Plex as a front end for Sage

[wayner]

There is a new version of Plex and it now appears to have a Windows client. This means that they have clients for Mac, Win, iOS, Android, Roku, LG TVs, etc.

Maybe this is another possible front end for Sage with very inexpensive (Roku) clients, plus native mobile interfaces.

[gplasky]

The only thing that Plex is missing is a DVR. Whether it is Sage or another product (DVBLink, NPVR, etc.) I think this is a direction to pursue. I plan to test this out this weekend. And I see they also have a client for Google TV. So another way to have inexpensive clients at every TV.

Gerry

[drewg]

Originally Posted by wayner

There is a new version of Plex and it now appears to have a Windows client. This means that they have clients for Mac, Win, iOS, Android, Roku, LG TVs, etc.

Maybe this is another possible front end for Sage with very inexpensive (Roku) clients, plus native mobile interfaces.

I have a fairly new high-end LG Plasma that I got a 2 months ago (LG60PZ950). I tried out Plex when I first got the TV, with the server running on my Linux box. It had limited media support.. Some of my BD rips would not play. The big drawback for me was that flash video (.flv) would not play. I don't remember if MPEG-2 PS (Eg, SageTV recordings) would play.

The process for steering metadata discovery seemed limited compared to BMT. The real kicker was that the TV's ffw/rew commands were quite crude compared to my HD300. I just didn't see myself using it..

I imagine the experience would be better on a "real" client.

Drew

[ybrew]

Originally Posted by drewg

I have a fairly new high-end LG Plasma that I got a 2 months ago (LG60PZ950). I tried out Plex when I first got the TV, with the server running on my Linux box. It had limited media support.. Some of my BD rips would not play. The big drawback for me was that flash video (.flv) would not play. I don't remember if MPEG-2 PS (Eg, SageTV recordings) would play.

The process for steering metadata discovery seemed limited compared to BMT. The real kicker was that the TV's ffw/rew commands were quite crude compared to my HD300. I just didn't see myself using it..

I imagine the experience would be better on a "real" client.

Drew

According to the website, Plex can now stream flash files. You need silverlight installed on the server, but it should work now.

I hope to test plex out tomorrow.

[LehighBri]

Yes, the new plex release (Laika) 0.9.5 is pretty incredible... take a look.

And I'm with you.. the holy grail would be to control Sage via the Plex UI somehow. I am able to have Plex scan my sage recordings folder, assuming the files have season and episode info, they show up in Plex with metadata, and then I'm able to view the recordings via Plex clients.

[wayner]

How does Plex get the metadata from Sage files? Do you have to name your filenames correctly? Or is there a plugin that you can use to send metadata from Sage to Plex and/or use .properties files?

What does Plex use as the source for Season and Episode number - is it tvdb?

[LehighBri]

Originally Posted by wayner

How does Plex get the metadata from Sage files? Do you have to name your filenames correctly? Or is there a plugin that you can use to send metadata from Sage to Plex and/or use .properties files?

What does Plex use as the source for Season and Episode number - is it tvdb?

Plex gets it from the season and episode # that sage puts in the filename. Unfortunately Plex won't import/recognize TV files that sage does NOT have a season and episode # for.

Nonetheless, to turn it on for new recordings in Sage, go to Detailed Setup -> Customize -> and set "Include season and episode numbers in filenames" to "Yes" (I am using SageTV 7.1.9 in case you don't see that option and are using an older version).

[ybrew]

Originally Posted by LehighBri

Yes, the new plex release (Laika) 0.9.5 is pretty incredible... take a look.

And I'm with you.. the holy grail would be to control Sage via the Plex UI somehow. I am able to have Plex scan my sage recordings folder, assuming the files have season and episode info, they show up in Plex with metadata, and then I'm able to view the recordings via Plex clients.

Pretty incredible is putting it lightly.
Very slick interface.

Metadata is AWESOME.
You pick a folder of shows for example and it'll play the them song of the tv show. It's pretty freaking incredible.

And being able to create folders is pretty awesome too. My son gets a folder for his shows (simpsons, futurama) right on the main menu. Pretty slick.

[Fuzzy]

I'm not positive, but looking at the API, it looks like Plex only supports H.264 video (in either .MOV, .MKV, .MP4, or .AVI containters), with MP3 or AAC audio. This would limit the sagetv recordings playable.

[wado1971]

I currently have a revue. Typically (90%) set on passthru for sagetv but will use googletv for online content (netflix). Waiting patiently for 2.0 update.
I hope Plex can completely remove my sagetv frontend duties for music, movies, & hd2250 recordings.

Does anyone know if plex can read edl (commskip) files?
Reading the existing metadata would be great - is plex open source for plugins of this type?

still hoping sagetv would release its own app for gtv

[Jason]

Originally Posted by wado1971

Does anyone know if plex can read edl (commskip) files?

Yes... Since plex is based on XBMC, it can read .edl files.

I currently use XBMC with the pleXBMC skin and it works great.

I tried using plain xbmc (sans plex...) for my headend duties, but it requires a strict folder structure, whereas plex can utilize the JBOF (Just a bunch of files...) structure that Sage has for it's recording directories.

Couple that with the Android client and I have on the go viewing everywhere I go!

-Jason

[LehighBri]

Originally Posted by Jason

Yes... Since plex is based on XBMC, it can read .edl files.

How does Plex's implementation of .edl/comskip work? Does it show the commercials on the timeline? How do I skip past commercials? Just curious.

[ybrew]

Originally Posted by LehighBri

How does Plex's implementation of .edl/comskip work? Does it show the commercials on the timeline? How do I skip past commercials? Just curious.

It's not by default, I can tell you that.

I just tried to watch some shows via Plex to test it. I know these shows have been comskipped, but the timeline is 30 minutes for a 30 minute show and it doesn't seem like it autoskips commercials.

I'd love to be proven wrong though.

If I can't get it to autoskip, I'll use Boxee to play back recorded TV and Plex for everything else.

[gplasky]

Originally Posted by LehighBri

How does Plex's implementation of .edl/comskip work? Does it show the commercials on the timeline? How do I skip past commercials? Just curious.

Originally Posted by ybrew

It's not by default, I can tell you that.

I just tried to watch some shows via Plex to test it. I know these shows have been comskipped, but the timeline is 30 minutes for a 30 minute show and it doesn't seem like it autoskips commercials.

I'd love to be proven wrong though.

If I can't get it to autoskip, I'll use Boxee to play back recorded TV and Plex for everything else.

You use to be able to make this change in the guisettings.xml setting <videoplayer> <editdecision>true</editdecision

Gerry

[ybrew]

Originally Posted by gplasky

You use to be able to make this change in the guisettings.xml setting <videoplayer> <editdecision>true</editdecision

Gerry

I'll let you know later today if you still can.

[ybrew]

I tried to edit the guisettings, but no luck. There's a few posts in the plex forums about this. Hopefully it's something they fix/add soon.

[polen]

I'm not positive, but from what I read, it seems that the Plex server transcodes for the android client, which I'm assuming would be for the GoogTV android client.

On a positive note I read that it will read our Video_TS directories and play the DVD, but I don't know if it will play the DVD menu or just steam the movie.

My Sony 40" got the GoogTV 2.0 update so I'm thinking of paying the $4.99 to get the Plex client.

[polen]

For those thinking of using GTV with Plex, this is a good read. Looks like they are not transcoding for GTV.

http://darrin.plexapp.com/2011/11/02...for-google-tv/

[gplasky]

So Installed Plex on my Sage server where I am running WHS v1. It was pretty easy and I added my ripped movies, muscic, photos and TV Recordings. Plex found all the metadata for the movies, tv series, and music. I installed the Plex Windows client on my Win 7 box where I run the Sage PC client. After configuring the client to do hardware acceleration for DXVA2 in both the Videos section and Systems section of Preferences everything plays without a hitch. That is both TV Reordings from a HDHR and HD-PVR (mpeg2 & h.264) are sweet and smooth. This is on an AMD x2 with integrated AMD video. Both DVD rips and Blue Ray rips play without a hitch. And I went 1 step further and installed the Android client on my Droid 2. Both the mpeg2 and h.264 TV recordings played great over 3 G. The h.264 took a little longer to start because of it being transcoded by the server but once it started it played flawlessly, pausing a few times to buffer up. The mpeg2 recordings just played. It picked up where I left off watching or I could start over. And Plex will track the watched and unwatched status within Plex. (No ripped movies with the Android client-yet.) So all it's missing is a plugin to playback the commercial skipping edl files. Plex can handle Netflix and other Internet channels itself. But I'm very impressed. With this Sage just becomes the backend PVR which I can manage with the jetty Web server. I'm looking to put togther some mini Windows clients. I think Plex will only get better.

Gerry

[wayner]

I guess the only downsides to Plex are the same as many of the other options:

1. No live TV.
2. No currently recording shows.
3. No way to schedule shows.

Issue 3 can be solved, at least on a PC, by running the Sage Web UI.

But there are lots of upsides, especially if it works just as well on a Roku as then you are getting very cheap clients.