Mac Home Theatre - Plex 9

[Striker]

Anybody wanting to build a Mac based (ideally Mac Mini) take a look at Plex 9.

http://www.9to5mac.com/23209/plex-9-and-new-plex-ios-app-detailed

I've been using Plex 8 for some time now and moved to Plex 9 when it became available.. Give it a try http://www.plexapp.com/

Andy

 

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coincidentally, i have recently contemplated buying a mac mini for use as a media centre as my appleTV doesn't have enough horsepower to handle HD .mkv files, though it does everything else i need fine.

i was browsing the plex website last week and was greatly attracted to plex9 until i read, in their forums*, about rather common audio synch problems with HD playback. have you experienced this?


*forums eh? all the fecking same, tales of doom, gloom and woe with anything new

 

[Striker]

Cookie,

To be honest no, but I dont have a load of HD content. Remember Plex 9 has just been released, and it works for me. It will play anything and source it from any intel based Mac on your network. Itunes, Music, Movies TV series photos and you can do it from a Iphone or Ipad.

I have an Apple TV also with ATVFlash but bought the Mac Mini just as a Media device connected to my Plasma TV and Onkyo Amp because it does everything. I also use EyeTv on the Mini to record films and play them back vis Plex.

You dont have to run it on a Mini try it on your current Mac first.

If you get 5 minutes pop round for a cuppa and I'll show you.

Cheers Andy

 

[cookie]

Cookie,

To be honest no, but I dont have a load of HD content. Remember Plex 9 has just been released, and it works for me. It will play anything and source it from any intel based Mac on your network. Itunes, Music, Movies TV series photos and you can do it from a Iphone or Ipad.

I have an Apple TV also with ATVFlash but bought the Mac Mini just as a Media device connected to my Plasma TV and Onkyo Amp because it does everything. I also use EyeTv on the Mini to record films and play them back vis Plex.

You dont have to run it on a Mini try it on your current Mac first.

If you get 5 minutes pop round for a cuppa and I'll show you.

Cheers Andy

i need to look into EyeTV. i use a humax to record off air, but that would be another option.

don't actually need plex. i only discovered it last week, but it looked really useful. i was planning on using VLC, Quicktime, and Front Row, but plex seems to do it all.

thinking of using a mini for lossless audio to hi-fi use as well. bonus being i can chuck out the TV and the DVD player.

TBH after a recent rukka splurge, the mini is on hold due to dwindling funds. they had some in the refurb store one morning this week, but while i thought it over, they'd sold them all by lunchtime


i'd love to pop round, and thanks for the offer, but i'd definitely need more than 5 minutes as i live in dorset

 

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well, i got around to trying plex on my imac today.

have to say, it is probably the least intuative program i have ever used on a mac & the documentation for plex9 is woeful. the 9 wiki guide seem to be identical to the page for 8 .

it does look like a very powerful program though, and i am considering using it. something with the usability of the appleTV interface would be much more preferable for me i think.

plex seems to have mis-identified many of my tv programs. finding out how to fix that will be my next hair pulling task
initial file naming seems key to getting plex to make the correct associations. looks like i'll be making even more use of my renaming program (here and highly recommended BTW).

 

[original_concept]

Boxee!

IMHO is actually usable compared to Plex; doesn't load a media manager in the background and seems to get the file info correct more often than not.

 

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i'm definitely going to need one or the other, as i've just sprung for a mac mini for media server duty

seems LG might be going to bring out some kind of plex driven tv box, maybe, possibly, but i think i'll prefer the mac option.

i am getting the hang of plex more now. some good tutorials away from their website.

 

[mr_magicfingers]

Have a mac mini as my media server and I'm running plex.

I don't watch live tv, only tv I watch is downloaded via iplayer or itunes and not a lot of that. I find it very handy as I don't own a tv, just a big screen and projector which the server feeds along with a bluray player.

Neat.

 

[skyenet]

I run Elgato EyeTV (with USB TV Tuners) on all my MACs so can record any Freeview TV programs. They export to a wide range of formats. I also run Elgato EyeConnect on my Macs and this integrates great with my PS3 which is connected to my Plasma to stream Video, Music and TV from any of my Macs. I don't use how well it compares on features to Plex but the only additional outlay I had on top of my existing gadgets and WiFi network, was £40 for the EyeConnect software.

 

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just saw on The Register that the price of the mac mini i ordered last week has been cut by £50, so i phoned apple.
5 minutes later & a transfer to a supervisor in the USA, and i was refunded the £50.

obviously, it's hideously overpriced in the first place, but £50 for 5 minutes work is still a result in my book

 

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been using my mini with plex 9 for a month or so now.

initially very impressed with the abilities of the program, especially the way it scrapes information for all the imported TV programs, providing title, synopsis, artwork even music. very clever.

plays my HD mkv files a treat, which is the main reason i bought the mac mini

have to admit the way it handles video from TV to iphone without losing it's place is superb.

a few annoying bugs though. i had loads of grief trying to get the mac to sleep properly, and stay asleep. i've mostly resolved that now, but not 100%.

audio has a habit of switching back from HDMI to internal speakers for no apparent reason.

also annoying is plex's inability to play dvd video_TS files smoothly. they play great in VLC, quicktime and frontrow (which i assume is just quicktime again), but are rubbish in plex.
not alone in this, and there's no answer on the, very busy, plex forums.

been wanting to try out MiRow which is a Frontrow extension from firecore, who make aTVFlash for apple TV. unfortunately it's $24 and no demo version available.
firecore just twittered that it's $10 off, today only, so i downloaded it and will try for comparison. i think it is still very early days for the program, and is itself a bit buggy, but we'll see.