Getting set up with Plex on Syncloud H

1

Hi, starting a new thread after introducing this topic in the ‘adding other nice apps’ thread. This is my first foray into using a NAS, so I’ve quite likely overcomplicated things so far. Prior to getting the Syncloud H, this was my setup-- external 10 TB hard drive hooked up to my desktop, Plex installed on the desktop, pointing to the Plex folder on the external drive. It worked great but obviously required my desktop to be up and running.
Since getting the Syncloud H, I hooked it up to my router (TP Link Deco M4R), and I was able to successfully follow the syncloud setup steps and access it via its domain name. I backed up the data from my external hard drive into an s3 bucket, then plugged it into the NAS and formatted the hard drive.
I was able to install Nextcloud onto it, and used a third party software to transfer the Plex content down from s3 into the Nextcloud instance, stored in the external hard drive. Now I’m not quite sure my next step(s) which components I need to configure (router settings, syncloud settings, nextcloud settings, plex settings…) in order to access the Plex libraries in the hard drive.
Would appreciate any guidance on how to proceed, i feel so close but so far :slight_smile:

1 Like
2

I am new to Plex, but I am happy to help you. Would you want to run Plex on Syncloud device so it can see your media files?

There is some info about installing Plex on a ARM:

If that is what you want I can create a github repo for Plex app and start putting basic packaging info so you can see what is happening and be involved if possible. After some time we should have a package which can be installed by downloading it from our build server onto device and running snap install …

Later if all good I will push it to our store so it is visible on the device store app list.

3

Precisely, that’s what I’m shooting for. That would be fantastic, and very much appreciated. Please do let me know if it would help for me to test anything on my end.

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Ok, I have started to package it, you can check the progress here: Commits · syncloud/plex · GitHub
Feel free ask/comment here if you want.
I will let you know when I have something to test or I am stuck :slight_smile:

5

Here is the first version, install using this command:

snap install plex --channel=master

6

How do you add a library?
Also do I need to have an account on Plex cloud to do certain things?
I am not even sure when I click play of cloud content is it streaming through the device or goes directly from cloud to my browser?

7

OK, you need to configure and add you server to the account first and this is only possible by using IP address, like this:
http://[device_ip]:32400/web

8

Maybe some magic with nginx proxy (we already have one in front of plex) can help removing this restriction (initial configure by IP only)

I really need some help from Plex gurus on what is right and what is wrong here.

9

Perfect! These steps worked, took me some time figuring out but it was more user error than anything. The URL address requirement you describe in your latter steps isn’t really going to be a day to day problem for users based on early returns. It is only a necessary step to write out the URL as you have when initially setting up- it’s preconfigured from that point forward. Thanks very much for the help. LMK if i can clarify anything for you.

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Am I right that anyone in my network can open http://[device_ip]:32400/web and add it to their Plex account?

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I think so, yes. But I think that’s the same level of access as simply attaching an external hard drive to a laptop and running it from there without the NAS.
Also, do you have any advice for keeping it up to date? I’m not sure how to download the update to Syncloud. For whatever reason when accessing Plex hosted on Syncloud, I need to download the update manually, but clicking the prompt to do so only downloads the Debian file to my local computer.

12

Usually we release a new version to Syncloud store, it is packaged and a set of tests are ran before it can happen so we have some confidence that it will no break existing installs.
If you want to help pushing new version it is as simple as making a pull request on this line:

changing PLEX_VERSION value.

Then you should see Upgrade button on the app page.

13

OK, so this is considered a secret URL ( http://[device_ip]:32400/web) which should not be available outside. I think this is the case right now as Plex does not allow DNS access to this url and only 80/443 ports are open in external mode anyway.

But if some users have public IP on their devices it can be exposed if they have no firewall and port 32400 is open to outside world.

Ideally we need to at least understand two things before this goes to stable channel:

  1. How to protect this “server url” from being used by a random person.
  2. Simplify activation so user does not even need to use this url and installation does this automatically (may be impossible as Plex cloud account is needed to do this)
14

Ok, I think what we have right now is probably good enough to go to stable, ip activation will be a current mode until someone suggests a better option.

We could in theory create an activation page which shows right after activation asking a user to paste his plex claim token from plex.tv/claim which could automatically claim this server.