PlexConnect FAQ's

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Welcome to PlexConnect FAQ:

This post will try to answer some common questions related to the use of PlexConnect, a non-official Plex client for AppleTV2&3 platforms.

Questions:

Q1 - What are the specs of ATV2 and ATV3 ?

ATV2 - Apple TV (2nd generation) - Technical Specifications
ATV3 - Apple TV (3rd generation) - Technical Specifications
Video and/or audio with other specs should transcode in order to play.
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Q2 - Video transcoding

Whenever you want to stream a file whose specs are different from above PlexConnect will request a transcoding decision to PMS. You should use ATV settings (screen panel on each ATV) to specify its maximum allowed bitrate (which is 14MBps for ATV2, and 20 Mbps for ATV3). If you specify higher bitrates than these the ATV may hang (or not) during playback and power recycle will be needed to return it to normal.

Subtitles require transcoding if they are embedded. External .srt subtitles are supported natively and do not require transcoding
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Q3 - Audio transcoding

ATV’s can decode AAC and MP3 natively, and can passthrough other audio tracks to TV/amplifier. PlexConnect has Dolby Digital disabled by default because most TV/amplifiers do not support it. If your TV/amplifier can’t play AC3 you must leave it disabled. This will force audio transcoding of AC3 audio tracks to Stereo.

But if you have your ATV connected to a TV (or amplifier) that accepts AC3 (Dolby Digital) you can enable Dolby Digital (in Apple settings, and also in PlexConnect settings). PMS will then stream AC3 audio tracks without transcoding them. AAC 5.1 wil be transcoded to AC3 5.1.

Dolby Digital=auto can cause problems with PlexConnect and should be avoided.

In summary, both parameters (Apple’s and PlexConnect’s) should be either On or Off depending on your audio device. If you have no sound with Dolby On then DD is not supported by your TV (or amplifier).

Warning: Setting Dolby Digital to on in PlexConnect, and to Off or Auto in ATV Settings will prevent playback (ATV pauses or gives error messages that film can’t be played). Such combinations cannot be used. Unfortunately PlexConnect can’t validate these situations.
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Q4 - Using the ATV remote for better viewing experience

Secret Apple TV remote controls: Fifteen button combos to power up your viewing! | iMore - please note that some features, such as chapter navigation, are only available in DirectPlay situations
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Q5 - Plex features not supported by PlexConnect

There are many Plex features referenced here but some of them are not available in PlexConnect, such as:

  1. Flinging
  2. Plex News
  3. Inline Collections (non-hybrid collections are supported)
  4. PlexConnect also has some limitations with the support of Photo Albums - if they contain videos PlexConnect will not see them. You need to create a separate library for videos
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Q6 - Can PlexConnect be used to manage remote ATV’s ?

No. PlexConnect and ATV’s should be installed in the same LAN. If you have a jailbroken ATV2 you can install PlexConnect in it. Otherwise you need to install PlexConnect in a separate device. Plex servers can be remote (logging the ATV to plex.tv).
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Q7 - PlexConnect does not find any Plex Media Server

From Oct 1st, 2020 onwards this announcement may impact PlexConnect:

  1. If you have PlexConnect installed in the ATV2/3 you can’t login it to plex.tv, therefore you can’t access remote PMS, or use plex pass. But you can use your local PMS
  2. If you have PlexConnect installed in other platform, you need to install python 2.7.9 or higher (2.7.18 recommended)

If you opt for option 1. these are the steps to access a local PMS:

  1. Identify the IP assigned to the ATV and parametrize PMS (see below)
  2. SSH to the ATV3 and stop PlexConnect (see Wiki)
  3. Edit Settings.cfg so that enable_plexgdm = False and ip_pms = x.x.x.x (where x.x.x.x is the ip address of Plex Media Server)
  4. Start PlexConnect

If you are using PlexConnect with PMS 1.1.0+ please note that Plex clients need to be logged in to plex.tv (and this is mandatory to use Plex Home), or use an IP that is authorized to access PMS without login. If you opt to use the latest method you need to authorize both the IP of the machine where PlexConnect is running and the IP of all ATV’s, as in the following example (no spaces allowed):

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You can also authorize the whole LAN with 10.100.10.100/24 but this should be avoided if you also use reverse proxy, because then you are going to open PMS to the whole world.

In above examples replace 10.100.10.xx with your actual IP addresses.
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Q8 - How to generate certificates (Windows 64-bit)

Certificates can be copied between platforms, but in case you don’t have certificates, or your certificates have expired, you can use Windows to generate them:

  1. Download OpenSSL from here and unzip to c:\OpenSSL
  2. Open a CMD session and give the following commands
  3. cd c:\OpenSSL
  4. copy bin\openssl.cnf *
  5. bin\openssl req -new -nodes -newkey rsa:2048 -out trailers.pem -keyout trailers.key -x509 -days 7300 -subj "/C=US/CN=trailers.apple.com" -config openssl.cnf
  6. bin\openssl x509 -in trailers.pem -outform der -out trailers.cer
  7. type trailers.key >> trailers.pem
  8. copy trailers.pem trailers.cer and trailers.key to the PlexConnect certificates folder

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Q9 - How to load certificates in the AppleTV

Ensure that PlexConnect is running and follow these steps in the ATV:
2. open AppleTV’s Settings app
3. Select General and select Network
4. set the DNS server to the network connection to the IP address of your PC (or NAS)
5. Again Select General, highlight Send Data To Apple and press Play on the remote (very briefly)
6. Remove any older profile listed here
7. Select Add Profile
8. Enter (ip of PlexConnect)/trailers.cer
9. Reboot the ATV

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Q10 - How to hijack another application instead of trailers

Yes. OpenPlex and the Synology installer already allow this. For the remaining users:

  1. The certificates need to be generated for another URL (where it reads trailers.apple.com in Q8 step 5. you need to specify another URL, see list below). You can use trailers as the name for the certificates or choose another name
  2. You need to modify hosttointercept in Settings.cfg for the URL to intercept (see list below)
  3. If you change trailers as the name for the certificate, then you need to modify the certfile parameter in Settings.cfg to specify the correct name
  4. Restart PlexConnect so that it picks the changes in Settings.cfg
  5. Load the cert in the ATV following Q9 (changing cert name if needed)

List of URL names for each ATV app:
3. iMovies - www.icloud.com
4. WSJ Video - video-api-secure.wsj.com
5. Trailers - trailers.apple.com

Other URL’s listed here may also work.
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Q11 - My ATV used to work but now has a strange behaviour

For unknown reasons the ATV can work during several weeks and then start showing strange behaviours, such as rebooting in the middle of a film. It is believed that this is due to buffer overruns, or other causes that corrupt the firmware.

The recommended procedure is to restore the ATV to factory settings (reloading the latest firmware). When this finishes you need to complete the ATV setup, which includes rearranging apps in the initial page, loading the certificate required by PlexConnect, specifying the fixed DNS, activating dolby digital if needed, etc.
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Q12 - PlexConnect fails to start in Windows 10

The following services can block ports used by PlexConnect:

  1. VPN - Can block port 443
  2. IIS - Will block port 80

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Q13 - How to change icon to Plex Icon

Please follow the instructions here (only works from v0.6 onwards)
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Q14 - How to Update PlexConnect

  1. Stable PlexConnect versions can be obtainned from here
  2. Development versions are available here

To update Plexconnect:

  1. Stop PlexConnect
  2. Unzip the new version over the existing one (certificates and settings are preserved)
  3. Start PlexConnect

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Q15 - When I click on trailers I only see a spinning circle

This can be caused by several situations:

  1. PlexConnect is not active
  2. Timezone and hour of the ATV are incorrect
  3. Python 2.7.8 or older (plex.tv login requires python 2.7.9+)

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Q16 - Intermittent connection issues

If you are experiencing this issue and you log showns DNSServer: Warning: DNS error (10054): An existing connection was forcibly closed by the remote host this may be caused by a Firewall. Avast can cause it.
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Q17 - Plex Home

In order to use Plex Home your ATV needs to be logged in to plex.tv
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Q18 - SSL: CERTIFICATE_VERIFY_FAILED

If PlexConnect.log contains this error message you can try this
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Q19 - PlexConnect won’t sign in

See Q07.
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1 Like
2

Thanks got it setup on ubuntu