I understand the gripe about the plex bloat. However, you can pretty easily hide it all. You can customize your home page so that all you see is your media. You can also pin and unpin sections on the sidebar. Only thing I have on my sidebar that isn't my media is the Discover tab because sometimes I like to see what is new or trending from certain streaming services.
Again an excellent video! Went from Plex to Jellyfin and it has been a great experience. Both great options, but at that time Plex required authentication through their cloud servers and I prefer no cloud dependencies.
Can't speak for Emby or Jellyfin, but if you sign up for Plex you're signing up to have your data, including your e-mail address, sold to unknown third parties. Regularly. It's been pretty rare for me that companies do that.
Another great one Frank! Been a Plex user for years, but have considered Jellyfin at times. Regarding the bloat in the Plex UI, at least we have the option to customize the UI and show only what the user wants to see.
I used plex for 10 years and have the lifetime plex pass. I switched to Jellyfin this year as I really don't like the direction plex is going. The weekly friend activity emails they started sending out without asking was the final straw for me. I'm liking jellyfin so far.
It's funny, for me Plex has the best interface. The main reason is the ability to browse your libraries and settings while playing media. While with jellyfin you have to close and reopen the stream every time you want to check something. And i really like the feature that tell me how many streams are active at the moment without having to go on the dashboard page.
I switched from Plex to Emby several years ago. Emby was just easier to use. All I wanted was to play my videos and Plex seemed to get to a point that one would need a college degree. My videos reside on my Synology NAS and Emby runs from a QNAP NAS which has an Intel I5 processor that has transcoding abilities. Both are on a 10gb network connection.
I have been using Plex mostly, then a few years ago tried Emby just to have a second choice for my Shield devices. I recently tried Jellyfin, only because it was available for the Vision Pro device. By far, Jellyfin was the easiest to setup. Maybe it was also because of my previous experience with the other two.
Started with Plex....but the interface became bloated( as you pointed out) so switched to Emby. My use case is different because I have a purpose built media server not a Nas running Docker.
Used plex on my synology for years on my 1515+ but it was rough to watch any movies without it buffering. Finally saw your promox videos and moved it to a small form pc with promox and loved it. Im sure the newer synologys r better at showing movies.
Plex was great on my NAS up until my synology NAS stopped supporting it with updates. I have had it crash and have to reload the app over again, compile the data - and it is turning into a pain in the butt. I am looking to Emby now
Try all 3: I started with jellyfin but I had a lot of problems with different types of video (image freezing, etc.) I bought the Plex license since here in Argentina it was much cheaper than Emby, I used it for almost a year, but one of my televisions kept hanging when browsing the interface, having to unplug it and plug it back in. I have been using Emby for almost 2 years (also with a lifetime license) and so far I have no complaints.
That is just an app that doesn’t you can’t use other than on an Apple TV or iPhone/iPad. It doesn’t host the media so it saves the metadata over iCloud which is expensive in the long run for more data. This is a terrible solution and isn’t a media server. Use the three in the video.
I use Plex on my NAS, but I am not using Plex apps on any devices to wach media. I use Infuse instead. It is paid, but it is not bloated like Plex , Dolby Atmos works on Apple devices. Besides it's not that expensive.
Infuse is THE best by far for my AppleTV!. It’s the most perfect database for my movies, and play raw files from my NAS with/without subtitles!. There’s nothing superior to Infuse so far.
Another great video! I went with Plex to manage my home videos and work-related clips. DS Video didn't give me the flexibility to categorize clips the way I needed. I actually had Plex set up on an old computer and I was unable to properly move it to Synology - I just reinstalled Plex using a new Plex premium account and it has worked well. Had I known about it, I would have tried Jellyfin, but now I'm committed to Plex and I don't regret it. I kind of enjoy all the extras that come with Plex.
Ha, coming here after DSM 7.2.2 😀I have considered Plex in the past when it cost 75€ for a lifetime pass. But as you mentioned, I feel it got too bloated. They should have a UI configuration page where we could select what to see. Well I guess I will go for Jellyfin. Unfortunatly Jellyfin is a bit tough to install on a Samsung smart TV. But will give it a go 🙂
None of these work trouble free with Subtitles "hearing impared" turned on, they need a video card to handle the conversion and most of the Synology NAS units are not geared for that, I use an I510th gen machine to run plex/emby both, and it has a built in QuickSync compatible GPU which makes both media servers much more powerful.
I have tried Plex and Jellyfin. I support opensource but it takes more work. Jelly fin when it comes to DVR with HD Homerun you have to do extra items and pay for the channel guide/lineup. While with Plex on the lifetime sub you get that included and its easier to configure post server setup and just works.
Thank you very much, very well explained. I'll probably stick with Plex though. I tried to install Jellyfin on my Synology NAS, but I'm not a network specialist and if I still can't access the dashboard despite port sharing and permissions, I quickly lose patience. In addition, I didn't experience a real advantage of Jellyfin over Plex here either. The Plex homepage can be customized, I don't have Live TV or Tidal etc. on there, just my links to the folders on the NAS.
I tried to like Jellyfin really hard, but the constant issues with subtitles and stuttering killed it for me. I don't understand why the same codecs for one movie works beautifully in 4k, while another movie with the same format, same codecs and way lower bitrate lags. Currently exploring Plex and these issues SEEM to be absent.
Great presentation. I read your installation instructions for Jellyfin in a docker container, which were excellent. The only question I have is; how do install more videos and have Jellyfin update the populated information?
I've always found plex to be buggy,.kind of limped along with it over the years. Recently tried JellyFin and it kept crashing my home server over and over, and I couldn't establish the cause. I'm trying emby now as an alternative. In theory since it's the same base as JellyFin it might cause the same issues but I guess I'll see.
It's a good overall option, though it doesn't have the brand name that these others have. I think if you just want something that works, it should be considered. If you want something that is going to continue (hopefully) to innovate, these other options should be looked at.
Plex and Emby both have official packages, but both will also run in Docker. Other than perhaps a simpler initial setup, what are the pros and cons of using the package vs a docker container?
The main pro of using the docker container is portability. If you ever wanted to move the media server to a separate server, it'll be easier with Docker than the packages. I'm also not positive (it used to be this way), but I believe you also have to use Docker if you want to get hardware transcoding working on all of them due to the way DSM 7 manages permissions.
@@WunderTechTutorials that makes sense. I just haven't had the time to test other solutions. After the major upgrade of DS Videostation, it is working fine for my and my kids needs 🙂 What I see, it is like a scraped version of Plex. But will look forward to hear your opinion 🙂
Plex is the best. It is far easier to set up. The server is more logical to add libraries. The clients are easier to connect to the server. Adding a client doesn't take nearly as long. All the media is there nearly instantly. It doesn't have to download all the artwork every time. Jellyfin will not play video formats that Plex will. Jellyfin isn't easy to maintain different accounts, edit what libraries they can access, see what they are viewing, etc. I don't understand how anyone can think Plex is hard to navigate. Kodi is the worst. Super difficult just to add media, and you have to click down about 5 levels deep every time you want to watch a movie. Plex? Just click MOVIES, and you are there. Infuse is just a video player. It's not a media center.
Been using plex for a year now. Two questions. In the nas media folder, do the movies show thumbnails on icons. Also, if I play them on the pc, some seem to take a long time to start playing, whereas on the tv they start immediately via roku. Thank you.
They should show the thumbnails on Plex for movies, but not on the NAS itself. For the second question, I'd guess that it's a transcoding issue (different resolution). If it has to transcode the video, it's going to take longer than if it doesn't.
Another great video. I'm just having fun learning how to better use my Synology NAS. Awesome stuff and much appreciated! I just installed Jellyfin using the package and found it to pretty straightforward. However, I'm having a hard time connecting to the server from my FireTV. It discovers the server fine, but when I attempt to connect, it says it cannot connect, either HTTP or HTTPS. I've gone through all the settings in Jellyfin but don't see anything that I believe is configured incorrectly. Any ideas?
It is on the same network. In fact, I’ve been running the native Media Server with DLNA successfully for quite some time now. The firewall is enabled but I have no rules configured. Do I need to make an exception for Jellyfin if it’s all on the local network? Thank you!
@@WunderTechTutorials I did not have the port included in the server address simply because it discovered the server address on it's own, which I selected. However, I just tried manually entering the address with the port as you suggested and guess what, it came right up! Very strange. Thank you for the suggestion. Now that I'm able to connect to the server, I need to figure out why only some photos (folders) are available in the library and none of my movies or home videos are available yet. It's been about three days since I installed Jellyfin, so perhaps it's still indexing them? Seems lengthy though, particularly when I don't see even one movie available yet (I have about 100 or so). Does it matter than I have my movies, clips, home videos scattered under the parent folder? Some of the movies are 5 folders deep. I do like the interface, so hoping my decision to use Jellyfin over the native Media Server is a good one. Again, thank you for the help, Frank!
@@whipp5965 Glad it worked! I don't think it would still be indexing, but I guess it's possible - do you think it's a permission issue? Are they in a separate folder than the data that worked? That's probably what I'd look at first.
I just got my Synology Nas and I am somewhat confused. I tried setting up Jellyfin and got to the point where I had to set up the libraries. I have a top level shared Media file and then under that I currently have a Music file. However, when I try to get to the Music file /volume1/Media/Music I can't choose that (it only goes to Media) and if I manually include it I get a path not found error. I have been at this for 3 days now. I even tried changing all the files to permission 777 to see if it was a permission problem. Still couldn't find it. Could someone PLEASE help me!! Also does anyone know if Emby or Jellyfin will work with the Wiim Pro 2? THANK YOU!
I love jellyfin. Hoever, recenly i wanted to retire my old Fire TV Gen 2 and switch to unused xbox1s as my main media streamer. Unfortunately jellyfin doesn't work its not being developed for xbox. And Plex streaming just suck with low quality and I wonder if that due to lack of hardware transcoding.
has Jellyfin fixed the problem on the iPhone when streaming movies (the white line that appears on the bottom of the screen it doesn't autohide and is annoying ) in the swiftfin app??????? So I still use Plex and unpin all the bloat.
@@deadlock_problem since i wrote EMBY, i could give a shit about that copy “jellyfin”… emby stands for media browser 3… it was around before jellyfin and plex… it used to be an attachment to the old windows media browser that came stock with windows 7. Theres videos on how to add it still. I wouldnt use either of those. Ill stick with emby since it has EVERYTHING i want and the other two are missing things.
What did you have trouble with? Definitely not the easiest with Docker (though it's easier now that Docker Compose exists), but Jellyfin has a package you can use as well.
Why even bother with all of this?? Just share a folder on your NAS and you're done. Every mobile and TV device out there can access shared folders for the past 10 years. Just share a folder and select the movie you want to watch from the device. So simple and no stupid "Media Server" to setup. These stupid media servers also have to re-encode the movie in real-time to be able to stream and put stress on your NAS. Don't waste your time and just share a folder, there is no media server software to run and no re-encoding going on and it's so simple.
Because some folks here are audio and videophiles and are streaming lossless bluray and 4k bluray files. if you have a home theater with full Dolby Atmos receiver you won't be able to take full advantage of these features if you are just streaming files from a share. Also many people like the library features, subtitle features and a nice polished UI. These are just some examples
@@rickc9616 LOL do you understand that these "media servers" are re-rendering the video and audio into a lower quality stream... lol too funny. My option of sharing a folder is lossless
@@EvoPortal I enjoy looking at my collection in style... That's the reason tbh... I enjoy reading information about the movie on a tablet and all the extras while in my home theater.
@@derrickdavis862 lol dude just share a folder. You realize you're losing video quality when your streaming server software is re-encoding your movie right? On top of that you're putting stress and heat on your NAS. All that just to see a more fancy menu when selecting your movie which takes 10 seconds either way??? Crazy! lol
@@bububob1 The point is it makes zero sense to be running ANY media server software when you can simply share a folder in 10 seconds and you're done. Media server software adds more stress to your NAS for no reason. I'm correct here.
