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For just $30 + $5 a month, I'm able to share everything with my family. Here's how. (midwest.social)

submitted 9 months ago* (last edited 9 months ago) by GiuseppeAndTheYeti@midwest.social to c/piracy@lemmy.dbzer0.com

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(Disclaimer: yes, I bought a $180 4TB Crucial SSD too, but my family split the cost with me since they're going to use my Jellyfin server. Whether that counts towards the final cost is up to you. And the electricity cost is pretty negligible to run a Le Potato as a server, but I guess you can count that too.)

So this all started rather innocently. I was fed up with all the ads being shoved in my face with everything I do, so I finally decided that it was time to set up a Pi-hole on a single board computer. For me, it ended up being a Le Potato. I had never even touched Linux prior to this, so it took me a day or so to get everything set up. I love learning new things so I kind of got hooked on learning my way around Linux basics and decided that I was going to upgrade my setup to a Pi-hole + VPN using wireguard. That was kind of a beast to configure as a novice but I got that to work after about a week. Now I was getting ad free content anywhere I wanted on my phone. I rode that high for a few weeks until I realized that I was just scratching the surface of what I could do with my little $30 Linux server setup and this is where I really got to upgrade.

I had learned of Jellyfin from LTT and decided that I was going to test it out. I set up the Jellyfin server on the Le Potato and I was off to the races. Now I just needed content. I read through some of the wiki and settled on Mullvad+qbittorrent to find the content I wanted. With everything configured it still didn't really feel complete, so I set up profiles for my family members and gave them their own passwords to access the content. I quickly realized that 64 GB was not nearly enough (without a rolling library) and I was getting annoyed with having to constantly swith the flash drive I was using between the Le Potato and the laptop where I was downloading my content. So I went out and bought a 4TB USB SSD from Crucial and set up access as a NAS on Ubuntu with Samba.

It's just now finally set up. My family texts me to let me know what it is they're wanting to watch, I torrent it, upload it to my NAS, and Jellyfin streams that content to my family 100% free. I've turned my 6 family members into pirates and they barely even realize it.

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[-] ulkesh@beehaw.org 55 points 9 months ago

Take a look at Overseerr.

You’re welcome.

[-] ollie@lemmy.dbzer0.com 41 points 9 months ago

Jellyseer also works

[-] eggdaddy@lemmy.dbzer0.com 7 points 9 months ago

The *arrs work well with all of the big three, I have a Jellyfin install here but it's apps for TV and what not are really lacking and attempting to get that to work with some of my elderly relatives I don't look forward to. Just setting up Plex with them was a nightmare.

Yes, Jellyseer works fine but it's really only a version specifially for jellyfin when OS already has support for it.

[-] sirico@feddit.uk 13 points 9 months ago

Radarr and Sonarr both have good list parsing now, all people have to do with mine is add it to their plex/imbd/trakt watchlists.

[-] ulkesh@beehaw.org 5 points 9 months ago

Hypothetically, a person could simply set up overseerr on a secure domain, provide that URL to those with whom the content would be shared, and they log in, do a search, and request the media.

I could see this being a very easy method of allowing others such access, quite a low barrier to entry for them while allowing the content provider the ability to vet requests.

But everyones’s use case may be different. So whatever works best for them is also valid.

[-] sirico@feddit.uk 1 points 9 months ago

100% the method I use doesn't really have auditing or limits in the intuative way programs like overseerr or ombi does. I'd have to setup each list per user with a load of rules set. Rather than a global ruleset for all users

[-] 7Sea_Sailor@lemmy.dbzer0.com 4 points 9 months ago* (last edited 9 months ago)

This comment piqued my interest. I've been dreaming of a trakt -> torrent integration for some time now, since I actively use trakt to manage my "watched" and "want to watch" movies. In an ideal world, whenever I add a movie to my trakt wishlist, it would automatically be grabbed from a torrent on a remote seedbox. But I could'nt find any trakt integrations on the tools you named when I researched this a couple months back. Do you have any instructing links or similar where I could read more about this?

[-] sirico@feddit.uk 3 points 9 months ago

This section of Spaceinvader1 covers adding lists in radarr there's a lot more defaults now within that list option that have made it easier to add things like trackt. Gone are the stevenlu days

[-] kratoz29@lemm.ee 6 points 9 months ago

The rabbit hole never ends.

[-] eggdaddy@lemmy.dbzer0.com 45 points 9 months ago

Gotta give it to you, you plugged away, learned, plugged away some more and got a really nice starting base for a setup. Now it's time to start burning time and money on ever increasing space, a docker stack, a more powerful server (leaving the pihole to handle the ads), and on and on lol. Welcome to the hobby!

[-] GiuseppeAndTheYeti@midwest.social 3 points 9 months ago

Thanks man! I think I'm going to let this setup sit for awhile before I do anything else to upgrade.

My hobbyist interests follow my fire making skills. I find a new and interesting hobby (kindling), then I do a little bit of research (stack twigs around the kindling), get started on this new hobby (use a match to light the kindling), discover just how deep the hobby can go(limbs and split logs), explore the advanced portions of this new hobby(toss the best looking wood onto my small fire in no semblance of order), be pleasantly surprised with my results(let the fire burn and go start a new one).

The next step is usually come back to a smoldering pit of ash and half-burned firewood, be annoyed, put the unburned wood in a pile, pour some diesel fuel over it, and flick a match onto it lol.

[-] LedgeDrop@lemm.ee 28 points 9 months ago

... or you could pay approx $2.70 / month for real Debrid. Replace jellyfin with stremio + torrentio and your family can immediately stream whatever shows they want w/o asking you and without needing to wait for the torrent to download.

[-] janguv@lemmy.dbzer0.com 44 points 9 months ago

This would be my preferred option, but: I do applaud OP's enthusiasm and dedication. He's learnt a lot of things about it, whereas because of my setup (as you described) I know fuck all. Plus, having his sort of setup gives you your own library over time (should that be desired).

[-] GiuseppeAndTheYeti@midwest.social 6 points 9 months ago

Yeah, it was a fun hobby over the course of the last couple months and I learned a ton about linux, networking, server infrastructure (kinda), and troubleshooting!

I don't like to be reliant on someone else's software or hardware either, so that played a part as well. The library part is good as well because my family is much more likely to give a TV show or movie a try if they see that I added it and we can talk about it when I visit.

[-] cesium@sh.itjust.works 30 points 9 months ago

Convenience at the price of reliance on outside infrastructure.

[-] ramblinguy@sh.itjust.works 5 points 9 months ago

Too relevant, given that uptobox shut down yesterday and alldebrid torrents don't work right now

[-] webghost0101@sopuli.xyz 13 points 9 months ago

I get it, thats a really low affordable price but i ain’t paying money to pirate more conveniently.

[-] Fuck_u_spez_@sh.itjust.works 5 points 9 months ago* (last edited 9 months ago)

This same mentality kept me from Usenet for a decade or more but I'll never look back now that I can see how much faster, more reliable, and more convenient it is. And it's cheaper than even the cheapest ad-free streaming service but with way better quality and selection.

[-] biddy@feddit.nl 1 points 9 months ago

Between power, hardware, and harddrives, an *arr stack works out more expensive than this unless you self host a bunch of other services. I self host because it's a fun hobby, not to save money.

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[-] radau@lemmy.dbzer0.com 5 points 9 months ago

I see no reason to not use both. Got a show you're watching that has new releases? Have Sonarr track it and auto download them as they release. Want to try a new show but not sure you'll like it or just a single season? Debrid.

I will say, Jellyfin with Infuse on apple tv is rather easy to use for non technical people where they would struggle with stremio a little more.

Still a far cry from the early XBMC/Kodi days where you had to manually try like 20 sources before you could watch both options really are great

[-] YarrMatey@lemmy.dbzer0.com 2 points 9 months ago* (last edited 9 months ago)

Has anyone read their privacy policy?

We may be required to disclose Users personal data in order to protect our legal rights or where disclosure of Users personal data's are required of us by the judicial authorities only when legal procedures are followed.

Files links that Users download are stored in a database for legal concerns and our internal use. All saved links are erased within 1 month for security reasons and service needs. However all requests made on our site are stored for 1 year, the legal retention period.

I would prefer they had a no-logging policy. This sounds fishy af like a honeypot.

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[-] tuff_wizard@aussie.zone 22 points 9 months ago

head over to !selfhosted@lemmy.world and watch any perceived savings evaporate into thin air. along with your spare time.... seriously, its great.

[-] Thordros@hexbear.net 5 points 9 months ago

It was never about the money. joker-dancing

[-] ninjan@lemmy.mildgrim.com 11 points 9 months ago

You paid $0 for the USB SSD? Hehe, just messing with you, welcome to the fun side and I'm sure there will be a lot more updates to your setup over the years! Once you tire of manually hunting torrents you can setup the famous Arr! Stack and if you trust your family they can get login to Radarr and Sonarr such that they can themselves pick out content they want available. And if you want to focus more on the tech and possibilities of self-hosting there are great communities for that as well!

[-] randomname01@feddit.nl 11 points 9 months ago

and if you trust your family they can get login to Radarr and Sonarr such that they can themselves pick out content they want available.

Jellyseerr is far better for this! And if you’re using Plex or Emby, Overseerr and Ombi should work for you.

[-] GiuseppeAndTheYeti@midwest.social 2 points 9 months ago

Well, $180 at Best Buy for a 4TB Crucial SSD. My family is splitting the cost with me though, so really it's like $30.

I know you're just busting my balls, but some people will unironically bring that up as a point of contention. If I really wanted to, I could have just kept using the 64 GB flash drive I had laying around and just had a rotating library, but then it would limit how much time my family would have to watch shows before I had to roll them out for something else. And I didn't like that personally.

[-] Retiring@lemmy.ml 2 points 9 months ago* (last edited 9 months ago)

Or just give them access to ombi which has great granular controls what users can and cannot do.

[-] Valmond@lemmy.mindoki.com 1 points 9 months ago

Even $30 for a raspberry 😭

Good work ofc 😉

[-] TrustingZebra@lemmy.one 2 points 9 months ago

It's a Le Potato, not a Pi.

[-] Valmond@lemmy.mindoki.com 2 points 9 months ago

Oh yeah, missed that, thanks.

[-] Helix@feddit.de 7 points 9 months ago

Needs a few line breaks and the amount of money is way off, as you didn't include costs of electricity and setting it all up.

Still, nice setup :)

[-] GiuseppeAndTheYeti@midwest.social 6 points 9 months ago

Look man...I finally got it fully configured around midnight last night and was excited to share lol.

$30 Le Potato
€5/mo for Mullvad VPN
Optional $180 for a 4TB Crucial SS
Some amount of $ to power the Le Potato
Like 50-60 hours of configuration hell because I am/was a fucking moron when it comes to Linux and networking. So whatever my free time costs in shitty labor conversion.

[-] Helix@feddit.de 3 points 9 months ago

Nice, sounds like you learned some valuable skills. Try to sell them to get the time and money back!

[-] Helix@feddit.de 3 points 9 months ago

Why an SSD? Multiple users at once and seek times?

[-] GiuseppeAndTheYeti@midwest.social 1 points 9 months ago

Yes. USB gives me a theoretical max of 480 MB/.A comparison HDD gives me about 8 more TB, but then I have to worry about the drives failing and a power supply.

[-] nix@merv.news 6 points 9 months ago

I thought mullvad doesn’t work with torrenting anymore?

[-] lud@lemm.ee 8 points 9 months ago

It works without port forwarding but you will probably have a harder time finding peers which will make it slower.

[-] Stormcrow@lemmy.dbzer0.com 3 points 9 months ago

I used Mullvad without port forwarding before they got rid of it and it worked fine for me. That was over 400↓10↑ coax and now I port forward with ProtonVPN over fiber 500↓↑ and the speeds are better, but you're still bottlenecked by the speed of your peers so it not that big of a deal imo

[-] matey@lemmy.dbzer0.com 2 points 9 months ago

I rarely get more than a few mb down or up even with port forwarding.

[-] Stormcrow@lemmy.dbzer0.com 2 points 9 months ago

Yup, private trackers and better, but that's the norm.

[-] Stormcrow@lemmy.dbzer0.com 1 points 9 months ago

Any issues yet with not being able to play certain types of media or are you sticking to something like x264 to avoid transcoding?

[-] GiuseppeAndTheYeti@midwest.social 1 points 9 months ago

Not yet, but if I encounter anything I'll try to come back and let you know. I've not used it extensively yet. I'll admit I'm ignorant to different video transcoding formats too. I think I've used AV1, HEV, and x264 so far. If that makes sense? I may be able to answer you better if you walk me through what you mean, but I think it's been pretty stable all around.

[-] Stormcrow@lemmy.dbzer0.com 2 points 9 months ago

Cool, ya I'm not sure which format is the best, but I believe almost anything will play x264. If you end up using a device that doesn't support certain formats you're using, you'll need a GPU to perform the transcoding or it will be hella slow.

[-] biddy@feddit.nl 1 points 9 months ago

$180 for a new 4TB USB SSD? Hard drives are becoming pointless.

[-] notepass@feddit.de 8 points 9 months ago

For that money I can get 10 to 12tb of HDD storage. So not really useless.

[-] GiuseppeAndTheYeti@midwest.social 3 points 9 months ago

Less power draw, more stable, so much faster...yeah, the only real advantage to actual platters now is capacity, but at these capacities you're likely dealing with very large files, so the convenience of an SSD is worth paying for imo

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