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WHERE DO I START

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THUMENTALISS

Serviio newbie

Posts: 4

Joined: Tue Dec 29, 2020 10:51 am

Post Tue Dec 29, 2020 11:00 am

WHERE DO I START

VERY SORRY, I'm just old so bare with me, I have an 8 series Samsung Smart tv with its own internet I wish to download Serviio but not sure about the basic operation of what I do? it just might be too technical for me?
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atc98092

User avatar

DLNA master

Posts: 5205

Joined: Fri Aug 17, 2012 10:22 pm

Location: Washington (the state)

Post Tue Dec 29, 2020 2:51 pm

Re: WHERE DO I START

Welcome to the forum! Happy to help out with the basics.

Serviio is used to stream your personal media to your TV. While it has some plug-ins for some online sources, that's not its primary role. If you have DVDs and Blu Ray discs that you would like to store on your computer and play through the TV, that's what Serviio is for.

Ripping your discs to the computer is actually very simple. The easiest to use program is called MakeMKV (www.makemkv.com), and will make a 1:1 copy of your media after removing the copy protection that would otherwise block it from playing. MakeMKV can rip DVDs as well as all forms of Blu Ray discs, including 4K/UHD discs. However, to rip anything more than DVDs requires a supported BD optical drive for your computer. Most computers have a standard DVD drive, which is fine for the DVD discs. But they can't read a BD disc. And only a handful of BD optical drives are capable of ripping a 4K BD disc.

Save your ripped media to a specific folder on your computer. For TV series, it's best to put each series within its own folder. For example (assuming Windows OS for the moment), whatever drive you are going to store your media on, first make a media folder, such as E:\Media. WIthin that folder you might have a Movies folder (E:\Media\Movies), and a TV folder (E:\Media\TV). Now within the TV folder, make a folder for each TV series (E:\Media\TV\The Twilight Zone (1952)). Notice I put the year of the series in the folder name. This really helps if the particular series had multiple versions. Rip your media into the proper folder.

Once you have your media set up (and you can always add more to those folders at a later time), you can set up Serviio. After installation, you use the Serviio console to tell Serviio where your media is located. Serviio will detect your TV and attempt to assign the best profile for it to use, but sometimes you have to assign a different profile to a player. It's quite simple to do in the console as well.

Let us know if this is enough to get you started, and if you have any additional questions.
Dan

LG NANO85 4K TV, Samsung JU7100 4K TV, Sony BDP-S3500, Sharp 4K Roku TV, Insignia Roku TV, Roku Ultra, Premiere and Stick, Nvidia Shield, Yamaha RX-V583 AVR.
Primary server: Intel i5-6400, 16 gig ram, Windows 10 Pro, 22 TB hard drive space | Test server Windows 10 Pro, AMD Phenom II X4 965, 8 gig ram

HOWTO: Enable debug logging HOWTO: Identify media file contents
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THUMENTALISS

Serviio newbie

Posts: 4

Joined: Tue Dec 29, 2020 10:51 am

Post Thu Dec 31, 2020 2:44 pm

Re: WHERE DO I START

Thanks for your response , from your advice I have realised that I'm not on the same page.... twelve years ago I built a Home cinema system, powered Drop down eight foot screen, HTPC WIN'10 PRO, PowerDVD SOFTWARE, Integral slot BLUETOOTH PLAYER/RECORDER, 8gb ram etc, etc, one Kilowatt 5.1 amp, Marantz AV PREAMP , B&W Floor standing speakers including expensive Sub wolfer, JCV CEILING Projector......the problem is its all out of date to play DTS X , ATMOS, 7.1 ETC to update the system it would cost me serious money there's nothing wrong with the system as such as, the HTPC will play Bluray Discs encoded with DTS Master but not encoded 4k ultra.....
I suppose I could just ditch the HTPC and purchase a decent DVD Bluray player ...sorry this is not the right forum for my frustration :cry:
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atc98092

User avatar

DLNA master

Posts: 5205

Joined: Fri Aug 17, 2012 10:22 pm

Location: Washington (the state)

Post Thu Dec 31, 2020 4:42 pm

Re: WHERE DO I START

Well, what Serviio can do is to transcode any unsupported audio/video codecs you have into something your existing equipment supports. For example, Serviio can transcode your TrueHD and DTS-MA audio into standard Dolby DIgital/AC3. I don't believe it's capable of only transcoding said codecs only if they contain Atmos/:X channels. Of course, if your AVR already supports TrueHD/DTS-MA, then it should ignore the additional channels and work just fine.

If it's simply H.265 video that is unsupported (almost all 4K material uses that codec), Serviio can transcode the video and let the audio passthrough untouched. But it does take a fairly powerful computer to transcode H.265 on the fly. It might require a custom profile to provide the maximum benefit for you, but it wouldn't take much effort since it sounds like your system already supports the majority of media.

However, Serviio isn't a player that you can just put on your projector from the HTPC. It's the media provider, not the player for this scenario. For that, you could use something like VLC, which is an exceptional media player for Windows (and other OSs). In fact, I believe VLC could even play your H.265 material without the need for transcoding, and it would all display on your projector just fine. The advantage to using Serviio for your media server is that you can then access your media elsewhere on your home network with a Smart TV, streaming player, or many Blu Ray players that support DLNA.

The one downside for VLC is that it doesn't have a "10 foot" user interface. You can't use it with a simple remote like you use with a BD player or streaming box. You really need to use a mouse and maybe a keyboard to select your desired media to play. Unfortunately, Microsoft discontinued their excellent Windows Media Center that worked so well in Windows 7.

I may have given you more questions than answers. Feel free to ask any followup questions. :D
Dan

LG NANO85 4K TV, Samsung JU7100 4K TV, Sony BDP-S3500, Sharp 4K Roku TV, Insignia Roku TV, Roku Ultra, Premiere and Stick, Nvidia Shield, Yamaha RX-V583 AVR.
Primary server: Intel i5-6400, 16 gig ram, Windows 10 Pro, 22 TB hard drive space | Test server Windows 10 Pro, AMD Phenom II X4 965, 8 gig ram

HOWTO: Enable debug logging HOWTO: Identify media file contents
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THUMENTALISS

Serviio newbie

Posts: 4

Joined: Tue Dec 29, 2020 10:51 am

Post Sat Jan 02, 2021 12:54 pm

Re: WHERE DO I START

Many thanks
what I will probably do is replace the PC, Marantz AV Receiver, and the 5.1 Parasound Power Amp with a quality BR Player + a combined Receiver Amp although this still leaves me with the projector problem as my JVC cost me well over £2500 after all why do I need a PC in my living room when its primarily used to play DVD/BLU-Ray and, there is three other HTPC'S in the house .......the real question though at the time of my life (75) and have still not got the jab :lol: is it worth the cost?
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atc98092

User avatar

DLNA master

Posts: 5205

Joined: Fri Aug 17, 2012 10:22 pm

Location: Washington (the state)

Post Sat Jan 02, 2021 8:07 pm

Re: WHERE DO I START

Only you can decide if it's worth the cost. For me and my family, it's great to be able to all watch something different without having to find the disc and put it in the player. It's a little effort to maintain my media on computer hard drives, but I still have all the discs in case of hard drive failure. I'm less than 10 years younger than you, but I've been a techno-geek since I was a kid. I actually enjoy ripping my movies and maintaining my home network.

But that's just me. If you're only ever going to watch your media on a single TV, maybe it's easier to just pull out a disc when you want to watch something. My wife prefers to fall asleep to the TV playing, and doesn't want it to stop because it's reached the end of the show. Using Serviio, I can either continue to play the titles one after the other, or even better using a playlist let it continue to play the exact titles I want in the order I say.
Dan

LG NANO85 4K TV, Samsung JU7100 4K TV, Sony BDP-S3500, Sharp 4K Roku TV, Insignia Roku TV, Roku Ultra, Premiere and Stick, Nvidia Shield, Yamaha RX-V583 AVR.
Primary server: Intel i5-6400, 16 gig ram, Windows 10 Pro, 22 TB hard drive space | Test server Windows 10 Pro, AMD Phenom II X4 965, 8 gig ram

HOWTO: Enable debug logging HOWTO: Identify media file contents
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THUMENTALISS

Serviio newbie

Posts: 4

Joined: Tue Dec 29, 2020 10:51 am

Post Sun Jan 03, 2021 4:30 pm

Re: WHERE DO I START

GREAT STUFF Dan, I use to rip movies as well but somewhere I got lost and my attentions went elsewhere ...Criusing, motorhomes, camping, Guitars, back to home media :lol:

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