Hi guys, I’m looking to run a wireless link between my house and my friend’s house across the road. I have a Plex Server running at my house and looking to put a Raspberry Pi running Rasplex on his side pointing to my library, however, if I do that, when he watches something it will be marked as watched on my end as well.
How can I achieve this so we’re not affecting each other?
Option 1 I have found is to install Kodi on his end and end of story, but i would like to use Plex
Option 2 is for my friend to install his own server and use the actual internet to watch each other’s libraries, which I’m trying to avoid hence why I’m running a wireless link.
Any good suggestions?
I’d suggest creating a Plex Home, if you really trust this friend completely, and invite him to that. If not, you can require local authentication. Read more here - https://support.plex.tv/hc/en-us/articles/200890058-Require-authentication-for-local-network-access
If your friend is on your wifi network then just gut them to create their own free plex account and invite them to share.
@Peter_W said:
I’d suggest creating a Plex Home, if you really trust this friend completely, and invite him to that. If not, you can require local authentication. Read more here - https://support.plex.tv/hc/en-us/articles/200890058-Require-authentication-for-local-network-access
I will definitely try the Plex Home (hope is compatible with RASPLEX). I’ll leave some feedback here.
Thanks for the suggestion!
@MCH01 said:
If your friend is on your wifi network then just gut them to create their own free Plex account and invite them to share.
If Plex Home doesn’t work for me I might need to try setting a separate account for my neighbour and share the desired libraries. *By wireless link I meant a point to point wireless link between our houses so the device I connect at his end of the link becomes part of my LAN but nothing to do with my actual wireless connection. So will be pretty much like running a cable between our houses but use a point to point solution. Cable from NAS to the wireless transmitter at my end and cable from the wireless receiver to a Raspberry PI running RASPLEX at his end and a HDMI to the TV.
I’ll send some feedback on which option worked best in my scenario, Thanks for the tip.
Not really anything special you need to do plex wise. It’s really the same as any other internet based connection. He’ll just stay on your network.
Personally I would check to see if your WIFI router supports a guest network that can be used independently from your internal wifi network. This would essentially give him internet only access but your router should be smart enough to forward all Plex requests back inside your network to the plex server. He will need a wireless router that supports bridge mode.
You can setup this “guest network” to use a 10.x.x.x or 192.168.x.x network address space. He will also need to use the specific IP address of your plex server instead of the plex.tv address or he will go out his internet to get to you.
How far are your houses from each other?
Have you tried to establish a link between your houses yet? If so what kind of speed do you get?
You might need to use external directional antennas at each location depending on distance.
Also depending on the use of both his and your WIFI it might already be too saturated and you might need to to use two separate dedicated WIFI boxes just for this purpose.
You will probably only be able to have one stream going at a time.
In case your starting to think this could get complex your right. 
I used to run an ISP business and I did a few neighborhood WIFI setups and can tell you it can be a challenge. Back when I did this 10 years ago “G” was tops and video wasn’t something really important.
Carlo
Actually now that I think about it. Before I’d go with WIFI I would give a set of powerline adapters a shot.
ZyXEL PLA5456KIT 1800 Mbps* AV2000 HomePlug AV2 Powerline 2-Port Gigabit Pass-Thru Ethernet Adapter 2-Pack Kit
These are fast and if they work will surely have the speeds you need.
Powerline to your neighbors house is hit or miss depending on the electrical setup but I’d give it a better than 50% shot it could work. If it does work it will be the simplest way to accomplish what you want to do and won’t degrade either of your current WIFI setups.
See if you can find these adapter near by AND make sure you can return them if they don’t work. Then setup and test them in your home. Once you have them working correctly take one over to your neighbors house and test.
@cayars said:
Actually now that I think about it. Before I’d go with WIFI I would give a set of powerline adapters a shot.ZyXEL PLA5456KIT 1800 Mbps* AV2000 HomePlug AV2 Powerline 2-Port Gigabit Pass-Thru Ethernet Adapter 2-Pack Kit
These are fast and if they work will surely have the speeds you need.
Powerline to your neighbors house is hit or miss depending on the electrical setup but I’d give it a better than 50% shot it could work. If it does work it will be the simplest way to accomplish what you want to do and won’t degrade either of your current WIFI setups.See if you can find these adapter near by AND make sure you can return them if they don’t work. Then setup and test them in your home. Once you have them working correctly take one over to your neighbors house and test.
Hi Cayars, thanks for your input. I will be running very shortly 2 x Ubiquiti Loco M5 Access Points between our houses. My mate’s house is 20-30meters apart literately across the road. I have a NAS with 4 network ports on my end storing my media. I will use 3 network ports on 192.168.x.x for my own network and use the forth network port as 10.0.x.x to connect to the Ubiquiti Loco M5 transmitter on my end and another Ubiquiti Loco M5 receiver on his end. These units will allow 150+Mbps plenty for transmitting one media at the time. On his end from the Ubiquity a LAN cable will go into his router (which address is 10.0.x x) and another cable from the router into his Raspberry PI running Rasplex. So these will be the benefits:
- My friend will only be able to access the media I’m sharing with him and not be a part of my whole network(and read only)
- Won’t be able to just unplug the cable and plug it into a PC and use my internet
- My friend will be able to use the Plex or Kodi app to control the Rasplex being in the same network when the phone is connected to his own wifi.
My only questions was how to setup the Rasplex so when he watches something it won’t get marked as watched in my end. But I think a Plex Home account is the way to go. You were very close with the 2 IP ranges. My wifi router Asus RT-AC68U supports guest wifi but my friend will not be part of my wifi neither part of my main network. In my upcoming weeks I’ll have this up and running and will provide some feedback,
Thanks for your help!
Nice, you’re looking at the RIGHT kind of access points. So many people try this with “home” routers and omni directional antennas. The Ubiquiti units will work just fine for you. But remember to mount them outside at both locations. Also try and get them as high (2nd story) as possible so when a truck drives down the road it doesn’t block the signal. Of course also watch for foliage. What could work in the winter may not in the summer do to leaves on trees, etc.
Have you considered the NSM5 instead of the Loco M5? Slightly bigger form factor with a higher gain antenna but still using 5Ghz at only a few bucks more?
As far as Plex is concerned you could make your neighbor part of your HOME setup or just a normal friend with their own account. Depends of the features needed.
You can start playing with this NOW before you ever get the WIFI bridge in place.
I’d still give the MOCO a shot first before going with the Ubiquiti units as the through put will be much higher.
Your looking at 150Mb vs 1800Mb theoretical throughput from each setup. I’m sure you already know to only expect 1/3 to 1/2 the quoted throughput in the real world.
Carlo
PS If you get stuck on the routing give us a shout out here and I or others can definitely help.
@cayars said:
Nice, you’re looking at the RIGHT kind of access points. So many people try this with “home” routers and omni directional antennas. The Ubiquiti units will work just fine for you. But remember to mount them outside at both locations. Also try and get them as high (2nd story) as possible so when a truck drives down the road it doesn’t block the signal. Of course also watch for foliage. What could work in the winter may not in the summer do to leaves on trees, etc.Have you considered the NSM5 instead of the Loco M5? Slightly bigger form factor with a higher gain antenna but still using 5Ghz at only a few bucks more?
As far as Plex is concerned you could make your neighbor part of your HOME setup or just a normal friend with their own account. Depends of the features needed.
You can start playing with this NOW before you ever get the WIFI bridge in place.
I’d still give the MOCO a shot first before going with the Ubiquiti units as the through put will be much higher.
Your looking at 150Mb vs 1800Mb theoretical throughput from each setup. I’m sure you already know to only expect 1/3 to 1/2 the quoted throughput in the real world.Carlo
PS If you get stuck on the routing give us a shout out here and I or others can definitely help.
Hi @cayars , almost 2 years since this setup and works like a charm. I’ve made some changes from the above setup.
I’ve decided for the Loco M5 paid $300 AUD for the pair and worked uninterrupted for 2 years so far and no buffering on the client end at all.
I’ve used subnet 10.x.x.x as one of my NICs on the NAS and have the Point to Point units feed from that port. I have setup some symbolic links to my media and in the end I’ve setup Kodi for my client on a Raspberry Pi and pointed the libraries via the symbolic links. I know with this setup he can only get access to the files within the symbolic links and not to my whole network or internet. Works really well but I would have preferred to use Plex as a client on his end as well so I don’t have to maintain 2 different media player clients.
Cheers,
Vio
