What is your player of choice for your hdtv ??

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JaseNZ

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Topic # 248391 24-Mar-2019 12:02

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Over the years I think I have tried just about every solution under the sun to give me the balance I would like as a player for our relaxation time.

For the last 5 years I have used Kodi with the odd dip in and out of Plex and Emby etc.

I have now settled on an Apple 4k tv using infuse as the player. I have found this is the best balance for me that I have setup so far.

What have you tried and discarded and finally settled on.

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Reply # 2204205 24-Mar-2019 12:43

Mostly use Emby on either a Fire TV box or a Shield. Emby is a bit faster on the Shield, especially the interface. Have also tried Kodi on both using the Emby plugin and it works fine and can look quite pretty but doesn't get a lot of use (another interface for t'other half to learn, or not).

The Emby app on Fire / Shield has also got prettier IMHO lately. Haven't used Emby on Apple stuff as I haven't got, believe its OK but don't think its got a TV grid guide yet.

Never bothered with Plex. Nothing against it, but it was a toss up between the two and happened to pick Emby.

rb99

driller2000

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Reply # 2204209 24-Mar-2019 12:54

Nvidia Shield (or Mi Box for 2nd setup) and Kodi.

Esp once you add in other apps like Netflix, Lightbox, Stremio, (+ Kodi Addons (Huismann etc))

Kodi/XBMC User for close on a decade now - have tried several others - but have not found anything that better meets my needs.

geekiegeek

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Reply # 2204233 24-Mar-2019 13:51

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I gave up on TV recording type apps a year or so back. I now just use the TVNZ Ondemand app and the TV3 app on my Apple TV along with others such as SBS, BBC and ITV. Gives me all the "traditional" TV I need without having to deal with an aerial or recording hardware.

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hio77

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Reply # 2204235 24-Mar-2019 13:59

my player of choice is... not a tv ;)

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chevrolux

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Reply # 2204236 24-Mar-2019 14:01

After running Kodi on a raspbery pi's for near on 5+ years now, I've just moved everything to Plex with the introduction of a new LG TV with native Plex app.

The old set up was a NAS storage and a MySQL database. All Kodi clients ran off that. Added the TVNZ/Mediaworks apps to Kodi and was all happy. But all of that takes a fair amount of mucking around.

With Plex, I ran up a VM, mounted my NAS shares, and installed Plex. So dam simple. And now I have a better method for playing remotely from the NAS. The experience is way way better with Plex transcoding for the web player, and no VPN to turn on. Much higher WAF too.

Malboo

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Reply # 2204329 24-Mar-2019 16:02

I have a Intel NUC hooked up to my Amp running Win10 Pro using Opera as a browser TVNZ on demand news etc for most streaming Explorer 11 is used for Netflix only if I get bored with Movies/TV I just start Dopamine software and listen to music all without getting off my arse sitting in my Lazyboy

Movie files are played through VLC

SirHumphreyAppleby

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Reply # 2204359 24-Mar-2019 17:49

I have used a variety of products over the years, starting with the MediaGate MG35 and MG350 players. These were replaced with a Egreat Network Media Tank (updated with Popcorn Hour firmware) and a few AC Ryan players as these supported the full range of Blu-ray codecs. I am currently using Kodi with Tvheadend, which I have tested using OpenElec/LibreElec on a range of platforms including the Raspberry Pi, ComputeSticks and NUCS. OSMC on the Raspberry Pi proved to be the most reliable, so I purchased an Amlogic-based OSMC Vero4K. I have now installed CoreELEC on that box, and am switching the remaining players over to cheap Amlogic S905W boxes running the same software. Requires some tweaks to play back UHD content, but I'm happy with how it's working now.

I also have a Roku stick, but that's no longer used.

Rikkitic

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Reply # 2204377 24-Mar-2019 19:15

Kodi on Shield. It's all I need.

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Jase2985

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Reply # 2204398 24-Mar-2019 19:56

Rikkitic:

Kodi on Shield. It's all I need.

but you have so many issues :P

Ive been running Kodi on a Odroid-C2 (HDMI 2.0 @4K, H265 in hardware, 1Gig LAN, 2GB DDR3, and IR receiver) for the last 18 months after my WDTV died, i was running it offline with just HDD's attached as where it was being used thats all i could do. i now have it in the bedroom and its now network connected so running streaming media along with accessing my DLNA server.

Still got as bit to learn about it but google has been a great help getting it where i want it and allowing me to "hack" the IR remote commands into it so i can use my WDTV remote with it.

getting a second one for my mate, as he used the one we had at work and loved it.

also have a RPi which has the identical config of Kodi on it, but i suspect the Odroid will be superior when it comes to playing higher quality media.

Rikkitic

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Reply # 2204404 24-Mar-2019 20:10

Jase2985:

but you have so many issues :P

Not with Kodi. Not with the Shield hardware. I have workarounds for the firmware stupidities and I have chucked the useless remote so no issues at all!

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DarthKermit

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Reply # 2204411 24-Mar-2019 20:31

A blu ray player. I have no clue about any of that other stuff.

Handle9

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Reply # 2204515 25-Mar-2019 03:28

Plex on a variety of platforms (Sony Android TV, LG TV, Apple TV).

The Android TV Grey bars on 4K content drive me insane though. Luckily Kodi doesn't have that problem

Fred99

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Reply # 2204634 25-Mar-2019 11:54

Malboo:

I have a Intel NUC hooked up to my Amp running Win10 Pro using Opera as a browser TVNZ on demand news etc for most streaming Explorer 11 is used for Netflix only if I get bored with Movies/TV I just start Dopamine software and listen to music all without getting off my arse sitting in my Lazyboy

Movie files are played through VLC

How have you got audio signal from the NUC to the amp?
(I assume via HDMI - as the stereo audio quality from my NUC sound card is pretty awful).

I don't have an amp, use active speakers via an external dac/interface. I won't be getting a 5.1 etc home theatre system.

For music listening, I'm trying to sort out a decent way to access and control the NUC using a portable device without turning the main TV on. That TV will be going, possibly to be replaced with an OLED or UST laser, neither of which I'd really want to use as a general HTPC monitor, though when it was used, then sometimes or often it would be using the NUC as source.

Using Chrome remote desktop on an android phone kind of works. It's usable if I enable "pointer trails" which for some reason makes the mouse pointer visible on the android device, not sure if that's a glitch or by design (set to "short" trails, the effect is barely visible - not incredibly annoying) Then so long as I'm in range of the wireless mouse receiver on the NUC, can use chrome remote desktop with the phone and a mouse (or keyboard) pretty much acting as a normal W10 desktop. The limiting factor is trying to use a W10 desktop on a 5 1/2 inch screen. There's a little video lag if the remote desktop client is in another room, but that's not really an issue, lag seems acceptable if I'm in the same room as the router which is siting next to the NUC.

I'm thinking I should probably go and get an inexpensive but larger tablet, then maybe with the HTPC/NUC set to "tablet mode" it'll be more usable without a mouse - but they're both there if needed. Next potential glitch is that the tablet screen needs to be same aspect ratio as the TV, or the remote desktop client app is a very inelegant ugly solution.

Then I wonder if the whole thing would be more coherent if I just bought a surface go instead of an android device, or instead of controlling the NUC, cast music from other devices to that system - but that would mean not being able to control the DAC etc remotely, to switch music sources etc. I did try VLC direct, but that really sucks as a user-friendly interface. I did have an android tablet (Asus transformer) which died about 5 or 6 years ago, and I never missed it or thought it might be useful to replace it until now. Better phones and compact laptops basically rendered it redundant.

Does anybody else use something like I'm playing around with? It's probably not "regular" home theatre / HTPC complications.