CES 2011: Boxee for iPad Previewed

[kingtj]

re: Plex

Yep, I was going to mention that too, but you beat me to it.
I've been using Plex for quite a while now as my media server/player on a Mac Pro in my basement. (I've got a DLP projector attached to the second video port on the card in the machine, and an optical cable routes the audio to a surround sound component stereo system.)

I tried Boxee and other solutions but found Plex was the most "solid/stable" feeling of the software I tried.

My biggest complaint though? A long time ago, Plex had uPnP/DLNA support built into it. But in recent versions, that has been removed. (The devs say this support was really only there as a left-over from when they first forked/ported the initial codebase and they weren't actively updating that part of it anyway.) The thing is, that's a critical feature to have, if you don't want to lock everyone into having proprietary "Plex compatible" players on all the devices that are supposed to display the content.

Right now, I get around it by running a second freeware program on the Mac Pro called "TVMobili", and I let it share the same folders/files Plex does. That way, my new Samsung plasma TV can automatically access them, and so can my PS3.

Just in case anyone didn't know, Plex has been doing this since September and is now built into LG's line of new TVs.
I much prefer it to Boxee as it is Mac centric and doesnt include all of the needless social integration.

http://www.plexapp.com

 

[pondosinatra]

Isn't Boxee that annoying chick on 4Chan?

 

[acribb]

Wirelessly posted (Mozilla/5.0 (iPhone; U; CPU iPhone OS 4_2_1 like Mac OS X; en-us) AppleWebKit/533.17.9 (KHTML, like Gecko) Mobile/8C148a)

Is this different from the app Air Video which will stream any video on your Mac to your iOS device via wi-fi or 3G? That also transcodes on the fly. Or maybe they just bought the code?

This looks like the same thing as Air Video, but instead using a much nicer Boxee front end to show your media, with the addition of useless to me, 'social' video aspects. I would assume you will need the Boxee software setup on your server.

I like that he said it will be **FREE**.

Let's hope Boxee as a company survives until then. I don't think the Boxee Box is doing too great personally....

 

[I WAS the one]

Ok, I'm an Apple fan. I admit it ok. BUT...

Boxee Rocks, its better than the Apple TV and it give you media and beyond.

(before any netflix or hulu bashing comments)

Repos solved everything. Think of it as the Cydia of Boxee

 

[purplesaber]

How does Plex compare to AirVideo?

I like AirVideo too. It does one thing and does it well. Streams and transcodes video files to the iOS device. I have a large collection though and the user interface is simple and honestly primitive compared to Plex.

So Plex is a complete media streamer. It streams video, audio, photos, and a growing list of internet video and audio sources (Hulu and Netflix on the desktop app, ESPN3, Daily Show, etc. etc.). They're all integrated into an elegant menu. Boxee is like this too, I just happen to think Plex looks and feels nicer.

Also (compared to Air Video) Plex automatically adds metadata. It's just stunning. Whenever you add new files to your home computer they just pop up in Plex with title, posters, background art, summaries of the movie or episode. TV shows even pull the theme music to play while you are browsing the interface (on the desktop version). Plex can sort by genre, by year, by things you haven't watched yet, by newest added, etc. etc.

Lastly, the iOS app also functions as a remote control for the desktop app. You can pick a movie or episode and Plex gives you the option of starting on the iOS device or starting it on the iOS device or the desktop.

The only weakness to Plex is that configuring it to stream over the internet (not locally) to the iOS device is complicated (can be done but a lot of steps). AirVideo is very easy to configure for remote streaming.

 

[Yamcha]

Boxee Box sucks for us Canadian users, no support for netflix.. Infact disappointingly they promised we would have netflix canada support before 2011, I found out a couple days earlier that its not going to happen at all.. I've used Boxee box for OSX, and it is pretty good, but useless because you don't get any of the content that would be available on Cable TV.. and not to mention no Netflix either..

Its great if your in the U.S. I actually like the GUI much better then anything else thats out there..

 

[!¡ V ¡!]

What I really want is for my MBPro to stream its audio and video to my LCD TV. I know that this is possible with Windows 7 and intel PC laptops. Why is this not possible with a Mac laptop. AirPlay is great for iOS products, however what about Mac OS.

 

[cryingrobot]

I like AirVideo too. It does one thing and does it well. Streams and transcodes video files to the iOS device. I have a large collection though and the user interface is simple and honestly primitive compared to Plex.

So Plex is a complete media streamer. It streams video, audio, photos, and a growing list of internet video and audio sources (Hulu and Netflix on the desktop app, ESPN3, Daily Show, etc. etc.). They're all integrated into an elegant menu. Boxee is like this too, I just happen to think Plex looks and feels nicer.

Also (compared to Air Video) Plex automatically adds metadata. It's just stunning. Whenever you add new files to your home computer they just pop up in Plex with title, posters, background art, summaries of the movie or episode. TV shows even pull the theme music to play while you are browsing the interface (on the desktop version). Plex can sort by genre, by year, by things you haven't watched yet, by newest added, etc. etc.

Lastly, the iOS app also functions as a remote control for the desktop app. You can pick a movie or episode and Plex gives you the option of starting on the iOS device or starting it on the iOS device or the desktop.

The only weakness to Plex is that configuring it to stream over the internet (not locally) to the iOS device is complicated (can be done but a lot of steps). AirVideo is very easy to configure for remote streaming.

Ok. I absolutely hated Plex. It was slow and lagged which might have been my own network issue except Airvideo worked flawlessly. The worst thing was that the server program decided to become a start up item ala Windows spamware and there was no way of turning this off. Further, again like Windows spam, you cant really uninstall it by throwing it away. You have to go dig through your user library files for the residual files and manually delete. I still dont know if I got it all out.

 

[Counterfit]

The worst thing was that the server program decided to become a start up item ala Windows spamware and there was no way of turning this off.

Preferences -> Server -> uncheck run all the time. That's what I do.

Further, again like Windows spam, you cant really uninstall it by throwing it away. You have to go dig through your user library files for the residual files and manually delete. I still dont know if I got it all out.

~/Application Support/Plex
~/Application Support/Plex Media Server

Seriously, it's not like it's the only app the ever install anything there.

 

[prestain]

what about StreamToMe

It's not as full blown as Boxee, and I do love Boxee and XBMC, but StreamToMe is very good at transcoding video on the fly and sending it to your iphone/touch or iPad. It does cost $1.99 but I was very happy that the iPad version was a free update (unlike many apps with their HD version.) Just wanted to put that out there cause I have thoroughly enjoyed their app and I think they were one of the first to do this.