hello,
I am looking for a valid alternative to Synology Audio Station, can you help me?
Do not misunderstand me, Audio Station is a very good “eco-system”, but it miss features crucial to me, like the ability to convert in mp3 (setting at least the bitrate) the audio files to be downloaded on mobile and using a reverse proxy on it, is not working as it should (but I am sure it is my fault)
So to recap this “service” must have:
personal and common music
personal and common playlists
nice and modern gui
ios app (not third party)
ability to download music in mp3 (with compressing options)
integration in home assistant & ability to cast audio on sonos, amazon echo, apple, etc.
open source (better option or at least with “one time payment” - I hate this trend of monthly payments for software services)
ability to edit tag (optional)
easy to use
other super cool features
bitperfect playback (optional but cool to have)
Till now I have tried:
navidrome (very limited features)
airsonic ('90s GUI and no ios app)
jellyfin (no point 1, 2, 5, limited 6)
volumio (boh… maybe I misunderstand it)
koel (I had high hopes, but no… it is a nicer navidrome, more complicate to set up)
plex / plexamp, just created the compose file, I will try it in minutes…
I am very happy with my Plex server. My music library isn’t that large, I mainly use it for films and shows. If the free version is not enough for you, you have the option to subscribe to Plex Pass for a monthly or yearly fee or to buy the lifetime license. From the mobile app, you have the option to connect to Chromecast and AirPlay. I don’t know about Sonos and Echo. Plex supports uncompressed audio and you can choose a lower quality for playback and download if you want. The GUI is very nice and there are apps for all desktop and mobile systems as well as many major TV / set top box / streaming stick brands. What do you mean by integration in Home Assistant?
One problem I have with the Plex mobile app is that it doesn’t handle network transitions very well. Whenever I switch from WiFi to cellular or vice versa, I need to force close the app because it doesn’t automatically rediscover the new IP address (Plex uses a technique similar to STUN in order to connect to the server directly without having to go through a relay).
Another thing to note is that Plex is not entirely self-hosted. What I mean by that is while you host your own media server, it still depends on Plex’s centrally hosted backend service for things like authentication and server discovery.
I have around 430 cd collected in years (and ripped in flac using EAC), and few album in hi-res I bought from 7digital or qobuz, so I have a lot of songs.
My goal is to play them with the best quality possible when I am at home and keep playing the same playlist/songs downloaded on mp3 (160 or 320 kbps) on mobile.
I tried installing plex with docker but I stopped on the login page. Do I have to register to their website to use it even in local?
If so, what happened if my internet goes down? can i still login and play my local music or no?
I recently saw a Darko video about plex & plexamp and it seems interesting, it looks like it has all I am looking for, but it is not clear if I can have separate collection for each users or only a big one shared.
With Syno Audio, I have a common collection with all the classics (acdc, zeppelin, queen, stones, etc). Also each user has its personal music. (ex. I have some anime or games soundtrack, my girlfriend has pop music and my sister has her music, etc.)
In picture the One Punch Man OST as well as the Destiny soundtrack are only visible to me
Apparently, you don’t need a Plex account or internet connection for it to work, but it’s highly recommended because of the discovery process I mentioned.
Plex has two options to organize media beyond libraries: collections and playlists. Collections are curated by the server owner. They logically belong to a library (so only media of that library can be part of a collection) and they are accessible by all users with access to the library. Playlists are individual to each user and can contain media from different libraries of the same type (e.g., audio, video).
