“It marks the end of an era for us, and we’d be lying if we said it wasn’t a little bittersweet,” the company wrote in a blog post about the change. The company explains this decision was made after examining how people were using Plex today, and found that most would have an equal or even better experience with a streaming device and its new players. The app’s arrival also signals a change in direction for the company, which will also now remove its existing Windows Store application and end support for the traditional home theater PC setup - the latter which involves a desktop computer connected to a TV or home theater. Plex provides a polished, user-friendly way of accessing your home media content over the network or internet, engineered specifically for the big screen.Plex today is launching a new desktop application for Mac and Windows, with the goal of eventually replacing Plex Media Player as the company’s only desktop solution. If you want access from the wider internet you’ll need to sign up for a MyPlex account, where you can upgrade to a PlexPass to gain additional features such as direct access to media stored in your cloud storage folders as well as offline playback on iOS and Android devices. Presentation is simply fabulous, with lots of detail about the media you’re browsing to help you find what you’re looking for, but you’ll need to spend a little time familiarising yourself with the interface (press the left cursor key on the main screen to access the all-important settings, for example).Īccessing media over your home network is simple – Plex immediately spots any servers and gives you complete access to your media library as well as any online channels (such as YouTube) that you’ve added to the server.

So long as Plex Media Server is running somewhere (even on the same machine), you’ll have instant access to your movie library. The initial setup wizard – remember, use your keyboard folks – lets you configure the type of audio and video inputs and outputs you have, then dumps you at the main screen. Plex works on Mac and Windows, and is designed to look good on your big-screen TV, which means it runs full screen, relies on a keyboard or compatible remote, and can be fiddly to set up. This is the media center portion of Plex, recently renamed from Plex Media Player and is the only free client available.

If you’ve built yourself a handy media library – photos, video, recorded TV, music and more – using the powerful Plex Media Server tool for Windows, Mac or Linux, you’ll need a suitable client to access it all across your network.

Plex client mac