Remote Access Not Working With Port Forwarding/Or McAfee Enabled

Plex Media Server Remote Access
1

Hi,

I am at my last tether for the past two months. I have read multiple guides on port forwarding via McAfee LifeSafe and via my router/nodes settings. I have been trying to figure out how to get higher quality video streams over my network above 720x404 but no matter what I try, It does not work. I am using Windows 11 Home.

When I also go to Open Port Check Tool - Test Port Forwarding on Your Router to check if any port (including 32400) is open, it says it’s closed? Even when I disabled McAfee LiveSafe entirely (so no protection), it says the ports are closed even though I added them to Windows Firewall Inbound Rules.
Is there something I am not doing or understanding? because the only time I can watch anything in original quality (not transcoding) is when I disable McAfee LiveSafe (even though I have told it to open the port). Is there a workaround with still having McAfee LiveSafe fully enabled? because I don’t want to have to keep turning off my firewall and Windows Defender not enabled either and being prone.

Any help will be incredibly appreciated!!

2

Let’s start with some basic question: have you configured a port forward on your home network router?

3

Thanks for replying @tom80H. Yes, I have added the rule within the router via single port forwarding.
My computer has an assigned static IP address.

4

@tom80H I have just had a look at my router settings and my IPv4 ‘‘Type of Internet Connection’’ is set to ‘‘Automatic Configuration - DHCP’’. If I edit it and select ‘‘Static IP’’ I can put in the addresses, but i am incredibly hesitant because the last time I tried to do this, I messed up my entire internet connection and had to reset the main node in the house and spent an entire day setting each device to have a static IP (as I always do).

Currently the remote access is detecting my IPv6.

5

So in a hallelujah moment after trying to work this issue on and off for the past two months, I think I figured out the issue! and I can’t believe I didn’t figure this out before…
For those of you that are trying a workaround without disabling McAfee Antivirus/Firewall, go to your McAfee software, Firewall > Internet Connections for Programs > Plex Media Server > Edit > Incoming and outgoing > Open to all devices.

This setting via McAfee doesn’t play a 2160p/4K video at 404p for example like it did when it was set to ‘‘Use designated ports (recommended)’’
For someone that doesn’t have the greatest knowledge at networking, it may not be an ideal scenario, but for someone who wants to casually watch on a TV screen, I found this is the best method at the moment.