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Plex vs Front Row - Your View
- Thread starter digitalmac
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I have been trying to use Plex for quite some time, the user interface has been very appealing given the feature of automatically downloading the meta information through its scrapers. It also offers you with different perspective to view your video library. And one of the noticeable feature that I am really looking for is the capability to switch among different audio streams.
However, I do agree with some of the people in this thread. The learning curve is quite deep and the initial effort of setting up the library is time consuming. It is really easy to drive people off. Also, I am living outside the States and really disappointed for not able to use Hulu. The other thing is the purpose of "Watch your Videos" and "Watch your Movies" is quite confusing at first too.
I saw some recommendation on the Aeon Project, this is the next thing I would try and see if I would stick to Plex any longer as I still found Front Row to be very suitable for my daily use. If the Front Row does have the option to switch among different audio streams, I would not give up on this at all.
However, I do agree with some of the people in this thread. The learning curve is quite deep and the initial effort of setting up the library is time consuming. It is really easy to drive people off. Also, I am living outside the States and really disappointed for not able to use Hulu. The other thing is the purpose of "Watch your Videos" and "Watch your Movies" is quite confusing at first too.
I saw some recommendation on the Aeon Project, this is the next thing I would try and see if I would stick to Plex any longer as I still found Front Row to be very suitable for my daily use. If the Front Row does have the option to switch among different audio streams, I would not give up on this at all.
Count me as one who initially was put off by the initial setup process for PLEX, especially since I have been working quite a while at ripping/encoding/tagging my media library for use on 
TV and none of the tagging is used in PLEX.
However, after spending the time to reorganize/rename my files accordingly for PLEX, I can say that I have become a fan. The presentation is terrific--love the fanart in the background for each movie/tv episode and the tv show theme music is a nice touch. Now that I finally was able to figure out how to setup my Harmony remote to work with PLEX so that the family feels comfortable navigating, the experience on my Mini is great. Once the initial work is done, PLEX is very easy to maintain.
My two pet peeves about using PLEX in a household also usingTV--not being able to play iTunes purchased video and still having to tag my videos for iTunes/TV still keep it from being an ideal solution for me but otherwise, I think PLEX is great. Now if Apple would just incorporate scrapping of video data/artwork, it would save me some time. 
TV and none of the tagging is used in PLEX.However, after spending the time to reorganize/rename my files accordingly for PLEX, I can say that I have become a fan. The presentation is terrific--love the fanart in the background for each movie/tv episode and the tv show theme music is a nice touch. Now that I finally was able to figure out how to setup my Harmony remote to work with PLEX so that the family feels comfortable navigating, the experience on my Mini is great. Once the initial work is done, PLEX is very easy to maintain.
My two pet peeves about using PLEX in a household also using
TV--not being able to play iTunes purchased video and still having to tag my videos for iTunes/TV still keep it from being an ideal solution for me but otherwise, I think PLEX is great. Now if Apple would just incorporate scrapping of video data/artwork, it would save me some time.
[Updated] Plex vs Front Row - Your View
After one month of vote on the Plex vs FrontRow, the poll result reflected the majority of the comments in this thread:
Front Row 25.37%
Plex 70.15%
Others 4.48%
Not sure where are the "Others" referring to. The conclusion is that a lot of people prefer Plex to Front Row due to its extensiveness and feature rich interface. It's very interesting to see how other people organize their files under Plex or any additional plug-in.
I am trying to sum up a few plug-ins or add-ons to Plex and Front Row, feel free to add in yours if it's not on the list:
Front Row
Plex
After one month of vote on the Plex vs FrontRow, the poll result reflected the majority of the comments in this thread:
Front Row 25.37%
Plex 70.15%
Others 4.48%
Not sure where are the "Others" referring to. The conclusion is that a lot of people prefer Plex to Front Row due to its extensiveness and feature rich interface. It's very interesting to see how other people organize their files under Plex or any additional plug-in.
I am trying to sum up a few plug-ins or add-ons to Plex and Front Row, feel free to add in yours if it's not on the list:
Front Row
- Sapphire
Plex
- ???
Other's could refer to Boxee/XBMC maybe?
Would an Aeon skin be a plugin/add-on for Plex? (Seeing as it doesn;t come with it i believe)
Front Row
There are a bunch of Front Row plugins here:
Boxee Plugin for launching Boxee
EyeTV Plugin for launching EyeTV
Hulu Plugin for launching Hulu Desktop
MythTV Plugin for launching the MythTV frontend
- Sapphire
- Plex plugin (for launching Plex within Front Row)
There are a bunch of Front Row plugins here:
Boxee Plugin for launching Boxee
EyeTV Plugin for launching EyeTV
Hulu Plugin for launching Hulu Desktop
MythTV Plugin for launching the MythTV frontend
They dont compare. It's like comparing a Moto Razr to an iPhone. Both basically do the same thing, one just does it much better and has many many more features.
As far as plugins go, there are TONS for plex. Right now I have Apple movie trailers, hulu, bicycling.com, food network, mtv music videos, the simpsons, family guy, south park, P***hub (don't judge me), pandora, and a few more I dont remember off the top of my head.
I agree that PLEX can be difficult to get started with. That's going to happen with anything in early stages. I stuck with it though and after the first couple of weeks I was an old hat with it.
It's very cool being in on something that one day will be in every household, as everything slowly goes digital. So those planning on trying it, don't give up easily, you'll be glad you stuck it out!
I have around 520 movies and probably about 400 tv show episodes and Front Row would be a nightmare for that much content. PLEX makes it easy to navigate and the eye candy is awesome, people's jaws hit the floor when they come over and all of my friends want me to do similar setups in their houses.
Merry Christmas to everyone!
It's very cool being in on something that one day will be in every household, as everything slowly goes digital. So those planning on trying it, don't give up easily, you'll be glad you stuck it out!
I have around 520 movies and probably about 400 tv show episodes and Front Row would be a nightmare for that much content. PLEX makes it easy to navigate and the eye candy is awesome, people's jaws hit the floor when they come over and all of my friends want me to do similar setups in their houses.
Merry Christmas to everyone!
I tried Plex a few weeks ago.
The Aeon Skin looked really nice but I didn't like a lot of the pre-set images that came with it on the selection screen. Lost for TV shows, Avril Lavigne for music, Wall-e for Movies. I tired to change the images, but Plex is not very intuitive for customizing the look of it.
I also had trouble with getting my movie info downloaded from the internet. I linked my DVD rips to Plex, but I didn't like a lot of the DVD artwork that Plex downloaded. It downloaded a lot of wrong movies and artwork I really didn't like as well. Also since I like Anime and foreign films Plex couldn't find a lot of the info and artwork for those DVDs and left the screen blank.
I think Plex is pretty nice for mainstream movies and TV shows, but kind of stumbles with more obscure stuff.
Maybe I could have customized it better, but like I said, I found that Plex is not very intuitive to customize the look of.
Maybe I will try it again later, but for now I think I will continue to use Front Row.
The Aeon Skin looked really nice but I didn't like a lot of the pre-set images that came with it on the selection screen. Lost for TV shows, Avril Lavigne for music, Wall-e for Movies. I tired to change the images, but Plex is not very intuitive for customizing the look of it.
I also had trouble with getting my movie info downloaded from the internet. I linked my DVD rips to Plex, but I didn't like a lot of the DVD artwork that Plex downloaded. It downloaded a lot of wrong movies and artwork I really didn't like as well. Also since I like Anime and foreign films Plex couldn't find a lot of the info and artwork for those DVDs and left the screen blank.
I think Plex is pretty nice for mainstream movies and TV shows, but kind of stumbles with more obscure stuff.
Maybe I could have customized it better, but like I said, I found that Plex is not very intuitive to customize the look of.
Maybe I will try it again later, but for now I think I will continue to use Front Row.