Streaming server to 4K TV

Trojan Horse

Trojan Horse

Trojan Horse

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1,705
Hi guys

My IT mates at work are giving me a free router/server box. I’m getting as SSD for it to run Ubuntu Server or something like that. It’s an industrial gigabit router box I’ll get model details soon but it’s a bit old.

I wanted to know how I could go about automatically streaming 4K movies from it. Like is there a torrent provider that is good for this? I was thinking RARBG and hooking the Ubuntu box up to my VPN.
Can I automatically do this?

How would I stream to my LG (early) OLED 4K (I forgot model number)

Would I need to buy a Nvidia shield 4K or can I stick something like Plex on to stream in 4K?
 
Do you want your media streamed straight from internet sources or will you hold a copy locally?

If the former then I'm not sure. If the latter then consider that you're solving two problems. Getting the (legal I hope) media and serving it to your house. Both can be achieved with the one box, and probably all on Ubuntu server too, although I'm no expert on that.

So dealing with the latter problem first, serving it to your home generally is best done by using a media server application on the server where the media is and client software on the end devices. Obvious choices are Plex and Emby. I personally use Plex because there's a plethora of clients and it is pretty mature and works well with the containerisation system I use. But equally you could just use some sort of DLNA server that even things like bog standard STBs can read media from.

If you employ a media server like Plex then you don't need something as expensive as a shield to view content. The LG probably has a Plex client and if it doesn't you can cast to a Chrome device, run Plex on a cheap Firestick or android TV box - lots of solutions. I would add that the 4K bit might throw a spanner in the works as you'll need a client device that can support that or your media server will transcode it down.

The getting media bit is a grey area for discussion here. Personally I run Unraid on my server and use its docker container system for not just Plex server but for Sonarr, Radarr, SABNzb, Deluge and OpenVPN to achieve what I think you want. Probably better places other than OCUK forums to discuss that stuff though.
 
BigT said:
Do you want your media streamed straight from internet sources or will you hold a copy locally?

If the former then I'm not sure. If the latter then consider that you're solving two problems. Getting the (legal I hope) media and serving it to your house. Both can be achieved with the one box, and probably all on Ubuntu server too, although I'm no expert on that.

So dealing with the latter problem first, serving it to your home generally is best done by using a media server application on the server where the media is and client software on the end devices. Obvious choices are Plex and Emby. I personally use Plex because there's a plethora of clients and it is pretty mature and works well with the containerisation system I use. But equally you could just use some sort of DLNA server that even things like bog standard STBs can read media from.

If you employ a media server like Plex then you don't need something as expensive as a shield to view content. The LG probably has a Plex client and if it doesn't you can cast to a Chrome device, run Plex on a cheap Firestick or android TV box - lots of solutions. I would add that the 4K bit might throw a spanner in the works as you'll need a client device that can support that or your media server will transcode it down.

The getting media bit is a grey area for discussion here. Personally I run Unraid on my server and use its docker container system for not just Plex server but for Sonarr, Radarr, SABNzb, Deluge and OpenVPN to achieve what I think you want. Probably better places other than OCUK forums to discuss that stuff though.
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Thanks man

Can I ask where you get your 4K content? I have Sky Q, Netflix 4K AND Prime 4K... There is literally never any good content I want to watch, especially in 4K. I've already seen them in 4K anyway. Did you go through any tutorials to get there? Which forums are good to discuss
 
Trojan Horse said:
Thanks man

Can I ask where you get your 4K content? I have Sky Q, Netflix 4K AND Prime 4K... There is literally never any good content I want to watch, especially in 4K. I've already seen them in 4K anyway. Did you go through any tutorials to get there? Which forums are good to discuss
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4K content is still really sparse... I have no idea why as its been around for a while now, not to mention they are even bringing out 8K tv's now.

There are a few good shows on amazon prime/Netflix that are 4K, and if you watch sports there are some 4K sports channels, including 4K BT Sport which should be out soon. But aside from that its really rare still.
 
So as we have no idea what the server/router is, or the specific TV, this will be vague advice.

Old server hardware can have a nasty habit of being loud, hot and highly inefficient (read expensive to run), free is often the only time it makes any sense at all. In terms of streaming 4K from it, the server hardware is largely irrelevant, as long as it can send whatever local content you have fast enough to your client, your network can support the speeds required and your TV (client) can direct play the file format, then it’ll work. As to how you’d legally acquire 4K content, that’s up to you and from the sites you mention I really don’t think that’s a topic for here.

If you did for example run Plex as a service on it, again the hardware would largely be irrelevant as you wouldn’t be transcoding 4K content (HDR transcoding is still broken and it’s horribly inefficient to do 4K without hardware acceleration or a decent chunk of CPU resources). You will need a lot of storage space and something like UnRaid is probably a good starting point.

You may want to save yourself the heat/noise/power and consider if one of your friends may already be running a Plex server and be willing to share its contents with you. The LG Plex client isn’t awful, but unless you (and they) have a decent internet connection, remote 4K will be a problem at REMUX quality, less so if they encode it to a lower quality.
 
If you've not already heard of it, have a look at PGblitz (previously Plexguide) and maybe consider renting cloud server. Might be cheaper over time. Or just use PGblitz on the box you are getting.
 
MrWhippy said:
If you've not already heard of it, have a look at PGblitz (previously Plexguide) and maybe consider renting cloud server. Might be cheaper over time. Or just use PGblitz on the box you are getting.
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It's normally me who pimps PG ;)

The issue with remote 4K from a VPS is it depends on your VPS/dedicated box's link to GDrive and it's peerage to you, followed by your own downlink, unless you're using a crappy rip, something like a REMUX will generally struggle unless you have a fast connection/deecent peering and everything else works as it should.
 
Avalon said:
So as we have no idea what the server/router is, or the specific TV, this will be vague advice.

Old server hardware can have a nasty habit of being loud, hot and highly inefficient (read expensive to run), free is often the only time it makes any sense at all. In terms of streaming 4K from it, the server hardware is largely irrelevant, as long as it can send whatever local content you have fast enough to your client, your network can support the speeds required and your TV (client) can direct play the file format, then it’ll work. As to how you’d legally acquire 4K content, that’s up to you and from the sites you mention I really don’t think that’s a topic for here.

If you did for example run Plex as a service on it, again the hardware would largely be irrelevant as you wouldn’t be transcoding 4K content (HDR transcoding is still broken and it’s horribly inefficient to do 4K without hardware acceleration or a decent chunk of CPU resources). You will need a lot of storage space and something like UnRaid is probably a good starting point.

You may want to save yourself the heat/noise/power and consider if one of your friends may already be running a Plex server and be willing to share its contents with you. The LG Plex client isn’t awful, but unless you (and they) have a decent internet connection, remote 4K will be a problem at REMUX quality, less so if they encode it to a lower quality.
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Tbh i find the lg plex app terrible for 4k playback, i always use the xplay one instead far better smoother no buffering ect, in my experiance anyhow
 
The best solution I've found for 4K content via Plex is the Fire TV 4K stick. Dirt cheap (if you grab it on offer) and works flawlessly with no stuttering or buffering and supports HDR too.

I would recommend connecting it via Ethernet rather than Wifi though.
 
Vertigo1 said:
The best solution I've found for 4K content via Plex is the Fire TV 4K stick. Dirt cheap (if you grab it on offer) and works flawlessly with no stuttering or buffering and supports HDR too.

I would recommend connecting it via Ethernet rather than Wifi though.
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I used flex, but dont you need to pay for it?
 
If you mean Plex, then no, you don’t need to pay for it on FTV, the app is free and the sever application is free, on iOS you can either pay for the app, or pay for PlexPass, which unlocks the paid client apps and gives access to beta features such as hardware transcoding.

FTV4K’s in various generations are nice devices, but they aren’t perfect, and the recent versions are Wi-fi only which can cause issues on high but-rate REMUX stuff, the earlier FTV4K had wired gigabit, though you can still get the USB adapter for the current gen.
 
Although not well publicised, I find the Ethernet adapter for the sticks works very well. Once it a blue moon it'll completely disconnect for no reason but a power cycle cures it.
 
The problem with the Plex app on most TVs when attempting to stream 4k is that the Ethernet on most TVs isn't Gigabit. I had no end of issues attempting to stream 4k HDR content to my TV using both WiFi and Ethernet. Got myself an Nvidia Shield last month and it's been flawless.
 
neodude said:
The problem with the Plex app on most TVs when attempting to stream 4k is that the Ethernet on most TVs isn't Gigabit. I had no end of issues attempting to stream 4k HDR content to my TV using both WiFi and Ethernet. Got myself an Nvidia Shield last month and it's been flawless.
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Strange you say that, I have a fairly low end LG 4k TV and have had no issues streaming some high bitrate 50gb+ 4k content over ethernet. It is a 2018 tv though so it may have gigabit, but I've always assumed not.
 
Vertigo1 said:
Indeed, no streamed content will be anywhere near 100Mbps, let alone 1Gbps.
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You appear to be confusing what passes for 4K on the likes of Netflix with actual REMUX content that can and does spike over 100Mbit. If you'v gone out and purchased a 4K screen, media to play on it and invested the time into not watching/listening to it via a potato, 100Mbit is a laughably low hurdle to overcome.
 
Avalon said:
You appear to be confusing what passes for 4K on the likes of Netflix with actual REMUX content that can and does spike over 100Mbit. If you'v gone out and purchased a 4K screen, media to play on it and invested the time into not watching/listening to it via a potato, 100Mbit is a laughably low hurdle to overcome.
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Firestar_3x said:
Try streaming a 4k UHD disk rip and report back.
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Fair comments. When I referred to streaming I meant from commercial services such as Netflix et al. Of ccourse with Plex you could be streaming a direct BD rip which would be far higher bitrate :)
 
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