@CDLehner said:
Have my 1st MKV conversion; now I’m going to work on the naming conventions…and Neo’s mapping suggestion!
As said above, don’t add it into Plex until the preparation is finished.
The suggestion is very good, since Plex should be pointed onto a folder, not directly to a share.
@OttoKerner said:
@CDLehner said:
Have my 1st MKV conversion; now I’m going to work on the naming conventions…and Neo’s mapping suggestion!As said above, don’t add it into Plex until the preparation is finished.
The suggestion is very good, since Plex should be pointed onto a folder, not directly to a share.
Good?
@CDLehner said:
Good?
Almost.
Don’t go ‘all caps’ on the folder name. Name it like it appears on TheTVDB.
@OttoKerner said:
@CDLehner said:
Good?
Almost.
Don’t go ‘all caps’ on the folder name. Name it like it appears on TheTVDB.
Damn picky scrapers 
@CDLehner said:
Damn picky scrapers
The overall folder name is the most important thing for the identification/matching of tv series in Plex. Keep it as close as possible to how it appears on TheTVDB.
Gotcha. Done.
That’s enough for tonight!
Thanks guys!!
@CDLehner said:
Pro gress
All looking like it’s supposed to look. 
CDLehner: OttoKerner has helped many times in the past with issues that I was having with some of my TV Shows. I found a little program that might help with some of the naming for TV Shows. It’s called FileBot. It has worked well for me in getting the correct naming convention that Plex loves. Good luck.
If you are going to go through the trouble of encoding your video_ts … I might suggest not saving them in that format… while plex will handle it just in an mkv container… its still in video codec that most lightweight clients like Pi and other won’t direct play… that means the server has to transcode during play… again not an issue provided you know what that means for your hardware / bandwidth
Also, size… you can rip SD dvds down with handbrake using the ATV3 preset and get very nice quality at 1/4 to 1/3 the file size… any you would be hard pressed to see the quality diff… and it keeps 5.1 etc. I keep my original video_ts offline so that they can be reencoded in the future to the latest and greatest… like hevc
I usually take the FULL traditional video_ts folder and convert to makemkv with only the main title… this takes seconds as its basically just containerizing …
Then I transcode that mkv into a lossy format ATV3 for online use… keeping the original mkv container materials as stated…
Similar for blu ray. Mkv rip just the main title lossless 30-50gb
Then rip it using handbrake ATV3 1080 5.1 4-6gb for online use
Archive the original or keep blockbusters online for local play only…
@dragonmel said:
If you are going to go through the trouble of encoding your video_ts … I might suggest not saving them in that format… while plex will handle it just in an mkv container… its still in video codec that most lightweight clients like Pi and other won’t direct play… that means the server has to transcode during play… again not an issue provided you know what that means for your hardware / bandwidthAlso, size… you can rip SD dvds down with handbrake using the ATV3 preset and get very nice quality at 1/4 to 1/3 the file size… any you would be hard pressed to see the quality diff… and it keeps 5.1 etc. I keep my original video_ts offline so that they can be reencoded in the future to the latest and greatest… like hevc
I usually take the FULL traditional video_ts folder and convert to makemkv with only the main title… this takes seconds as its basically just containerizing …
Then I transcode that mkv into a lossy format ATV3 for online use… keeping the original mkv container materials as stated…
Similar for blu ray. Mkv rip just the main title lossless 30-50gb
Then rip it using handbrake ATV3 1080 5.1 4-6gb for online useArchive the original or keep blockbusters online for local play only…
Point taken Dragon. Everything I’ve ripped to this point…which is considerable; is lossless/not compressed, etc.
Going forward…I’ll have to see, if I want to “double-up” on everything.
I get the idea; once you lose it, you can never get it back…without a re-rip. But…it’s also, a good amount of work.
Thanks
OK…TV thing, is on track for now. If I run into other TV questions, I’ll re-visit.
Thanks sooo much guys. Happy to see, what a responsive forum this is 
Quickie: as I mentioned before…I eased into PLEX, with a FIRE TV. Price, size, features seemed right; and it’s “fine”.
Ready for a 2nd location. Stick with FTV; or try something else? NVIDIA Shield, PS4, etc?
There is a good youtube video somewhere where a guy did an in depth review of most of the more popular options in a compare and contrast…
This is defitily one of those 'it depends ’ questions
Price
Quality (what size screen)
Wireless/wired
Do you want to direct play or transcode (hardware capabilities differ)
Do you need 4k
Do you need optical out
Do you need/want HDaudio or is DTS or dolby 5.1 good enough
I have found that the lowly Pi running openPHT is a very nice experience and cost for performance ratio is right…
It will NOT play every format so blu rips in VC1 and some audio formats will require the server to transode… but I have the horsepower so its not an issue…
It gives me 1080p 5.1 DTS passthough via hdmi to my tuner then to my DLP 70" and the quality is great… will shift the display to the Match the framerate of the material and with a cheap wireless dongle I get good thoughput
It will even direct play hevc up to 720… but not 1080… hardware limit so a 1080 or 4k hevc will be transcoded server side to 1080 x264 and pushed to the client… which can take substantial back end horsepower… 2k passmark for a full blu Ray rip to something else is pretty standard… 4k is really not going to work in real time unless you have hella hardware…
OpenPHT on all platforms seems like a better experience especially on embedded systems like the pi… my PMP install on the Mac is pretty good but the skin sucks… although it plays everything under the sun without transcode
On the pi you can buy codecs for VC1 and others I think… have not done it but they are like 5 bucks each for the licenses… no biggie…
This one??
@dragonmel said:
It will even direct play hevc up to 720… but not 1080… hardware limit so a 1080 or 4k hevc will be transcoded server side to 1080 x264 and pushed to the client… which can take substantial back end horsepower…
If you need 4K and HEVC, substitute the Pi with an Odroid C2.
OpenPHT runs on it.
I have been keeping my eye on that piece of hardware… you going off personal experience with it or word of mouth?
I have been seeing some reports of issues here and there… perhaps they have them ironed out at this point…
the pi has been around longer so the code for it is more mature… and as for PMP embeded… they cant get the plex one half decent so not holding my breath for a odroid optimized version
openPHT recognizes that pi can do hevc at 720… PMP … nope…
thanks for the imput … let me know more about it if you use one … would like to get your first hand review
@dragonmel said:
you going off personal experience with it or word of mouth?
I have one.
I didn’t connect it to an AVR, so I cannot tell whether there are issues with bitstreaming surround sound.
But I can tell you that it plays indeed 4K and HEVC directly, without the server transcoding it.
There are some teething problems yes, but not much worse than those on the Pi.
I will have to keep an eye out for a deal… i think one of these pi type mfg could make a fortune with a custom board just to run a plex client
OK Guys…thanks sooo much, for the help thus far. But let me make some things clear, for going forward.
Yes…I am looking for some new “tricks”; but…some of these areas you guys are getting into (and I realize to a certain extent, they are organic and meant for each other; which is fine)…are wayyy over my head, lol :">
So…I do not, nor really anticipate needing: 4k. And I only need more than 5.1, for my HT location; which I am renovating, and not in immediate need of an STB for yet.
So…with that in mind; based on the video above: it seems the FireTV, is a fine choice…performance to cost-wise?
I am a little disappointed, he didn’t cover PS4 (or 3, if this video was done before 4); but clearly he’s an XBox guy, lol.
Can anyone briefly comment, how PLEX does; on 3/4?
