Plex on older smart TVs

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thenine

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#289809 30-Sep-2021 12:22

Got this email today. Applies to older smart TVs.

On September 30th, some older smart TVs (some LG, Vizio, Hisense, and other unsupported TV platforms) will no longer be able to use secure connections to communicate with Plex Media Servers. These devices are no longer supported by their manufacturers, and won't be receiving an update needed to continue making secure connections to a personal server.

If your TV is on the same network as your Media Server, and you haven't made changes to your secure connection settings, this change should have no impact on your experience.

eracode

Smpl Mnmlst
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#2786936 30-Sep-2021 12:24

Any idea what they mean by 'older'?

Sometimes I just sit and think. Other times I just sit.

thenine

37 posts

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#2786950 30-Sep-2021 12:52

Had a look at the announcement on the plex website. It states:

LG models running “Netcast” (the pre-webOS system)
Vizio models running “Presto” (models using a Mediatek chipset)
Older Hisense models
Panasonic (2014-2016 models)
Pre-2016 Samsung models, running v1.x of the community Samsung Smart Hub app 397 for Plex

And on the Plex forums it says:

Support for the old (and long since cracked[!]) encryption protocol TLS 1.0 will be removed from the plex.tv cloud servers.
Which means that any device or software trying to contact plex.tv will fail to do so, if it only “speaks” this old, unsecure protocol and not one of the newer protocols.

JimmyH

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#2818598 24-Nov-2021 16:49

No big deal. The apps built into most Smart TVs for things like Plex tend to not have much love devoted to them, don't work well and go out of support a few years after the TV was released.

The Plex app on any decent streaming device (NVidia Shield, Apple TV, Chromecast, Chromecast with Google TV etc) will almost certainly be a better experience, and some of those options aren't expensive. A basic Chromecast will run you to less than $70 even without a sale. Get one of those and it will be a much better experience.

wellygary

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#2818601 24-Nov-2021 16:55

Looking back its clear this is due to the expiry of Let's encrypt's Root certificate..

https://letsencrypt.org/docs/dst-root-ca-x3-expiration-september-2021/#:~:text=DST%20Root%20CA%20X3%20will,that%20use%20Let's%20Encrypt%20certificates.

Handle9

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#2818703 24-Nov-2021 18:38

wellygary:

Looking back its clear this is due to the expiry of Let's encrypt's Root certificate..

https://letsencrypt.org/docs/dst-root-ca-x3-expiration-september-2021/#:~:text=DST%20Root%20CA%20X3%20will,that%20use%20Let's%20Encrypt%20certificates.

Yip. It can be worked around but it does make the server less secure.