Airport Extreme and Plex

[mohicanspap]

Hey All,

I am trying to set up my Airport Extreme to play nice with Plex Media Server. I have myPlex setup how I want it with all my movies. My hardware setup is pretty simple. I have three external Harddrives that are connected to Airport Extreme through USB hub. One of those harddrives contains all my movies which I want Plex to recognize. I understand I need my Airport to port forward a specific port and this is where I am stuck. I really know next to nothing about wireless networking. I am hoping someone here has a similar setup and can hold my hand and guide me to do what I need to do.

What I want to accomplish is to have my movies shared through local wireless devices e.g. iPhone, MacBook. And also publish my server to allow public access so family members I share my server with can enjoy my stuff as well. Is this possible to do?

In advanced, Thank you.

 

[blevins321]

Hi there. I'm just hoping that you realize, because it isn't specifically mentioned, that you need a computer running the Plex Server app for this to work. Just having the hard drives on the Extreme won't do it.

If that was just missed on your original question, here's my setup. On the Plex server app, I have it manually configured to a specific port. You can do this under Plex Media Server > myPlex> Manually Specify Port. I have mine configured to a nonstandard one to throw off sniffers.

Then to handle the routing, you need to open up Airport Utility. Two things need to be done. 1 - Set a DHCP Reservation for the computer that will be running Plex Server. This will ensure that the computer gets assigned the same IP address every time. 2 - Set a port routing rule to ensure that the outside world accessing the port that you specified in Plex Media Server above will go to the correct computer/server.

See the attached screenshot from my Airport utility setup. When you're doing the port setup, there are options for public and private port settings. If you want to have a different port accessible from outside your network, you can have a different port for the public and private settings.

 

[mohicanspap]

Hi there. I'm just hoping that you realize, because it isn't specifically mentioned, that you need a computer running the Plex Server app for this to work. Just having the hard drives on the Extreme won't do it.

If that was just missed on your original question, here's my setup. On the Plex server app, I have it manually configured to a specific port. You can do this under Plex Media Server > myPlex> Manually Specify Port. I have mine configured to a nonstandard one to throw off sniffers.

Then to handle the routing, you need to open up Airport Utility. Two things need to be done. 1 - Set a DHCP Reservation for the computer that will be running Plex Server. This will ensure that the computer gets assigned the same IP address every time. 2 - Set a port routing rule to ensure that the outside world accessing the port that you specified in Plex Media Server above will go to the correct computer/server.

See the attached screenshot from my Airport utility setup. When you're doing the port setup, there are options for public and private port settings. If you want to have a different port accessible from outside your network, you can have a different port for the public and private settings.

With my luck I have accomplished nothing. I have dug a little deeper with tutorials and to no prevail. I tried setting a DHCP Res in and outside of range. One of my main problems now and has been is that myPlex cannot reach my server. I'm thinking of reseting my Airport to factory settings and starting clean. Not sure if that will solve my issue (doubt it) but I've not much to lose. Finding a very detailed tutorial of what I need is hard to find. If you know of one please send it my way

Thanks for the response and lesson