Plex on Ubuntu with media on external HDD

[Ecco]

Hi Guys,

Anybody successfully setup Plex on Ubuntu with your media on an external drive?

I cannot get Plex to see the external drive.

I used the steps int the link below to guide me, but no luck:

How to Install Plex Media Server on Ubuntu 18.04 LTS Server or Desktop

This tutorial shows you how to install Plex media server on Ubuntu 18.04 LTS server/desktop. Enable Plex repository and access external hard drive

www.linuxbabe.com

 

[Ecco]

Likely a permission issue

Now my knowledge about linux permissions is limited, but the link provided the commands to set the correct permissions. I have executed these, no issue. but still nothing visible in Plex, when browsing for media.

 

[Crumbl0x]

Now my knowledge about linux permissions is limited, but the link provided the commands to set the correct permissions. I have executed these, no issue. but still nothing visible in Plex, when browsing for media.

what usually fixes this for me (and emby) is to use gnome-disks to mount the drive in my home dir, but you can set that up in a CLI as well. Good luck! Permissions editing with chmod or fstab work too but do other weird things on my other systems so I just mount.

 

[Ecco]

what usually fixes this for me (and emby) is to use gnome-disks to mount the drive in my home dir, but you can set that up in a CLI as well. Good luck! Permissions editing with chmod or fstab work too but do other weird things on my other systems so I just mount.

If you can share more detail how to do this, i would be grateful

 

[Ecco]

And Plex is set to search the correct directories?

Odd one, maybe a full system reboot is needed

Cannot add the correct directory to search in the first place. Plex cannot see the drive.

Made all the changes as per the link, rebooted the machine several times (for other things too), restarted plex etc. No change.

 

[acidrain]

Did you mount the external drive? That tutorial doesn't cover that part.

How to mount an external HDD?

I have Ubuntu Linux 12.04 version the latest right now.I want to mount an external HDD NTFS 1TB.I have followed many guides but still no success.The error I'm getting is this: Failed to read last ...

askubuntu.com

 

[Crumbl0x]

If you can share more detail how to do this, i would be grateful

the GUI way: gnome-disks > select drive and partition you want > additional partition options (looks like cogs) > edit mount options > slide the switch off for defaults > change mount point to /home/$user/afolderyouwant > ok
then remove and insert the drive again for it to take effect and mount in your home folder, which should work. Just lemme know if something's up

 

[Ecco]

the GUI way: gnome-disks > select drive and partition you want > additional partition options (looks like cogs) > edit mount options > slide the switch off for defaults > change mount point to /home/$user/afolderyouwant > ok
then remove and insert the drive again for it to take effect and mount in your home folder, which should work. Just lemme know if something's up

This did the trick, thank you so much for your help

 

[Ecco]

Adding to this thread, now that plex is sorted, i tried to take the next step and setup Sonarr.

Got everything setup, however when i try and add a show, I again cannot see the External drive, even at the mount point I created as above. If I manually enter that into the field, I get and error "Folder is not writable by user root"

 

[Gtx Gaming]

Do you really need to use linux? I mean all good and well if do have lots free-time to set this up.

 

[SauRoNZA]

Is the external mounted statically in fstab?

Can you get to the location yourself in the GUI or command line? It’s usually under /media

 

[SauRoNZA]

Adding to this thread, now that plex is sorted, i tried to take the next step and setup Sonarr.

Got everything setup, however when i try and add a show, I again cannot see the External drive, even at the mount point I created as above. If I manually enter that into the field, I get and error "Folder is not writable by user root"

Do ls -l on the folder in question and post it here.

Likely it doesn’t have permissions as it suggests.

Easy to fix although a very bad way to go about things, but unless you setup the sonar user and groups properly you won’t make it work otherwise.

How did you install Sonarr?

 

[Ecco]

Do you really need to use linux? I mean all good and well if do have lots free-time to set this up.

My PC i am using as the media sever is quite old. So Windows 10 runs really poorly, and with all the patches, its always needs a reboot and the installation of the updates takes forever. I am trying the to get the linux setup going because of the stability and performance. If all else fails, i will revert back to my windows partition

 

[Gtx Gaming]

My PC i am using as the media sever is quite old. So Windows 10 runs really poorly, and with all the patches, its always needs a reboot and the installation of the updates takes forever. I am trying the to get the linux setup going because of the stability and performance. If all else fails, i will revert back to my windows partition

Ahah ok make sense, through it was because windows 10 too exspensive

 

[Ecco]

Do ls -l on the folder in question and post it here.

Likely it doesn’t have permissions as it suggests.

Easy to fix although a very bad way to go about things, but unless you setup the sonar user and groups properly you won’t make it work otherwise.

How did you install Sonarr?

I installed Sonarr through the Ubuntu software app (didnt go command line seeing as it was available)

Here is the output:

drwxrwxrwx 1 root root 4096 Mar 18 19:51 D
drwxrwxrwx 1 root root 4096 Mar 19 19:18 Downloads
drwxrwxrwx 1 root root 8192 Mar 17 11:58 Movies
drwxrwxrwx 1 root root 0 Mar 11 16:41 '$RECYCLE.BIN'
drwxrwxrwx 1 root root 4096 Mar 19 19:19 'System Volume Information'
drwxrwxrwx 1 root root 8192 Mar 16 18:08 'TV Series'
-rwxrwxrwx 1 root root 2126544896 Mar 20 11:56 ubuntu-18.04.4-desktop-amd64.iso

 

[SauRoNZA]

I installed Sonarr through the Ubuntu software app (didnt go command line seeing as it was available)

Here is the output:

drwxrwxrwx 1 root root 4096 Mar 18 19:51 D
drwxrwxrwx 1 root root 4096 Mar 19 19:18 Downloads
drwxrwxrwx 1 root root 8192 Mar 17 11:58 Movies
drwxrwxrwx 1 root root 0 Mar 11 16:41 '$RECYCLE.BIN'
drwxrwxrwx 1 root root 4096 Mar 19 19:19 'System Volume Information'
drwxrwxrwx 1 root root 8192 Mar 16 18:08 'TV Series'
-rwxrwxrwx 1 root root 2126544896 Mar 20 11:56 ubuntu-18.04.4-desktop-amd64.iso

Is that an NTFS drive?

 

[Ecco]

Yes (really need to be able to fall back to windows if need be)

Is that an NTFS drive?

 

[SauRoNZA]

Yes (really need to be able to fall back to windows if need be)

Likely your problem right there.

Best way would be to mount it in Fstab.

Redirect Notice

MountingWindowsPartitions - Community Help Wiki

How to mount a NTFS partition in /etc/fstab?

I have two partitions that I want to mount on startup: /dev/sda3 /mnt/devel ext4 defaults 0 2 /dev/sda2 /mnt/excess ntfs defaults 0 2 The ext4 partition mounts fine (owned by ...

askubuntu.com

Usually half arsing things and trying to have fallbacks is exactly why people have so many Linux problems. They try to live two lives at once.

If you formatted the drive as ext4 from the start likely would have avoided a lot of hassles.

 

[Ecco]

Likely your problem right there.

Best way would be to mount it in Fstab.

Redirect Notice

MountingWindowsPartitions - Community Help Wiki

How to mount a NTFS partition in /etc/fstab?

I have two partitions that I want to mount on startup: /dev/sda3 /mnt/devel ext4 defaults 0 2 /dev/sda2 /mnt/excess ntfs defaults 0 2 The ext4 partition mounts fine (owned by ...

askubuntu.com

Usually half arsing things and trying to have fallbacks is exactly why people have so many Linux problems. They try to live two lives at once.

If you formatted the drive as ext4 from the start likely would have avoided a lot of hassles.

I have another much smaller drive lying around - will format it to ext4 and test - if it works, i may consider formatting the current drive. Will try just now and let you know the outcome

 

[Ecco]

@SauRoNZA

Just tested with another drive formatted ext4 and same result as before. This time screenshot (maybe i am doing something wrong:


When i type the path name in the field, and press enter i get the same error message as before (I mounted the drive to the Test folder in my home drive):


output of folder is on that drive is below:
~/Test$ ls -l
total 20
drwx------ 2 root root 16384 Mar 23 10:30 lost+found
drwxr-xr-x 2 ecco ecco 4096 Mar 23 10:34 TestMovies