XBMC + Playon Experiences

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PointandClick

Limp Gawd
Joined
Dec 6, 2008
Messages
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I've been using a JB ATV2 with XBMC for the past few years. While library navigation is somewhat slow, it works ok, but I'm tired of moving it between the bedroom and living room every time we want to watch something.

I finally accepted that I'm probably not going to find one box that will do XBMC and Netflix, so I broke down and bought a Roku 1 and planned on picking up a Pi and loading it with OpenELEC.
Basically, after using the ATV, the Roku interface sucks hard. They really expect you to scroll through 300 icons in a single list? Not only that, but whoever organized Netflix "genre" list must suffer from serious ADD.
The only reason I havn't taken it back already is because I have Amazon Prime and it would be nice to be able to take advantage of the videos. Honestly though, I don't know that there's enough decent content that's not already on Netflix to make it worth it.

Sooo I was looking at Playon. I don't really care for the idea of having to transcode everything I watch, but I do have a server sitting mostly idle. At least I would be able to watch some content without having to already pay for cable. The library integration with XBMC looks pretty slick too.


Tl;dr
Does anyone have any experience with Playon and XBMC? Or just Playon in general? Reliable? Quality? What are you running it on, and what is the CPU usage like?
I'm about to upgrade my server to either a E3 1220 or 1230 V3. Is running Playon in a VM with 1 core to optimistic?
 
I don't have any experience with Playon but I have used Plex for the last year and I can't recommend it enough. It is very much like Playon.

You install the PMS (Plex Media Server) on your PC and from there everything is web interface based. Add your media files and that is it, no transcoding, nothing because Plex does everything on the fly. The best part is the amount of supported devices there are. Roku, Android, iOS, Chromecast, WinRT/7/8, Mac, PS3, 360. Seriously just about anything. Granted the PS3 and 360 are only bare media files but all the other platforms have the Plex interface. Media is tagged, posters and descriptions are added with ratings and such. I really love Plex.

Also, for PC, Roku and using the web interface it's free. If you want to use it on mobile devices the Plex app is 2.99 I think unless you go with a Plex Premium subscription then you get those free plus some other nice features. But again, the brunt of features do not require a subscription.
 
Yeah I had played with Plex several years ago and I tried it out on the Roku to see if it could be an alternative to XBMC. My h.264 content worked with direct play and my older .avi files, although they required transcoding, took little cpu usage. The problem with Plex on the Roku is, once again, the Roku's terrible interface. I'm not about to browse through 900+ TV shows one by one. Even narrowing it down by genre was pretty much useless since it came up with 300+ genres.

As far as local content, I prefer XBMC. As far as Netflix, Amazon, and other streaming services, Plex doesn't appear to have a solution either. It's plugins seem to be just as frequently broken as XBMC's.
 
Just thought I would give an update for anyone that might be interested. I went ahead and purchased a one year subscription to PlayOn. I set it up in a Win7 VM on my desktop (Xeon e3 1230v2) with one core and 1.5gig of ram. For SD, CPU usage in the VM showed about 30-35%.
It seemed to work, but ultimately not being able to fast forward/seek or resume playback was a deal breaker. Often times we will start watching something at night and not finish it. Having to start the show over every time just won't work.

On the plus side, they did honor their 30 day money back policy. I emailed them with my situation earlier today and my Papal already shows the credit.
 
I tried PlayOn, it seemed functionally good, but one thing I didn't like how to plowed itself all over my PC. It was just a trial and I didn't need it to install overweight toolbars in my browsers (I may be confusing that detail with TVersity which I also tried at that time and found equally intrusive). I can see where running it in a VM is desirable. And once you give them an e-mail be prepared for never-ending sea of e-mails from them to that account.
 
I've tried Playon in the past with my PS3 with less then satisfactory results, but on a side note you do know that you can run Plex (Plexconnect) on ATV3 right now. I have my ATV3 running Plexconnect accessing a remote server (even iOS remote works for navigation). The steps have been simplified that you don't even need to connect the ATV3 to upload the certs via mini USB. You should also consider an Ouya, which supports Plex and XBMC. You can pick it up from Target for $100. Check out the XBMC forums, that's the current recommended box for under $200
 
Don't forget you can use the iOS/Android/Web apps for Plex to remote control your Roku - means you don't have to use the ugly Roku interface. (Until I release my build of Plex for the public!)


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Buying a Roku 1 was your first mistake. That hardware is way outdated. I run a roku3 for netflix, hbogo, plex etc. along side a openelec box for xbmc.
Another drawback of playon for xbmc is no HD.....stupid.
 
I was aware of Plexconnect for the ATV3, but honestly given a choice I'd prefer to stick with XBMC. I was just trying out Plex on the Roku since it was already there.

I had also looked at the Ouya and all the other Android boxes. I got the impression that they weren't quite ready for prime time yet, and that the Linux versions of XBMC run much better than the Android, which puts me back at square one with two separate devices for Neflix and XBMC. I figured a Pi would be just as good an option and a little cheaper. Have mine bumped up to 900 arm, 300 core, and 450 sdram. I must say I'm pleasantly surprised with it. The library does take a few seconds to load, but once all the artwork is cached it really runs quite smoothly.

Buying a Roku 1 was your first mistake. That hardware is way outdated. I run a roku3 for netflix, hbogo, plex etc. along side a openelec box for xbmc.
Another drawback of playon for xbmc is no HD.....stupid.
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I didn't see any reason to spend twice as much when they both play the same things. I'm not interested in games. If I was going to do that I would have went with an ATV.
 
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