
Completed Download Folder/data/usenet/completed
Watched Folder/data/usenet/nzb

If you are using SABnzbd for your download client in the Arrs you will want to add some categories and paths as shown below. When adding SABnzbd to each of the Arrs match up the category in the download client settings, like the example below in Sonarr.

You are now configured to get downloads working, there are quite a few options in the configuration sections of the app that can both improve and hinder performance. These really depend on the capability of your NAS so keep this in mind.

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Published inDockerDownload Tools 7.2Synology

100 Comments

  1. Tram Van Collision Tram Van Collision

    TVM for all your excellent work @DR_Frankenstein!

    I made the switch from native Synology packages to Docker some time ago using your guides and whereas everything is working very well, I have recently noticed that two of the containers are using a surprisingly high amount of CPU resource.

    Both SABnzbd+ (linuxserver/sabnzbd:latest) & Sonarr (linuxserver/sonarr:latest) are each showing about 25% CPU utilisation, even when the apps are idle.

    These were the first two containers that I added to Docker, there’s now 10 in total but it’s only these two that appear to be misbehaving.

    Please could you suggest why this might be and what I could do to reduce their appetite for CPU cycles?

    # 4 January 2024 Reply
  2. David Mc David Mc

    Hi. Thank you so much for the guide.

    I have set up my file structure exactly as you said – so I can see the following in File Station:
    /data/usenet/completed
    /data/usenet/intermediate
    /data/usenet/nzb

    However, when I try to set the Folders in User Folders in SABnzbd I cannot access anything that is under /data/usenet. There’s just nothing there with the file browser and if I type it manually it just strips it out (e.g. strips out ‘intermediate’).

    I followed everything exactly and used your YML file with only the PUID, PGID and TZ to match my own.

    What’s going wrong?

    # 29 December 2023 Reply
    • Dr_Frankenstein Dr_Frankenstein

      Hey, sounds like a permission issue, jump back to the user and group guide there is a command you can run to fix the folder(s)

      # 29 December 2023 Reply
  3. ninjajim ninjajim

    Hi there. Thanks for your guides. I was wondering if you could help me with a basic question: I’ve got the arr apps root folders set to the media subfolders and sabnzbd / qbittorrent set up to send the downloads to the incompleted/completed/etc folders in their respective /data folders. In your folder structure guide, you didn’t show torrents/usenet subfolders for different media types. I was about to setup categories in sabnzbd for my media types – do I need subfolders there? Also, I’m about to move on to set up plex and I’m wondering how the completed torrent and usenet files get moved to the media folder? Is that done in the background through the arrs integration with the download client? Please help me understand

    # 21 December 2023 Reply
    • Dr_Frankenstein Dr_Frankenstein

      Hey

      So when you set up Sonarr Radarr etc they will tell the torrent clients which categories/subfolders to put the file in. However this is not mandatory as they are clever enough to detect the correct files to import, so I don’t have that in the initial guide.

      From a Plex perspective… Radarr and Sonarr once a download has completed will Move/Hardlink (depending on Usenet/Torrents) the files to the appropriate media folder automatically and perform renaming etc. So in Plex you would set you Media folder to be /data/media/movies etc..

      # 22 December 2023 Reply
  4. Ger Ger

    I already have Heimdall running on port 8080. I tried changing the port to 8090 in the compose file, but I can not get it to work. Do you have any pointers for this noobie?

    # 17 December 2023 Reply
  5. DonMario DonMario

    Thanks for the guides! I followed lots of them to set up my synology and they’ve been working great! The only issue I’ve had has been getting download speeds over 11MB/s on Sabnzbd. I’ve to gigabit speed and the synology is connected to ethernet. Any suggestions?

    # 17 December 2023 Reply
    • Dr_Frankenstein Dr_Frankenstein

      Hey,what NAS do you have and drives downloading to? Under the Wrench icon do a performance test to see if it highlights an issue as you should easily hit much higher.

      # 17 December 2023 Reply
      • DonMario DonMario

        I’ve got a DS220+ with 2 Seagate Iron Wolf drives. Under performance tests I get the following:

        Used cache 0 B (0 articles)
        System load 3.56 | 7.16 | 7.07 | V=150M R=85M
        System performance (Pystone) 182945 Intel(R) Celeron(R) J4025 CPU @ 2.00GHz SSSE3
        Download folder speed 36.5 MB/s /data/usenet/intermediate
        Complete folder speed 25 MB/s /data/usenet/completed
        Internet Bandwidth 87.2 MB/s 697.6 Mbps

        Thanks!

        # 18 December 2023 Reply
        • Dr_Frankenstein Dr_Frankenstein

          OK, you should be getting a lot more, noticed your overall system load is high, how much RAM do you have? You need to keep in mind if your disks are busy it’s going to bottleneck throughput.
          Was there a line that said something like Download speed limited by – Disk speed (29x)

          That test gives a rough idea, but it can be all over the place as I receive Disk speed warnings when it’s going direct to a SSD connected to esata.

          https://sabnzbd.org/wiki/advanced/highspeed-downloading

          # 18 December 2023 Reply
          • DonMario DonMario

            I’m at 18gb of RAM, and I didn’t get a “Download speed limited by” message. I was able to increase my speed up to ~70MB/s by changing my server priority order and changing the number of connections. There’s still room to increase speed, but it looks like the issue may be more on the server side than the Synology itself.

            Thanks for helping me figure that out!

            # 18 December 2023 Reply
          • DonMario DonMario

            Looks like I spoke too soon in my previous reply. Now that I’ve got some faster download speeds, I am getting the “Download speed limited by” message:

            Used cache 145.8 MB (199 articles)
            System load 9.05 | 7.62 | 5.95 | V=449M R=377M
            Download speed limited by Disk speed (11x)
            System performance (Pystone) 178649 Intel(R) Celeron(R) J4025 CPU @ 2.00GHz SSSE3
            Download folder speed 12.2 MB/s /data/usenet/intermediate
            Complete folder speed 4.7 MB/s /data/usenet/completed
            Internet Bandwidth 74.9 MB/s 599.2 Mbps

            # 18 December 2023 Reply

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