I’ve been a plex subscription member for 7 years. My only use of Plex is to manage my collection of ripped DVD/BD discs and make them easily available on the home network.
I pay the subscription partly because of some app features, and partly to support Plex.
I’m a big fan of giving feedback, especially when I genuinely like (or used to like) the product, so here goes.
Lately I’ve been getting more and more frustrated about the direction that Plex has taken.
I’ve got several apple tvs that struggles to play subtitles consistently over time on 1080p MKV files. There is still no support for multiple versions of the same movie, being director cuts or alternate endings (yes, there are hacks, but come on).
Home user management is terrible.
The new search is useless, and the UI is cluttered with tons of “Stream this now”-ads that I have no intention to look at. They can be turned off, kinda, but not quite.
And that is just a few of the issues I have.
I’m using Plex because of my home library. That is it. I’m considering purchasing a different player (Infuse), just because Plex doesn’t seem to have any focus on playing your own media at home any more.
So I guess it’s time to start looking at alternatives. Might be just me, but since it’s not possible to give any kind of feedback directly to plex, then I write here in the forum to see if it’s just me or if more people have the same issue.
Plex has decided to maximize profits no matter what harm those profits will do to users.
I strongly recommend Emby. They are extremely good and stable. (However they are not perfect) The developers are VERY responsive and also answer just about every question that gets asked on their forums and they actually take suggestion seriously, although even though they are like God and answer every prayer sometimes the answer is no, again just like God.
Emby is different, even though they do mostly the same thing as Plex they do it without screwing the user just to make money.
Emby take a bit of time to get used to, as does Plex, but Emby does not bloat their software in order to get rich.
I used Plex for many years and I have a lifetime Plex pass but I have now removed every single Plex reference from everywhere on my computer.
One more thing Plex puts a HUGE load on the machine it is running on while Emby, after the initial scan completes, is very unobtrusive and loads the computer a lot less that Plex. But, just like Plex, it is usually a mistake to give a server other regular duties.
Servers should serve and not be tasked with much other regular duties.
Last year I reduced my Plex use to near zero and, after this fiasco I decided to remove Plex completely and I have successfully done so now.
It is a somewhat strange thing but my server test about 10% faster under Emby than it ever did with Plex and all my clients start playback faster by about the same margin.
There are other alternatives for acting as a media server but, right now, Emby is the best client server media solution I have found.
Edit to add: One good thing is that if your media files conform closely to the naming and structure requirements of Plex they should need no changes to move into Emby. When I did my original migration I only had to fix one TV show and it is an obscure early Japanese TV show and I had problems with it in Plex also.
I’m not sure I remember when… Perhaps the pre-Uno interface issue… Whenever it was, I decided to throw money at Emby. I run them both. Emby really is a no frills way to get straight to your stuff without any fuss.
