Remote Connection Issues (Green then Red > Failed Port Forward > DLNA Disconnected Error: LG B7)

General Discussions
1

I’ve been at this for 4 hours now and kind of at my wits end. Need a miracle or a guru.

I’ve always been able to discover my plex server through DLNA on my LG B7 smart TV. Last week I was traveling and took my laptop - during that trip the 5ghz usb dongle I was using broke so I had to remove it and use the built in 2.4ghz adapter. I don’t know if that’s the cause of my issues but figured it was important context.

No matter what I do I can no longer establish a remote connection. The issue seems to be due to my inability to open any ports. That issue is specific to my laptop and does not occur on other devices that are also running their own plex servers.

  • What I’ve done so far:

  • Tried port forwarding - rule was created in my router (http://prntscr.com/l32d4k) but fails all port forward tests. (i’ve also tried a wide range of public ports in addition to the 34200 private)

  • When that didnt work I tried reserving DHCP for my local ip

  • When that didn’t work I tried setting a static IP in windows

With each of these tests I disabled remote connection, quit plex server, relaunched plex server then reenabled remote.

I’ve also tried:

  • disabling adblockers
  • turning off windows firewall
  • rebooting my router
  • restarting my laptop
  • ipconfig /release (get a media disconnected error when I do ipconfig /renew)

Don’t know what else I can do and on the verge of throwing a tantrum - appreciate any help.

2

I’m a little confused about the network setup.
Are you trying to establish a remote-connection from a client or do you have a server “to go” that fails to be seen by other clients?

also not sure about the reference on DLNA… DLNA only works in your local network.

3

re: DLNA this is in my local network - I’m at home Smart TV connected (via ethernet) to the same network my server is connected to (my laptop via wifi)

Basically I’m at home now - I have a laptop that has a plex server on it. I access that media from the input list in my smart TV (but its also not accessible via web browser ip).

My brother has a plex server on his desktop PC - that PC is able to port forward without issue and I can see his server on my input list on the smart TV.

4

Also I should note that It always successfully establishes a connection which lasts a few seconds before turning red and givign me the not avail outside your network error

5

then let’s go through this step by step…

  1. can you access the Plex Media Server via Plex Web from that laptop (https://localhost:32400/web or https://127.0.0.1:32400/web)?
  2. you said you have a static IP address assigned via your router’s DHCP… can you access Plex from within your network (https://your-local-IP-address:32400/web)?
  3. can you access Plex via the hosted Plex Web (https://app.plex.tv/desktop)?

As for the remote access itself:

  • don’t rely on the indicator inside Plex telling you, your server isn’t available from remote.
  • can you access the port-forward from outside your network (e.g. using a service such as canyouseeme.org)?
6
  1. Yes both of those URLs give me a chrome HTTPS warning screen, clicking advanced > proceed to URL then redirects me to the plex login screen which then displays my dashboard with all my media.
  2. Yes, same outcome as above.
  3. Yes, straight to my signed in dashboard with all my media visible.

Canyouseeme as well as dedicated port forwarding software all tell me that I cannot access those ports. Oddly when I enter the port that my brother has set up to forward on his PC that port is open for me.

Not sure if this is relevant but I also noticed that my public IP address is my WAN IP which as far as I understand is for the router not the client (my laptop)

7

Your WAN IP is the address of your router in the outside world. By itself, nothing in your home network is visible to the outside.
A port forward is telling your router that certain requests should be passed on to a machine inside the network.

Did you do the canyouseeme check with your WAN IP and the external port you configured when you established the port-forward on your router?

8

Ah I see, that makes sense. That’s the purpose of the subnet mask I guess right?

Yes, canyouseeme only allows me to use the WANIP on a test which fails (connection timed out). I also tried other tests that let me modify the IP which also didn’t work.

9

In that case your issue appears to be between your router and your ISP.
The rule you created (screenshot in your first post) looks ok. With that you should be able to access <your-router’s-WAN-IP>:32400 from the outside.

Out of curiosity… what’s the first block of your IP address - something like 192 or 10? This would indicate that your ISP doesn’t even give you an actual IP address. Instead you’d be part of “their home network”. If that’s the case, ask them if you can get at least a temporary regular public IP that will allow you to remote connect to your network.

If you actually have a regular public IP, the ISP might be restricting the ports you’re allowed to connect to/from. Same as above… ask them if they can lift this restriction.

10

local ip is 192.168.0.21
default gw 192.168.0.1

public IP starts with 173.33…

https://myWANIP:32400/web gives me a connection timed out error in chrome.

What doesnt make sense to me is why that would only apply to my laptop and not my brothers PC - were on the same network with the same ISP - Also it was working just fine up until last week. With that in mind, is your recommendation the same?

11

https://yourWANIP:32400/web will in most cases fail if you try to access it from within your network.

If you’re both working from within the same network, you’ll need to tweak your router setup.
The router needs to know which requests from the outside should go to your brother’s Plex Media Server and which should go to yours. So you cannot both connect to the same external port.

Try the following:

  • change your router configuration (referring to the screenshot you shared in your first post)
  • set public port range to e.g. 32401-32401 or 32399-32399
  • leave the private port as-is
  • verify that your local IP address is reserved for your laptop
  • optionally: add a suffix to the Application Name (e.g. Plex-Media-Server_drquantum)
  • when done, access your Plex server on your notebook (e.g. https://127.0.0.1:32400/web) and go to `Settings > Remote Access
    • click Show Advanced
    • check Manually specify public port and enter the port from the public port range (see above)
12

OK so update I just went to my brothers PC and tried canyouseeme and it failed for him too - to make matters more confusing I had him login to his plex which also shows that remote connection is not available. But even though thats the case his server is still showing up in DLNA.

I tried changing the public port range to 32401 and that still didnt work.

On the phone with ISP as we speak who says they cant provide technical support for port forwarding but confirmed that 32400 port is not blocked. Im on hold right now because he didnt understand my request to be issued a public IP

edit: just tried 32399 which also didn’t work.

Verify that your local IP address is reserved: http://prntscr.com/l32wl8

went to local host url settings and updated manual port - still no go.

Really appreciate all your help so far but starting to lose hope :frowning:

13

Anyone else have any ideas? I’ve been at this for 2 days now. Latest attempts were to try factory resetting my router, then uninstalling and reinstalling plex server.

15

OK, so an update - I saw that network discovery was off on my laptop, so I turned it on (windows). After doing that my plex server is now accessible via Smart TV input list (DLNA) as well as via the WAN IP URL so although I haven’t yet tested it from outside my network I imagine it will work.

The problem is when I go to open the directory on my TV (DLNA) the folders don’t populate and I get a 'device is disconnected error" - however when I launch the plex app all my media is there and I’m able to play it.

Do you have any ideas what could be preventing my tv from accessing the server contents via DLNA? In DLNA settings I have the radio box checked to enable with the following (where the ip is the local ip of the laptop running the server):

IP=192.168.0.12,DirectPlay=true,DirectStream=true,LocalResolution=1920x1080,RemoteResolution=1920x1080,OnlineResolution=1920x1080,LocalVideoQuality=99,RemoteVideoQuality=99,OnlineVideoQuality=99,SubtitleSize=60,AudioBoost=100,MusicBitrate=320;IP=192.168.0.22,DirectPlay=true,DirectStream=true,LocalResolution=1920x1080,RemoteResolution=1920x1080,OnlineResolution=1920x1080,LocalVideoQuality=99,RemoteVideoQuality=99,OnlineVideoQuality=99,SubtitleSize=60,AudioBoost=100,MusicBitrate=320;IP=192.168.0.19,DirectPlay=true,DirectStream=true,LocalResolution=1920x1080,RemoteResolution=1920x1080,OnlineResolution=1920x1080,LocalVideoQuality=99,RemoteVideoQuality=99,OnlineVideoQuality=99,SubtitleSize=60,AudioBoost=100,MusicBitrate=320;IP=192.168.0.10,DirectPlay=true,DirectStream=true,LocalResolution=1920x1080,RemoteResolution=1920x1080,OnlineResolution=1920x1080,LocalVideoQuality=99,RemoteVideoQuality=99,OnlineVideoQuality=99,SubtitleSize=60,AudioBoost=100,MusicBitrate=320;IP=192.168.0.23,DirectPlay=false,DirectStream=false,LocalResolution=320x240,RemoteResolution=1920x1080,OnlineResolution=1920x1080,LocalVideoQuality=24,RemoteVideoQuality=99,OnlineVideoQuality=99,SubtitleSize=60,AudioBoost=250,MusicBitrate=64;IP=192.168.0.25,DirectPlay=true,DirectStream=true,LocalResolution=1920x1080,RemoteResolution=1920x1080,OnlineResolution=1920x1080,LocalVideoQuality=99,RemoteVideoQuality=99,OnlineVideoQuality=99,SubtitleSize=60,AudioBoost=100,MusicBitrate=320;IP=192.168.0.11,DirectPlay=true,DirectStream=true,LocalResolution=1920x1080,RemoteResolution=1920x1080,OnlineResolution=1920x1080,LocalVideoQuality=99,RemoteVideoQuality=99,OnlineVideoQuality=99,SubtitleSize=60,AudioBoost=100,MusicBitrate=320;IP=192.168.0.33,DirectPlay=true,DirectStream=true,LocalResolution=1920x1080,RemoteResolution=1920x1080,OnlineResolution=1920x1080,LocalVideoQuality=99,RemoteVideoQuality=99,OnlineVideoQuality=99,SubtitleSize=60,AudioBoost=100,MusicBitrate=320;IP=192.168.0.26,DirectPlay=true,DirectStream=true,LocalResolution=1920x1080,RemoteResolution=1920x1080,OnlineResolution=1920x1080,LocalVideoQuality=99,RemoteVideoQuality=99,OnlineVideoQuality=99,SubtitleSize=60,AudioBoost=100,MusicBitrate=320;IP=192.168.0.35,DirectPlay=true,DirectStream=true,LocalResolution=1920x1080,RemoteResolution=1920x1080,OnlineResolution=1920x1080,LocalVideoQuality=99,RemoteVideoQuality=99,OnlineVideoQuality=99,SubtitleSize=60,AudioBoost=100,MusicBitrate=320;IP=192.168.0.27,DirectPlay=true,DirectStream=true,LocalResolution=1920x1080,RemoteResolution=1920x1080,OnlineResolution=1920x1080,LocalVideoQuality=99,RemoteVideoQuality=99,OnlineVideoQuality=99,SubtitleSize=60,AudioBoost=100,MusicBitrate=320;IP=192.168.0.28,DirectPlay=true,DirectStream=true,LocalResolution=1920x1080,RemoteResolution=1920x1080,OnlineResolution=1920x1080,LocalVideoQuality=99,RemoteVideoQuality=99,OnlineVideoQuality=99,SubtitleSize=60,AudioBoost=100,MusicBitrate=320;IP=192.168.0.31,DirectPlay=true,DirectStream=true,LocalResolution=1920x1080,RemoteResolution=1920x1080,OnlineResolution=1920x1080,LocalVideoQuality=99,RemoteVideoQuality=99,OnlineVideoQuality=99,SubtitleSize=60,AudioBoost=100,MusicBitrate=320

16

OK for anyone who finds this in the future looks like I’ve solved the issue - problem is I can’t isolate which of my actions resulted in the fix. After doing the above, in network settings I allowed access without auth to my entire local ip range. Immediately after doing that it still wasn’t working but then I quit the plex server instance and relaunched it and it now seems to be working.

Fingers crossed it stays that way.