The best way to play movies over LAN from linux?

by __next__

Hi,

recently I've got my first AndroidTV tv, which is Sony KD49XD. It is connected to the Internet over Ethernet cable and all my home laptops are connected to the same LAN over the WIFI.

Now, the simple question is: what is currently the best way to play movies with subtitles (just as separate files or at least hardcoded..) from my Linux laptops? I've tried Plex today, but it looks quite overwhelming and it forces me to maintain kind of library on my machines, which I simply don't do. Simplicity is important for me but I don't want to loose to much features/compatibility like mentioned subtitles support. There's a lot of DLNA apps available for my distro but I don't want to loose 2 weeks on researching every of them:) And now I'm able to install apps on the TV, so this adds another possibilities. What's the best one?

glassbase86

Those apps on your tv. And use file sharing from your computers (samba, nfs), etc to share files over LAN

BradB111

I'd say plex as it is easier once initially set up (and has better UI in my opinion) just a case of pointing the server to the correct folders then drag and drop from there. next best alternative is kodi if you already use it for other 'legal' uses ;). next best would be VLC with a media share but in all honesty plex is miles more straight forward.

install server -> make account -> point server to media folder - > install app on tv -> log in on tv -> play. boom

another plus is that any other device e.g. tablet/phone will just be: install app on device -> log in -> play

glassbase86

Kodi. VLC. MX Player. To name a few

donnysaysvacuum

I use the videostream extension to stream from my Linux desktop with Chrome. Worked pretty good for me.

PopeSeanV

Kodi

NominallyMusing

I share my media from FreeBSD over NFS to Kodi running on AndroidTV. No transcoding and full subtitle support.

AManAmongstMen

Honestly someone here suggested plex and if you want simplicity plex is it. You dont have to 'maintain' a library just have two folders TV & Movies and point plex to those and enable it to auto update on detecting changes. Congrats you are done installing plex via command line is like ~1-3 commands including aptget update aptget upgrade or the like. then the rest of the configuration is done through a web ui. If plex is too complicated for you then I really don't know how you are running linux as your primary OS.

I'm not being snarky I'm just pointing out plex is the simplest solution and you are overthinking it. If you are running not Ubuntu you already know enough to about *nix that this should be cake mate.

GambaKufu

Install either Kodi or SPMC (Android specific fork of Kodi with a few niceties added). Add source - enter either a NFS or smb share, and then browse to your machine. Libraries and scraping are entirely optional. I've not messed with the others but you definitely don't need to install anything extra.

JimboLodisC

You can cast from Chrome if you use something like Videostream but I would highly recommend putting some effort into Plex.