Replacement for Front Row, keeping my metadata?

Y-Guy

I could use some advice, I've tried Plex, Boxee & XBMC. However I have spent a fair amount of time getting all my movies and TV shows metadata n place, they work well in Front Row within the limitations of FR itself. However each of the other programs insists on going out and finding information for my shows instead of using what I have. I've tried to dive into their individual forums but for the sake of me I can't find anything that will tell those programs to use my own metadata and ignore the internet.

Part of the problem are shows like RiffTraxx, Plex decided that my RiffTrax Avatar was actually a 2nd copy of Avatar.. which isn't not. I played around in some options but could never force Plex to separate it. One of the Anime shows my kids watched ended up getting some gay pr0n name instead of the correct name, at that point I nuked Plex.

I want control like i have with files in Front Row with the features I see in the others. Any advice?
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Smithcraft · Posted: Mon Jun 06, 2011 3:37 am Post subject:

Plex is the easiest of the three to use, so I'm not sure you are going to find any joy, other than pulling Front Row out of where ever Apple has hidden it, and install it where ever it is you are planning on going.

As for Rifftrax, I'm not sure what I'm looking at. Some seem to be short videos and others seem to be audio tracks to be played along with a movie? Is that right? The shorts most likely wouldn't be cataloged any where and would go into a Videos section. Audio tracks would be muxed into the movie right?

SC
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Y-Guy · Posted: Mon Jun 06, 2011 11:14 pm Post subject:

Thanks SC, guess I'd hoped the was say hope/way to force Plex to stop looking to the net for metadata, guess not though.

As for RiffTrax, I combine the MP3 from RiffTrax with the Movie via Garage Band and create a new Movie. I can't see how to tell Plex or any of the others to ask for me for the metadata information, none of the RiffTrax information are online since the are all custom.
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Smithcraft · Posted: Tue Jun 07, 2011 12:03 am Post subject:

While I don't know how many movies you have Rifftrax'ed, you can edit the metadata in Plex very easily from the Plex Media Manager.

I'm not going to say that the PMM is perfect, especially since I can't get it to get the right metadata for the Ridley Scott/Michael Douglas Black Rain (two Black Rain movies came out in 89!) but it's much easier to deal with than the other two.

Oh, there is Media Central. I think they gave up a few years ago as it seems very feature poor.

And there is Squire. It's still a ways from being really usable, but you can give it a try.

Finally, it can be hard to get good help at the Plex forums so feel free to ask here. Who knows, someone here might know the answer.

SC
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Grumpy old man of computing.

[Desktop] G4 mini - 1.5Ghz 1GB 80GB HDD - Newer miniStack v2 500GB - 10.5.8

[Media System] Intel i5 mini - 2.33Ghz 8GB 500GB HDD - 4 x Hitachi 2TB HDD in a qBOX-SF - 10.7.5 (Thanks Phil!)

Make sure it has pins!

unblowupable5 · Member Joined: 22 May 2010 Posts: 71

You can also direct Plex to import the metadata from your files instead of from the net. When you set up the scanners, change it from movie database to personal media, or something like that...

Y-Guy · Posted: Fri Jun 10, 2011 10:21 am Post subject:

I installed Plex again and this time tried to see, what I think, is the Media Server to scan using Personal Media. First scan found 256 of my 272 movies. Took a while dig and find if you hold Shift or Option you can force a deep scan. After shutting down its now found 273 movies, yet my finder shows I have 289 folders in the Movies folder in iTunes. So I need to see which movies are either duplicates in the finder or were not removed correctly.

It's a good start though. Thanks for the advice.

On to the TV shows after I figure out the file number variances.
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tamarok · Junior Member Joined: 28 Jun 2009 Posts: 28

Despite having a few stability issues with Plex and it having some issues with some video formats, Plex got my vote.

While technically XBMC is more feature complete, I feel Plex is more polished from a user experience. As to Boxee, I don't need to be social about what I am watching, unless that social happens to be the other person in my living room.

It should be noted Boxee and Plex are based on XBMC, either as an extension or as a fork.

My 5c.

geeji · Member Joined: 29 Dec 2007 Posts: 146

Unfortunately, there is nothing equivalent based on Plex to Front Row + DVDpedia plugin (by para9).
And I hate the Plex interface, which is both too flashy and cumbersome.
Please Apple, a new and better Front Row !!

Y-Guy · Posted: Wed Jul 20, 2011 1:18 am Post subject:

I've tried Plex for several weeks, still not thrilled with it. It's managed to miss a number of TV shows I have, because I've locked it down to try to use my own Metadata and not scrape the web for it. When I did let it scrape the web it managed to fine "adult" movies out of my TV shows, go figure how it botched that. I liked having Netflix built in, but found that the netflix app would lock up after watching a show. Had a great lazy weekend a few weeks ago and tried to watch 24... watch one episode, had to shut down Plex to get the next one to start. Finally gave up and just played through the browser.

Well the good news is, somebody had found away to keep FrontRow running on Lion. I'm waiting on Lion until the 1st update, but if I do opt to upgrade my HTPC I'll have an option. You can find the FrontRow Enabler here http://www.mac-hatter.com/blog/frontrowenablerforlion

I've also been beta testing an app called Squire, bit similar to FR but its way to early to judge. However it also managed to find an adult title from a PG rated movie, how apps botch the name so bad is beyond me. However those guys are trying to use the IMDB code in the file name - that's interesting way to get it right. Might see if the guy that makes iDentify 2 could code that in. Time will tell.
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geeji · Member Joined: 29 Dec 2007 Posts: 146

Great news about Front Row Enabler For Lion Smile

Hope it survives Lion next updates...

Regarding metadata, my experience is that no automatic matching works 100% accurately, either in Plex or any other program.
That's even worse when you mix movies in different languages (French, English and German in my case).
Searches in IMDB are especially "fuzzy"...

The only reliable solution I found is semi manual : use DVDpedia to upload the metadata, correcting its findings when necessary, and use para9 Front Row DVDpedia plugin to make it visible thru Front Row.
Unfortunately, the same plugin does not exist for Plex, so that's not even an option for Plex users.

Y-Guy · Posted: Thu Jul 21, 2011 12:50 am Post subject:

Well spoke to soon from what the develop of the Front Row Enabler has stated...

**UPDATE**
With the recent update to iTunes 10.4, Apple has changed how the library is read/written. As such, your iTunes Library content will not play in Front Row. I am hoping Apple rectifies this issue (as it has also affected my Snow Leopard Machine). You can however access 'Photos' and 'Movies'

At least would appear movies works, as I'm not upgrading right now I'll wait to see.
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Y-Guy · Posted: Mon Jul 25, 2011 5:19 pm Post subject:

macmanmacman · Veteran Member Joined: 25 Oct 2007 Posts: 1682

media central is a really old piece of software it's been around for a while the only thing you need to understand.

Media central is built off of source code from plex so why would you want to pay for a fake version of plex when you can get the real thing for free

Smithcraft · Posted: Tue Jul 26, 2011 3:17 am Post subject:

I tried Media Central back when I picked up the minis.

It seemed like a program written for children, with a very circus like feeling. Plus it has very limited codec support and only outputs stereo.

For a program that's been out since 2005, it really is barely functional.

However, you can always try it for free.

SC
_________________
Grumpy old man of computing.

[Desktop] G4 mini - 1.5Ghz 1GB 80GB HDD - Newer miniStack v2 500GB - 10.5.8

[Media System] Intel i5 mini - 2.33Ghz 8GB 500GB HDD - 4 x Hitachi 2TB HDD in a qBOX-SF - 10.7.5 (Thanks Phil!)

Make sure it has pins!

Y-Guy · Posted: Tue Jul 26, 2011 8:44 am Post subject:

Thanks, figured something was up since I'd never heard of it and it's been out for a while. Won't waste my time.
_________________
iMac 24" 2.4 GHz 4GB | Logitech S530 | Z-2300 speakers | NewerTech Guardian MAXimus RAID
MacMini HTPC 2.26 GHz 2GB | Panasonic Plasma TV | Logitech diNovo Edge | Mercury Elite-AL Pro 800
AppleTV1 unhacked | Panasonic LCD


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