New Server Install

Plex Media Server
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I have been a cord cutter in some form since 2006. I have been utilizing Tablo DVRs since 2016, and recently purchased a couple of HDHomerun ATSC 3.0 tuners and was waiting to see if ATSC 3.0 would be fully supported by DVR software. Given the current state of ATSC 3.0 (it seems like it changes almost daily), I decided to jump in and test the waters.

Currently the HDHomerun tuners can record utilizing their software, but I absolutely hate their interface. It isn’t bad for watching “live TV” (big improvement over the Tablo DVRs for watching live TV), but the DVR software leaves a lot to be desired.

I watch a lot of OTA TV shows - both current in HD (ABC, CBS, NBC, etc) and SD (MeTV, Cozi-TV, ION, etc). I almost exclusively watch programming on HD TVs (I have a couple of 4K TVs), utilizing Roku or FireTV devices (occasionally on a computer). I never watch recorded stuff on tablets or phones, so I don’t think transcoding is going to be an issue. Typically there would only be 1 or at the most 2 streams at any given time. Some of the recording has been on 3-4 channels at one time.

I want to setup a Plex Server (will purchase the lifetime subscription), and I am trying to decide on whether to do it on a PC or utilize a Nvidia Shield Pro for the server. I don’t plan on loading up a bunch of media - I have a few DVDs and BluRay movies, but it would be just as easy to watch the original media instead of it being on the server.

Just looking for opinions from people as to which way they would go. Thank you for the help!

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If you have yet heard or subscribed of The Antenna Man, I highly recommend you check out his YT channel.

To put it bluntly, WE as consumers are at the mercy and are here where we are due to a lot of political shenanigans. Not in just the audio with ATSC 3.0, which is what Plex themselves have said is holding them behind, but there’s a bunch of crap that set ATSC up for where it is now. Atenna Man did some digging and brought some news to light about how the digital signals COULD BE BETTER but aren’t because of X reasons.

While I’m on board and don’t mind using an antenna to capture my local area channels, its actually quite maddening and really a F-U to the consumer when ATSC had a problematic start.

Because it is so proprietary and political, I’d actually propose a TAX that funds all local area broadcasts to require their digital channels be available for streaming.

This stuff has gotten absolutely out of hand. And what I mean by this is that I’ve noticed using Roku in my house, that Roku has currently added the ION brand (ION, ION Plus, and ION Mystery) to its Roku TV lineup, something lots of digital VOD services like PlutoTV (owned by Paramount), XUMO TV (owned by Concast/NBC Universal) and Tubi TV (owned by Fox Entertainment (not Big D owned) already do on their own platforms. They’re so segmented though. Roku also has carried the Buzzr channel, also found on Pluto and many other services.

Tubi TV literally has over 30+ Fox affiliates available to watch, available to stream NATIONWIDE! If I wanted to watch Fox in Kansas City, while in Chicago, boom! done.

Why have this convoluted process to stall OTA channels over the web when there’s already access through their apps? Something HAS TO CHANGE!!

Now IF EACH of these streaming app services are allowing their local broadcasts available through the download of their apps, HOW much harder is it for all of them to come up with a PROPER way for all their digital signals to be found on every platform available. In the meantime, people who are using their antennas are getting screwed over!

I’m over it and tired of the excuses.

Additionally, there was a drop of ME TV from Sinclair/Scripps owned stations this past Summer and that station too can only be found to stream via Frndly or Philo.

This has gotten so divisive and is just crazy. I don’t see much point in investing in ATSC 3.0 right now as the TV landscape of channels and ownership is CONSTANTLY changing and the TV viewers are the ones left out to dry.

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My only gripe was recently the H&I channel disappeared from local TV. I receive 50 channels (10 ATSC 3.0 and 40 ATSC 1.0), and can view them all without issues. I am aware that the ATSC 3.0 channels aren’t an option today (I can view & record them with the SiliconDust software) for Plex - but in my opinion, other than being “cutting edge technology”, there isn’t a huge benefit to viewing them - and even though Austin, TX was one of the first markets to go live, all of the ATSC 3.0 channels are on low power broadcast frequencies, and often “go down” for maintenance. None of the broadcasts have been in 4K, and the AC4 audio codecs in my opinion aren’t any better than the ATSC 1.0 broadcasts.

So, I have recorded everything using the ATSC 1.0 stations because they are online and working 99% of the time.

The main reason for the post was to see if the Nvidia Shield Pro would be a good option for my DVR services, or if I should invest in a PC to do it. I really like the option of lower power consumption by the Nvidia product, not to mention the smaller form factor. But if there are big differences in performance, I may “just have to deal with it”, and use a PC.

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when you say PC i presume you mean windows? you can go cheaper linux based alternatives that will be more stable than both windows and the shield. the main problem with the shield is that when they update it to newer android versions it can break for a lot of people. also, many people don’t put their shield on a UPS and that will corrupt the database if you have power outages ever. PMS does not like random power fails. corrupts databases. i used a shield for 2 year and ended up switching to a nas just for ease and reliability. but you can get a cheap PC, rasberry PI, NUC, etc. not sure how well the pi would do for live recording for DVR. someone would have to speak to that. many people use the shield and use it successfully. you can search for shield vs pc or shield vs linux or shield vs nas etc. people ask this question frequently. the truth is that if you can find a system that is reliable and you never have to touch that is the best system. most of them can do that if you get everything correctly set up. i’d say linux is the most stable though.

a question that you did not ask is if you should you plex for your DVR. i dont use it much so but there are some large threads of people that are more power users having major issues. i dont know if that is widespread or just certain power users.

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I have a few computers that are a few years old that I could repurpose. They are currently running Windows 10, but they have no upgrade path to Windows 11, so I will probably switch them to Ubuntu (or different flavor of linux). I usually record around 10-15 programs during the week (it seems like Thursday Nights have the majority of them). Not big on getting a huge collection, and there are two users, watching on streaming devices in the home.

I just don’t want to build a $2,000+ machine that I utilize 1% of it, or create a $200 machine that is running at 100% all the time, and possibly fails to record a few of the shows.

Youtube has a lot of videos that talk about transcoding streams, and usually it is because they have 4K content that is being streamed to phones/tablets or other devices that don’t support 4K. Since nothing is 4K OTA right now, and probably won’t be for quite a while, I don’t think that is an issue. And the range of NAS devices range greatly as well.

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