Hi there
I have just recently downlaod plex media server and I am currently playing around with it, however I would like to know what is the best way to play the media on this server.
- Is it better to run a cat 6 cable from the server direclty to the ethernet connection on back of tv for direct play through app
- Run the Cat 6 connection through a Cat 6 to HDMI convertor into the TV
-
- or through a media player box like Nivida sheild.
Also how come the free app does not have a deinterlacing option or is this only for plex pass holders.
Kind regards
Hi,
- If your TV has Plex client than that’s the easiest and best solution.
- What is your PMS running on? A PC? I have never used Cat6 converters and have no idea about the quality of the image.
- That depends where your PMS is located. If you run it on NAS and want more power or if you run on PC and you want to safe your electrical bill. There is also option for PMP (only for Plex Pass if you consider getting it) or OpenPHT (community project).
What is the application you are talking about?
Sorry to sound thick but what is PMP and OPEN PHT.
I am currently running it off my laptop until a purchase a Nas but not sure what nas to get yet though unless anyone know of someone who builds them
OpenPHT is a community driven fork of PHT (Plex Home Theater, old client).
PHT was replaced with Plex Media Player: https://www.plex.tv/blog/introducing-the-plex-media-player/
If you are planning on getting Nas don’t let Plex be deciding factor. Buy Nas for storage, not to run Plex on it. You are better of with buying Nvidia Shield + external drive.
I would recommend either Netgear or Synology as Nas, that is if you are looking for out of the box solution.
I’m not saying the other brands are better or worse, I’ve no experience with QNAP, Thecus or WD (they make great drives:))
You can always build your own Nas, it would be cheaper but would require more effort and knowledge.
How much storage do you need? What clients are you planning to use? Are you going to share your server with family and friends?
well was thinking of just using plex by itself to direct play to my tv and maybe one or two streams if there is an affordable naz out their that would do this, not fully deided yet don’t no what the pros and cons of running it through nevida sheild or by itself any tips. Size wize im a not to sure as i have some films stored on my google play movie account and currently ripping my store brought dvds using win ex dvd ripper mp4.h264 formate just the film which rips at aboud 1-2 gig… without counting I would have about 130 dvds
Kind regards
I do NOT agree that using a Shield as a server. I have a shield and from time to time I try to set it up as a server to see if it can work well. The last time I tried was yesterday and I put all my movies on a 5 TB hard drive and attached it to the Shield (I did that to get around the fact that the Shield cannot handle large libraries) and it did work, mostly. But I kept running into problems and the web interface was often as slow as if it were running on a computer of 20 years ago.
The Shield is just not a good device for a server.
But I do agree that most (possibly all) NAS devices are too under powered to make a decent server either.
What I did a couple of years ago was to simply get a good desktop computer that was about three times more powerful than I projected I would need for the foreseeable future and attached a bunch of USB drives to it. (I kind of wish I had decided to use internal drives in a couple of drive enclosures)
That computer only runs PMS and a small amount of support programs like StableBit’s DrivePool. It has given me no problem and is able to easily transcode anything I throw at it. It is a bad idea to run PMS on a computer that has other daily functions.
I also recommend a separate media player and not a built in app on the TV. So called “smart” TVs do not get regular upgrades as often or as well as stand alone devices do.
If you already have a Shield you can use it as your player as it will play virtually everything but, personally, I find the Shield to be clumsy to use as a player and almost never use mine for that purpose.
There are lots of choices for players that run Plex. My personal choice 95% of the time is the Roku line but I do not use any advanced audio settings and thereby avoid many problems that others have. BTW: For the most part the Roku 3 is free of any problems and has proven to be the best streamer I have ever used.
For just Plex alone a Raspberry PI running either of the embedded Plex players is probably one of the best options there is but I generally like my streamer to easily do more than one thing.
I also do not like to use a computer as a player no matter if it is also the server or not. Even with a fully functioning remote a computer always feels like a kludge or even worse. But be aware there are some things that are not available on any streamer like Fox Soccer 2go and several other web based services so it is a good idea to have a computer hooked to your TV as well as another streamer.
I do run my Plex server on my ‘everyday/everything’ desktop, but I am dedicated to the necessary pre-Plex-processes to create material that will Direct Play across ALL my devices. Few possess that level of dedication/OCD.
My result is that many Direct Play Streams can be enjoyed at the same time the baddies are removing my limbs in Doom 2016, but this, again, comes at the cost of a lot of pre-processing.
It really depends on your personal willingness to do the work Plex wants to do for you. The downside is that Plex often makes poor decisions when transcoding your material, but if you really don’t care what it looks like - or can’t see the difference - it doesn’t matter, but no matter which path you choose you’ll need a box capable of:
- wading through mountains of encodes in a timely manner so they’ll Direct Play while your internal organs are sliding down the walls on Mars without dropping a frame
or
- Having Plex mangle your Video in a full-blown transcode for every device that can’t support it in it’s current state.
6 of one/half-dozen of another I guess.
