After spending the last few days, tinkering and trying to put together an HTPC for my family, I wasn’t able to get a smooth enough experience to match even our old, ad-filled, laggy, Roku. In particular, every streaming service I tried needed to be controlled almost exclusively by mouse, as everything has been reduced to electron apps/websites with little-to-no keyboard or controller navigation support. As such, I’m looking for other options, although considering how quickly these platforms change and how outdated a lot of the information available on them is its hard to single out the best options.
In particular, I’m looking to be able to:
- Use Netflix, Prime Video, and Disney+. Ideally other services too, since we tend to juggle subscriptions.
- Control it with a remote, controller, or similarly simple device
- Be able to cast to it from a phone
Does anyone have much experience with options for this - esspecially if you’ve tried multiple and can compare?
Sony Bravia, not connected to any network, running in Pro Mode so it’s “just a TV”
Then a PC running plex and the arrs to substitute the streaming services.
What’s arrs?
Sonarr, lidarr and radarr are used to grab content
I didn’t get into self hosting until after Plex jumped the shark so any time someone recommends it I assume it’s purely legacy.
I have an analogue/digital crossover era Bravia which is literally what a TV should be so it’s good to hear about Pro mode if I ever want to up to 4k.