Plex DVR/Live TV Functionality

[Guinea]

I am not 100% sure if this is the correct forum to post this in, but I figured I would give it a try. I have a FreeNAS build using the following hardware:

• Chassis - Supermicro 846BE16-R1K28B
• Motherboard - Supermicro MBD-X10SRH-CLN4F-O
• Memory - Crucial 16GB ECC RDIMM DDR4-2400 x2 (32GB)
• CPU - Intel Xeon E5-1640 v4
• CPU Cooler - Noctua NH-U9DXi4
• Boot Drive - Samsung 850 Evo 120GB
• HDD - 8x WD Red 4TB's

The only thing this NAS is used for is Plex streaming to the entire house and media storage. I want to incorporate some DVR functionality for this configuration. From what I understand, I can setup Plex to record live TV coming in over the air. I have an antenna in my attic that picks up X number of channels of HDTV over the air. I have the antenna connected into the coax network throughout the entire house so every TV has access directly to the over the air TV channels. I think I understand the requirements but I wanted to confirm and get some advice on how I am setting it all up. If I get a digital tuner card for my NAS and have that installed in the chassis (or get an external digital tuner if that is my only option), I should be able to plug the coax from the house (antenna feed) into that digital tuner and have Plex recognize it. Is that correct or am I missing steps/hardware? Is there a similar build somewhere in a blog that maybe explains the setup for something like this? The main purpose is to provide me the ability to record certain things when I want....football games, kids shows, etc.

 

[thorn57]

I am currently trying somthing similar with tvheadend na di would say an external sat>ip tuner should be your best bet since there are no drivers for most pci(e)/usb tuners for freebsd

 

[Guinea]

Oh ok, great to know. So how does the external SAT plug connect in to the Plex server?

 

[thorn57]

well you connect the cable from the antenna and a network cable to your tuner and then you can acces it via its ip adress to watch tv. i dont know how dvr works in plex but in tvheadend there is a option to enter the ip adress over a sat>ip server

 

[nightshade00013]

You can not setup a tuner within the FreeNAS as Drivers do not exist. You can however grab something like https://www.silicondust.com/product/hdhomerun-duo/ and have it work. Look at the adapters that Plex supports https://support.plex.tv/hc/en-us/articles/225877427-Supported-DVR-Tuners-and-Antennas grab one that can connect to the network and then set it up.

 

[nojohnny101]

+1 to what @nightshade00013 said, I have an HDHomerun extend and it has worked great with plex (in fact, hdhomerun devices were the first ones that pelt supported). Have the HDHomerun extend connected to my network via LAN and so any device (even mobile ones) can watch live TV while at home or remotely through plex.

works great, no more cable bills!

 

[scrappy]

HDHomerun extend and it has worked great with plex

Same. This is the way to go hands down.