Twonky vs. Plex Media Server

Hi there,

today I got my WD Wireless Pro that I want to use to stream my music library in the car.
As the Audi MMI supports only maximum 10’000 Songs on a SD card or harddisc, I was looking for a DLNA solution, where this limit does not exist.

I added my 75’000 songs on a directory ‘music’ and the default Twonky Server is offering them to the MMI for streaming. So far, so good. It works, but is a bit slow, and, when searching on the directory level, the songs in an album are presented in alphabetical order, not the order on the album (even, if the filename is 01 - Money for nothing and 09 - Brothers in Arms it sorts first ‘Brothers in Arms’ and so on …).

Therefore, I wanted to try out the Plex Media Server. However, I’m quite cautious, and when the system tells me, that the installation of Plex will deactivate Twonky I’m not hitting ‘yes’ with ease …

Basically, I have a solution, that works, but I’m curious, if the other opion is better :slight_smile:

Anyone of you tried both versions?
Are there significant differnces when streaming to a DLNA client?
One thing I already found out is the .plexignore file, to exclude directories and files from being added to the library. For my use, I only want to stream the music in the music directory.

Once Plex is installed, can it be deinstalled and Twonkey be activated again?

Thanks for your thoughts and help!

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Absolutely. You just can’t operate them at the same time, but they can coexist.

Thanks, I’ll give it a try …

I had a typo up there. You CAN’T operate them at the same time. Sorry for the confusion!

yes, I understood it that way. Either one or the other is running. That’s fine, so I can compare the different functionality. If I find significant differences I’ll report here …

By the way, is there a way to prevent the download of metadata while scanning the files?
All my music files are carefully tagged including an embedded cover. No need to add more metadata …

Yeah, I think so. Not an expert here as I don’t have mine in front of me, but I think you can set the metadata source to be LOCAL FILES (instead of fetching from a server somewhere.) Just can’t remember what it’s called.

The Plex documentation has pretty good info on that.

I chose local files, but he does a lookup so, it takes hours …
Twonky built the db in a few minutes, Plex takes hours …
So, that’s a significant difference, at least for the first use :blush:

And I miss a guess, who long it might go. Twonky showed, how many of the 75’000 files were added. on Plex I see it working, but no clue how many songs are already in the database …

Are you using an app (on phone, or elsewhere) to play from the MPW to the car player?

The following info may or may not be useful to you:

Most DNLA servers play music in alpha order and not track order, although some Android apps can be configured to play in track order or alpha.

iOS apps mostly play in track order, although I have one iOS app that plays from DLNA servers (not SMB shares) and it plays tracks in alpha order, and all the other iOS apps I have play in track order (via SMB (Samba) shares.)

These are big distinctions and the type of app used determines the ordering of tracks played (i.e. in alpha or track order.)

So again, are you using an app to play from the MPW to the car player?

Hi Mike,

I don’t use an app on a phone. The Audi MMI Car System comes with a built in client to connect to a DLNA Media Server connected to the in-car WiFi.

Audi has an app for Android or IOS Phones, but the limitation there is the same. How can you put a music library with 500GB on a phone? I’m waiting for the FIIO X5 3rd gen, a high end music player based on Android with optional more than 500GB of storage. There, the Audi app would work and everything would be fine. It’s fast and does exactly what is needed. FIIO X5 3rd gen has been released in China, but is not available in Europe at the moment.

In the meantime, I’m trying different options. The best one today: WD My Passport Wireless Pro.
Beside the car use case, the WD MPWP is a very useful device when travelling a lot. Backup for photos from the camera and handy and mobile backup device for PC & Laptop.

So, just a short review, what I’ve found out.

Plex did not work with the Audi DLNA Client.
I could see and browse the directories and files, but the files were not playable.
As I don’t want to mess around with XML files, I did a factory reset and went on with Twonky.

In theory, with Twonky everything works, however, there are a few things that makes MPWP unusable as a music server in the car.

With about 5’000 Albums and 75’000 songs, the system is too slow.
Right after powering up MPWP in the car, a scan is started. During the scan, streaming music without interruptions is not possible, therefore I need to drive 10 Minutes until the system is ready. Then, changing from one track to another takes up to 30 seconds. Believe me, you don’t like to listen to Pink Floyd’s ‘The Wall’ or Beethoven’s ‘Piano Concerto No.5’ with a pause of 10-30s between tracks …

So, even if used only as music server, there are too many restrictions to use it as I thought.

As I would like to use MPWP also as backup solution, I added a backup of my Lightroom photo directory.
A very bad idea, when Twonky is active. The DLNA server imports 200’000 hi-res pictures, 200’000 preview pictures and tries to create thumbs for all of them. This results in a DB crash. So, without a possibility to tell Twonky to ignore the photo directory, MPWP would be either music server or portable backup solution. But not both at the same time.

I decided for portable backup solution and look forward to FIIOs X5 3rd gen …

Hi HaPeKa, with Twonky you can set many features including specific scan folders and media types (or music only. It’s not well documented but if you browse to the IP address for the My Passport Wireless, adding the required port 9000 used by Twonky you’ll find what you need. So, in my case the IP address is 192.168.60.1:9000 yours may vary. Look under ‘Sharing’, to adjust.