@starkee:
There used to be discussions about this on the forums, but I can't find them–let's start a new one!
I just set up Plex and I'm weirdly having fun figuring out the ideal strategy for organizing my files. I'm really curious to find out what other users have found that works for them. Some thoughts:
It's annoying but important to be consistent about storing both types of files, .torrent and video–I'm not saying it's really difficult or anything, just something I always have to remind myself (sometimes I neglect/lose track of .torrent files, and then I can't seed files because even if I re-locate the torrent, I can't figure out/remember what video file it went with
It's also annoying but important to pay attention to the file info/data in 2 places: on the actual data file stored on my hard drive, and on the metadata/info stuff which the media server/player uses to do its own thing with those same files. I wish I didn't have to think about this step because it's like doing the same thing twice, every time, but anyway, what about everybody else?
I commend you on this quest. It is a huge undertaking - and frankly I'm going to guess only a small percentage of us truly have the fortitude necessary to manage a perfect scenario - because it truly is time-consuming to develop and maintain. There have been a few posts in the past about XBMC, Plex, Emby, and what-not. Plex seems the most popular for casting/streaming on other devices from your primary server/storage for Plex. Plex, as of now, is the only DLNA server that has the most agents scripts written to match metadata with some videos and/or studios. Dependent upon that, everything then works backwards. So if your goal is to match your collection and have it tagged correctedly in Plex, there are a few steps involved to make that happen, one of which has ramifications on your torrent association with the files on your O/S or storage device/plex server. At best I've only been able to match up to 20% of my collection using Plex's agents (i have over 16,000 videos files). If I wanted to continue that method it requires me to hard code the information into every movie with a sub-set of tools another member here on the site shared with me. It's time-intensive as hell. Trust me. And it breaks the connection to your torrents/files (in essence you have to re-record every file and then write-in (encode or hard-code) the meta information into each file including posters. So this means you must double your torrent video files and maintain two different worlds. And that was too much for me.
If you want to use Plex exclusively for meta information look up to play your videos, then think long and hard about going that route.
Ive settled upon a balance between maintaining my torrents/file (keeping them seeding) AND my DLNA tools (I use both Plex and Emby).
The gateway between the two worlds is the BiglyBT bitorrent client. It allows you to rename your files so as to include all the pertinent metadata information into the file name on the O/S, and move the files into the corresponding folders (i.e. studio, bareback vs. ss, bdsm/fetish, general categories, amateur categories, etc..) I waited 10 years for the client to be able to do everything that I wanted and BiglyBT is the best, hands down, for super collection management of my size.
We can talk more, just message me if interested and I'll get into a lot of details with you and share my lessons learned and observations. 🙂
