Amazon Fire TV - Plex

[Guest Numero Veinticinco]

What it the app doing exactly? Getting your media and allocating art and descriptions to it? I assume it's easy enough to set up things in genre order?

I'm not sure about ordering or anything yet. There's a search bar, which filters down like iTunes (or any modern app would be expected to do). For example, if you type 'Ho' it brings up homeland and hoes with camel toes.

 

EDIT - Yeah, you can filter your content by Genre and loads of other ways, too. It comes with these preset ways of sorting...

 

 

but you just click 'filter' and you can add to that sort menu with one of these:

 

[Guest Numero Veinticinco]

I've just got the app for the phone, no fucking about at all, you sign in and instantly everything in your library is there to play. Can't praise this enough, actually. Cheers for bringing it to my attention. I'm off to order a fire tv or something similar.

[Sugar Ape]

Is your library stored on your computer then? So the app just accesses wherever the library is stored and accesses if from there. Suppose you could give access to it to other people like my brother.

 

I'm going to have to get my arse into gear and try and sort it out.

[Guest Numero Veinticinco]

Yeah, I think you can even set up accounts for them to view your library with.

 

My desktop has the video HD drive in it, on that I've got folders and files (for example TV Shows/Entourage/Season 3/1 - Aquamom) and it found that, got all the right covers, episode guide, etc, and then I can access it on my phone just perfectly. It's like netflix for your own media library, sort of.

[Furmedge]

Hmmm. Plenty to think about. It's probably worth buying one of the Amazon fire boxes just to download xbmc on it alone without even thinking about Plex. How did you get on with the XBMC on it Furm?

Wasn't too much of a problem. Runs perfectly but need some new repositories now that mash up has gone and sportsdevil isn't updating anymore. Need something with a user friendly interface like mash up for my movies. But yeah, runs like a dream.

[Sugar Ape]

Wasn't too much of a problem. Runs perfectly but need some new repositories now that mash up has gone and sportsdevil isn't updating anymore. Need something with a user friendly interface like mash up for my movies. But yeah, runs like a dream.

 

Can you install iStream on it? I've had that on mine for nearly a year now and it is brilliant. Links for everything, art and descriptions for every movie and TV show. There are loads of videos on YouTube showing you how to do it such as:

 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H2ZMSfsIDRc

[Furmedge]

I used to have iStream but deleted it when I got Mashup. Tried to install it again today through the way above and through Total Installer but both ways are giving errors when trying to open it.

[Sugar Ape]

Not sure on that. It works fine on my mac mini, but maybe it doesn't work with the Amazon Fire. Have a look at a few different YouTube videos and see if you can get one working. 

[Furmedge]

I tried it on my phone which has had it on before. No joy.

[Guest Numero Veinticinco]

Just ordered one of these fuckers. I'll review it and charge you cunts £50 each to view it.

[Sugar Ape]

Since I brought it to your attention I feel I should take a percentage of the £50. Somewhere in the region of 100% would be acceptable.

[Guest Numero Veinticinco]

Sure, I'll let you off paying the 50 quid. Everybody else has to pay me, though.

[Guest Numero Veinticinco]

This plex has got me building my library like mad, though. I'll run out of HD space soon.

[Sugar Ape]

Only thing stopping me is where to store all my downloads. I'd quite like to start building a library but can't keep it on my laptop as it's only 320gb and could expand the memory on my mac from 500gb but don't really want to keep it on there.

 

Which leaves a Nas hard drive but having a look round it seems a bit of a minefield trying to determine what one to get. Some people are saying get one and put Plex on the hard drive itself and manage it from there, others are saying they've bought one, put their library on it but it's not being recognised by the Amazon fire or whatever device they are using, or that they are having to convert their files because it won't play certain types like MKV or MP4. 

 

That's without even mentioning all the people banging on about whether or not it's a device that can use DLNA.

[Guest Numero Veinticinco]

Plex handles the DLNA stuff. It'll work perfectly on the Fire. I researched the NAS thing, with the idea that I'd buy a has and have 2x6TB (1 for movies, the other for back up) and then run plex on it so it would be always on, regardless of whether my computer was on or not. However, the ones that transcode in 1080p are £2-3k, although I think it only transcodes if you're not on your home network (so you'd be on your cellular network and plex would transcode it down to a lower res - or something). But if you just want to store your TV shows and movies on your NAS, then put plex media server on your computer, then you can go with pretty much any NAS. The only downside is having to keep your computer on. The computer with the plex application on it then just pulls the data from those drives.

 

I wouldn't bother having an always on NAS at that price. I'd just build a mini dedicated PC for a few hundred quid. Then keep that always on.

[Sugar Ape]

So if I bought a cheaper NAS drive and had my library on that and installed Plex on my laptop, I would then access the laptop and through that the hard drive if I wanted to watch something from another location?

 

So:

 

1: Buy a Nas drive and fill it with my films and shit.

2: Install Plex on my laptop and sync that with the hard drive.

3: Use my other devices - Tablet, phone, Amazon Fire - to access Plex on my laptop and the laptop will then pull stuff from the hard drive and send it to my device.

 

That sound right?

[Guest Numero Veinticinco]

Yep, that's about it. Did you watch those videos a page or two back? It's practically exactly the set-up that guy uses.

 

[Sugar Ape]

I flicked through them but I'll give them a proper watch tonight when I'm home from work.

[Guest Numero Veinticinco]

Its here its here its here.

 

Way smaller than I thought. Looks pretty though. Totally inconspicuous next to the TV. She's just downloading something.

[cloggypop]

Its here its here its here.

 

Way smaller than I thought. Looks pretty though. Totally inconspicuous next to the TV. She's just downloading something.

No way am I paying 50 quid for this. You have not even marked it out of 10. I am gonna wait for a TK review.

 

[Guest Numero Veinticinco]

I'm no TK.

[Guest Numero Veinticinco]

So, I've had half an hour with it now. I've got to say, I'm mighty impressed. I've currently got trials of prime and Netflix, but Plex is really good too. The voice search is perfect, but needs to be system wide. That is just a software thing though. Controlling Plex and Netflix through a phone and tablet is boss.

 

Now, time for a new TV.

[Guest Numero Veinticinco]

So, this has just dropped to 69 quid. Might as well give it to you for nothing. Being the thrifty git I am, I contacted them and they're refunding the 10 quid difference. Boss.

[Rick Sanchez C-137]

Currently have a smb share set up (4tb + 3tb +1tb +1tb) on a microserver and streaming  to a raspberry pi, but definitely want to get plex set up. It looks slick, and the ability to access my films from anywhere by carrying a chromecast is pretty sweet.

[Guest Numero Veinticinco]

Currently have a smb share set up (4tb + 3tb +1tb +1tb) on a microserver and streaming to a raspberry pi, but definitely want to get plex set up. It looks slick, and the ability to access my films from anywhere by carrying a chromecast is pretty sweet.

Exactly. Stream to your phone or iPad too. I'm gutted I spent so many hours naming the episodes and making DVD cover icons for my library. Plex just sorts them all without blinking, the suave bsstard.