Plex is locking remote streaming behind a subscription in April
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Dammit, my friend just said he would give me access to his file server, all I have to do is install Plex. Presumably this announcement means that will become impossible without a subscription.
Mmmmmaybe.
A lot of what they paywall depends on if the server runner's account is a Plexpass holder. You might have to pay a one time fee for the app depending on what platform you choose.
Then again, there's different ways of sharing your server, they might be keen on only including Plexpass for the Plex Home users and then paywall the E-mail shared users.
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I just want to make sure I read this correctly. It says that if your a Plex plass holder already that remote streaming changes won't affect your service. This means that if I have the lifetime subscription and host my own server than users whom have not payed for Plex pass can continue to access this server without issue correct?
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This might be a dumb question, but could I access my Jellyfin through an external VPN like Proton?
I have it set up in my raspberry to download Linux ISOs and run Jellyfin
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This might be a dumb question, but could I access my Jellyfin through an external VPN like Proton?
I have it set up in my raspberry to download Linux ISOs and run Jellyfin
If you mean that you are using Proton VPN on your Raspberry Pi to mask your downloading traffic, then no that same VPN will not help you access services like Jellyfin on your home network while you are remote.
Instead you'll want to use something like Tailscale (or Wireguard). You run it as a service on your home network and it then becomes your own VPN that you (or others) can use to connect to your home network when you are remote.
You could run Wireguard on the same RaspberryPi that you use for downloading but I would recommend against it assuming that you're running Proton VPN right on the host itself (and not inside a container).
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We are also changing how remote playback works for streaming personal media (that is, playback when not on the same local network as the server). The reality is that we need more resources to continue putting forth the best personal media experience, and as a result, we will no longer offer remote playback as a free feature. This—alongside the new Plex Pass pricing—will help provide those resources. This change will apply to the future release of our new Plex experience for mobile and other platforms.
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I’ve just reinstalled the latest version of Jellyfin and installed the Media Segments Provider, and tested every client available for it and none of them appear to have a skip intro button implemented.
Most clients have it disables by default and you'll still have to install the intro skipper plugin.
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I absolutely love that Emby is such a third thought that they don’t even get a mention anymore. They fucked their loyal users over so much that they don’t even get mentioned anymore. Can’t wait for plex to suffer the same fate
I absolutely love that Emby is such a third thought that they don’t even get a mention anymore.
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As someone looking to get into self hosting and was researching plex. What’s been the experience like using jellyfish with non techy people? This is mainly something I want to set up for my parents
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That's just not correct. Mate. It's setting up a secure route from the client to your Plex server. It's essentially doing what Tailscale does but just handling the client setup automatically via their Plex authentication. They are authenticating the connection and setting up the route from the client to the server. They are not handling petabytes of data people are streaming.
Ok sure, they aren’t routing, just using P2P like I mentioned. It’s still not possible to access remotely without using plex services. This is what you are paying for. If you don’t want to pay for their auto-config remote streaming it’s easy enough to do it yourself.
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They do not have chromecast support. (Atleat the last time i checked) Thats a deal breaker for me, would live to use it.
IIRC it has it. Not if you're behind VPN or a tunnel. Only over HTTPS.
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As someone looking to get into self hosting and was researching plex. What’s been the experience like using jellyfish with non techy people? This is mainly something I want to set up for my parents
Jellyfin is very versatile but a bit clunky. I have it set up for my parents on their Roku and it works well enough for them. I set it up for other family members on their WebOS TV but they don't really use it. I used to use it with Roku as well, but had issues with some captions, Dolby Atmos and HDR. I finally broke down and got an Nvidia shield, which fixed all my problems since the developers focus on Android TV the most. I also have Plex, and it is easier to set up, looks more polished, but is less versatile.
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My dude if you are connecting from outside your local network you are "exposed" to the Internet in some way. What magic are you thinking Plex is doing? Is someone hand deliverying the packets via USPS?
Plex runs relay servers where your Plex server will connect to the relay and your player will also connect to the relay, making both ends of the connection egress type as far as routing and access control goes. https://support.plex.tv/articles/216766168-accessing-a-server-through-relay/
It's optional and likely not everyone uses it, but this provides a way for Plex to do remote streaming without the Plex server being reachable directly from the internet.
Separately, it costs money for Plex to run.
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As a techie I hate this answer but it's hard to beat a Roku with Plex from an ease of use standpoint. My 70+ year old parents have no problem navigating it.
Yeah, this is the unfortunate truth. Jellyfin’s setup will never be as simple as Plex, purely because the simple setup requires a centralized server to coordinate things. And Jellyfin is built specifically to rebel against centralization. Plex is easy because the company has servers set up specifically to handle the remote access handshake.
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This might be a dumb question, but could I access my Jellyfin through an external VPN like Proton?
I have it set up in my raspberry to download Linux ISOs and run Jellyfin
Not in the way you’re probably thinking, no. The VPN (like Proton) will be isolating devices from each other. This is by design, so you don’t end up in situations like different customers seeing each other on the network.
Your router might be able to act as a VPN host. This would allow you to connect to your home network from anywhere, and use it just like you would use a service like Proton. And if your home network is set to allow devices to see each other, then you could see your Jellyfin server.
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As a techie I hate this answer but it's hard to beat a Roku with Plex from an ease of use standpoint. My 70+ year old parents have no problem navigating it.
Uh, my parents are over 80, and I have jellyfin set up on their firestick. They have no problem using it. It's just an app they open like anything else.
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We are also changing how remote playback works for streaming personal media (that is, playback when not on the same local network as the server). The reality is that we need more resources to continue putting forth the best personal media experience, and as a result, we will no longer offer remote playback as a free feature. This—alongside the new Plex Pass pricing—will help provide those resources. This change will apply to the future release of our new Plex experience for mobile and other platforms.
I'm surprised by the resistance to Jellyfin in this thread. If you are using Plex, you're already savvy enough to use bittorrent and probably the *arrs. If you can configure that stuff, Jellyfin is absolutely something you can handle. If you like Docker, there's good projects out there. If you're like me and you don't understand Docker, use Swizzin community edition. If you can install Ubuntu or Debian, and run the Swizzin script, you're in business.
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Unless Jellyfin becomes more plug and play Plex will be fine. I like Jellyfin but there is a reason Plex is still around. People are willing to pay for how user friendly it is. Every time I've reinstalled Plex it just works with no issues. I can literally set it up at a friend's house once and never have an issue ever.
With jellyfin Its just never been that experience.
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Setting jellyfin up is for the technically inclined, i'll agree there, but once deployed I don't really see where Plex fundamentally excels over Jellyfin?
You open the app, app shows library, you click on desired media item, desired media item plays.
What am i missing?Some movies just refused to play for me. Subtitles for certain releases just straight up wouldn't load on my lg TV, and then instead of nice picture subtitles I got shitty looking ones.
Idk... I ran it in docker and just assumed it'd all work but it doesn't.
Also, I really like that plex stores you're watched state on their server. I lost a jellyfin db once and had to remember what shows I was watching. There's not a good sync to cloud or something feature for that... Yet another container and solution I have to stand up aside from my media
