I’m considering using PLEX to record OTA TV from a HD Home Run tuner.
Question: If I run PLEX server on my computer, can I set my recordings to save on a NAS share rather than my computer’s hard drive?
It seems like I could do that by creating a media folder that points to a NAS share, but I want to make sure.
You can but my suggestion would be to add two folders to the libraries you setup for recordings. One on your local disk in the machine running Plex Media Server, the other a folder location on your NAS. Then when setting up all of your recordings choose the local folder to store the recordings in. Final step is to setup a script to run occasionally to move the recordings to your NAS. This will prevent failed recordings due to the NAS not responding in a timely manner to the start of the recording. Other users I have assisted in the past found that recording locally eliminated recording issues. I use a similar process on my Plex environment. You didn’t mention what OS your Plex machine is running, on my Windows machine I use a script something like:
robocopy /MOVE /S "G:\TV_DVR" "F:\Recorded TV" /XD "G:\TV_DVR\.grab"
This command moves folders in “G:\TV_DVR” to “F:\Recorded TV” while ignoring any folders in “G:\TV_DVR.grab” which is where current recordings are stored until the recording finishes.
Files recorded to your local drive will be picked up by Plex and added to your library, then when moved only the location will be updated. Since most of your recordings will then be on external drives it is normally recommended to turn off the option to empty trash after scans. This will help make sure Plex doesn’t remove recordings that it doesn’t see if the NAS is ever offline for some reason.
You can ask Plex to save them wherever you want as it’s just a library you add. What Plex does do is record the show live to the local HDD, once the show is finished it will then move to your share.
Personally I used a form of symbolic link on my Windows PMS to ensure it uses a different location rather than local PMS install disk during the record (or live watching). I use FreeNAS as my media store so have no issues with speed for Plex moving the recordings.
This topic was automatically closed 90 days after the last reply. New replies are no longer allowed.
