after almost 15yrs my plex server is no more. jellyfin behind nginx with authentik is running very nicely.
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I’ve been using jellyfin for years.
My best recommendation is DELAY UPDATES and back up before you update.
I have a history of updates breaking everything so you should be careful about them.
All software recommends backing up before an update, but for jellyfin the shit is real, you really want to back up.
Jellyfin still so buggy though. The UI is garbage too. I want to love it… I run both lol.
I have Jellyfin running for years too and it has never broken for me, I use Linuxserver image, so maybe they delay the updates a bit?.. Now, Immich has broken so many times that nowadays is the only docker I don’t keep at latest (and I know using latest is a bad practice, I understand the reasons, but the convenience of not worrying about the versions beats all that for me)
Like the version or the media?
I have it on docker with two volumes, ./config and ./cache
I back up those before each update.
A bad Jellyfin update should not mess with your media folder in anyway. Though you should have backups of those aswell as a rule of thumb.
With respect to the media, you can mount the volume as read only, preventing Jellyfin from accidentally wiping your underlying content.
or just change the folder ownership to whatever user you use in the container, but don’t give them write access. that’s how I do it so I can still edit my media as root.
the config and databases or the media, you mean?
if so, the former, but I mount the meadia with a read only docker volume just to be sure, because chances are I would never notice it
laughs in immich
Updating immich brings excitement into my life :)
I’ve had mine on latest for about a year and I haven’t noticed any issues… I have a cron job that pulls it every night too
It’s funny, I’ve heard this so many times. And read through the docs. But I’m a mad lad who has auto updates (I know!) and have never had an issue with Immich.
Maybe they aren’t updating enough which leads to larger issues. Had a problem in the past updating NextCloud too slowly and stuff broke.
I’ve been using jelly since just after the emby fork and never had an update issue on docker. Automatic snapshots every 5 mins (amoung other backup tools). means I don’t need to worry much if it does.
Did plex do something again
Their last UI changes
Also, Plex email blasted a few weeks ago about how nobody can share their libraries anymore without paying for a subscription. That was the push I needed to check out Jellyfin again, and the experience ranges from “good enough” to “that’s better than Plex” for me and my buddies.
Yeah the jelly team did a good work and the product work well on what I have tested.
And my god, it’s amazing how each UI iteration gets worse. How is that even possible? My shits never been so buried in menus.
Long ago I ran a Windows Media Center PC in the living room and used the hell out of it. When WMC finally went EOL, I look for alternatives and found Plex. I never got around to setting up a Plex box, and now I see it too is ready for the scrap heap. I think this is what getting old is. You plan on doing something and never get around to it. Time passes much faster up here in age.
There are a few things about jellyfin that I don’t like compared to Plex. First I can’t skip the intro of a show drives me nuts. The second one is it has newly added but not newly released. Other then that it has been really good.
https://github.com/intro-skipper/intro-skipper solves your intro skipping issue.
https://github.com/intro-skipper/intro-skipper
*edit it’s such a common complain this got posted twice at the same time :)
How do you keep all your virtual machines up-to-date? Or are those containers?
Unattended-upgrades or dnf-automatic
it’s mostly debian 12 or ubuntu 22 lts vms, i’m slow dumping ubuntu. so it’s all cron jobs running apt update and bash scripts for specific services like the minecraft server. i’m just old and have spent so much time modifying xml in nano that sticking with virsh has worked for me. i’ve only got two containers running in docker, frigate and authentik.
Does jellyfin do untranscoded video/audio?
Haven’t used it in years but finally building up my media server again and I remember it had some funky settings for hardware encoding back then which I didn’t need because I was connecting to it via a repurposed gaming laptop that could easily handle 4k content and surround sound by itself.
I use jellyfin for unencoded audio and video on my clients that support it like my newer television, but I also use transcoded audio video on things that can’t handle the higher codecs like the raspberry pi.
I’m also 90% done migrating to jellyfin. I’ve had the instance running for 6 months now, the cultural change to watch jellyfin is complete, except for my wife’s iPad.
Heck, I should just retire Plex. That will force the change.
These are the thoughts of a cold and calloused sysadmin. Didn’t get the email about the change? Too bad.
yeah it took me about 6 months with jellyfin to feel like i was ready to finally kill plex. the thing that finally did it was getting an email from plex asking if i’d like to check out whats streaming on hbomax.
What are you using to watch jellyfin on iOS?
Swiftfin is what I’m using for Plex on my Apple TV
It’s perfect for me because it supports direct stream and decoding of the file for playback on the Apple TV - because the Apple TV is capable enough to do that.
This is ideal because my NAS server is a venerable but now very long in the tooth HP Gen 8 microserver from 2014, so it doesn’t have the chops for reencoded streaming anymore.
Can also use the web client
Maybe, Streamyfin? its the only iOS App with Downloads and Offline-Mode
In order of personal preference:
Maybe just try them all out and find the one that fits you best. You could also use more than one (which is what I do).
my only issue is how user friendly it isn’t compared to Plex.
i genuinely want to leave Plex (especially the more and more they enshittify) but I just could not figure out how to set up jellyfin. i use Linux every day, and know I’m at least a tiny bit more tech smart than your average PC user, but I can’t imagine trying to explain to my family how to set jellyfin up.
Host Jellyfin either by running their easy setup script or by hosting it on docker, in order for it to be publicly accessible you will need to either port forward and give people your external IP or you need to have your own website. It’s very easy with a docker container to get it running locally, you literally just spin it up, the same as Plex.
Jellyfin us easy to run, but then when you are running it it just doesn’t have your files. Are they in the incorrect folder structure? Who knows
I literally just run Kodi and it just works, I can browse my folders and watch stuff
this was the dealbreaker for me. the demand for specific file and directory naming schemes with no default indexer seems deranged.
I use sonarr and radarr, they automatically structure the folder system, and you can also have the same issues with Plex. I had an issue where Plex would not, no matter what, detect the newest episode of a show and Jellyfin picked it up no problem
The only thing that plex has over jellyfin at the moment (in my opinion) is the simple sign on and user options that allow users to have their own usernames and not have to know anything about reverse-proxying a domain for jellyfin access. It’s that little bit of back-end that you have to set up that’s the problem for the ‘normie’ users that a lot of plex admins cater to. That, and there’s some holes in where the jellyfin app is available.
And Plexamp.
And a decent AppleTV app.
There’s plugins that can replace Plexamp
So it does the Sonic adventure on mobile in a free app? And has offline storage? And has a station creator?
Idk man there’s a music player
So, no.
Got it. :-)
plex is still definitely easier to get started on. i don’t begrudge anyone still going that route, i had a lifetime plexpass the last 8yrs i think. jellyfin is a great option if you either already know how to set things up and want full control. Or you’re looking for an opportunity to learn more about reverse proxy, dns and authentication/access systems. plex is still i nice gateway drug.
I am still using Kodi. It is feeling a bit long in the tooth in current year, but I can’t complain. I tried Plex because chromecasting is a feature I would love. Sadly it didn’t support the ISOs of my 1:1 rips. Maybe it does now (I stopped waiting for them years ago). As for Jellyfin, they seem to have an anti-ISO stance. One of the devs seemingly (or someone claiming to be a contributor) said I should convert all my media to a more modern format and make my own menus because it would be fun. Oh well, Kodi it is.
i’ve never heard of anyone that keeps dvd menus around. like, i get it for archival purposes but i would never want to actually navigate a menu when i want to watch something. in my mind it’s like sitting through the commercials on a rented vhs. i would probably store a converted copy as well, in a format that would let me specify from the application what track and subtitle i want so i can set a default.
i love old dvd menus :(
maybe it’s because i grew up with vhs first but dvd always felt like a lot of hassle compared to just “put it in and watch”
Blu-ray menus do kind of suck, but they are still mostly good enough to make all the supplemental material accessible (assuming the studio bothered to provide any anymore). But DVD menus (at least during that earlier golden age) add a layer to the experience I never knew I had been missing.
The Rocky Horror Picture Show has some dancing fishnet legs and sexyhorror lips dancing around. You get to see so many extras and choose two versions of the movie and AND a secret Easter egg third version. A smorgasbord. Same for Terminator 2: two good versions of the movie and that lame Star Trek-ish ending one was hidden and I love having the option to not watch it. Plus many more. Fight Club is the only one I can think of to make use of that camera angle swapping button. The DVD versions of Dragon’s Lair and Space Ace wouldn’t work any other way.
Perfect way to kill time when others go for a last minute toilet visit or decide to make popcorn. I am not going to the trouble of transcoding my entire library to get less.
i ripped all my dvds specifically to get rid of the menus because they were slow, hard to use, and full of frustrating animations. they usually just felt like an afterthought.
i’ve never been one to be swayed by extras, it usually just feels akin to jingling keys to get me to buy shit. maybe i’m weird.
Streaming services don’t include any extras. Torrents (so I am told but I would never do that, myself, haha) are just the movie and maybe subtitles but nothing else. I doubt you are in the minority. Anyway, we are both afforded options to enjoy however we like. (Just wish I had chromecast support, but I will live). Cheers.
oh absolutely, it’s fascinating to hear a perspective i didn’t know existed.
How is the Jellyfin software situation looking? Last time I checked it was pretty meh compared to plex. if I recall correctly the best app was Infuse and it was a monthly sub. Are there better options these days? I mostly watch plex on my TV through Android or Apple TV.
I haven’t done a bunch with it. I set it up locally on an old laptop, installed the app on my TV and on the other machines throughout the house. It works great when I use it. I stream a lot of content outside of it so I don’t use it all the time but the interface I really liked. It’s fluid even running the server on a laptop that would struggle to run a zoom call.
Believe I set it up with pop-os, but it could be mint. I haven’t had to touch it in months so I honestly wouldn’t know without going to it. I leave a RustDesk connection on it from my phone if I ever need to get to it.
I’m pretty sure you can pay for a lifetime access to infuse, cause I don’t think I pay monthly.
Its monthly or lifetime and the lifetime is like 6-8 years of paying monthly.
Ah I didn’t know that. I doubt it was that much when I first got it, but I’m unsure. I’ve had it for a long time
Jellyfin is a lot better than it used to be, to get feature parity with Plex you will probably need to install some plugins but I literally searched “best Jellyfin plugins reddit” and the list in the first thread I found was all I needed. The webOS, Android, and Roku apps are very good, I’m not sure what the situation is on Apple TV but I think they have an app
…and Roku apps are very good
🤘
swiftfin has reach what i’d call stable on apple tv. its a little janky still with homepods used as speakers. i had to switch the nativeplayer to avoid an audio delay bug. the native player doesn’t support auto play next episode. so far thats the only issue ive had. infuse doesnt have that bug but the issue hasnt annoyed me enough to need infuse. all my other uses are on android tv or webos and have had no complaints. for music, manet has good carplay functionality so its made a nice replacement for plexamp.
Right? Jellyfin is awesome
Plex still good for the boys that bought the lifetime pass. I understand why people would change. But it’s still the best plug and play option. Waiting until they break the “lifetime” thing and fuck us over.
Didn’t that already happen? Or am I misremembering?
Mostly not yet. They did restrict the bandwidth on relay, but anyone with half a brain can open a port and that still allows apps to direct connect without relay. Honestly I wish could just force it to never relay since randomly my iPad will use relay even when I’m on the same network but that’s more because the new iOS app since the rewrite is dogshit.
Lifetime pass since 2012 here.
I’m pretty certain that you can turn Relay off in your account settings.
Hmm I don’t like dogshit. Nobody ever seems to clean it up.
I have been running in parallel both jelly and plex and jelly is good.
I just wanna get rid of Plex so bad but jellyfin isn’t going to work for my grandma…
Why? It’s been much easier for me
Grandma? Pls send money.
if my parents can navigate it your grandma can :)
I understand. I have converted fully to JF which required people to get onn players, and tunnel into my network and it was a lot of work on my end too.
Do what works for you and them.
You can run them concurrently and let grandma continue to use plex.
If your grandma can handle torrenting over VPN, then she can probably handle Jellyfin.
Grandma probably doesn’t do the actually torrenting herself, chances are OP has a overseerr or jellyseerr type of setup, grandma makes the request and things just flow.
Host both. Keep plex up for your gma, Jellyfin for everyone else. Tbh Jellyfin is also pretty intuitive. Currently I’m hosting both, but my gma doesn’t use it, so I’ll probably move completely to Jellyfin.
The people asking why confuse me…y’all acting like jellyfin is easy to use on an off-site tv when it’s literally not for non tech savvy people. I don’t understand why jellyfin just doesn’t nut up and make an samsung tv client or something?
My 67 year old Mother has been using Jellyfin for years via Chromecast. Change the TV input to Chromecast and pull up the Jellyfin app. And that’s it. She never leaves Jellyfin and the Chromecast is never shut off, even if the TV is.
It’s amazing to me that you fanboys pretend like Plex is easy to use but Jellyfin is somehow not. It’s generally the exact same interface.
I don’t understand why jellyfin just doesn’t nut up and make an samsung tv client or something?
Because application development is expensive, and they’re open source–not funded by corporate interest like Plex. What exactly about that is difficult to understand?
Lol bad day huh
I’ve heard people had luck with Tailscale playing nicely with non Plex options. I can’t say I’ve tried it. Though I do use Tailscale. Essentially if you setup Tailscale for Grandma it’ll be like she’s sitting on your local network. Even better, set it up on her router and you can literally debug all her Internet problems if you can ping it.
Beyond that a raspberry pi with a battery backup on a 4G subscription connected to the router. That would be the ultimate “grandma” setup. Connect her router/modem power to remote power cycle. But I digress.
The irony of not wanting to use Plex and saying to use Tailscale to let you use jellyfin is just too good.
Why all those VMs instead of containers?
it’s just what i’m comfortable with. started playing with linux servers before docker existed. i’ve got frigate and authentik running in docker, but if i have the option to run something outside docker i still prefer that.
To each their own man. I just would not have enough memory on my potato servers to run all those VMs 😅
I saw this and was pleased, actually. The relative opacity of containers makes them a validation challenge and hides versioning from standard tooling used for large host populations and/or enterprise.
Even if they sparkle.
