PMS replacement suggestion?

Plex Media Server
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I currently am running PMS on a 2019 Shield TV Pro with files on a Synology volume. I love how stable its been for me and I particularly love how even if there are network disruptions, when the network is back up, it re-mounts the Synology share on its own. I used to run a PMS on an Apple Mac Mini which was great except that if the mounted share became unmounted, it would not automatically re-mount and I had to either restart the server or screen share into the headless Mac mini and remount the share.

I’d like to upgrade the PMS to something more powerful that I can transcode 4k if needed or serve up a variety of file types. I’ve recently been getting a lot of “server not powerful enough” errors. So, I’d like to get something that I can set up and largely forget about. I’d really like to not have to remount the network share each time my router gets reset, or some other reason that the shared volume gets unmounted. I’d probably use it just as a Plex server and put it in a server closet. I mostly use 4k Apple TVs for viewing, but sometimes other devices as well. I think I’ve read people say that some PMS server versions are maintained with more frequent updates and would probably give preference to this. I’m very open to purchasing any new hardware if it makes things easier for me. Best suggestions for 2022?

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If you’re familiar with Linux, then consider running Plex on a Linux based system.

I recently moved from running PMS on a DS918+ to an i5-10500T PC running Ubuntu 20.04 and it has gone very well. The system doesn’t break a sweat transcoding & tonemapping 4K HDR media. It does struggle with burning subtitles when transcoding 4K HDR due to the low single-thread passmark score of the 10500T (burning subtitles is single threaded). Burning subtitles when transcoding 1080p media is not a problem.

Note that support for 12th gen Alder Lake CPUs is still being worked out in Linux. The 5.18 kernel will have several additions to enhance Alder Lake support.

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Thank you for the suggestion. I’m not familiar with Linux, but I’m pretty good at following directions, so I certainly may go that route if it seems like a good option. I’m sure that I could get it up and running since there are lots of tutorials. How is it with updates? For Mac, I know that while I can initiate a PMS update from Plex app on iOS or the like, but it won’t complete the update without giving the update permission from Mac OS (meaning that I need to periodically log into the Mac OS computer). Do you have to do this with Linux or can I just tell it to update from and iOS client and not have to worry about logging into the PC running the linux distro? And how is linux at auto-remounting network shares? For me, this is a huge convenience if it can maintain or automatically re-mount a NAS share.

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Linux has a learning curve, especially if you are not familiar with it. Even with the various graphical interfaces you will still have to learn the Linux command line, become familiar with its file structure, how read/write permissions are set, how to install Linux updates, etc.

If you’ve never used Linux and need a Plex server up and running quickly, then Linux is not the right choice. Use an OS with which you are comfortable.

If you have time, and do not mind the learning curve, then give Linux a go. Just realize it will take time to familiarize yourself with the OS.

Plex updates are via the command line. Straightforward, but CLI based. Plex Media Server will tell you an update is available. You can download the file using a web browser (or CLI), then login and update the software via CLI.

Auto-remounting shares is usually not a problem after rebooting the system. I still login and check, but it is rare that one of the shares does not re-mount.

The issues you will run into are with Linux system setup and administration, especially if you’ve never been hands-on with the OS.

A couple of examples with NFS mounts (media on Synology, using NFS to share to Plex system):

When initially setting up the system, it would not auto-remount NFS shares after reboots. I had to dig into the Linux log file to find out that the system was trying to mount the shares before the Ethernet port had been brought online. Once I knew what was happening, I had to search through Ubuntu, reddit, & other online forums and the appropriate NFS docs to find a solution. Turns out there is one additional parameter to add to a config file. Easy solution, but it took me a couple of days to find it.

Another issue was with NFS permissions. Synology handles things a bit differently than Ubuntu. Also, NFS changed default behavior between v3 & v4. It took me another couple of days to get read/write permissions worked out.

A daily Linux user could probably have fixed the issues much faster. I had not used Linux in a few years. I knew what was happening, but it took a big chunk of time to resolve the issues because thing had changed a bit over time.

One other recommendation: Take copious notes when installing Linux - any system configurations or modifications, what extra programs/packages are installed & when, etc.

I completely mucked up my system a couple of times when experimenting with non-Plex related items. When it came time to set it up for real, I did a complete re-install of the OS, wiping the SSD, etc. Having the notes to follow about what I installed, configured, etc saved a ton of time.

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OK. You’ve sufficiently warned me off. I just don’t have the time these days to do tinkering and troubleshooting. Its actually something I used to enjoy, but like a lot of people, I just don’t have much free time these days. Not to mention that the wife just needs things to work when she wants to use them. She’s not going to want to log into the server and remount the network share so she can watch a movie.

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have you considered that you may be getting that “not powerful enough” message because HW transcoding is broken on most peoples shields to my understanding. If you upgraded to the latest experience. If it wasn’t happening before and is just now happening it is probably that. the shield should be able to handle 4k transcoding if HW acceleration is working.

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i run a ds920+ as my server and works great. I also have the shield running its own server for back up purposes if for some reason my syno is not working. But i haven’t really ever used it. i moved to syno as my pms when shield constantly would screw up my server because of power outage or updates or whatever. syno has been stable for me for a few years now. you just need plex pass so you can enable HW acceleration on the syno. Not required if the shield is your pms.

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I run 2 PMS instances; 1 on a 10 year old Ubuntu PC, the other on a RPi running Raspian. The clients are all Roku 4/Ultra or Fire Cubes. With the Roku 4 or Fire Cube because the client is so powerful there’s NO Video transcoding ever needed, the client can handle all the video content thrown at it. Audio transcoding is easy, and even the RPi can handle that. They can also display PGS subtitles so thats not an issue, many lighter weight Plex clients (ones built into smart TVs) cant handle PGS so you can either supply SRT subtitles or a powerful GPU / CPU to do the transcoding. But with a powerful $99 client (Roku 4/Ultra or Fire Cube) the server can be a $50 RPi. Also the Roku / Fire Cube are a more responsive client, Plex on a Samsung TV is so much slower to respond to the remote control. I believe the best most rock solid Plex setup is PMS on a Linux server & Roku / Fire Cube clients. It just works.

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Understand about not having time.

Just an FYI that Plex on Linux is very solid. It is just the OS learning curve you’ll have to deal with.

As far as the NFS mounts go, your wife, or any other user, should never have to deal with it.

My Plex server runs 7x24. I last rebooted it two weeks ago after loading some Linux updates. The whole process took maybe three minutes. Install updates, reboot, login, check NFS mounts (which were good). If one of them were missing it takes ~10 seconds to type the command to mount it.

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Yikes. No, I haven’t. But just doing a quick search of the forums here. It sounds like I’d need to downgrade my PMS version to get things working better? Is that the current consensus?

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What about when the mounts get unmounted (such as when the network gets reset or something)? My shield seems to automatically remount the network shared drive without me needing to do anything. On MacOS, I need to remount the drive (every other method of auto remount seems to be deprecated for MacOS). I have the network share mount automatically on boot/reboot, but thats different. I have a pretty big place with a main router, multiple switches, 6 APs and lots (about 100) of network devices, so there lots going on and so there are commonly little errors that pop up and I need to reset my router. I’m sure there are a lot of people here who would be able to maintain a rock solid network and not need to reset things frequently, but thats usually my go to solution to get things working well again in a hurry.

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I have not had that happen.

The Plex Media Server, Synology NAS, my Windows 10 desktop, and Internet router are all connected to the same switch.

I’ve had my Internet service drop a few times due to outages and rebooted my router due to s/w updates, but it never affected the NFS mounts.

I’ve shut things down a couple of times due to power outages (graceful shutdown before the UPS ran out). Everything has always come back OK. I do power up the NAS before powering on the Plex server. The NAS takes a few minutes to fully boot. The Plex server takes under a minute.

Edit: Ran a quick test. I rebooted the Synology NAS. While the Synology was rebooting, if I tried to play a movie via Plex, it errored out with a “the media is not available” message. After the Synology finished booting, the media played fine. I logged into the Plex server and the NFS mounts were in place.

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