Advice on my Plex growing pains?

General Discussions
1

I’m a new Plex user, and totally love it. I’ve just gotten started importing my movies and shows into my server, and wanted some advice from the community on how to get past some issues I’m having.

One issue is that when I stream 1080p movies to my living room wirelessly (wireless-N to Plex app on Roku TV), I often get buffering and sometimes a message saying my network is inadequate. Streaming to my bedroom TV (which has a max resolution of 720p, and is closer to the wireless router if that matters) hasn’t had issues. Nor has streaming SD shows and movies to the living room.

(Note that this is a rental house so running ethernet to the living room isn’t something I want to do here.)

Another issue is that I’m quickly filling up my new 4TB drive and I’ve barely gotten started with my ripping. My movies vary in size between 1 and 8 GB (using Handbrake and an RF of 20, at 1080p when possible).

I want my collection to be as future-proof as possible, but don’t want to break the bank buying lots of hard drives, either!

I recognize that ripping my movies to 720p might alleviate both problems, but at the expense of having to re-rip my higher-res media in the future if/when storage is even cheaper and/or my TV is even more capable of displaying such beauty.

What would you do (or what have you done) in my place?

-Keith

2

Keith, There maybe other options but you have basically answered your own questions.

Wireless is never going to be as reliable as hardwired.
Ethernet over power lines might be an option!

720p vs 1080p - individual taste - me I cant see it.

And re storage - funny about that,
you’re filling your drive/s - mmmm why is that?
Solution - buy another one or buy a NAS or DAS .

3

@spikemixture said:
Keith, There maybe other options but you have basically answered your own questions.

Wireless is never going to be as reliable as hardwired.
Ethernet over power lines might be an option!

720p vs 1080p - individual taste - me I cant see it.

And re storage - funny about that,
you’re filling your drive/s - mmmm why is that?
Solution - buy another one or buy a NAS or DAS .

Haha! Good point. I just didn’t expect the biggest drive I’ve ever bought to fill up so fast! But it’s also my first experience ripping blu-rays, so I shouldn’t be surprised.

A NAS is sounding pretty smart.

Also, this morning, I got buffering while streaming an SD video. Yet the other night I streamed an HD movie with few issues. So I guess my wireless network’s reliability is intermittent.

4

Definitely try going with the powerline adapter option, it’s cheep and should work much better than wireless.