My favorite media server is the Plex Media Server it has a lot of features that make it very easy to work with when cataloging and serving your media anywhere in the world. – I have a very cool set up that has my Plex server running on its own Linux box. It has a all of the DVD’s I own and many of the digital pictures I have on it. Along with lots of my music. The Linux machine is not the storage location, that is on a separate NAS. I have added a diagram below.

I have an HDHomerun cable box that allows me to provide access to my cable service. Through that box I am able to access my Cable TV with MythTV. You can find out more about MythTV here its the best in Open Source DVR software. It will fill a massive void that is left by Microsoft removing Windows Media Server from Windows 10.

On the backend of my MythTV I have “written” a script that automagically translates the TV show into something that the Plex server can work with, so any TV show I record I can see on my Plex anywhere in the world. – Very cool!

 

I also have a Roku (or two) the Plex has a Roku app so I can see the Plex on any TV that has the Roku attached to it. – It is the first baby steps I have made to “cut the cable”.

I also have Netflix on the Roku, most of what we watch on TV now is served up by the Roku and includes Netflix or the Plex. It’s definitely a journey to get unplugged from cable but we are on the journey now. The cable bill is now mostly the Internet access.

For those of you using Windows Media Center one of the Plex users wrote a way to link that to the Plex Media Server. There are details on a doku wiki that I host wmc2plex I don’t use this anymore because of issues I had with the connection speed. It is a great tool though.