NAS Media Server Suggestions

[bmoc]

I finally got word that we are indeed going to the mobile phone stipends at work (allegedly before the end of the month). I purchased the Synology unit and it arrived today.

Synology's Video Station software would be pretty decent if it weren't for its terrible indexing. I moved some files and it thought I had two copies . I've installed Plex and I like it better but I am still concerned about how it will behave with no Internet. I'll test that out later this week.

If nothing else, I can still use it as a "dumb" DNLA server. I'll just have to keep things organized on my own which should not be too hard.

[Exhuminator]

Synology is good stuff. You made a wise decision.

[bmoc]

Today I got serious about getting my local LAN functional. When I built the new house, I wired most of the rooms. I never got to use it because of that whole no internet thing. We were just working off my mobile hotspot.

I needed a way to use my phone to give Internet access to things on my local LAN on an as needed basis. Initially I tried some stuff with tethering and Windows' Internet Connection Sharing. I'd never tried it before but apparently some people have had success with it. I could not get it to work at all on Windows 10. It worked occasionally on Windows 7.

I gave up on Windows ICS and ended up digging out my old Linksys WRT54G router then setting it up in "Client Mode" with DD-WRT firmware. The hotspot connects via wifi to my Linksys router and provides Internet access to its LAN ports. I then connected it to a larger 8-port Linksys switch which is also powering a Cisco access point (which better covers the house in wifi).

TL;DR - My LAN gets its DHCP addresses from a Linksys router and I can turn on my mobile hotspot to feed Internet into my wired ports and a Cisco AP. My NAS maintains the same IP address whether connected to the Internet or not.

Next up - I tackle offline Plex usage. Wish me luck!

[bmoc]

Next up - I tackle offline Plex usage. Wish me luck!

So Plex client apps just don't work at all if you are offline. You are forced to log in via the Internet each time.

Offline, Plex still shows up as DLNA server if the video player supports DLNA. However you lose quite a bit of functionality that way. Resuming videos, changing audio/subtitles, better interface, etc.

If I can train my kids not to use Netflix/Amazon/Youtube, I may just continue leaving my hotspot on at home so that we can log into Plex and get video metadata. That is going to be tricky though at 3 & 6 years old.

Incidentally, some of my older MKV files would not play audio when used via DLNA. I made some new MKVs tonight with MakeMKV and those worked fine. I'm not sure what caused that but it was easy enough to fix by re-encoding with Handbrake.

Overall things are going with with the NAS so far. Thanks to all that chimed in to help out with suggestions!

[Ghudda]

Not too long ago, I was also deciding on which NAS solution would be best for me. I had just purchased a Lenovo Thinkserver which I use as a ESXi Hypervisor Host for an assortment of VMs, but was also in need of a reliable storage solution. I originally thought I would just host FreeNAS in a virtual machine, but after hearing the downsides to that, I decided to look into an independent hardware solution. I ended up going with a Synology DS416, which I currently have 2x 4TB Deskstar NAS drives installed and couldn't be happier. In terms of RAID configurations, I have my storage running in SHR, which has been both efficient and easy to manage. It may be somewhat excessive for my needs (just basic file sharing/storage), but the power efficiency and form factor of the synology boxes, made it a perfect solution. I think you can't go wrong with the pre-built stuff, let us know how it works out for you!

[bmoc]

Post Unlimited Internet Update:

I'm currently on my third day using Straight Talk's 10GB per month phone plan. I've used 0.64 GB of data. Most of that is probably Plex meta-data downloads. Straight Talk doesn't appear to allow people to use mobile hotspots on their phones but you can get around that by using the FoxFi app on Android if your phone is compatible.

The Synology NAS is still doing well and since I have been downloading stuff via PlayOn non-stop since September, I'm currently using about 30% of the 5TB drive. My one complaint is that if it is transcoding something, no one else can watch anything additional without stuttering. Everything has to be encoded into MP4 if you intend to have multiple simultaneous users. Again, Handbrake makes this easy so it is not a deal breaker.

The kids seem to have adjusted pretty well to the change. 90% of their favorite shows and movies are there without having to wade through all the stuff they don't like. My wife took to Plex in a weird way. She didn't want to have to remember how to operate it until it was absolutely necessary. Basically she tuned me out any time I brought it up until our unlimited internet went away. But I haven't heard any complaints in the past three days so I guess that means she likes it? She isn't one to suffer in silence.

I have also been ripping my DVD collection to MP4 using MakeMKV and Handbrake. One pitfall I came across is that DVDs with TV shows (as opposed to movies) are typically interlaced. The video from a ripped TV show off a DVD will have a combing effect unless you run it through a deinterlacing or decombing process. I've just started using the "High Profile" preset on Handbrake for everything (which has decombing turned on). That works reasonably well.

I really need to shell out for that second hard drive in case one fails considering all the work I have put into this project. I also need to get a Blu-ray drive to start ripping Blu-rays.