Going Digital - How Roku and Plex Became Part of the Family

We have come a long way since the days of the of DVD's.

The year was 2011 when I decided to take my collection digital. I had amassed well over 2200 DVDs, and had quickly ran out of room. That's not including the multi-movie packs like the Lord of the Rings trilogy, Lethal Weapon 4 pack, Rush Hour Trilogy, etc.

Being the neurotic, ocd-driven guy I am, I had them all meticulously alphabetized and cataloged... and Lord help anybody who returned a movie to the wrong spot...... you'd think someone had committed a murder...... yeah, I was that bad.

The moment I decided to rip all my movies to my hard drives was a moment that I realized I may actually be crazy. Not only had I never ripped a movie before, but I didn't really know what I was doing from one moment to the next. After doing a ton a research, I decided to stick with smaller file sizes, and started ripping standard movies to approximately 800MB per file, no fluff, no filler. I left out subtitles, I left out other languages, and I left out extras. I figured I was going to maximize my space. I had purchased four 3TB external network hard drives, so I could access them anywhere....at least that was my thought at the time.

When it was all said and done, I think I was left with roughly 2470 movies (if memory serves me correctly)

Then came my next issue, how to make it look nice on the TV screen. There were quite a few different options at the time, and they all required quite a bit of tinkering. I finally settled on XBMC. Damn if they didn't have some sexy layouts. The banners for TV shows is still my favorite. The main problem I had with this setup was I had to use my TV as my computer monitor. This quickly annoyed my wife, as when we weren't watching a movie, I was still on the TV surfing the web........ you know....its what us nerds do. I never understood why she was surprised...... she knew she married a geek. The big issue was that I didn't have a simple, fool proof way to stream everything to the rest of the TV's in the house.

Then came along a little box called Roku and another little program called Plex. I decided why not, it'll let me get the computer away from the TV, even though it was actually adding another dreaded remote to the mix.

When I first setup Plex.... it was a royal pain in the ass. I ended up having to rename EVERY file, and redo my entire file structure to get it to work properly. As you can imagine, this took weeks of my free time, my meticulousness took this challenge seriously even when I tried to walk away and say screw it.

Once I got everything coded and labeled the correct way, I added everything to the Plex Media Server. In the early days, this took FOREVER. I think it took a day or two to get everything loaded and all metadata downloaded.

Then came the real test. I went to the store and purchased the Roku...I think it was the Roku HD. I eagerly took it home, hooked it up, went through the sign-up procedure, installed Plex on the box and loaded that bad boy up. IT WORKED........and I was disappointed. The original layout was an ugly single row of movies that you had to scroll through, and shit was it slow.

However, it DID work without many hiccups despite being slow. So I stuck with them. After doing some more research, I realized it had more to do with the Roku, and less with Plex. I figured, what the hell. I purchased a subscription (Although my subscription recently expired. I've been meaning to get the lifetime membership, believe me it's worth it) from Plex and figured if I helped support the team, they would continue to improve. I then proceeded to purchase 4 more Roku boxes for the house.... hoping I was making the right call.

It was a few years later (mid 2015) I think when they did actually improve. They had come out with an updated UI that looked simply amazing compared to what we had been used to. No longer was the user forced to scroll through a single line of movie titles. We now could scroll through 14 covers at a time! This was an amazing, AMAZING change that I couldn't be happier for.... at least for a year and a half. I noticed the system as a whole was slowing down. I tried rebooting the server, I tried reinstalling Plex, I tried everything I could think of to speed it back up. Then it hit me. If the issue wasn't with Plex before, perhaps it isn't this time either.

I had been having issues with the Roku HD overheating a lot, and was forced to rotate boxes repeatedly. I figured it was time for a change. I went online to see what they offered, and to be honest, started getting a little gun shy. As not all channels are supported on all devices, and not all devices are clear on what channels they support, I was worried to try something new. I pulled up the Roku site to see if they had made any changes, and that's when I came across the Roku Premier Plus. I said, screw it, it should at least be faster and hopefully won't overheat. So I went to my local Fred Meyers store, grabbed one, and rushed home, eager to see if it was an improvement.

When I pulled this thing out of the box, I was already happier with the unit. It had a larger, yet thinner chassis, making it look more aesthetically pleasing to the eye. I set this box up, enjoyed the new startup noises it made, and practically wept with disbelief and joy when I found out how different and fast the experience is compared to the old unit.

Now, when watching a tv series, Plex will automatically play the next one in line after a 30 second screen pops up showing what you just watched, what's next, and a brief synopsis about the upcoming episode. If that doesn't float your boat, how about the ability to put a tv show on shuffle? I use this feature every night for Big Bang Theory. All in all, the team up of Plex and Roku has been one that I am proud to have supported in the early years, as they haven't let the community down. I know I can speak for my family as well when I say I don't know what we would do without these two in our lives. They are part of our everyday routine and to not have them would feel.....empty. I haven't even touched on the music collection side of Plex, or even the picture collection.

A couple of key points I'd like to make:

1: Adding new movies or tv shows is a snap once you have the tagging method down.

2: I also have a Vizio "Smart TV" with the Plex app. To be honest, it's a step backwards from the Roku Premier. The Roku is much faster. This is most likely the TV fault, so take that with a grain of salt.

3: I was not paid or compensated in any way by Plex or Roku to write up this little piece. Indeed, it's not even a review. I just wanted to share my journey on going digital and send some love to the two companies that made it possible for me.

If you are ready to cut the cord, and start saving some space. I can not sell you enough on this combo. Recent news is that Plex is coming out with yet another UI change to enhance the experience for users. If it's anything like the last change, most everyone should be thrilled, so go ahead, what are you waiting for.