For long time Mac users, iTunes became the default media server for all your movies, television shows, music, home videos, and the like. It worked decently enough, but the user really had to take the time to manage file information, metadata, album or movie artwork, and much more.
Plex
A much better solution has gained widespread adoption over the last few years, and that is Plex. Plex does what iTunes does, serving up your content over your network, but it does so much more, and it does it so much better.
Tag: Mac Mini Plex Media Server WD My Cloud Pro PR4100 NAS for Plex in 2018. Posted on 9th June 2018 3rd August 2018 by Rob Andrews. WD My Cloud Pro PR4100 NAS in. May 26, 2020 Have a Mac Mini (64-bit, 10.9) set up with Plex server and a bunch of movies and TV series. Plex plays ANY format, the server is working 24x7x365, and I can watch everything on iPad, iPhone, iMac and my WiFi connected Samsung TV. Plex today announced the launch of Plex Podcasts, a feature that's designed to provide Plex users with an intuitive, customizable podcasts experience on any iOS device or Mac with no subscription.
Old Mac
Do you have an older Mac sitting around with nothing to do? You have to really watch those old Macs, they get lazy if you don't tell them what to do! Why not repurpose that Mac to be a Plex media server?
OS X Minimum Requirements
The biggest software requirement for an older Mac to become a Plex media server is that it has to run Mac OS 10.8 or later, otherwise known as Mountain Lion.
If Older Than Mountain Lion, Try Linux
If you have an older Mac that does not run Mac OS 10.8, you could install Linux on the machine and run a Plex media server that way. Ubuntu 10.04 can be run on many older Macs, and will make a fine server. And you know you always wanted to play around with Linux a little, right? Here is your chance!
Meta Heaven
A Plex media server does something really cool that we only wish Apple's iTunes did: it takes care of all the meta data for you. It will scour the internet to provide movie descriptions, album artwork, keep television series tagged correctly for season and episodes, provide album data for your music, and much more.
Interested in Buying an Old Mac for Cheap?
Storage
Running a large media library via a Plex server is no problem. Simply connect a large external hard drive, or even a RAID, to your Mac, configure Plex to look on that drive, and your all set. Even cooler? Any time you add something new, Plex will update your library automatically at a set interval. (I have mine set to once an hour).
While we all love Apple and Apple products, we also live in a world with numerous other technologies. Smart TVs, Android, Windows, Playstation 3 and 4, the Xbox, Amazon Fire TV, and ROKU (just to name a few). And everything listed above is compatible with running the Plex client software, which is what you will use to enjoy all your content!
Apple TV
The new Apple TV (forth generation) has a Plex client you can download, so if you are an only-Apple technology household, you can still take advantage of the better Plex media server. (One caveat: iTunes purchased content cannot be played via Plex).
Free!
You can download Plex for free. Requirements for a Plex media server can be found here.
Mac Pro
Mac Pro 1,1 and 2,1
Mac Pro 3,1
Mac Pro 4,1 and 5,1 4-Core
Mac Pro 4,1 and 5,1 8-Core
Mac Pro 5,1 6-Core
Mac Pro 5,1 12-Core
Mac Pro 6,1
iMac
iMac 4,1, 4,2 and 5,2
iMac 5,1 and 6,1
iMac 7,1
iMac 8,1
iMac 9,1
iMac 10,1 and 11,1
iMac 11,2 and 11,3 (i3)
iMac 11,3 (i5/i7) to 12,2
iMac 13,2 14,2 15,1
iMac 17,1 Zbrush for mac os.
MacBook Pro
MacBook Pro 1,1 and 1,2
MacBook Pro 2,1 and 2,2
MacBook Pro 3,1 and 4,1
MacBook Pro 5,1 to 6,2
MacBook Pro 7,1
MacBook Pro 8,1 to 8,3
MacBook Pro 9,1 and 9,2
MacBook
MacBook 1,1
MacBook 2,1
MacBook 3,1 to 4,2
MacBook 5,1
MacBook 5,2 (667-Mhz)
MacBook 5,2 (800-Mhz)
MacBook 6,1
MacBook 7,1
Mac Mini
PowerMac 10,1 and 10,2
Mac Mini 1,1
Mac Mini 2,1
Mac Mini 3,1
Mac Mini 4,1
Mac Mini 5,1 to 5,3
Mac Mini 6,1 and 6,2
When I started my Mac Mini Mediacenter project, one thing was absolutely clear; I wanted, no, needed Plex as my media front end and server. For the ones who don't know Plex; it's a very powerful and easy to use media indexer, streamer and transcoder for images, music, videos and more. It's free with multi OS and multi platform support.
I've been using Plex for some time now and love its multi-device flexibility. How it seamlessly delivers all my media with the exact same experience to either my TV, iPad or laptop over either LAN or WAN. It even allows you to resume watching a video on your iPad you stopped halfway on your TV or the other way round. Installation and configuration is fairly easy, but there are some things to consider.
Installation & Configuration
Installation should be a breeze. Download both the Plex client and Plex Media Server (PMS from now on) and install as normal. PMS will manifest itself in the background. Not much else I can tell about he actual installation.
Configuring PMS is pretty straight forward and is done from within the Media Manager. Except for the setting to start PMS together with Windows, something you definitely want on a mediacenter. That specific setting is found clicking the tray icon. Double clicking the tray icon opens the media manager, PMS' main interface. The left column allows you to specify folders with your media content and assign a category to them, like movie or TV series. This is used in the client to distinguish between the different media. You can use a category as many times as you like.
I'd like to point out a few settings. Covering them all won't be necessary.
- Library – Empty trash automatically after every scan: This one is off by default. When you sometimes manually delete media files like me, you also want PMS to remove the item from its index. Otherwise you can still chose a movie in the client but upon play get an error the file can't be found.
- Library – Allow clients to delete media: Awesome feature. Before Plex, I used AirVideo to watch media on my iOS devices. I don't retain the files I've watched, so the time I sat behind my MacBook, I had to remember e.g. what episodes I watch the previous night and delete them manually. Enabling this setting allows every client to delete an item directly. Both the instance in PMS and the file itself.
- Sharing – iTunes sharing enabled: If you use iTunes on the same system the Plex server is running on (independent of Mac OS X or Windows), Plex can use your iTunes library. This way, iTunes remains the place to manage your music collection. Letting PMS do its own indexing can be very time-consuming, depending on the size of your library. Better to let iTunes handle this on, so enabling this is advised.
MyPlex
Another item within the PMS settings is myPlex. MyPlex requires an account, which is easilly created online at plexapp.com. MyPlex does two things;
1. it makes the PMS discoverable to clients logged in with the same myPlex account. Even over the internet. With other packages, you need to remember your WAN IP address provided by your ISP, which can change without notice. Or you need setup some dynamic DNS account somewhere. MyPlex publishes your WAN IP to a central Plex server, and is automatically updated when necessary. The only thing you have to do is set up port forwarding in your main router. If done correctly, you server is always reachable, hassle free, from any device, anywhere in the world.
2. the website my.plexapp.com is enabled. This online myPlex environment offers a few things:
- It shows a list of connected servers and makes it easy to share them with friends. Allowing (or denying) them access to your server.
- Clicking a server brings up the media manager for remote management
- It gives access to your Media queue. Whenever watching an online video, you can add it to the Media que to watch it some other time. It will pop up in any client to watch at your leisure.
Plex channels
Think of Plex channels as Apps. Independent plugins to extend Plex's functionality. When enabling iTunes sharing in the PMS settings, the iTunes channel is automatically added. There's a lot to choose from, mostly online video channels formatted to work in Plex. CNN, Netflix, iPhoto, BBC iPlayer and MTV to name but a few. It's another fine example how well Plex is integrated between devices. Channels can be added from within any client and will show up in all others. (Tip for dutch readers: uitzendinggemist.nl and RTL XL are also available).
Plex enabled devices (Web TV's, NAS and mediaplayers)
Both PMS and the Plex client are found on other devices then your average PC. The client is available on LG TV's, Google TV and a variety of Samsung media equipment (my d8000 TV included), jailbroken Apple TV's and Roku Mediastreamers. The functionality and stability varies between devices, but the client on my d8000 for example is nowhere near as good as a PC based client. Less flexible and tends to crash from time to time, but it's still a work in progress.
The Plex Media Server found its way to Linux based NAS stations. Synology being the most widely used. They work as expected, but the raw processing power is what's letting it down. During the time of writing, the newer NAS stations are equipped with an Intel Atom processor at 2,13 GHz. Perfect for the day to day tasks, direct streaming to a client should be without issue, but transcoding becomes problematic. SD content, and even some 720p can be done, but 1080p transcoding maxes out the little Atom, resulting in stuttering video playback. as a prove of concept it's very succesful, but it's better to wait for a more powerful solution. Probably the next generation
Remote control
Obviously, you want proper remote control over your Plex Media Center. I've gone into detail on how to achieve this in this article.
Plex For Mac Mini Versions
If you have an older Mac that does not run Mac OS 10.8, you could install Linux on the machine and run a Plex media server that way. Ubuntu 10.04 can be run on many older Macs, and will make a fine server. And you know you always wanted to play around with Linux a little, right? Here is your chance!
Meta Heaven
A Plex media server does something really cool that we only wish Apple's iTunes did: it takes care of all the meta data for you. It will scour the internet to provide movie descriptions, album artwork, keep television series tagged correctly for season and episodes, provide album data for your music, and much more.
Interested in Buying an Old Mac for Cheap?
Storage
Running a large media library via a Plex server is no problem. Simply connect a large external hard drive, or even a RAID, to your Mac, configure Plex to look on that drive, and your all set. Even cooler? Any time you add something new, Plex will update your library automatically at a set interval. (I have mine set to once an hour).
While we all love Apple and Apple products, we also live in a world with numerous other technologies. Smart TVs, Android, Windows, Playstation 3 and 4, the Xbox, Amazon Fire TV, and ROKU (just to name a few). And everything listed above is compatible with running the Plex client software, which is what you will use to enjoy all your content!
Apple TV
The new Apple TV (forth generation) has a Plex client you can download, so if you are an only-Apple technology household, you can still take advantage of the better Plex media server. (One caveat: iTunes purchased content cannot be played via Plex).
Free!
You can download Plex for free. Requirements for a Plex media server can be found here.
Mac Pro
Mac Pro 1,1 and 2,1
Mac Pro 3,1
Mac Pro 4,1 and 5,1 4-Core
Mac Pro 4,1 and 5,1 8-Core
Mac Pro 5,1 6-Core
Mac Pro 5,1 12-Core
Mac Pro 6,1
iMac
iMac 4,1, 4,2 and 5,2
iMac 5,1 and 6,1
iMac 7,1
iMac 8,1
iMac 9,1
iMac 10,1 and 11,1
iMac 11,2 and 11,3 (i3)
iMac 11,3 (i5/i7) to 12,2
iMac 13,2 14,2 15,1
iMac 17,1 Zbrush for mac os.
MacBook Pro
MacBook Pro 1,1 and 1,2
MacBook Pro 2,1 and 2,2
MacBook Pro 3,1 and 4,1
MacBook Pro 5,1 to 6,2
MacBook Pro 7,1
MacBook Pro 8,1 to 8,3
MacBook Pro 9,1 and 9,2
MacBook
MacBook 1,1
MacBook 2,1
MacBook 3,1 to 4,2
MacBook 5,1
MacBook 5,2 (667-Mhz)
MacBook 5,2 (800-Mhz)
MacBook 6,1
MacBook 7,1
Mac Mini
PowerMac 10,1 and 10,2
Mac Mini 1,1
Mac Mini 2,1
Mac Mini 3,1
Mac Mini 4,1
Mac Mini 5,1 to 5,3
Mac Mini 6,1 and 6,2
When I started my Mac Mini Mediacenter project, one thing was absolutely clear; I wanted, no, needed Plex as my media front end and server. For the ones who don't know Plex; it's a very powerful and easy to use media indexer, streamer and transcoder for images, music, videos and more. It's free with multi OS and multi platform support.
I've been using Plex for some time now and love its multi-device flexibility. How it seamlessly delivers all my media with the exact same experience to either my TV, iPad or laptop over either LAN or WAN. It even allows you to resume watching a video on your iPad you stopped halfway on your TV or the other way round. Installation and configuration is fairly easy, but there are some things to consider.
Installation & Configuration
Installation should be a breeze. Download both the Plex client and Plex Media Server (PMS from now on) and install as normal. PMS will manifest itself in the background. Not much else I can tell about he actual installation.
Configuring PMS is pretty straight forward and is done from within the Media Manager. Except for the setting to start PMS together with Windows, something you definitely want on a mediacenter. That specific setting is found clicking the tray icon. Double clicking the tray icon opens the media manager, PMS' main interface. The left column allows you to specify folders with your media content and assign a category to them, like movie or TV series. This is used in the client to distinguish between the different media. You can use a category as many times as you like.
I'd like to point out a few settings. Covering them all won't be necessary.
- Library – Empty trash automatically after every scan: This one is off by default. When you sometimes manually delete media files like me, you also want PMS to remove the item from its index. Otherwise you can still chose a movie in the client but upon play get an error the file can't be found.
- Library – Allow clients to delete media: Awesome feature. Before Plex, I used AirVideo to watch media on my iOS devices. I don't retain the files I've watched, so the time I sat behind my MacBook, I had to remember e.g. what episodes I watch the previous night and delete them manually. Enabling this setting allows every client to delete an item directly. Both the instance in PMS and the file itself.
- Sharing – iTunes sharing enabled: If you use iTunes on the same system the Plex server is running on (independent of Mac OS X or Windows), Plex can use your iTunes library. This way, iTunes remains the place to manage your music collection. Letting PMS do its own indexing can be very time-consuming, depending on the size of your library. Better to let iTunes handle this on, so enabling this is advised.
MyPlex
Another item within the PMS settings is myPlex. MyPlex requires an account, which is easilly created online at plexapp.com. MyPlex does two things;
1. it makes the PMS discoverable to clients logged in with the same myPlex account. Even over the internet. With other packages, you need to remember your WAN IP address provided by your ISP, which can change without notice. Or you need setup some dynamic DNS account somewhere. MyPlex publishes your WAN IP to a central Plex server, and is automatically updated when necessary. The only thing you have to do is set up port forwarding in your main router. If done correctly, you server is always reachable, hassle free, from any device, anywhere in the world.
2. the website my.plexapp.com is enabled. This online myPlex environment offers a few things:
- It shows a list of connected servers and makes it easy to share them with friends. Allowing (or denying) them access to your server.
- Clicking a server brings up the media manager for remote management
- It gives access to your Media queue. Whenever watching an online video, you can add it to the Media que to watch it some other time. It will pop up in any client to watch at your leisure.
Plex channels
Think of Plex channels as Apps. Independent plugins to extend Plex's functionality. When enabling iTunes sharing in the PMS settings, the iTunes channel is automatically added. There's a lot to choose from, mostly online video channels formatted to work in Plex. CNN, Netflix, iPhoto, BBC iPlayer and MTV to name but a few. It's another fine example how well Plex is integrated between devices. Channels can be added from within any client and will show up in all others. (Tip for dutch readers: uitzendinggemist.nl and RTL XL are also available).
Plex enabled devices (Web TV's, NAS and mediaplayers)
Both PMS and the Plex client are found on other devices then your average PC. The client is available on LG TV's, Google TV and a variety of Samsung media equipment (my d8000 TV included), jailbroken Apple TV's and Roku Mediastreamers. The functionality and stability varies between devices, but the client on my d8000 for example is nowhere near as good as a PC based client. Less flexible and tends to crash from time to time, but it's still a work in progress.
The Plex Media Server found its way to Linux based NAS stations. Synology being the most widely used. They work as expected, but the raw processing power is what's letting it down. During the time of writing, the newer NAS stations are equipped with an Intel Atom processor at 2,13 GHz. Perfect for the day to day tasks, direct streaming to a client should be without issue, but transcoding becomes problematic. SD content, and even some 720p can be done, but 1080p transcoding maxes out the little Atom, resulting in stuttering video playback. as a prove of concept it's very succesful, but it's better to wait for a more powerful solution. Probably the next generation
Remote control
Obviously, you want proper remote control over your Plex Media Center. I've gone into detail on how to achieve this in this article.
Plex For Mac Mini Versions
Mac Mini For Plex Server
Wrap up
I hope it's clear by now the Plex environment is very versatile and with the provided add ons should meet most of your media needs. Both the media center and server are being update regularly with fixes and new features. AirPlay support to stream from your iOS device directly into the Plex Media Center is currently being developed. There's a very active community willing to help and providing new ideas that actually get picked up by the developers. I'll be using Plex for many years to come.
