I’m sort of curious and not sure if can actually make a poll here or not.
But which do you prefer, Kodi/XBMC or Plex and why do you prefer it? Personally, I have used both, am a PlexPass user, but always keep finding myself going back to Kodi over Plex.
I love the central database of Plex, but I just find the menu system’s of Kodi easier to use and navigate. I also think Kodi seems to respond better with pause and playback, etc over Plex, as well as the use of NFO files and 3rd party media scrapers making it easier to keep organized.
I use Plex, but mostly because it’s baked into my SmartTV and I’ve sideloaded it onto our NowTV (Roku) box so I don’t need additional boxes plugged into my TVs.
The centralised database does it for me - starting watching on one device and seamlessly continuing on another is fantastic. Rasplex also works very well.
I started with Kodi (XBMC), because my NAS did not support Plex. And I am very happy with Kodi running on OpenElec - using it now on a HTPC (Zotac), on my PC and on a PI.
WAV is also high
Good thing is, that KODi is well supported. eg. Plug-in for my Fibaro system, from which I am currently moving over to OpenHAB. And there are regulary updates enhancements, and a lot things to “pimp” it, (designs/Skins, functionities, plug-in’s,…)
I’m running with both. The Living room TV has the Plex client, so makes sense to use it. But all of the other TV’s have Raspberry PI’s attached using OSMC (Kodi). Media is stored centrally on my NAS and I’ve setup the a central DB for the OSMC clients, which means when anything new is added it appears in both.
I do like the UI that Plex provides and is very friendly. The OSMC default UI is very basic but very functional, the kids operate it with easy. I’ve thought about migrating to Plex client that runs on the Raspberry PI’s, however OSMC is very stable and therefore I don’t want to introduce anything that I may have to keep resolving. Or as the saying goes, “if it’s not broken then don’t fix it.”
OpenHAB integration is far easier with Kodi than Plex, so if your driver is in part down to that then I would recommend Kodi…
Run a plex server and use the Plex add-on for Kodi on your clients. My preference is Plex client, but I have used Kodi with the Plex add-on. If you have an Amazon Echo device, try out the new Plex skill.
I prefer the Kodi interface by far and have been using it since XBMC on the original Xbox. My setup now uses Emby (pretty near all the same functionality of Plex) as the backend to organize the media and handle metadata scraping. It also allows mobile device streaming or playback from a web browser.
Kodi connects to Emby via a plugin and keeps the local database synchronized with the server. Best of both worlds. I don’t need to do any content management on any of my Kodi boxes, but I still get the, superior in my opinion, Kodi experience on my TV’s. Playback status is even synced so I can start watching on my TV and pick it up on a phone or computer.
I have both. I have all my media stored on my central storage. I use a mysql db for all the kodi clients in house. Plex is only used on devices that leave the house (tablets, phones, and my travel amazon fire stick.)
I like plex for the streaming/transcoding side of things and being able to playback where ever you are. However, I can not let go of some of the features in kodi. 2 in particular for me. I use the security camera overlay add on to popup my security camera if motion is detected after certain times. The big big big reason I can’t let go of kodi… smart playlists. I have playlists that are nothing more than “all movies rated for kids” or my big background noise playlist that just plays stuff like southpark, simpsons, family guy, in whatever random order. I have one for “play something” that just picks a random movie not marked as watched.
Those smart playlists are the reason i was able to cut the cord a decade ago. I can hit a playlist and not have to make the decision on what I want to watch, it just does it randomly for me.
