I have had so many issues and complaints with the Plex DVR functionality. I was using a MythTV backend with a Kodi frontend and it worked great, but then my server died and I ended up changing to FreeNAS for my server’s OS and Plex was just easier.
Major Bug/Issues:
- “Watch from Beginning” doesn’t actually work half the time and it usually just starts playing from live.
- Once it starts playing from the beginning (if it does) it does not allow me to fast-forward. There is no way to drag the dot to select a specific time. I don’t even get a fast-forward/rewind circle button usually.
- Several times, especially while casting, if I do get a FF/Rew circle, if I push the button multiple times (say, to fast-forward through a commercial), oftentimes it will restart me all the way at the beginning. And again, there is no way presented to me to drag the dot and select the specific time where I was. It is as if it keeps trying to refill the buffer/cache and as soon as you press the skip button, it wipes the cache and starts over.
- Almost every time I try to start a show that is still recording, if I don’t get the issues above, then I get no playback and I get this error: “An error occurred while attempting to play this video. Please check your connection and try again.”
Major Annoyance/Pet-Peeves:
- Imagine I set a particular show to record. Once that show starts, before it ends, where do you go to start watching that recording? You have to navigate to the guide, find the show in the guide on the appropriate channel and then select it. What about shortly after the recording has completed? Trick question…you can’t actually find the recording anywhere. It is in limbo. Finally, where do you go if the show has finished recording and processing? In this case, you go to your library folder. Why is the answer different for each of these cases? For each of these cases, the recording should be accessible the same way, from the library folder. Accessing from the guide or some other method should only be possible other ways in special circumstances (i.e. while the show is still recording).
- My ABC signal is very weak so my recordings are often glitchy Plex seems to be very unfriendly to my weaker signals. MythTV seemed to have much more forgiveness and could still function after a small glitch. Plex seems to have major hiccups with even the smallest of glitches.
Server Version#: 1.20.2.3402 (FreeNAS Plugin)
Player Version#: Chromecast (Android 8.7.2.20952), FireTV (8.7.3.21018)
Tuner Make/Model: HDHR3-US
Guide/Lineup name: DVR—Broadcast TV Dallas-Ft. Worth OTA Broadcast
Using XMLTV?: No
