Need help installing plex on freeNAS

[Hulkbert]

I'm having trouble putting content onto plex. I set up a windows share, put movies onto that, and got plex running through creating a jail and installing it through the shell. However my media doesn't show up in plex. I assume I messed something up in the installation process. Also, if plex just doesn't work on freeNAS, are there any alternatives?

[NTDaws]

Yeah, Linux server

[Hulkbert]

18 minutes ago, Being Delirious said:

Yeah, Linux server

So I take it that plex doesn't work on freenas? I'm new to linux so I don't understand what to do from here.

[dalekphalm]

47 minutes ago, Hulkbert said:

I'm having trouble putting content onto plex. I set up a windows share, put movies onto that, and got plex running through creating a jail and installing it through the shell. However my media doesn't show up in plex. I assume I messed something up in the installation process. Also, if plex just doesn't work on freeNAS, are there any alternatives?

Okay so you need to mount the location of your media into the Jail.

 

By default, the Jail is treated as a separate system. That means it has no read-access to the rest of the drive that FreeNAS is installed on.

 

Here's the relevant section of the FreeNAS user manual:

http://doc.freenas.org/9.10/jails.html#add-storage

 

That's for 9.10, but the instructions should be pretty similar for 11.x as well.

 

Once you have the folder or drive mounted to the Jail that contains the media, you need to go into the Plex Web UI, and add library locations for each media type you want to use (Eg: TV, Movies, etc), and select the specific folder necessary. This actually tells Plex where your media is stored, and tells it to scan the folders looking for media files.

[dalekphalm]

30 minutes ago, Hulkbert said:

So I take it that plex doesn't work on freenas? I'm new to linux so I don't understand what to do from here.

Plex works extremely well on FreeNAS. It also works well on Linux and Windows too. The simplest setup would definitely be Windows, if you want to avoid FreeNAS, but I'd suggest trying to get FreeNAS working first, before jumping to a different OS.

[DarkPlatinum]

If you are using a raspberry pi, or any linux device i might be able to help you with OpenMediaVault. It can run plex. Also at the same time run samba.

[KingCollins]

19 hours ago, dalekphalm said:

Plex works extremely well on FreeNAS. It also works well on Linux and Windows too. The simplest setup would definitely be Windows, if you want to avoid FreeNAS, but I'd suggest trying to get FreeNAS working first, before jumping to a different OS.

I have had the Plex server on both FreeNAS and Windows and I defiantly agree that Windows is the easiest to set up. I remember this issue you are running into and it is exactly what @dalekphalm has outlined above, you need to mount the file location before Plex can find your media. 

 

BTW, I also found that the trans coding and buffering was a little more crisp and responsive when it is running in Windows. But that could just be my specific server. 

[Hulkbert]

20 hours ago, dalekphalm said:

Okay so you need to mount the location of your media into the Jail.

 

By default, the Jail is treated as a separate system. That means it has no read-access to the rest of the drive that FreeNAS is installed on.

 

Here's the relevant section of the FreeNAS user manual:

http://doc.freenas.org/9.10/jails.html#add-storage

 

That's for 9.10, but the instructions should be pretty similar for 11.x as well.

 

Once you have the folder or drive mounted to the Jail that contains the media, you need to go into the Plex Web UI, and add library locations for each media type you want to use (Eg: TV, Movies, etc), and select the specific folder necessary. This actually tells Plex where your media is stored, and tells it to scan the folders looking for media files.

I had the media mounted, and plex did find the folder. However none of my media shows up in plex. I'm going to reinstall freeNAS, maybe it was a problem with the windows share.

[dalekphalm]

1 hour ago, Hulkbert said:

I had the media mounted, and plex did find the folder. However none of my media shows up in plex. I'm going to reinstall freeNAS, maybe it was a problem with the windows share.

I would suggest checking the structure of the media folder, and how you located each library.

 

Plex can be pretty picky about the way things are structured.

 

For example, the Movies library should have the following folder location (example only):

M (Media):\Movies

 

TV Shows:

M:\TV

 

etc

 

Whereas if you chose M:\ for both library locations, it might confuse the system.

 

If that's not the issue, then I have no idea. Have you tried manually forcing each library to reanalyze and rescan the files?

[Hulkbert]

1 hour ago, dalekphalm said:

 

If that's not the issue, then I have no idea. Have you tried manually forcing each library to reanalyze and rescan the files?

How do you do this?

[dalekphalm]

Just now, Hulkbert said:

How do you do this?

I won't be able to give you 100% accurate steps, as this is off memory. But you log into the Plex Web UI. Then you should see a list of your libraries to the left.

 

Beside each library should be a little menu button (I think it's three dots, like "..." but I can't recall exactly). Basically you need to click on the menu button for each library you created, and you'll see both options in there.

 

Check this out:

https://support.plex.tv/hc/en-us/articles/200289306-Scanning-vs-Refreshing-a-Library

 

You'll want to try scanning first, then refreshing the meta data.