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Plex - all that and a bag of chips!

S

srexy

macrumors 6502a
Original poster
Nov 19, 2006
566
34
Received my Mini refurb on Thursday. Worried about overscan/black bar issues - Panny commercial series panel to the rescue!

Installed plex, copied over all of my ripped movies and downloaded tv shows. Was concerned that Plex wouldn't pick up on all of them due to them not having dates in titles. Needn't have worried. Plex is the t*ts! HULU!!!!

I feel like someone opened a door into the inner sanctum :D

Serendipitously my wife has been making lots of murmurings about having the :apple:tv in the bedroom...
 
Plex is great and has progessed a lot. The only thing that's wrong with it is still its idle CPU usage (yes, even after the 0.8 release). Using it on a MacBook White is like hearing a plane take off. But I guess all the XBMC derived projects have this issue.

As long as fan noise and higher power consumption doesn't bother you, Plex is awesome and really nice to look at.
 
macdim said:
Plex is great and has progessed a lot. The only thing that's wrong with it is still its idle CPU usage (yes, even after the 0.8 release). Using it on a MacBook White is like hearing a plane take off. But I guess all the XBMC derived projects have this issue.

As long as fan noise and higher power consumption doesn't bother you, Plex is awesome and really nice to look at.
Click to expand...


I think so far so good w/cpu and power consumption (don't really know - it's my first ever Mac Mini). The noise isn't a huge issue because I have the whole setup stashed in a cupboard using an IR extender to control it. I have a Ministack in there too and haven't noticed any noise at all.

I have noticed that trying to encode a Handbrake will cane the Mini's proc and render Plex pretty choppy for video playback. I am probably going to streamline my ripping/encoding process by using my old XP box (previously my godawful media server) as a ripping/encoding drone. I'll rip out my raided drives and either Ebay them or press them into backup service somewhere.

I'm still slowly ironing out all kinks - right now I'm trying to add a 46gb music collection stored on an airdisk that is completely choking it. May have to use the iTunes media server plug-in instead...

TV shows and movies have been absolutely painless so far (more than could be said for my initial :apple:tv experiences)
 

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The Plex/eight release is a good milestone in my opinion. After several failed attempts at getting previous versions of Plex/Boxee/XBMC to behave in a non-buggy manner and scrape all the metadata correctly, Plex's latest release seems to, well, actually work! The iTunes library integration (both local and over LAN/WAN!) is great, and will even update play counts on remote libraries (something that Front Row never could do for me). The addition of the 'app store' means that with minimal configuration, Plex is already immensely useful to be even before I add any video files of my own. All in all, a quite solid release from the Plex team.
 
I really like Plex, nice and simple. I'm trying to work out a home theater system so I can use it. I don't get why everyone is always going on about Boxee... it's interface is horrible.
 
Plex is an interesting concept. One thing that still bothers me is all the settings. I'm afraid that if my girlfriend comes over to use it, she'll mess up one of the settings or something. Thus, having a keycode to enter any preferences would be great. In the meantime I'll stick with my appletv and tivo. Appletv has it so that no one can mess with the settings unless a 4 digit passcode is entered.

Simplify man
 
Rychy said:
I really like Plex, nice and simple. I'm trying to work out a home theater system so I can use it. I don't get why everyone is always going on about Boxee... it's interface is horrible.
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Boxee's interface is the same as Plex. What makes it horrible is the freezes.

Plex is much smoother and more consistent
 
Chris Rogers said:
Boxee's interface is the same as Plex. What makes it horrible is the freezes.

Plex is much smoother and more consistent
Click to expand...

I disagree about the interface being the same. Boxee's interface is very confusing. Anytime you open up a different section, the design isn't the same. I just started to play around with both and each has it's positives.

The problem with both of these is that neither is the perfect solution. Getting your own content on there can be a pain and there are always issues with recognizing video titles. Not to mention the programs for both suck at music and photos.

I would gladly pay $50 for an app that added the best of both and made it easier to tag videos. The best solution would be for Apple to open up Fromt Row to play other formats and have an API.
 
gcmexico said:
doesn't play movies bought from Itunes...can't use it till it does
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I find the transition between using "my app" which include front row to be smooth. Plex will close and front row will open. Close front row and plex reopens. Flawless.
 
The thing that makes boxee the best is that every thing is included if you want to watch tv etc. It comes set up. Now I think Plex is overly complicated but I like a challenge.
 
hookem12387 said:
I got it up and working about a week ago, it's amazing. .8.1 has significantly lowered idle cpu usage, btw
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Is there any reason ANY app should use 25% CPU for a simple scrolling line of text? Think not. Plex uses less CPU power while watching 720p video than it does on the main screen doing nothing.
 

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macdim said:
Is there any reason ANY app should use 25% CPU for a simple scrolling line of text? Think not. Plex uses less CPU power while watching 720p video than it does on the main screen doing nothing.
Click to expand...

Are you on 8.1? - your cpu at idle should be lower than that...
 
macdim said:
Is there any reason ANY app should use 25% CPU for a simple scrolling line of text? Think not. Plex uses less CPU power while watching 720p video than it does on the main screen doing nothing.
Click to expand...

I have the same problem and im 5.1
 
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