The only real contender is jellyfin, it is not ready though.
1 Like
Been checking in on this thread for years now. I canât believe plex still canât handle audiobooks properly. Very disappointing.
5 Likes
Note to PLEX - All it takes is album level remember where you are. PLEX actually finds lots of book art already. It just canât remember where it is if the book has more than one audio file. Thatâs it. Thatâs all you haveto do . Prologue does it. Why canât you? If you wonât do it until you have a good solution for metadata, skip that and just add this. Seriously.
3 Likes
But they DO have a good solution for metadata: Musicbrainz. Itâs communty-managed, and itâs not a storefront. So audiobook metadata can be added to their database by Joe Bob User, and it wonât be removed when the audiobookâs license for sale on Audible expires. The downside is itâs up to us to add the books that arenât listed yet.
But back to your original point: They donât need to skip finding a solution for metadata, which means they have little to no excuse for not implementing album-level resume. Other than that @elan and/or their investors donât think it will make them much moneyâeven though thatâs not true because theyâd then be the only decent audiobook media server in existence.
2 Likes
A thumbs up or thumbs down after 8 years would be cool.
3 Likes
This would be awesome together with the PLEXREADER suggestion ngl.
2 Likes
I finally gave up and setup a booksonic air container for audio books. Itâs not the prettiest setup, but it works pretty well. Iâve tried setting up the âresume where you left offâ audio thing in Plex, and itâs pretty bad, especially if you chapterize FLAC files like I do.
You have audiobooks in FLAC? Heck, I downgrade my audiobooks to 64k mp3 since it is only spoken voice.
Ewww⊠Might as well just have an audible subscription at that point
1 Like
Very disappointing that feature hasnât been implemented yet.
2 Likes
All jellyfin devs need to do is go through Plex support and add those features faster than the Plex team.
1 Like
Jellyfin is lacking manpower. Client support is poor at best, the scanning is a mess etc etc.
JF is not an alternative and, at this speed, wonât be for years to come 
âŠAs opposed to what? Audible is my primary source of books, given that they only cost me $15 each at the most.
Where do you get source FLAC audio for audiobooks? I find it hard to imagine it was not compressed at some point, which defeats the purpose.
On top of that, audio books are just spoken words. Speech. The voiced speech of a typical adult male will have a fundamental frequency from 85 to 180 Hz , and that of a typical adult female from 165 to 255 Hz. Trying to figure out what sort of sonic nuance you are gaining by having a FLAC file of something that is, by its very nature, low hi fi. Plus 64k (which sounds perfectly fine for voice) takes up only 8% of the disc space that a FLAC file does.
In any event, this is my sticking point. The reason why I donât straight up use Audible is because itâs not pretty either.
In Audible, the covers are often ugly; series titles arenât arranged by number; chapter titles are often mislabeled; and chapter breaks are often misplaced. Certainly Audible is prettier than it used to be, but it still has issues. [EDIT:] And donât get me started on the stupid âOnly from Audibleâ yellow ribbon on many of their covers these days.[EDIT]
I mean, look at this:
On the left, that is the cover shown on Audible. Itâs grainy, the text is tiny, and the whole thing is pillarboxed.
On the right, that is a cover I made myselfâin part using assets available online.
I want my UI to be pretty. So no thank you, Iâm not interested in Booksonic.
1 Like
I buy CDs then rip them to FLAC using UAC, then chapterize them. So each FLAC file is 1 chapter (when appropriate, some titles obviously donât have chapters).
For me, 64k mp3s just sound icky, like fuzzy/garbled around the edges, not sure if that makes sense, and probably super subjective. Itâs also possible that there are better 64k mp3 audiobooks out there, and I was just unlucky with the few Iâve tried listening to on audible a few years back. 128-256k is what I prefer for MP3 audiobooks, but a lot of publishers probably think along the same lines as you, and they just push out their audiobooks as 64k.
Still though, CD quality is amazing on my earballz
Youâve gotta also consider audiobooks with better production than just a human voice narration. For instance, graphic audio puts a LOT of work into their audiobooks, and even allow you to buy 5.1 FLAC tracks (which is kind of amazing).
The setup is⊠not the best. Itâs been a while since Iâve added to it, but itâs unfortunate that itâs not very automation friendly. Having to provide the txt file with extra info, and managing the directories to organize things just right. The companion Android app is pretty slick for the most part though. I wish it did âBookmarksâ differently, and itâd be nice to see some iOS/WebUI love too. But Iâve been pretty happy with it.
Still would be nice if I could just keep my whole library on Plex thoughâŠ
2 Likes
I just discovered that a few classic Star Wars books are getting new covers:
which has inspired me to redo my Star Wars audiobooks in the same style:
and I am supremely happy with the result.
2 Likes
Magnificent!!
1 Like
Are those from Plex agents or did you download the picture and use it?
Neither.
The top âHeir to the Empireâ is a book cover image I found online, for use on the new Trade Paperback edition. The following audiobook covers, I edited together myself in GIMP using relevant art (most times a book cover; but sometimes not), the SW logo from the book cover at the top, and the appropriate fonts (Oregon LDO and ITC Serif Gothic Heavy).
I have a thing about wanting covers in a series to look similar to each other. Previously, I put effort into making all (or most) of my covers to have a Force-Awakens-style logo. I think this looks much better.
