Plex for Mac

User Reviews

• Sometimes, Plex works!

  sashamandaJanuary 22, 2013

  Pros

  Great streaming YouTube on the tv (Roku). I couldn't get Facebook to sync.

  Cons

  Channels tend to disappear either on the tv screen or on the computer server. Often, when they show onscreen, the directory is empty and nothing on that channel will play. Updates have been frequent in the three weeks I've had the software; they rarely work on my computer, and I have to uninstall and re-install the software.

  Summary

  Great for YouTube. Or, if you love software forums. Save hours of frustration installing and software, adding and deleting channels, and tinkering with the settings and get another server.

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• Waste of $

  TattmomJanuary 10, 2013

  Pros

  There aren't any if you have a Mac, unsure if there any if you have any other hardware.

  Cons

  Too many to mention individually, the company are more than willing to take your $29.99 USD but if you have a problem, which you will, as the this programme is VERY hard to operate there are NO operatives for help, no online support and NO emails for you to contact the company! So basically once so hand over your credit card details say goodbye to your cash. You may as well give the $ to charity and feel the warmth of that knowledge then the bittersweet taste in your mouth that you've been fleeced.

  Summary

  Basically this is a con, any online company in today's world who do not offer online support telephone help or at the very least a contact email address are a sham. SAVE YOUR MONEY! If you've read any good reviews then they are more than likely written by paid individuals.

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• Not As Easy As It Looks...

  darkguardianMay 11, 2012

  Pros

  Easy to pin Internet videos from any site to watch later

  Cons

  Never able to watch videos from hard drive but I can see them in My Plex account Could only watch videos I pinned on internet with my computer on

  Summary

  I seen 5-Star ratings on Roku for streaming like Air Play. I have used these types of apps before for iPad to view content from my computer hard drive as long as both share the same router. Those apps were easy compared to Plex. I installed the apps on my computer and Roku and set up an account on Plex website and created a bookmark to tag videos in my browser. Everything works except the viewing video from my computer hard drive part. I see the videos on the website but Roku doesn't see them even when manually setting ports and entering it's address. I could view the web videos that work very good. I trusted them but allowing Plex to scan my hard drive and yet I couldn't do what I set out to do and watch videos from the computer. The web videos were only available with the computer on and I had lost the link twice and had to generate a pin, go to the web site enter it to reconnect. This is a good idea but it's not ready for prime time with the headaches users have to go through to view videos. I'm back to saving videos on the USB drive and plugging them into Roku. Safe and secure.

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• complete solution = sign your life away

  cottchenJanuary 28, 2012

  Pros

  seems to promise a richer movie experience?

  Cons

  difficult to understand and get support. complicated and heavy.

  Summary

  I was attracted to this by the idea of watching netflix on my laptop with a better experience than firefox. But I could not figure out if I needed the server, the client or both. DEspite several hours research, I couldn't find the info on their 'wiki' and their instructions to add plug-ins did not work with whichever app it was i downloaded (not labeled on the app, just says 'plex'). after attempts web research, wiki research, forum research, chat-room (unanswered), and forum posts (standard response, watch the videos), I am giving up. From what little I can tell, the netflix plugin (I gues there is only one available but i could not even get this straight!) doesn't work well anyway. I was not interested to stream to a TV, ipad or iphone, so these aspects do not count in my review.

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• Takes Over and Slows Down

  marcharmondesignOctober 28, 2011

  Pros

  Great idea

  Cons

  Launches itself, and doesn't fully shut off even when you Quit. Causes Safari to hang because it's hogging bandwidth waiting in the background. GUI wants you to use keyboard, but you have to use mouse to hit icons on toolbar and it can be difficult to get the pointer back onscreen. I tried for a week and gave up.

  Summary

  I keep reading great reviews, but I think this bites

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• Too much stuff, hard to uninstall

  elksmAugust 15, 2011

  Pros

  Looks nice, has lots of features. Probably great if you have a computer dedicated to TV/media.

  Cons

  Tries to take over your life by installing things that start up on their own. And hard to uninstall.

  Summary

  Nice interface/graphics, and has tons of features but it was too much stuff for me. And for some reason it installs a "media server" that launches by default whenever you start your Mac. That irritated me enough that I decided to uninstall the whole thing, but instructions to do so aren't included and requires a bit of searching to find out how. Also I was hoping Netflix would work better than it does in a web browser (Silverlight seems to make my computer overheat and drain the battery) but Plex offers no improvement. Boxee for mac uses less of your CPU power for Netflix but has problems of its own when it comes to browsing for movies.

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• Phenomenal Software

  ddruckerMarch 18, 2011

  Pros

  Plays most kind of media, streams from any Mac or PC on your network to any Mac, iPad or iPhone (or outside your network if desired). Plugin architecture, and integration with iTunes and iPhoto.

  Cons

  No sort by composer for iTunes, requires some skills to set up, some customization requires knowledge of system software and a little Python

  Summary

  Plex is remarkable software that turns a Mac Mini connected to a TV into an Internet-based Media Center that makes the most of the Mac's software and integrates metadata (information about movies and TV shows from Internet databases) into a beautiful user interface that you can operate with your Mac remote. This software gets us much closer to the future of television, and does so in a very 'Mac-like' way. Imagine FrontRow on steroids, plus an added plugin-in architecture for Internet video and audio (like Hulu and Pandora in the US, other streaming content like YouTube and TED Talks) and an attractive and highly customizable on-screen guide.

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• invasive; can't uninstall. Is this a scam?

  Richard GoldwaterDecember 27, 2010

  Pros

  I have found nothing to like

  Cons

  Shows me media that I do not have. Its app support files are hidden. It threatens that my media are unavailable if I close it. Even App Trap cannot uninstall it.

  Summary

  this is a nightmare -- it's like being in Windows again. What does it want to do? Why is there no uninstall? If I try, it wants me to cancel my account with "ILighthouse" or something -- i never opened an account.

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• User unfriendly

  mackaayNovember 7, 2010

  Pros

  Nicely collects information about performers

  Cons

  Too difficult to use with mouse (and keyboard)

  Summary

  Needs more work to become really good

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• Very nice multimedia center

  salvo981October 4, 2010

  Pros

  Automatically movie information from the web. Nice looking interface

  Cons

  little heavy.

  Summary

  Perfect if you have a spare machine you would like to use as multimedia center.

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