Roku streaming - Lil help?

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**usernamesareannoying**

So I just got a smart tv with roku and am trying to figure out how to stream from my pc to the TV. Can any of you make this easy on me and tell me how before I try to dredge through the Internet?

Thanks in advance

**Gordon Shumway**

Look into setting up a plex media server account. It is a program you download that lets your computer act as a server to exterior devices (roku, Xbox, etc). You will need to download it as a roku app and on your computer as well. Kodi is another one but I have no experience with it. Good luck.

This might help for the basics http://lifehacker.com/home-theater-software-showdown-kodi-vs-plex-1746501974

**pretre**

Plex is really good. I use it to stream off of my Freebsd machine to my TVs. Real slick.

**usernamesareannoying**

Awesome guys thanks. I read a bit about plex but the article was from 2012 and all of the links were dead.

**Ouze**

I'm running Plex off my Unraid server. It's... OK. I don't think there is anything much better though.

**pretre**

Ouze wrote:
I'm running Plex off my Unraid server. It's... OK. I don't think there is anything much better though.

I mean, what else do you want it to do? It streams all your media through a nice interface, has an app for chrome cast, etc and has a bunch of free channels. Sure, it could be better but it is still pretty nice.

**Ouze**

It could stop randomly refusing to index files, sometimes deciding to take an hour or so before detecting new files, and the other sundry bugs I've experienced with the Unraid version of the client. It also has really poor rewind/fast forward granularity which is less of a bug, and more of a poorly implemented core functionality.

Oh man, that reminds me. They added a feature recently where when you go into a folder for a TV show, it starts playing the theme music/opening song for that show at full volume while you browse episodes? There's a thing I can't fathom why anyone wanted.

**pretre**

I haven't run into those problems with the FreeBSD server or the ps4 or iPhone clients.

**Ouze**

Well, that must be great for you I guess?

Even with the relatively minor annoyances and glitches that I've experienced, I still haven't really found a better option though.

**pretre**

Just trying to say, maybe it's the distribution for your OS and not the program itself.

**Ouze**

Yes, I don't doubt that's true at all. I have had a few other friends report similar problems on various devices (I don't know what OS my friends nasbox is) but everyone else seems to really like it. /shrug

Anyway, sorry for the huge diversion on the Roku discussion

I would agree with Pretre that you'll probably like Plex.

**Ouze**

I'm glad this thread came up now because this reminded me I meant to dig into it a little, and I did. Some of the more recent annoyances I was able to resolve - you can adjust the reward/ffwd granularity, and i found a spot to untoggle the music playing thing.

It's not totally bug free - I still have this occasional super annoying issue where I add new files to my nas, and sometimes they take a long time before they appear in Plex (or don't appear at all) - but this seems uncommon.

**pretre**

What do you have the refresh timer set at for the library?

I have mine every hour? I think and then nightly. Also, if I add a bunch of files, I just hit refresh so I can see them immediately.