Moving Library between PCs (and doing it RIGHT this time)

Plex Media Server Desktops & Laptops
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If you can believe it – I’m moving the library a 3rd time. This is because –

  1. I’ve been trying to replace a 3.5 year old Mini PC for almost two months.
  2. I have a ‘trial’ period of that PC, which includes running Plex.
  3. The Beelink GTR and the Minisforum DMAF5 both failed their tests. (Noisy fans. Which is the reason I’m getting rid of the original.) (Had to resort to a medium sized tower, the Asus Expert Center, which is so quiet it concerns me.)

So people. I’m using THIS tutorial –

I appreciate it’s a little dated but I like how he holds your hand. For peeps like me. I think I found where the problem is. I’ve cued the video up to a minute before he says it. Watch it for a minute and listen to him explain exporting the registry.

His method seems simple enough. He suggests it will take A WHILE. For me, it took only a minute and the resulting file is only 2.13 kilobytes.

I’m perfectly happy to switch to a different video tutorial if you have one. But does that tiny registry file sound right to you or is it the smoking gun? If the latter – what was I supposed to do?

I’ll try to see what your doc says in the meantime.

23

Registry files aren’t very big. They’re just text files.
Open one in Notepad to see what’s in it.

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Thank you sir. I know I’ve been mouthy but I really want it to work this time. Because if I have to go thru my movies and correct all the goofed matches yet again - lol.

Fun Fact – if you’re an old movie buff like me the matching thing hates you. It’s like what clown would be watching movies from the 30s.

This clown. :frowning:

25

So that tutorial instructs the user to install PLEX on the destination PC but not open it. Explained better here -

Later in the tutorial, a Plex Media Server folder is supposed to be awaiting. But it isn’t. Dead end.

I tried creating one and extracting to it. The extraction locks up the Windows decompression utility. It seems that Zip file jams up other decompression files too. Sigh.

This is where I typically have to give up and do it manually.

Is that tutorial wrong?

26

I found another issue.

Instructions say install PLEX on the destination but don’t open. And I didn’t. And I saw the Plex Server Folder empty. But I had to reboot. When I did, Plex automatically opened in the background.

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Another thing. I have media on external drives. Moving to the new PC renamed some of them. Like from D to F.

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I urge you to restore the drive letter assignments on the new PC just as they were on the old PC. It saves so much hassle afterwards.

29

If you have the chance, copy the Plex data folder directly from one hard drive to the other.

Using the ZIP file as an intermediate container may save some time during the copy process (under some circumstances), but will require you to refresh all metadata later. Because it destroys the Symlinks in the Plex data folder which are used to link the selected poster pictures to the media items. (i.e. many of the posters will be black rectangles)

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