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CWSWine · 05-19-2023, 08:09 AM

For the past few years, I have been using Plex on a Synology NAS 920+ with four 12 TB drives set up into 4 drive Raid. My travel NAS is Synology 220+ with one 18 TB drive also running Plex.

Plex is the gold standard for Media services but recently it seems to have gotten feature rich with features I really don’t need. It does a terrible job of selecting the correct cover art when importing new movies. I have to manually edit the cover art to change them from horizontal to vertical graphics. It is easy to configure and get up and running and with stock settings runs fine.

Recently I gave Emby a second look and found it to be a less bloated system with faster imports and selects the correct orientation of cover art without me having to manually edit each movie. It is fast to import and very accurate. Lots of plugins to enhance the look and function of your media server. Has lot more settings than Plex but easy to crash if you don’t respect the warnings when changing settings.

Jellyfin Is an open-source breakaway from Emby and looks a lot like the early version of Emby. The plus is open source and free but the one big negative is it doesn’t have a version that runs on Synology unless you want to install it in a Docker container.

We have used Plex on our streaming device called the Nvidia Shield and works well for me with under 400 movies. The Shield has two USB ports to attach USB hard drives plus you can connect network storage for additional space. The Nvidia Shield is one of the best streaming devices in my opinion. Easy to set up and has AI Enhanced Video that improves video quality.

What are you using?

PbdBlue · 05-19-2023, 08:21 AM

I run Jellyfin on an HP Elitedesk 800 G2 Mini I5. You can get the HP's used for around $100 on Ebay. I ran Plex for a long time and still do in the S&B but on the road found Plex was very quirky when we were without internet. Jellyfin is perhaps not quite as elegant as Plex but has been a solid performer on the road. I have a 5TB 2.5" drive in the G2 as my base library and then supplement on a 4TB 2.5" external usb 3.0 drive. Frankly I haven't noticed any significant difference in performance between the internal and the usb drive. I went with 2.5" drives under the assumption they would hold up better than 3.5" drives in a high vibration environment. I'm using Roku's with hard wired ethernet connections as clients. Everything powered by 12 volts. Running Jellyfin on Windows 10 mainly because it's easier to manage than Linux and I can run NTFS drives.

Captain8 · 05-19-2023, 09:01 AM

Plex is amazing and works perfectly for us. We use plex with sonarr and radarr which downloads every movie and the TV series we like automatically using sabnzbd. You can Google how-to setup but we use everything in a powerful docker setup running i9 and a gpu. I'm trying to save a copy of every movie ever made and like 2200 shy.

Have 8tb of nvme for downloading and processing then gets dumped into my 800TB (yes TB) HPE storage array over 16gb FC.

Captain8 · 05-19-2023, 09:06 AM

Also we use chromecasts for everything, some ultras some with remotes and some just basic ones. I find its easier to use our phones and click to cast. Only issue is some chromecasts don't always work with hvec codes so we block those downloads.

Radarr is great since it'll auto upgrade files when higher quality ones come out

K Charles · 05-19-2023, 09:20 AM

I may be old and out of touch so I have to ask, what kind of movies are you saving? Aren't most movies make believe, and if you already saw it, why would you save it? We have some home movies but I have them on a 2T drive that is almost empty, your talking a lot of hard drive space.

Captain8 · 05-19-2023, 09:59 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by K Charles

I may be old and out of touch so I have to ask, what kind of movies are you saving? Aren't most movies make believe, and if you already saw it, why would you save it? We have some home movies but I have them on a 2T drive that is almost empty, your talking a lot of hard drive space.

I'm saving every movie ever made. Many others save all their favorite movies too. Even though we pay for basically every streaming app its just so much easier to have a library with every movie instantly at my fingertips. Most movies we only watch once but then everytime there's another sequel we'll typically watch every movie in the series just as a review. Also there's movies that we just can't get enough of, my wife watches Beauty and the Beast (real people one) and Jurassic World at least once a week.

Plus its nice to watch a movie then be able to look up a certain actor and see what other movies they're in and watch that one next.

For me personally I need to have multiple things going on all the time so I always either have music or a movie playing in the background

GypsyR · 05-19-2023, 12:01 PM

I've got a fair collection of mp3's but where exactly do you get hundreds of movies? I've personally ripped a few from DVD's but don't really have the time and energy for all that.

CWSWine · 05-19-2023, 01:47 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by GypsyR

I've got a fair collection of mp3's but where exactly do you get hundreds of movies? I've personally ripped a few from DVD's but don't really have the time and energy for all that.

This is really a gray area but I get mine from though a program called Playon which downloads the movies from lots of streaming services. It marks all the downloads with my name and the IP address on the splash screen before the video starts to play. I have been told that this is no different than using a DVR and for MY personnel uses only. If I give the files to someone else or charge someone for viewing them I have broken the law. This is no different than using a DVR to record and watch later.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PlayOn

CWSWine · 05-19-2023, 02:00 PM

My 18TB Ironwolf Drive crashed again and contact Synology support and found it Synology and Ironwolf 18TB do not work reliably. After rebuilding from the last crash I going to have to re-order s 16TB drive.

I have been running Synology NAS for 3 years without one problem that wasn't my fault. This error is really my fault also since the 18TB is not listed on the Synology compatibility list.

Anyone reading my post above and seeing I used an 18TB don't do it.

Captain8 · 05-19-2023, 03:14 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by GypsyR

I've got a fair collection of mp3's but where exactly do you get hundreds of movies? I've personally ripped a few from DVD's but don't really have the time and energy for all that.

Illegally

using torrents and newsgroups. This is why I use Radarr and sabnzbd as it's automatic. Set a list to follow and it'll download for you, test and tell Plex it's added. If somethings wrong just right click in plex and hit delete then it'll search for a new one.

KenZ71 · 05-19-2023, 10:55 PM

Jellyfin running on a NAS at my stick house that I access over internet while on the road.

Look into port forwarding if you want to do the same

GUS2000 · 05-20-2023, 03:59 AM

Synolgy NAS here.. have our movies and TV shows that are our favorites loaded up.. been working great without a hitch using Plex on AppleTV. I need to check out PlayOn.. How is the video quality on PlayOn??

CWSWine · 05-20-2023, 07:07 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by GUS2000

Synolgy NAS here.. have our movies and TV shows that are our favorites loaded up.. been working great without a hitch using Plex on AppleTV. I need to check out PlayOn.. How is the video quality on PlayOn??

Playon works on Credits that you purchase. You use one and record at 720P or two and record at 1080P. We record at 720P and our streaming device Shield uses AI to increase video quality. They have a downloading program that will download the file to your computer when completed.

johnhicks · 05-20-2023, 08:11 PM

I use Playon Cloud and record at 1080p, then download and cast using either Playon Home (with ad skipper) or Plex. Playon Home will only record up to 720p and is much more susceptible to net glitches.