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Ask Slashdot: What's Your Preferred Media Streaming Device?
New submitter bkr1_2k writes: Way back when, I had a PC dedicated as a media server using MythTV. That died and I didn't bother building a new one. Consumer electronics caught up and I recently bought an Apple TV (3rd Generation) to use for streaming my media library. I am, unsurprisingly, finding flaws with it. I'm looking for alternative devices that allow me to stream from my media server directly, without the need for a middleman app like iTunes for the Apple TV. I don't need a ton of streaming services (we have Netflix and Amazon Prime but don't use anything else). I primarily want to use this for streaming my own music and movie libraries over my home network, preferably with a user interface that lets me browse those in a fashion that doesn't force me to scroll through my whole library to get to the title that starts with the letter "Z" (A very poor design choice in the Apple TV). Nor do I want any voice controls since they all suck, in my experience. I would prefer an 'open' device that I can update at will with add-ons, but it's not a requirement. What are the current options out there? Roku, Apple TV, Chromecast. Anything else that might fit my needs better? Last week, we asked a similar question: "What's your preferred music streaming service?"
Done.
Microsoft Zune. Brand fucking new, state of the art technology.
Raspi with Kodi (OSMC is good) does it for me.
Windows is like the faint smell of piss in a subway: it's there, and there's nothing you can do about it.
Apple TV Gen 4 meets all of your criteria. Don't forget that it supports pairing a keyboard, and you can also control it from an iPhone or iPad if you have one of those. Now with the app store, there are lots of add-ons, including MythTV and Plex, which opens up the world.
I've got an Apple TV 4 which has a native Plex client and that works really well. I've also set up (with a bit of fiddling) PlexConnect on the Plex server which allows you to replace the Apple Trailers on an ATV2 or ATV3 with Plex too without any jailbreaking. That works amazingly well too. This way I still have the benefits of iTunes for renting movies and for my iTunes collection, but also Plex which is a much more flexible media server with clients for lots of other platforms.
"I have the attention span of a strobe lit goldfish, please get to the point quickly!"
Apple is the NIH platform. If you want something "weird" people hiss at you and call you a pirate. They design based on the most pedestrian use case. What they do with photos is especially atrocious.
Plus Apple doesn't bother with any sort of video metadata support at all.
I would put them at the bottom of the heap.
Something like MythTV or Kodi will just play what you have with no muss and no fuss. Kodi has best in class metadata management. You will also be able to organize things as you wish as not how Apple thinks it should be done.
Apple proprietary content is prone to breaking due to network issues.
A Pirate and a Puritan look the same on a balance sheet.
Stream most video and Netflix on my Atari 2600. Things look a little blocky and there's alot of frame drops, but it looks okay. Movies look kind of like Frogger or Pac-Man.
On the main TV I have a new Apple TV, problems abound at first but as seems to be the custom with Apple sh*t a few updates later and it's pretty smooth. The trick I found is to embrace the Siri interface. Pretty quick and easy to get around once you get used to it. On other TVs or while traveling I use chromecast, it's pretty slick but of course I can't stream amazon prime to it. I'm really resisting getting yet another device to stream Amazon, I'm hoping at some point they let it stream on either Apple or chrome. I can stream my laptop browser to chromecast while watching amazon prime, but sheesh.
Would love to cut the chord, the only thing keeping it is the fact that my father in-law wouldn't know what to do with himself if he couldn't watch sports when he's here.
while [ 1 ]; do echo -n -e "\xe2\x95\xb$((($RANDOM&1)+1))"; done
I bought the wired adapter for the Chromecast for about $15. It works fine. You still need wireless to set the device up however.
We hope your rules and wisdom choke you / Now we are one in everlasting peace
Device? Depends where I am and what I'm doing I suppose. A Mac mini is the cat's meow IMHO. It is my main device for watching "TV". It also makes it trivial to stream anything any way I want to my other devices.
Other devices would be something iOS. iPad's, touches, and iPhone's depending on location / use there. VLC usually going back to my library directly (or live TV).
I've used Plex for management, but really don't anymore. Too much database corruption problems with it. Easy to do though as it's just another avenue to scan libraries.
Connected to the Mac via bluetooth I primarily use a numeric keypad with most of the keys re-programmed / re-purposed -- depending on the APP [BetterTouchTool].
One key is space (play / pause pretty much across the board). 0-9 tunes the TV for EyeTV, whereas I decided "6" changes the aspect ratio for VLC.
Across the top where function keys -- now APP keys: .... BetterTouchTool.
EyeTV Netflix Sling VLC iTunes
Other keys programmed differently, but universal for function, ie: one key is "G" (guide), another now says "F/S" (FullScreen on/off), etc. +/- channel up/down in EyeTV, but will play next/previous song for iTunes. No function in Sling. So on and so forth
That's the primary remote -- the secondary is a old iPhone pretty much running BetterTouchTool -- which allows you create custom menus on the display along with acting as primarily a mouse pad...
Running a full blown Mac gives you WAY more options than just a AppleTV (tried it upstairs, meh), Roku, Chromecast, etc... The Mac wins in this case -- hands down IMHO. It helps that ssh / bash / unix is the under-pinning for remote access whether locally in the same room or from work... Of course my desktop there and at home are other Mac's. :)
If you want to retain the usual Raspbian (Debian derived) command line interface and use the box just like any other Debian/Ubuntu box, there is no need to install a media specific distro like OSMC or OpenELEC.
Just install regular Raspbian, then install Kodi as you would any debian package:
$ sudo apt-get install kodi
If you want kodi to start automatically and take over the HDMI port, then add this to crontab:
@reboot sleep 45; /usr/lib/kodi/kodi.bin --standalone -fs
The delay is to give you some time to kill the process if you want to start the GUI desktop.
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