Access Windows share across internet

unhappyBB · 10-10-2018 11:42pm #1

I'm looking for advice on how best to connect to a Windows share from an Android box across the internet.

I think some kind of VPN might be the answer but how do you set that up on Android? Won't that force all android traffic across it? Would it be easy to change the settings when my public IP changes?

The image below better explains what I'm trying to achieve. My media store is on a constantly running Windows 7 PC. Any ideas/pointers welcome.

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Dardania · 11-10-2018 8:28am

VPN would be one way. I'm almost certain you can set up a routing rule that discerns between traffic (so that at your folks' house, internet is routed directly, whereas it can see the Windows server also)

If I was you, I would look at specific products which have solved this problem already, for average consumers, rather than looking at something which needs something approaching a CCNA's level of knowledge to implement. I have used Plex lately and it seems to work well for this situation.

The high horse brigade · 11-10-2018 2:27pm

Use Plex or Emby

ED E · 11-10-2018 3:19pm

Step 1.
https://www.noip.com/

Step 2.
Plex.

The high horse brigade · 11-10-2018 4:00pm

ED E wrote: »

Step 1.
https://www.noip.com/

Step 2.
Plex.

You don't even need noip, just login to your Plex or Emby account. They even support upnp if it's enabled in your router so you don't have to forward ports on your firewall

unhappyBB · 11-10-2018 10:57pm

Thanks for the responses guys but the reason for the question was that I was actually trying to avoid plex :rolleyes::o
I tried it a few years ago and didnt like it. This is what I remember but it could all have changed by now:

At the time I hated the interface (compared to xbmc/kodi Confluence).
It didn't do as good a job of recognising media
The server, while always running, never seemed to connect
It was always trying to transcode everything, straight passthrough regularly failed
I never got the Android app working properly and I don't think it done full HD

Saying that, it is supposed to do exactly what I'm looking for. I guess I'll be giving it another go over the weekend.

Johnboy1951 · 14-10-2018 12:45am

I do similar using tvheadend and set up a user who has to log in by user name and password.
I also specify a specific IP address for that user.

I forward port 9982 to the tvheadend server box.

The user uses a no-ip URL which is updated on my main PC daily.

EDIT
Forgot to mention the shared folder is accessed through Kodi (share set up in Kodi).

the_syco · 14-10-2018 1:10am

unhappyBB wrote: »

It didn't do as good a job of recognising media

I find it does a good job now. I find it doesn't like Anime, and doesn't put it into folders.

unhappyBB wrote: »

The server, while always running, never seemed to connect

Is your external IP address static where the Plex server is located?

unhappyBB wrote: »

It was always trying to transcode everything, straight passthrough regularly failed

Ensure your Windows machine isn't a basic thing with only 4GBB of RAM if you intend to play any x265 titles.

=-=

Look into the "Unofficial App Store" of Plex, as it was good the last time I used it. It allowed me to use Plex as the GUI for streaming other things.

BailMeOut · 15-10-2018 12:19pm

install a DLNA service on the windows box (example TVMOBiLi) and open DLNA ports in the Vodafone router to it. Then install a DLNA app on the Android box, point to the public Vodafone IP/Name and stream that way.

ED E · 15-10-2018 3:45pm

BailMeOut wrote: »

install a DLNA service on the windows box (example TVMOBiLi) and open DLNA ports in the Vodafone router to it. Then install a DLNA app on the Android box, point to the public Vodafone IP/Name and stream that way.

Do not do that. No fuppin way.

Great way to get yourself owned.

Johnboy1951 · 15-10-2018 3:57pm

As both ends of the connection use Kodi, the easiest, IMO, is to set up a secured connection between the two using Kodi, and route the share through Kodi on the server.

Johnboy1951 · 15-10-2018 3:57pm

How does one reduce the image size when posting?

BailMeOut · 15-10-2018 4:00pm

ED E wrote: »

Do not do that. No fuppin way.

Great way to get yourself owned.

You'd restrict to the Horizon IP only so that would be the only network that can access it.

The high horse brigade · 15-10-2018 4:08pm

Johnboy1951 wrote: »

As both ends of the connection use Kodi, the easiest, IMO, is to set up a secured connection between the two using Kodi, and route the share through Kodi on the server.

Why would you use Kodi? This is exactly what Plex and Emby set out to simplify, they're both originally forks of XBMC (former name of KODI)

Johnboy1951 · 15-10-2018 4:17pm

The high horse brigade wrote: »

Why would you use Kodi? This is exactly what Plex and Emby set out to simplify, they're both originally forks of XBMC (former name of KODI)

Because Kodi is already installed on devices at both ends!

Why install something else when it is unnecessary?

user1842 · 15-10-2018 4:29pm

PLEX has improved massively in recent years.

Honestly it is the easiest solution and has good apps for the majority of smart TVs.

If your media collection is not H264 encoded then make sure you have at least i3 processor for you server as most phones/smart TVs will need encoding into H264.

The high horse brigade · 15-10-2018 5:20pm

Johnboy1951 wrote: »

Because Kodi is already installed on devices at both ends!

Why install something else when it is unnecessary?

As a former Kodi user this a very clunky setup and the exact reason I moved completely from Kodi to Plex. Kodi is not designed as a server -> client system and with a large library it will be slow. Plex and Emby are designed this way from the ground up to stream and will transcode in lower quality where needed. You can configure bandwidth limits per device or user profile

Fwiw I've now moved from Plex to Emby as Emby now has a better community supporting it and is going the right direction. The Plex developers are too busy adding crap I don't need (AR view, news and podcasts) and dropping support for stuff I use (plugins, I use the Trakt plugin to backup my watch history to the cloud) and are not fixing any of the bugs.

ED E · 15-10-2018 5:33pm

Johnboy1951 wrote: »

How does one reduce the image size when posting?

Imgur. Boards file hosting honestly sucks.

If your imgur link is imgur.com/123456 then you can do /123456m for medium and so on.

BailMeOut wrote: »

You'd restrict to the Horizon IP only so that would be the only network that can access it.

Which is dynamic. User fails this bit and they're very exposed. Worst solution IMO.

Johnboy1951 wrote: »

Because Kodi is already installed on devices at both ends!

Why install something else when it is unnecessary?

Transcoding. I've whats considered good broadband, 20Mb US. That won't stream all content natively. Transcoding is useful.

squawker · 15-10-2018 5:46pm

found the best way to use Plex worldwide with no buffering is to route it through Cloudflare using a reverse proxy

then your only open port is 443

I use it for lots of other services as well (i.e Security Cameras / Homeassistant / etc)

The high horse brigade · 15-10-2018 6:42pm

ED E wrote: »

Transcoding. I've whats considered good broadband, 20Mb US. That won't stream all content natively. Transcoding is useful.

I have one that needs 45mbit upstream

Johnboy1951 · 15-10-2018 7:11pm

ED E wrote: »

Imgur. Boards file hosting honestly sucks.

If your imgur link is imgur.com/123456 then you can do /123456m for medium and so on.

Ah, thanks.

Transcoding. I've whats considered good broadband, 20Mb US. That won't stream all content natively. Transcoding is useful.

That is why I mentioned tvheadend, which I suppose could be installed without Kodi, but as the server already has kodi then the obvious thing to do would be to install the tvheadend Kodi add-on.
Tvheadend has various preset profiles for use and transcodes to those when required as well as pass-through, HTSP, mkv etc etc. You can also build your own if you have particular preferences.
I have only used it for Live TV (including HD).

unhappyBB · 16-10-2018 3:57pm

I went ahead and set up Plex on my server over the weekend. After a bit of reading online I found out that you cant turn off transcoding completely. This is a problem for me as my server is just a very old PC that wouldn't be up for any kind of transcoding task.
Not being able to disable it is a terrible oversight in my opinion. I installed Plex on my phone for testing. To try and avoid transcoding I set the quality to max but the app still used it as the video file was deemed incompatible with my phone. This is despite the fact I can browse to the file using ES explorer and play it on the default android video player :rolleyes:

I wanted the windows share to be accessible to the parents Kodi as this has the lowest overhead on the server and the best compatibility with Kodi. The last time I thought about doing this I tried setting up an FTP server.
I think I remember that Kodi couldn't fast-forward/rewind via FTP so I just scrapped the idea until now.
The files are a mix of everything. Some are quite old and some less so; xvid, x264, x265 and I cant even remember what my action cams raw footage is stored in.

(Sorry about the posted image size, I forgot I was on a very Hi-res monitor and the image looked small :pac: I'm still not even sure how to post images correctly)

The high horse brigade · 16-10-2018 4:18pm

unhappyBB wrote: »

I went ahead and set up Plex on my server over the weekend. After a bit of reading online I found out that you cant turn off transcoding completely. This is a problem for me as my server is just a very old PC that wouldn't be up for any kind of transcoding task.
Not being able to disable it is a terrible oversight in my opinion. I installed Plex on my phone for testing. To try and avoid transcoding I set the quality to max but the app still used it as the video file was deemed incompatible with my phone. This is despite the fact I can browse to the file using ES explorer and play it on the default android video player :rolleyes:

I wanted the windows share to be accessible to the parents Kodi as this has the lowest overhead on the server and the best compatibility with Kodi. The last time I thought about doing this I tried setting up an FTP server.
I think I remember that Kodi couldn't fast-forward/rewind via FTP so I just scrapped the idea until now.
The files are a mix of everything. Some are quite old and some less so; xvid, x264, x265 and I cant even remember what my action cams raw footage is stored in.

(Sorry about the posted image size, I forgot I was on a very Hi-res monitor and the image looked small :pac: I'm still not even sure how to post images correctly)

Try Emby. With Plex you are most likely transcoding because your audio needs transcoding to stereo, I've had this issue. This is not an issue with Emby and you can also disable transcoding completely in user settings.

user1842 · 16-10-2018 4:30pm

unhappyBB wrote: »

I went ahead and set up Plex on my server over the weekend. After a bit of reading online I found out that you cant turn off transcoding completely. This is a problem for me as my server is just a very old PC that wouldn't be up for any kind of transcoding task.
Not being able to disable it is a terrible oversight in my opinion. I installed Plex on my phone for testing. To try and avoid transcoding I set the quality to max but the app still used it as the video file was deemed incompatible with my phone. This is despite the fact I can browse to the file using ES explorer and play it on the default android video player :rolleyes:

I wanted the windows share to be accessible to the parents Kodi as this has the lowest overhead on the server and the best compatibility with Kodi. The last time I thought about doing this I tried setting up an FTP server.
I think I remember that Kodi couldn't fast-forward/rewind via FTP so I just scrapped the idea until now.
The files are a mix of everything. Some are quite old and some less so; xvid, x264, x265 and I cant even remember what my action cams raw footage is stored in.

(Sorry about the posted image size, I forgot I was on a very Hi-res monitor and the image looked small :pac: I'm still not even sure how to post images correctly)

PLEX has the option of using the Android video player. This many prevent a lot of the transcoding.

I wanted to use PLEX on my smart TVs (and a Fire TV stick) and did not want any transcoding (similar issue as you as my media server was an NAS). I ended up converting everything to H.264 in an mp4 container.

It is actually so much easier having one format that I know will play on all current and future devices.

Gadgetman496 · 16-10-2018 4:39pm

user1842 wrote: »

PLEX has the option of using the Android video player. This many prevent a lot of the transcoding.

I wanted to use PLEX on my smart TVs (and a Fire TV stick) and did not want any transcoding (similar issue as you as my media server was an NAS). I ended up converting everything to H.264 in an mp4 container.

It is actually so much easier having one format that I know will play on all current and future devices.

What did you use to do the converting?

The high horse brigade · 16-10-2018 4:41pm

Gadgetman496 wrote: »

What did you use to do the converting?

Both Plex and Emby have this built in

user1842 · 16-10-2018 4:49pm

Gadgetman496 wrote: »

What did you use to do the converting?

Handbrake for the converting:

https://handbrake.fr/

Xmedia-recode to change the audio language flag to English if necessary (i dont like PLEX showing it as unknown):

https://www.xmedia-recode.de/

Media Info for spot checks on files to make sure all is ok:

https://mediaarea.net/en/MediaInfo

You can just point Handbrake to a folder, select a preset and let if off (it will take time though depending on how many files you have). Also good to have different presets for SD and HD (I did some sample encodes to make sure I was happy with the quality and file sizes).

I actually saved and about 1GB of space with no real degradation in quality.

Johnboy1951 · 16-10-2018 5:08pm

The high horse brigade wrote: »

As a former Kodi user this a very clunky setup and the exact reason I moved completely from Kodi to Plex. Kodi is not designed as a server -> client system and with a large library it will be slow. Plex and Emby are designed this way from the ground up to stream and will transcode in lower quality where needed. You can configure bandwidth limits per device or user profile

That is why Tvheadend is used - to take care of all the backend/server stuff, from managing tuners of various sorts for live TV; recording; streaming; encoding; user access settings etc. etc.. Kodi takes care of the user interface and has lots of useful plugins.
The user has a choice of several backends if tvheadend does not suit for some reason.

Plex, as I understand it, has both built in.

Fwiw I've now moved from Plex to Emby as Emby now has a better community supporting it and is going the right direction. The Plex developers are too busy adding crap I don't need (AR view, news and podcasts) and dropping support for stuff I use (plugins, I use the Trakt plugin to backup my watch history to the cloud) and are not fixing any of the bugs.

Access Windows share across internet

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