I have am not new to Raspberry Pi. I have had 7 displays running the Signage Program Screenly on Raspberry PIs for over a year now. That's why I have a spare Raspberry PI to play with. I was an XBMC user from the beginings on an original Xbox and later on a custom built PC. I discovered Plex about a year and a half ago and ended up getting a Roku 2 (later a Roku 3) for my primary TV. This replaced my XBMC PC quite well but I always missed the beauty of the XBMC interface. The Roku interface is very utilitarian. I had flirted with the Plex HT but really didn't want to put a PC back in the living room. I watched the progress of Raspberry Pi for several months and tried a version or two but just wasn't impressed until I saw the youtube video for 0.4.0-RC4. I immediately downloaded it and within 30 minutes I had it up and running at my office, connected to my home Plex Server and was viewing content. I took it home that night and swapped out the Roku3. That was a Thursday evening. We watched TV shows and movies all weekend with the only issue being FF/RR. I did not have a remote control but I did have a wireless keyboard that I had used for my XBMC PC. Since RasPlex is a port of XBMC, I already knew all the keyboard commands. That weekend convinced me that even without the FF/RR functionality, this was the best software I have seen run on a Raspberry PI. I ordered and received a universal USB IR Dongle that allows my existing Universal Remotes to work with RasPlex. Over the past week, I have taken RasPlex off and put the Roku 3 back in place just so I could take the RasPlex to several places and show it off. I have even set it up on one of the 7 displays used for Signage just to demonstrate its abilities as a media server. The customer was very impressed and since they have an ongoing requirement to show training videos to their employees, they are configuring their own Plex Server just for that purpose. To convert one of the signs temporarily only requires the PI to be powered off, the SD card swapped, and a USB dongle inserted for Remote or Keyboard. As for my time with RasPlex, the only other issue I have found with RC4 is that Apple Movie Trailers Channel does not work. It works fine on all my other Plex clients, even my Windows Phone, just not on RasPlex.
So, even though currently I know of two issues with RC4, it has been and will continue to be my choice for my primary TV. I'm sure these two minor issues will be corrected soon. I would like to take just a moment to say thanks to all involved in this project. I wish I was into programing so I could help out but I'm just a hardware guy.
Just an update, now 40 days in and still using RasPlex over Roku3. Found another issue. When playing Music, the Pause button does not work. In my case, I am unable to stop Music play without exiting from Music and going into TV or Movies. By starting some other media playback, it cuts off the music and then I can stop the playback of the new media with the Pause button. So far, it's only an issue in Music. As for stability, we watch at least 3 TV shows a night on RasPlex and have watched about 5 Movies during the last 40 days. I have had only one instance of it locking up and it occurred during a jump back to main screen while a Movie was playing, then trying to get back into the movie. It just froze and I had to reboot. Otherwise, I have not had any stuttering or loss of control. I do not watch any 1080p content, all of my stuff is 720p MKV format. I do use 5.1 surround with no problems. I really hope the merge with Gotham code comes soon.
Keith
P.S. My wife prefers the RasPlex over Roku also. She finds it much easier to get around our 10000 plus library of Music, Movies, and TV Shows in the RasPlex (thankfully because I really didn't want to switch back to the Roku)
Just an update, now 40 days in and still using RasPlex over Roku3. Found another issue. When playing Music, the Pause button does not work. In my case, I am unable to stop Music play without exiting from Music and going into TV or Movies. By starting some other media playback, it cuts off the music and then I can stop the playback of the new media with the Pause button. So far, it's only an issue in Music. As for stability, we watch at least 3 TV shows a night on RasPlex and have watched about 5 Movies during the last 40 days. I have had only one instance of it locking up and it occurred during a jump back to main screen while a Movie was playing, then trying to get back into the movie. It just froze and I had to reboot. Otherwise, I have not had any stuttering or loss of control. I do not watch any 1080p content, all of my stuff is 720p MKV format. I do use 5.1 surround with no problems. I really hope the merge with Gotham code comes soon.
Keith
P.S. My wife prefers the RasPlex over Roku also. She finds it much easier to get around our 10000 plus library of Music, Movies, and TV Shows in the RasPlex (thankfully because I really didn't want to switch back to the Roku)
I'm using the FLIRC USB Dongle with the X-10 Nstinct Universal Remote Control - Model IR34A. I have programmed the FLIRC for Roku commands from a Roku IR Remote. The Nstinct is set for Roku and works perfectly with the Roku. I use the Nstinct remote on Roku setting to control the RasPlex. Every command works with the sole exception of Pause when playing music. Pause works in all of the other modes of play. Interesting anomaly. I have not tried Keyboard commands, I will probably hook up my RF Keyboard later today and test it but I'm betting that it will work with the keyboard. I'll let you know.
