Yesterday I was delivered a Chromecast device and plugged into my TV. At the moment I want to do one thing only: play MP3s on my PC through my TV, using my Android phone. I DO NOT want to use a thing which relies on the Internet - ONLY WIFI.
Googling yesterday how I might do this I came across mention of Plex, which I’d never heard of before. I also installed AllConnect on my Android.
Installed it, told it where to find my music library on my PC… it took about 40 min to process everything.
After this when I looked at AllConnect, tapping the mobile phone icon I could see something that said Plex server … but when I went to it there was no content at all (specifically under Music, but none anywhere).
To post on this forum I found I had to use the email address I had configured the PC setup with, which was annoying. I then deleted that account and have set up another email… but this won’t install the server… it keeps saying “can’t find the server, please run the .exe file”… but when I run it I get back to the same page. (NB I’m talking about the page where it offers “premium features” for a subscription).
I have tried (twice so far) removing the whole of Plex, deleting the installation directory, rebooting and reinstalling. It never runs the installation Wizard as it did yesterday first time… suggesting that some residue of the previous installation remains. It can never find the server.
Another thing: I’m not clear whether to use Plex you need to use another server, e.g. Windows Media Player. The WMP on my installation shows Plex Media Server as present … but the message there is “The remote media library did not allow the connection. Please contact the device manufacturer…”
So I’d be very grateful if someone could answer this:
Do I need to use WMP as well as Plex or is the Plex server able to serve over the Wifi network on its own?
Is AllConnect the thing I need to use on my Android?
How do I get the browser-based app to “recognise” the Plex server, assuming it is indeed operative at the moment?
Is it in fact possible at all (in theory) to use Plex to serve MP3 files over a Wifi system? What might be going wrong in my setup that I can’t see the contents of the library which Plex processed?
The problem for a Newb is that Plex can theoretically do so many things that there are innumerable red herrings out there.
Plex is a Media Server of it’s own which can organize your content and enrich it with metadata / posters (if named properly). Personally I believe you get the most value when dealing with movies or tv shows… but Plex can also deal with music or photos.
With the Plex Android client you’ll be able to fling the content to your Chromecast – but if I remember correctly the native client of Plex for Chromecast itself just got a major update as well: https://www.plex.tv/blog/massive-update-chromecast-app/
side note…
you do not need a Plex account to use a Plex Server… but for certain content / functions you won’t get entirely around it. However… Plex will require some level of internet connectivity!
Yesterday I was delivered a Chromecast device and plugged into my TV. At the moment I want to do one thing only: play MP3s on my PC through my TV, using my Android phone. I DO NOT want to use a thing which relies on the Internet - ONLY WIFI.
That is impossible, the chromecast requires the internet, this isn’t a plex requirement its a google one. It has nothing installed on it, whenever you launch a “chromecast app” it downloads it from where ever on the internet it is hosted. You can get plex to mostly work without internet access, but not with the chromecast as a client device.
… in one of those funny occurrences… all of a sudden my mobile is now showing the Plex server … with all my music library. I am not conscious of having done anything to make this happen…
I couldn’t get any to actually play using AllConnect… so then I tried AllCast (couldn’t find my TV) and then I tried MediaHouse: hurrah, actually plays a track on my mobile.
@trudge Ok thanks… yes I’m just beginning to understand exactly what this Chromecast thing is (sorry, please bear with me). Yesterday I installed an app on my mobile which had a “Cast” button: tap it and the TV starts using the feed/stream.
Obviously my MediaHouse app doesn’t have a “Cast” icon and if I understand you, couldn’t have. Yesterday as I was googling people were talking about “hacking” the Chromecast device to pick up stuff from your Wifi and relay it to your play device… but clearly I’m a long way from the stage of “hacking”… is it not possible for one of these apps to be installed in the Chromecast actually to be something which captures stuff (at a command from the Android) from your Plex server?
Otherwise I’m slightly stumped: my TV is a Samsung supposedly “smart” TV (from 2013) but hasn’t worked since I installed VirginMedia cable as my Net… it “sees” the Wifi devices, including the Plex server… but can’t seem to get a proper connection to things.
@tom80H Thanks, going to look at that article. I have a good Internet connection but don’t want to have to rely on it to play my music.
“correctly the native client of Plex for Chromecast”… hmmm I’m still trying to work out what that means! If I have understood trudge correctly I’m not sure how Plex can interact at all with Chromecast…
with your server hosted in your home network, the actual music won’t stream through the internet. Plex just needs the connection to confirm your credentials or lookup metadata/posters when you add new media.
And it appears (as I currently understand things) that the Chromecast device is irrelevant to this question.
well I suppose my main question now is what is the best way to stream over Wifi, using Plex (for example) as my server, from my large music collection on a large HD on my PC to my TV (or some sort of audio device which I might buy) … possibly using my phone to control what I play?
At the moment I have an ancient Roku Soundbridge… which I have just found is able to pick up the Plex network… and play music! Unfortunately I don’t at the moment have an amplifier or similar device into which I can plug the audio jacks output… but I can see from the display that it’s working. But this Roku thing is a pretty primitive device for 2018. Scrolling through looking for particular artists or tracks (on a big collection) was always a bit irritating. I would have thought there must be some kind of high-quality audio amp which allows streaming from Wifi which you can control using a well-designed Android app. I have a couple of high-quality audio speakers of the kind which attach to a “conventional” audio amp.
