Don’t think the Fire stick works in your scenario. I believe like Chromecast, it’s designed to connect your TV to services like Netflix, Amazon Prime, Plex, etc. and stream your content from a networked source or service. I don’t think you put content on it to play directly like you did for PS3.
Thanks, Thierry, that’s what I suspected. Kinda ticks me off that I’m losing a capability by moving from my PS3 to PS4 (the ability to play videos from the USB stick.) Since that capability was present on the PS3, and Sony refuses to even answer questions about why they won’t allow it on the PS4, it is a decision nit a lack of capability.
I guess I’ll just have to figure out another way.
The fireTV Plex client is excellent. I suggest you grab a cheapo firetv stick, get Plex on it, and install the plex server on your computer.
It also runs Kodi really well, which will stream directly from any windows share on your network with no server required. But that’s not quite as plug and play as Plex on the fireTV stick.
Ordered a Fire Stick, although Amazon says it will be end of January before they are back in stock. I have Plex installed on my PC, and was going to try to figure it out to use with my Chromecast stick, not sure I really did. Maybe I’ll “practice” on the Chromecast stick until the Fire stick shows up in a couple of months.
Still irritates me that upgrading my PS3 to a PS4 loses a key capability.
The chromecast doesn’t have a UI, you use your phone and select “play on chromecast”.
The fireTV has a UI and its own remote control and everything.
Is there a remote for the Chromecast? I installed it about 6 months ago, used it this summer in the sunroom to watch Netfix and Hulu on the tv out there, brought the stick in when it got too cold out there but could not find the remote. Maybe I’m looking for something that does not exist?
I DID just now figure out how to use Plex to stream videos to my TV in the room the PS4 will go into. Seems to be limited to 720p for some reason. And it took me a while to figure out that Google wants me to use Chrome to open up my Plex server and stream them to the Chromecast - duh.
No, there is no UI or remote. You just use your phone and cast to the TV.
Just install the Plex app on your phone. It usually costs five bucks, but I think it’s on sale now for 2.
Well, since my ripped DVDs are on my PC, I assume I need to run Plex from my PC?
Whoa! Just tried that on my iPhone - I did not realize that works so well! Thanks for the tip!
There are Plex clients for windows, OSX, linux, roku, android, fireOS, and iOS. Any of those can stream from whereever you’re running the Plex server. If you open a port on your firewall you can even do so remotely! That’s why it’s so cool.
OK, so I have Plex running well with my Chromecast - the only time I have any problems are when my internet gets flaky for some reason, but love running it from my iPhone and watching all the shows and movies I have on my PC. So - I have a Fire TV stick coming Monday, and when I google I get mixed reviews on how well the Fire TV stick works with Plex - some say it stutters a lot, etc.
Any experience from folks here with it with Plex? Are you buying the Plex app on the Android store for it?
FireTV works great with Plex, I imagine the stick will as well. Plex transcodes media to a format your device can natively play, that’s why it works with everything.
You will need to buy it from the amazon store, not the google play store.
FireTV has integrated ethernet. The Stick is wifi only, so HD streaming isn’t ideal.
I have never had a problem streaming 1080p content over my wifi network.
OK, hooked up the Fire Stick this morning. Pretty simple and easy setup. Got my Netflix and Hulu + apps running pretty quickly, of course my Amazon Prime Video account was already set up. Elegantly done in recognizing from the beginning who I am.
Added the Plex app, cost me $2.31 (weird price) and then got a $1 credit back from Amazon. Worked fine, the only issue I see is the native app on the Fire Stick does not show playlists. Not sure why it would leave that off. However, my iPhone Plex app that I was using for Chromecast (and still will, the Chromecast is in one room, the Fire Stick in another) works perfectly and the playlists are of course still on there, so I doubt I will use the Fire Stick Plex interface. But still odd that the Playlists aren’t there.
I noticed that there is an iPhone Fire Stick remote app - it’s cool except that it uses a touchpad like interface for navigating, and it is WAY too sensitive to be useful. Unless I find a way to turn that down I’ll stick with the Fire remote.
A small word of warning. It turns out the pixel orbiter feature (used to reduce the likelihood of image burn in) of some Panasonic tvs is incompatible with the fire stick. The symptom is that the video output will begin to show high frequency green flashes rendering video unwatchable. It took a fair bit of digging to figure this out. There are threads on reddit and the Amazon firetv support forums about this if anyone else has this issue and is watching for a fix.
Wow, good to know, I have a Panny plasma from about 2009 that has that feature - not sure if I have it turned on. But as obscure as that is - and how did anyone figure that out? - if I do see that issue, I’ll at least know where to start.
Is there an alternate Flex app for the Fire Stick, as opposed to the one from the Amazon store that I directly purchased and installed on the stick? I really dislike the native app; there’s no Play List support, which is a key way we use Flex. I also dislike the lack of any kind of editing the view (e.g I don’t want the coming up next display, I don’t use it and it takes up a huge part of the view when I bring the app up.)
You mean Plex? If so, no.
To be more precise, the android handheld (touch) version does support this. Also the androidTV version (currently only on the nexus player) supports it also. Both only with Plex Pass.
I would expect the fireTV version to get the feature sooner or later, likely Plex Pass only at first. But if you’re really concerned, ask on their forums.
Been on the Plex forums a lot this morning. It appears that even though the newest update of the Plex App on the Fire Stick says it supports Play Lists, there’s still no option on the actual app. I frankly just prefer using the app on my iPhone to run it anyway.
I’ve been doing a lot of side by side comparisons of the Fire Stick with my Chromecast. Most things about the Fire Stick I like, but my experience with Plex on the Fire Stick vs. Plex via Chromecast has left me feeling like I prefer it on the Chromecast. Set up exactly the same way, I am getting stutters on some video with the FS that run without any issues at all on the Chromecast. The Fire Stick just seems to be “pickier” - a video that played without issue on the CC played with no sound on the FS; a 720p TV show had numerous stutters on the FS and none on the CC; getting 5.1 surround on the FS seems to require a lot of diddling around (long threads on the Plex forums about that.) The Chromecast seems to just work. The only issue I have with the Chromecast is that sometimes I’ll be playing, say, a Netfix video, and it will appear to stop responding to my iPhone app (e.g. I’ll hit pause and it will just keep playing.) The stuttering issue (and 2 out of 3 things I play seem to pay just fine, without any real correlation between wrappers, resolution, sound codecs, etc.) is a big issue on the Plex forums, although I also realize that any support forum, buy its very nature, has a higher number of people complaining (people don’t go to a support forum to say “no problems here!”) Surprising since the processing power, etc. is quite a bit higher on the Fire Stick compared to the Chromecast.
Still experimenting, and for the price, not feeling pissed off or irritated, I’d just like it to work as well and transparently with Plex as my Chromecast does.
Oh, and I subscribed to Plex Pass, not sure I need the extras, but the app does enough and I use it enough I like giving them some monetary support.
I would just use kodi instead at least for local streaming.
You might want to look at mediabrowser which is free currently:
I’ve never used it myself but it sounds similar to plex.