Plex Live TV and DVR

RoyMi6

RoyMi6

RoyMi6

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Got some Amazon giftcards for christmas so picked up Hauppauge WinTV-quadHD (i.e. 4xHD tuners for £100) for my Plex server.

Honestly, very impressed.

Don't massively need it but we have a TV in one room that can't watch regular TV because it's got no aerial. We mostly just use it for watching Amazon Prime / YouTube.

Anyway, wouldn't have bought it if I didn't randomly have some extra cash as I'd been agonising over the fact it currently doesn't have an EPG - but it's meant to be coming.

However... not having the EPG is actually quite a refreshing way of looking at your TV listings. Just having listed everything by categories of TV Shows, Movies, Dramas, Documentaries that's on now, or on next, is kind of liberating.

Additionally the added functionality of the Plex interface that allows you to see movie ratings, the cast, related movies etc is also really neat. Seeing everything presented like this actually makes you realise how rich TV is in terms of variety of TV shows and the movies actually available.

To me, the funny thing is that we (in terms of morden people watching TV) have lamented that we need our TV "on demand", that we need to be able to watch what we want, when we want; and pay for services that provide it. But honestly, the Plex interface has suddenly let me realise that TV actually has plenty of material, it's just not easy to find.

Take for example that currently Dances With Wolves is currently airing on BBC2.

Plex reminds me that it's Kevin Costner in the lead role. Simply clicking on his name (while still watching the film) shows me that he's also in JFK and it's airing on Film4 on Jan 10, 11:55pm.

Boom, recording JFK. That's a win for me. It's simply just not a way I've been able to use any other guide on Sky, Virgin, FreeView, YouView before.

So yeah, don't get me wrong, by recording it at midnight I'm allowing myself to view what I want, when I want - but I'm not paying a subscription for the privilege.

Oh yeah! And it automatically cuts commercials out of recordings :D Win win.

P.S. I should mention that currently Live TV and DVR are only available for Plex pass subscribers and that commercial cutting is currently in Beta (I personally don't actually have it turned on at the moment because it's can't be enabled per recording and don't want to risk losing anything for a movie I've got scheduled if it guesses the adverts incorrectly)
 
That's refreshing to read. I've plexpass and when love TV came I was a bit meh so didn't explore. I may now have to look into it.
 
I have a Blackgold twin Freeview-HD tuner in my HTPC that I no longer use, but I recently found it's community supported in Plex, so I may well give it a go. I was a bit worried about the lack of EPG but apparently they are now going to implement it, although if you say it's fine without it, I will see how it goes. I already have a Plex Pass so might as well make some use of it.
 
Aye, honestly, lack of EPG put me off since they launched support - so I'm with you guys.

But it's surprisingly usable without one!

However... I still kind of need it for some housekeeping :)

Pet peeve of mine having channels listed that I don't watch/use on a regular TV and at the moment I've added all 400 scanned channels and I'm getting TV shows listed as "on now" called "Off air" and crap like that. So I want to be able to check a channel is actually worth while having but there's currently no way to actually say "show me the TV guide for BBC1".

Still, not a reason to try it if you've a) got a TV card and b) got Plex pass! It's really a no brainer.

Oh! Actually, only thing I don't like is the time it takes to start watching a channel. It's obviously taking the raw analogue stream then has to start it's transcoding process to then allow you to watch and, in turn, pause/rewind live TV. Only thing is that takes about 10 seconds each time I swap what I'm watching.

BUT, on the other hand, there's less channel skipping because the interface much it much easier to see what's on.
 
Sounds good!

Well I have got as far as taking the TV tuner out of my HTPC, going into the loft to find the standard size pci backplate.. then fitted to my server. Although one detail I forgot to think about is the fact my Plex server is a VM.. and I need to pass through the TV tuner to the VM, which so far isn't going too well :D Then I need to run a TV cable to the server if I am successful.
 
Given there's quite a few problems with the supported cards make sure you've got it detected in Plex before bothering to run the TV cable and doing your scan (you do a channel scan then have to download the EPG data, which can take about 15 minutes total)

Also, make sure you select the Beta branch from Settings > General > Update Channel for all the latest fixes.

EDIT: Also, pro tip.

TV shows can only be recorded to a library defined as being a "TV Shows" library type - movies can only be put in libraries defined as "Films". This means that the shows you're recording are being put in the same folder on your server as your films and tv shows that you've got through other means.

Because my movies are limited to BluRay rips I don't want to muddle them up in the same folders.

Additionally I ultimately plan to buy a dedicated HDD for all Live TV recordings so I'm not brutalising my disks used for long term backup of rips.

So I've created two new libraries called:
Recorded TV
Recorded Movies

This means that DVR usage is separating out the recordings onto a different drive and from the interface side of things I've got extra categories to easily see recorded films from the TV.

Of course, on the plus side, Plex is great at aggregating everything so my "newly added" for TV shows doesn't care that some are box sets that I've ripped and some have just been recorded from the TV - they all just appear side by side.

Although... I've yet to record anything that I've maybe got some seasons for already. I.e. what happens when the next episode of The Big Bang Theory airs and is stored in a separate physical location from the Season 1 boxset I've already got? I assume Plex is smart enough to handle/aggregate that, but I've not checked myself.
 
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Christ, the more I use this the more I like it.

Honestly, there's just so much on that normal TV guides just don't make obvious to you. Did you know Jet Li, The One is on at some point? Can't even remember how I found that out :)

However, it does remind me how good I've had it with just watching stuff in HD... not sure I'll actually be happy watching it in SD!
 
Yup, that is the plan so far, to try and get Plex to see it. I have put a thread up on the Plex Forums as I'm not able to get Plex to see the card.

The TV Tuner looks very lost in my server :D :D

download


So I will concentrate on getting that working before I hook up an aerial. But the idea of this was to try it out and see how it performs before I splash out on a quad-tuner supported device seeing that I already have something.

Your experience so far sounds very positive though :) It will be handy for just having TV all around the house, instead of limitations of having a TV with an aerial.

How come you have no HD?
 
I do have HD channels, it's just that one specific show is being shown on a channel I don't have in HD (it's something like PickTV at 3am or something random like that)

P.S. Nice setup :D
 
Ah ok! Yes SD sucks really.

I found my Plex issues though, you have to apply to be a community tester! So I will have to wait until it's activated.
 
What? I didn't have to be a community tester? I thought that was only for people using unsupported devices? Thought you found yours on the list?
 
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