@BRBMan said:
I have both hdhomerun and plex is far better
Thanks for that input. Can you elaborate? Is the DVR better? Can you give me the pros and cons of the HDHR DVR?
I would say first you seem to have initially approached plex by trying to fit your solution to your favorite client. I have ATV 4k, Shield TV, Roku Ultra (for the wife) and HTPC running Plex Media Player. Shield is by far the best but ATV can also schedule recordings as well as ios clients liek iphones and ipads and any android client such as your phones or tablet. Roku cant yet. I also would point out that “TV” specific clients are often not main stream clients and rarely seem to work as well. HDHOMERUN DVR is even more limiting to clients, they dont even have a roku solution. Secondly everyone complains about no grid guide and tries to cry foul or imply they are being disingenuous when plex says it was delayed bc of legal concerns over Rovi’s patent. Well HDHomerun had the same concerns and still does not have a grid guide even though plex is now developing it. I find the interface and ease of what I want to do with the DVR much more friendly in plex. 6 months ago I would have said HDHOMERUN DVR was more reliable but I honestly rarely ever have an issue with plex dvr since they have been so actively squashing bugs. The one thing HDHOMERUN has in its cap is that if you have the prime and get DRM cable channels they have had their windows solution certified and it can “View” DRM channels.
My main issue is simplicity for my wife. And I would say me as well. I am using the Tivo Bolt and minis at home now. They work almost flawlessly. The software and scheduling is pretty rock solid. My only gripe is with the lack of streaming apps. They have the basics, but that’s about it.
And, yes, I did approach this by first identifying the client (i.e.streaming platform) that I preferred. When reading the webpage about Plex DVR and Live TV I saw where it was available on almost everything. What I missed was the wide differences in the state of development of the client apps.
I have tested Samsung TV, Roku 3, Amazon Fire, Roku TV and now I just bought an Nvidia Shield. If all else fails i could create a YouTube video comparing them all B)
The nVidia Shield is likely the best option. I have AppleTV (4th gen), Amazon Amazon FireTV (4k), iOS, PS4, Xbox One and LG 4K Smart TV. I’m considering buying an nVidia Shield.
The Amazon FireTV has an issue with interlacing on 1080i media. To avoid this one has to step down to a lower resolution of 720p, the quality of which suffers somewhat.
The Shield will arrive Monday. I am eager to see the differences. Being Android TV it also has the added benefit of being less controlling of apps. i.e. you don’t have to sideload Kodi or other apps on Fire TV or deal with being locked out all together on Roku.
I prefer the Roku remote and device in general, but would adapt to Nvidia Shield for the more flexible platform and better performance.
Through trial and error I have found what works for me. I have now bought and tested the 3 big DVR solutions; Plex, HDHomerun DVR, and Tablo. I will share my experiences. It is important that my frame of reference was I just needed to replace a Tivo DVR, so that was my primary concern when evaluating these products.
Plex- Began being offered over a year ago and still today many of the client apps cannot even set a recording. Development work seems to be active, but the pace seems slow for something that continues to be marketed today as a DVR solution. Plex DVR has worked OK for me. However, even if I can work around the inability to set recordings that the interface is seriously lacking in comparison to Tivo or any of the other solutions. It may be just a matter of my past experience or personal preference, but the way recordings are simply dumped in with ripped DVDs does not work for me. I don’t want to have to navigate all my media. Why can’t a dedicated DVR interface be presented? One just needs to look at Tivo, Tablo or the grand daddy, Windows Media Center. That’s how it is done for a DVR. Again, I am looking to replace a DVR. The one thing Plex did that neither of the others did was to remove commercials. I already miss that.
HDHomerun DVR- Closer than Plex. More traditional interface. Does a good job replacing a standard DVR. Recorded or live TV comes up quickly. The only thing lacking was no grid guide, will not work with Roku (wife factor) and no lifetime subscription.
Tablo- I tried this last because the reports I had read was it took so long to load live tv. And it does. About 10 seconds. Recorded media is much faster. Recorded media is segregated and collated under a single thumbnail for the show. No need for a bunches of button presses to get to the right season. Setting a recording is simple. Almost as easy as a Tivo. Setup was easy… The webapp actually shows the signal strength of all the channels on one page. You would still need an app like HDHomerun to tune an antenna channel by channel. Channel reception on Tablo seems better as well. Channels that were on the fringes of acceptable using HDHR Extends are stable with the Tablo tuners.
I am not here to dump on Plex. I just wanted to share my experiences so I might save someone else the hundreds of dollars I have spent on equipment and a Plex Pass. I think Plex still shows great promise. I just don’t know when it will get there. I need a (wife acceptable) DVR replacement now.
I have a Lifetime Plex Pass. I will keep an eye out on development.
I have asked this question several times with no response- Windows Media Center came out over a decade ago. I would say it is still better than any of the solutions above. Even Tivo. Why is it proving so difficult to reproduce something that old? Microsoft is no longer supporting it. Why hasn’t someone tried to by the software rights and copied it?
