I’m new to Plex and need some guidance in setting up my media player. I have an Intel NUC running Windows 10 Pro with 8 GB RAM and I would like to use it as a home theatre PC for streaming services like Tidal, Netflix, Disney+, Prime Video, and more. I want to be able to play music from my Tidal account on my HTPC using my Android phone or tablet, as well as choose movies to play on my HTPC from my Android device.
I’d like to have a centralized location to choose shows and movies from my streaming services and have them stream on my HTPC using the Plex app. If possible, it would be great to control everything from my Google Home speaker as well.
I’ve already tried installing the Plex Media Server, the Plex HTPC, and the Plex for Windows program, and I’ve disabled the Windows firewall. I’ve read through the Plex.tv website documentation, but I’m still having trouble getting everything to work properly.
When the Plex Media Server is running, my HTPC sometimes shows up as a device that I can connect to from my Android device, but I often get an error message when I try to play content from Tidal. The error message says that the content cannot be played remotely on this device.
I’m clearly missing something important in my setup. Can anyone offer any guidance to help me get everything working properly? Any help would be greatly appreciated.
I don’t think Plex is capable of directly being a client for Netflix, Amazon or whatever.
I think what you’re trying to do would be better done with a Roku device, for which there are client applications for most services including Plex. Connect the Roku device to the TV, install the client apps including Plex, then you can open whichever service you want from the Roku home screen.
This way, you can watch Netflix, Prime or whatever, and Tidal, OTA TV, Tidal and whatever else you want via the Plex app.
One further suggestion. When / If you buy a Roku, don’t cheap out and buy the “Express” versions. Get the Ultra model. It has more memory, a micro SD slot for adding more, and most importantly, an ethernet port, which the express models lack. Even if you must use wireless, the Ultra models have better wlan adapters.
Thank you for the reply.
A few years ago we had a Roku device and I was really unimpressed with it. Perhaps they’re better now. I’m in Canada so a number of their “channels” didn’t really work here. But if I wanted 750+ channels of some tiny church somewhere, then they had that. The apps seemed really outdated, and at one point I reached out to (I think it was) Spotify to ask if/when they were going to be upgrading the Roku app because it was lacking in so many features and was basically presented with laughter and they had zero plans of updating it, telling me that the Roku devices were so low in RAM and CPU power that there was no point.
I’m really surprised that here we are in 2023 and there’s apparently no application that I can install on a full computer that will replace something as basic as a Chromecast.
Nvidia Shield Pro would be another contender. It has broad app support, including Apple TV+ and Tidal, it has a decent Plex client app and it can be used as a Chromecast receiver. So you can cast media from any mobile device which supports Chromecast.
I wouldn’t use the Shield as a Plex server though.
