What are some of you guys using for Media Servers?
Are you guys moving off Plex with the direction they are taking? Heard most recently they are going after a hosting provider because of piracy?
What are some of you guys using for Media Servers?
I moved to Emby a couple years back and it's been great.
I hadn't heard anything, but then again I don't follow along with news or e-news or anything like that. I run plex-media-server on Archlinux, and don't pay for anything.
That said, just a few days ago I asked everyone in the house if they had used it at all recently, and got a unanimous 'no' from everyone. So I'll probably just delete it when I get around to it. I haven't added
anything to it for a bit, and most things we just stream these days. One less VM to maintain. ;)
That said, just a few days ago I asked everyone in the house if they had used it at all recently, and got a unanimous 'no' from everyone. So I'll probably just delete it when I get around to it. I haven't added
anything to it for a bit, and most things we just stream these days. One less VM to maintain. ;)
What are some of you guys using for Media Servers?
I moved to Emby a couple years back and it's been great.
Are you guys moving off Plex with the direction they are taking? Heard
most recently they are going after a hosting provider because of
piracy?
telnet://bbs.roonsbbs.hu:1212 <<=-
Same boat. I used to run my own DLNA servers but found less and devices with good clients, so eventually migrated to Plex, but I run a local Plex server off of my Debian based NAS box. Not much power for transcoding, etc. but good enough for most uses, and seemingly everything under the sun has a Plex client these days. I don't use mine much either, only for the occasional thing I run into that I can't easily stream.
Makes sense if you're not using it.
We don't pay for any streaming services if you know what I mean.
I use it with IPTV too.
Sure do. I'm not sure how you're able to do it, seeing as though it
would take me quite a long time to try to snag any/all TV series we actually watch somewhat regularly. I don't have time for that shiii..
lol.
It's a bit to setup, but once you get the following configured it just works and it's automated.
See below.
Radarr
Sonarr
Transmission
NZBGet
JellySeer
Sure do. I'm not sure how you're able to do it, seeing as though it would take me quite a long time to try to snag any/all TV series we actually
Plex just happened to be the first one I ever setup, and just stuck with it because the need for it wasn't all that major, and it's super easy to maintain and/or upgrade. I used to throw movies on there quite a bit,
but haven't in the past few years or so.. probably more due to the lack
of good movies that have come out since the great and powerful covid
scare of 2020. :|
Once we picked up streaming services, there really hasn't been a need to use it. I'm definitely not going to try to keep up with downloading everything we enjoy watching when I can just flip on the TV and pick and choose. Still less than paying for cable, and we have half a dozen services probably. The money I save from getting rid of cable is able to take care of my gig internet upgrade and then some.
Sure do. I'm not sure how you're able to do it, seeing as though it
would take me quite a long time to try to snag any/all TV series we actually watch somewhat regularly. I don't have time for that shiii..
lol.
Yep, Plex tends to be a lot easier for basic management than most other options out there I'm aware of, though if you end up getting deep into building an archive and getting your meta data and everything just right, you'll do just as much work as when we used to do it mostly by hand back in the day. :P
I'm the same way. Streaming services are cheap and convenient. The only issue is that now there are so many, and individually, they seem to be going down in quality content, plus having too many counteracts the cheap part. We keep a couple all the time and rotate others depending on what we want to watch. I still download movies sometimes, but it's rare to need to download a show.
Stealing is its own reward!
Joking (mostly) but most of my friends who do this have close to fully automated processes to snag things, download them, and put them on their media servers. I'm sure practically everyone reading this would enjoy setting something like that up. :) Still, the number of people I know who do this has dropped drastically since the rise of streaming services. I wouldn't be surprised if more start up again though...
What are some of you guys using for Media Servers?
I moved to Emby a couple years back and it's been great.
Are you guys moving off Plex with the direction they are taking? Heard most recently they are going after a hosting provider because of piracy?
Whatever do you mean? I've always done it mostly by hand, granted it wasn't all that hard. Just time consuming downloading and then copying
it to my shared media folder.
I just came to that realization when this thread started, to be honest. Started looking at what we all had and asked the rest of the family what
I can get rid of. Come to find out we get MAX from our AT&T cell package for free, yet still pay for Discovery+. That one was cancelled immediately. Within the next 24 hours I had 3-4 emails from them begging me to come back with offers up to 50% off for the first few months.
I wouldn't be surprised if more start doing this again either,
especially when the greed continues rearing it's ugly head. Discovery+
had just emailed me that it was going from 6.99/mo to 8.99/mo, which is chump change in dollars and cents, but calculate the percent increase on that once. Have you ever gotten a 20-30%+ pay raise? Fuck them.
Oh, sorry, I was referring specifically to organizing your media files and ensuring they have the correct, full metadata, cover art, etc. If you're just leeching a movie and sticking it on your server to watch the same day, then nuking it later (which is how I usually do it) it really doesn't matter much, but for people building a massive collection of their favorite movies and shows, they're usually a bit more anal about this kind of thing.
Ha! They're taking another one from cable companies' playbooks, I see.
Yeah, Netflix used to be one of my constants but it doesn't have nearly as much good stuff as it used to, and its original content hasn't been all that compelling for a while so I suspect that'll change soon. Prime, I rarely stream on, but I have it because I pay for Prime for various other reasons and it definitely comes in handy on occasion (they have quite a lot of weird, obscure stuff if you really dig around.) HBO/MAX has felt pretty strong at times, I think I have it more often than not these days. Apple, Discovery+, Disney, etc. are all sort of on an as-needed basis for me. Hulu and Paramount+ are always battling each other for a spot. I've been watching more on Paramount+ lately, but generally we've used Hulu more. I don't think I've ever had Peacock. I'm sure I'm forgetting some other major ones...
Exactly! It really does feel like we're in "late stage capitalism" here with so many companies (definitely not just streaming services) just saying "fuck it!" and going all in on greedily milking consumers while they still can, before the whole thing collapses. Beyond my own inbox, there's been so many headlines lately about companies aggressively upping prices, changing terms and conditions, etc.
I'm the same way. Streaming services are cheap and convenient. The only issue is that now there are so many, and individually, they seem to be going down in quality content, plus having too many counteracts the
cheap part. We keep a couple all the time and rotate others depending
I've been using Plex for quite a while, and I think I had seen some mention about that but so far it hasn't seemed to be a problem..? I haven't had any issues with Plex lately. What exactly does that mean? And how would they be able to detect whether any of your content was pirated or whether you ripped it yourself from your own discs? I
thought part of the idea of Plex was to be able to rip your own content and put it on your Plex server..
I'm the same way. Streaming services are cheap and convenient. The only issue is that now there are so many, and individually, they seem to be going down in quality content, plus having too many counteracts the
Oh I see. I guess I never really needed to do any of that since Plex did most of the grunt work for me. At least everything that I needed, which was basically a title and cover art.
We have Hulu Live TV with no ads as our main, which is fairly expensive (75/mo or something). We also have Prime, but I think the last thing I watched on there was Mr. Robot, which was years ago. But like you, we
have Prime for other things. Netflix, but I always fight myself and the rest of the family to get rid of it, same reasons as you. We've watched all the good stuff already, and nothing new has come in awhile. MAX is free for us, which now includes most of what's already on Discovery+,
and Paramount+ is nice for skipping the theatres for some movies (Top
Gun and Transformers were the last couple I watched anyway). I think we have Peacock, but we don't pay for it (shared account or some such).
So with that said, it's still at or under $100 probably. Whereas cable
is like 140 for their medium package around here. Not saving an arm and
a leg, but plenty enough to not want to go back to cable. I remember flipping through cable channels with absolutely nothing on, wondering
why I was paying so much for it. At least now when I actually want to watch TV there's always something to watch.
That's what now stinks about the streaming services.. There used to be just a couple, and now every company wants to run one. Then pulls there show's from the main players...
I'm just not willing to pay for 5+ diffrent streaming services (at $12-15AUD+ for basic) to watch the show's that used to be on the one platform.
I have a heap of shows in my list on Netflix, and have been going though them...Some are Netflix producted shows and are pretty decent, also just finished watching Startrek: TOS, TAS and about to start on TNG. Will
watch some other's first to have a break....
Jesus, didn't know it was so expensive, but Live TV is something I don't really need (or want) personally.
I don't think this requires a Prime membership (but I could be wrong) but one compelling case (well, to me at least) for Amazon is "renting" with media credits. If you buy stuff from Amazon even semi-regularly, you sometimes get the option to receive a few bucks credit that you're only allowed to spend on media (I think) when you group items for slightly slower delivery. They've been doing this for years now, but I rarely did it and when I did I'd be like "cool, I'll have to use that credit sometime..." and then forget about it. Nowadays, anything we're not in a hurry for, we pick that option, and every time I watch something I can't stream for free, I see if I can rent it from Amazon (I usually can) and just use those credits to do it for free (which it actually defaults to doing.) The only downside is that they expire after a while, but it's several months.
compelling case for piracy too.) Unless there's some kind of major event going on I want to watch live, I have zero need to watch TV on *someone else's* schedule.
I'd guess the millennials are the last generation to experience that, but it's really ingrained in a lot of older people. My parents, for example, whose evening pretty much every night of the week is turning on the ol' boob tube to watch... well, whatever the fuck there is to watch. I mean, they have their favorite shows of course, but they watch stuff they'd probably not watch otherwise just to pad out their schedule, they watch reruns, or whatever random stuff if nothing better is on. It's kind of gross to me to think of how much time they've wasted in their lives watching some bottom of the barrel bullshit they never had any real interest in, and a third of which was commercials anyway. When I spend all evening watching TV, it's at least a show or a movie that I actively want to watch.
I admit, I do miss occasionally finding a hidden gem or developing an appreciation for something you might have never gotten into if you weren't in an entertainment desert, but then there's virtually limitless stuff on
I don't think I ever would've watched The Office until streaming services. The
came to realize it's probably one of the best shows ever, hell we've probably watched it from front to back about a dozen times already. We turn it on to fall asleep to. Superstore was another one that I probably never would've even
heard of. Also kind of nice they hold on to some of the oldies like Married
jack phlash wrote to Accession <=-
Exactly! It really does feel like we're in "late stage capitalism" here with so many companies (definitely not just streaming services) just saying "fuck it!" and going all in on greedily milking consumers while they still can, before the whole thing collapses.
Accession wrote to jack phlash <=-
Long story short, we will probably be going back to US Cellular after
our 'bill credits' for our phones is done (basically meaning the phones are paid off through our promotion). At least we'll be considered new customers again, and be able to get into another good deal.
HusTler wrote to Vorlon <=-
Pisses me off I can't watch football games without paying for channels
I won't watch!
I think my wife gets something like that. But I had thought they were redeemable for e-books only or some shit like that, so we just give them to our neighbor.
Yeah definitely. We basically watch TV as a last resort when we wind
down for the night. We're going to watch what we want to, when we want
to.
Oh same, for sure. My parents watched shit like Wheel of Fortune and Married with Children (and probably other's I'm forgetting) like it was religion. I was the one who had to get up and change the dials on the TV to whatever they wanted to watch. I basically got an hour or two after school and Saturday/Sunday mornings. Then again, they made me go outside and not come home till the street lights came on too. ;)
probably watched it from front to back about a dozen times already. We turn it on to fall asleep to.
the oldies like Married with Children, Frasier, and random shit like that
The cable companies have seemed to find a business model that pisses off all of their customers half of the time. it's almost like they rode decades of government subsidies into a monopoly position and Just Don't Care.
Unlimited means 25GB of data (per phone) at 5G and the remainder slowed
to something like 1mbps - works for messaging just fine. Hotspot allows for 5 gb of data. They offer wifi calling on most phones.
My service is $130/month for 4 lines. Prices haven't gone up in years.
Not sure. I remember back when it was semi-new e-books were a thing for sure, and you could download digital albums with those credits too. Maybe being able to rent stuff with it is a bit newer?
We kind of do the opposite. We watch 1 episode of one longer form show every night with dinner. We don't usually watch more than that unless we're just not really in the mood to do much else besides veg out, or if the show we're watching is really good and we want to keep watching more.
Yeah, I was thinking as I re-read that about wasting their lives away "shit, I should say the same thing about myself for playing video games or whatever. In fact, our parents DID used to give us tons of shit about that when we were kids." :P
I find it hard to fall asleep having a TV show playing. But I also don't really like leaving things like the TV turned on when I'm going to go to sleep.
I used to watch reruns of Married With Children in the mid 90s, but that was one of those shows where I'd start to find it a bit annoying after a while and stop watching it for a little while, but then I might go back to watching it for a while.
N I find it hard to fall asleep having a TV show playing. But I also
N don't really like leaving things like the TV turned on when I'm going
N to go to sleep.
I don't mind having that bit of white noise, if you want to call it that. Low volume, something we've already seen and set the sleep timer for an hour. The Office, Superstore, and Frasier seem to take that role most of the time.
The cable companies have seemed to find a business model that pisses off all of their customers half of the time. it's almost like they rode decades of government subsidies into a monopoly position and Just Don't Care.
For me in that case, I'd mainly be concerned about the use of electricity for something beint left on that's not actively being used for anything. If I'm not watching the TV (or perhaps streaming some music on it), I'd rather have the TV off (especially if I'm asleep).
Small appliance electricity isn't of much concern to me, really. I mean, most of us run BBSs and or multiple VMs of them on a machine that stays on 24/7. Easily the same amount of electricity as a TV would use (and the TV still gets turned off automatically soon after we've fallen asleep). I'd be more concerned about the HVAC that makes the energy bill so expensive, if cost is what the concern is here.
Yeah, though the reason I keep my BBS PC on is for people to connect to
it and use it (which people do throughout the day). And HVAC at least
is useful for making you comfortable (though I like to avoid it running
Yeah, though the reason I keep my BBS PC on is for people to connect to
it and use it (which people do throughout the day). And HVAC at least is
useful for making you comfortable (though I like to avoid it running
it's at least nice that the amount of computing power we have nowadays doesn't require running the A/C just to cool your "bbs room" or whatever :)
it's at least nice that the amount of computing power we have nowaday doesn't require running the A/C just to cool your "bbs room" or whate :)
True. :) Though even in the 90s, I think I only had one computer that would overheat on hot summer days - Its CPU was an AMD K6-2 300mhz, I think. I worried that PC had an inadquate CPU cooler, though I thought
I had always bought a CPU cooler rated for the CPU.
had one of those same k6-2's back when they came out.. that was a reliable machine.. ran os/2 on it for a long time. finally sold the mobo/cpu this year for a pretty penny since it's retro now to run windows 98 -_-
Yeah, though the reason I keep my BBS PC on is for people to connect to it and use it (which people do throughout the day). And HVAC at least is useful for making you comfortable (though I like to avoid it running up my bills). If I leave something like a TV on when I'm not watching it, that seems wasteful to me - like leaving the light on in the bathroom or something when I leave. It might be small, but if you leave multiple things on when they're not being used, it can add up.
And in our case, leaving the TV on for an hour while we fall asleep makes us comfortable, much like that HVAC. :)
And in our case, leaving the TV on for an hour while we fall asleep
makes us comfortable, much like that HVAC. :)
But do you really benefit from having the TV stay on after you've fallen asleep? ;)
of TV time? Egghh, I didn't realize this pettyness would continue this far, but it did, and I helped it along. lol
Re: Re: Media Servers
By: Vorlon to jack phlash on Sun Oct 08 2023 01:57 pm
I'm the same way. Streaming services are cheap and convenient. The
only issue is that now there are so many, and individually, they seem to
be going down in quality content, plus having too many counteracts the
Pisses me off I can't watch football games without paying for channels
I won't watch!
That's what now stinks about the streaming services.. There used to be
just a couple, and now every company wants to run one. Then pulls
there show's from the main players...
Yes indeed. By doing so, they're watering down the entire streaming ecosystem, and I think the whole thing will eventually lose popularity
if it continues. As I said earlier, a lot of us who have been happy to trade dollars for convenience will likely go back to piracy when this happens, if we haven't already.
I'm just not willing to pay for 5+ diffrent streaming services (at
$12-15AUD+ for basic) to watch the show's that used to be on the one
platform. I have a heap of shows in my list on Netflix, and have been
going though them...Some are Netflix producted shows and are pretty
decent, also just finished watching Startrek: TOS, TAS and about to
start on TNG. Will watch some other's first to have a break....
Yep, definitely. Like I mentioned, watching the things I want on one service, then canceling and going to another is part of my strategy.
For instance, there have been a few things building up on Apple TV I
want to watch. When I do, I'll subscribe for as long as it takes to
watch all of them back to back, then cancel again.
And HVAC at least is useful for making you comfortable (though I like
to avoid it running
it's at least nice that the amount of computing power we have nowadays doesn't require running the A/C just to cool your "bbs room" or whatever
:)
That's just to much of a pain in the backside... Plus forgetting what services are paid for and what knot... It's to much effort for only a few shows.... I'd just rather go without, or wait until they are released on
DVD. The only remaining shop here that sell's DVD's has a good range, but it's not as huge as it used to be... Need to go and see if they have more seasons of "The Expanse" etc...
Buying the Expanse Season 4 DVDs was cheaper than streaming them. I have yet to see any Season 5 or 6 sets, though. I think Amazon got wise and have not made them.
Dumas Walker wrote to VORLON <=-
Also, those S4 DVDs are the "unfriendly" ones that you can only watch
on a DVD player. I cannot watch them from my PC or laptop DVD drives.
Also, those S4 DVDs are the "unfriendly" ones that you can only watch
on a DVD player. I cannot watch them from my PC or laptop DVD drives.
Have you tried some of the tools out there for ripping DVDs? Ripping a
DVD and keeping a copy both a) for archival purposes and for allowing
for display on a device not supported is OK, but decrypting it is
illegal. Wonderful, convoluted world we live in, when legislators don't understand what they're legislating.
Also, those S4 DVDs are the "unfriendly" ones that you can only watch on a DVD player. I cannot watch them from my PC or laptop DVD drives.
Have you tried some of the tools out there for ripping DVDs? Ripping a DVD and keeping a copy both a) for archival purposes and for allowing for display on a device not supported is OK, but decrypting it is illegal. Wonderful, convoluted world we live in, when legislators don't understand what they're legislating.
I tried several linux utilities. The included advertisements rip fine, but they all report errors, or don't work at all, on the other containers.
Interesting, I didn't know DVDs could behave that way. I wouldn't think there
ould be a difference in what device you played it in, perhaps aside from a reg
n code. And since DVDs are read-only, I'd think it would be the PC or laptop fusing to play it for some reason - and perhaps different DVD player software uld play it (such as VLC).
Interesting, I didn't know DVDs could behave that way. I wouldn't think
I tried multiple (linux) ones. It won't play. It is likely some encryption scheme.
Nightfox wrote to poindexter FORTRAN <=-
It sounds like technically from a legal standpoint, you'd be legally unable to make a backup because you need to decrypt it in order to do
so. Odd world we live in.
Re: Media Servers
By: niter3 to All on Mon Oct 02 2023 08:06 am
What are some of you guys using for Media Servers?
Plex, for probably almost a decade now.
We don't pay for any streaming services if you know what I mean.
Sure do. I'm not sure how you're able to do it, seeing as though it would take me quite a long time to try to snag any/all TV series we actually watch somewhat regularly. I don't have time for that shiii.. lol.
If you use the hell out of it, then it's definitely worth it. It was worth it for us for quite awhile until we just damn near flat out stopped using it. *shrug*
One thing that bugs me about streaming services is that they could remove content at any time, or change what you can watch. One time, I was watching a TV series on Amazon Prime that was included free with Prime, and then suddenly one day they changed that series so you had to pay
extra to watch it.
Plex, for probably almost a decade now.
Yeah, me too. Though the usage has declined.
Sure do. I'm not sure how you're able to do it, seeing as though
it would take me quite a long time to try to snag any/all TV
series we actually watch somewhat regularly. I don't have time
for that shiii.. lol.
I've done that and generally haven't had a problem getting TV series I want to watch.
Yeah, I still use Plex quite a bit. I haven't had cable in years, and
I generally don't use streaming services (there really isn't a whole
lot I can think of that I want to watch on them), so I'm not sure I
want to spend the money on them. But there are several shows I can
get over the air (Jeopardy, etc.), and I've been using Plex as a DVR
for those so I can watch them any time I want to. Over the past few years, I feel like Plex has been increasingly useful for me, as I've
been using it as a DVR, and for other things I want to watch, I can
throw them on my Plex server and watch them fairly easily. I've also ripped much of what I have on blu-ray (movies and TV shows) and put
them on my Plex server so I can watch them whenever I want.
One thing that bugs me about streaming services is that they could
remove content at any time, or change what you can watch. One time, I
was watching a TV series on Amazon Prime that was included free with Prime, and then suddenly one day they changed that series so you had
to pay extra to watch it.
That sounds like it could come in handy, especially if you're not hooked up to streaming services. I never even thought of using PLEX as a DVR before.
In our case, though.. we don't have anything over the air. I tried fitting up every TV in the house with some antennas and analog doo-dads (because long before we moved in some 20 years ago, the antenna in the attic was bypassed for cable - and I don't feel like crawling up there to confuse myself with whatever shoddy wiring that was done in the 80s) and would get like 2 fuzzy channels, so I ended up taking everything back and getting a refund. Not worth the money for channels I'm supposed to get for free.
Yeah, I think the DVR may be one of Plex's premium features (and also requires setting a TV tuner up with Plex). Several years ago, I
bought a lifetime Plex Pass when it was on sale for half price, so I'm able to use its premium services forever (hopefully they don't change that).
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