How to setup a curated collection?

ZuckZwing

Hi,

I'm looking for a way to setup a small private movies collection with a couple of friends; bonus if there is a video player and/or a way to do synchronized stream to 2-3 people at the same time.

Any suggestions on what spec and what software should I use? I'm thinking a small VPS with 1GB RAM with 128-256GB storage. Do I need a dedicated core for transcoding?

Flying_Chinaman

Yo my friend in pirate party,

for that spec, aria2 + ownclound would be a consideration

ZuckZwing

@Flying_Chinaman said:
Yo my friend in pirate party,

for that spec, aria2 + ownclound would be a consideration

I'm something of a sailor myself. Getting the media would be the easy part, but the rest is hazy for me.

cybertech

plex

Ympker

As others already said: Plex is a decent option. Using it myself (homeserver) and it's been great

@ehab has lots of private movies to share

bugrakoc

Jellyfin is also great.

somik

Subsonic does support multiple users and getting cover arts as well as streaming video/music over the internet.

http://www.subsonic.org/pages/index.jsp

beagle

Plex has the Watch Together feature
https://support.plex.tv/articles/watch-together/

A small VPS depending on the server specs may not be enough if you need transcoding.

It worth having a look at Seedbox providers. Some offers include Plex and other apps.

ZuckZwing

Thanks a lot for the suggestions y'all. Gonna check out all of them.

@beagle said:

A small VPS depending on the server specs may not be enough if you need transcoding.

It worth having a look at Seedbox providers. Some offers include Plex and other apps.

Do you mind elaborating on what transcoding is exactly? And what would you say is the ballpark server spec for ~100-200 FHD movies for 2-3 concurrent devices?

Flying_Chinaman

@Ympker said: @ehab has lots of private movies to share

O'heaven forbid, jus' wonder he prefer missionary or cowgirl movie though

skorous

@ZuckZwing said:
Thanks a lot for the suggestions y'all. Gonna check out all of them.

@beagle said:

A small VPS depending on the server specs may not be enough if you need transcoding.

It worth having a look at Seedbox providers. Some offers include Plex and other apps.

Do you mind elaborating on what transcoding is exactly? And what would you say is the ballpark server spec for ~100-200 FHD movies for 2-3 concurrent devices?

Transcoding is converting video format to something the client can handle. It's very processor intensive since it has to happen faster than the video is being displayed or else the move will play for a few, pause, play for a few, pause, etc.....

ZuckZwing

@skorous said:

Transcoding is converting video format to something the client can handle. It's very processor intensive since it has to happen faster than the video is being displayed or else the move will play for a few, pause, play for a few, pause, etc.....

Why transcoding on the fly is necessary? Could I just transcode the videos into a couple of common formats in advance?

skorous

If you're 100% certain in advance what your clients are going to be able to handle that might work. It'd take up more space ( since you're saving multiple copies of the same file ) and off the top of my head I think it'd probably mess with your synchronized streaming since you wouldn't be watching the same files.

You'd still have to be careful when you transcode in advance to make sure you throttle the CPU ( or do it offline of course ).

ZuckZwing

I see your point about the CPU - Storage tradeoff. Not entirely sure about the issue with synchronized streaming part yet but I'll experiment and see how it goes. Thanks!