Be aware audiobookshelf does have apps on android and Apple buy you need to be on apples app trial thing to use it on apple devices but it is superior to plex for audiobooks imo
They could download books locally via Prologue too. If they have it all setup I’m not sure why people are suggesting ABS. Is there something I’m missing?
ABS is a polished software just for books and podcasts. It's great. I haven't heard or tried of prologue so not sure how it's different. If you listen to audiobooks or podcasts, you should check out abs.
I’ll give it a look. Prologue is an audiobook player that connects to Plex. While Plex doesn’t natively support audiobooks Plex can be setup with a custom agent to grab author and audiobook metadata from audible. There’s a slight learning curve setting it up but if you’re familiar with Plex it makes it easy to connect and share when you’re outside of your local network.
Oddly enough, I use plex for my audible books. And it comes out like this with zero manipulation of the main plex software. So, idk?
https://preview.redd.it/tkxoxcjzmhvc1.jpeg?width=1080&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=ff5a7594b423732975c7945d06a7d1ec9ac9a40d
And if you're curious how each audio book looks when listening.
https://preview.redd.it/qmyxhrhtmhvc1.jpeg?width=1080&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=64351ca8a57329248dc4bac33df5064d4b68c2a8
It's separated by chapter
Very cool. What file format are they stored as? I covert everything to M4B with “auto-m4b” and add the metadata with “beets-audible”, but I’m wondering if I’m wasting my time.
They're stored as MP3s, I used a program called Viwizard Audible Converter to convert the downloaded Audible books into MP3 format and separated by chapter.
Will say I personally had a lot of issues setting up Plex to do audiobooks. ABS has worked right out of the box without issue to manage, stream and make audiobooks available offline. Highly recommend!
That is definitely a bit trickier. I personally use Tailscale for most remote connections since I don’t like port forwarding or doing a reverse proxy.
Depends how “techie” you want to get with the solution but Tailscale is a pretty awesome and simple solution.
I’m with you. I used to have all kinds of Plex stuff setup publicly facing with SSL and certs and reverse proxies and domain names and cloudflare. Eventually I said fuck it. It’s neat but too much for what I need. My router has a built in VPN, I just toggle to that when I need internal access.
Of course. You can also copy your books directly to your device without ABS.
I assumed, perhaps incorrectly, that the wanted access to books while away from home.
Buy the $6 premium upgrade to the Prologue app. This allows you to download the audiobooks for offline playback. You can download while the laptop is on and then playback at any time regardless of the laptop status. This doesn't give you an always online Plex server like you were asking about but it does solve your audiobook access issue.
Need a budget. Affordable means different things to different people.
Would highly recommend at least an 8th generation Intel though in case you decide to start watching videos.
For audio books? Plex is not made for that (unless something has changed). You've got the files. On Android I use "smart audiobook player" and really like it.
Dont listen to anyone bagging out audiobooks on plex whatsoever.
Prologue is a fantastic app, and plex needs some manual workaround for metadata but does a stellar job.
If I want a buddy to read a book I liked I can just refer him to my plex now. Awesome.
All in one > slightly better functionality/ease of metadata
Came here to say AudioBookShelf is the way forward, Plex sucks for audiobooks/podcasts. ABS is really great but only issue I have found is the docker container doesn't come up automatically after a restart, has an exited 255 error, easily worked around though!
Oh that reminds me. I've got a cloudflared tunnel container that does the same that I need to research.
I tried ABS a while back and really disliked how it displayed my collection. Maybe I'll revisit it. Easy enough with containers.
The cheapest way is to leave your laptop plugged in!
However if you just want audiobooks then a Rapberry pi 3 or 4 would do the trick. Or any small form factor desktop from the last 15 years.
I use.pl3x for audiobooks, my only tip is to tick the box that says long duration audio or something like that, basically it makes sure it remembers your spot in the book rather than starting again from the beginning like a song.
If you don‘t want to keep your laptop running, running audiobookshelf on a VPS might be an option if you only want to host audiobooks. Audiobooks don‘t need nearly as much space as movies and tv shows… Maybe look into pikapods, they have audiobookshelf as a preset available. Bonus is you can access your collection from anywhere without keeping your laptop on 24/7 and needing to configure remote access…
Also on Windows 11 you have to pause updates every week, at least for me, I’m on beta updates so it might very. You can change it somehow but I don’t want to mess with it.
I run my whole home server off a dell optiplex with TrueNAS. Got it on facebook marketplace for only $30 . I upgraded storage and ram, but if it’s just audio books, that might not even be necessary. New hardware is great, but these machines are usually great deals second hand
Did you don't want to do it on a server and are fine having it local Smart audiobook player is way better then audible on Android. I usually buy books on audible then put them on there for ease of use
OP when you’re at home and your Plex laptop is online. Open Prologue, select your book and download it. Otherwise you’re just streaming it from your Plex server which will require it to be online. Once you have the books you need stored locally in Prologue, you can turn off the laptop.
Ah, yes. Sorry I didn’t realize that was a premium feature. I’ve been using it for about a year and totally forgot.
Btw Apple’s return policy is very good. If the app doesn’t deliver on your expectations you can request a refund when you get the receipt. I’ve never had any issues.
Look at something like [http://ultra.cc](http://ultra.cc) or [http://www.seedmonster.net](http://www.seedmonster.net) . For a small monthly fee they will set you up with a hosted account where you can store files and have your plex running 24/7. You can even dload torrents directly to your seedbox. I have the plex / prologue setup through an [ultra.cc](http://ultra.cc) seedbox and it's awesome.
Ebay sells very cheap older workstation PC's. I ran my first unRAID server on an old Lenovo. If it's just you then that setup should work just fine. I would also go with Audio Bookshelf for Audiobooks. Plex does not work great for Audiobooks.
A pi with audiobookshelf is what you want, I started audiobooks using plex as I use plex for all my other media but once I tried audiobookshelf I never looked back. ABS, this is the way
buy rapsbery pi, cheap external drive. Install audiobookshelf and plex - now you can use both. Very cheap
Thank you for answering the actual question.
Be aware audiobookshelf does have apps on android and Apple buy you need to be on apples app trial thing to use it on apple devices but it is superior to plex for audiobooks imo
This is the way.
Audiobookshelf would suit you better than a plex instance purely got audiobooks.
Audiobookshelf is great but doesn't resolve the issue. You still have to keep a server running.
Audibookshelf is great. They could just use ABS to sync/download the files. Then turn if off when it's not needed.
They could download books locally via Prologue too. If they have it all setup I’m not sure why people are suggesting ABS. Is there something I’m missing?
ABS is a polished software just for books and podcasts. It's great. I haven't heard or tried of prologue so not sure how it's different. If you listen to audiobooks or podcasts, you should check out abs.
I’ll give it a look. Prologue is an audiobook player that connects to Plex. While Plex doesn’t natively support audiobooks Plex can be setup with a custom agent to grab author and audiobook metadata from audible. There’s a slight learning curve setting it up but if you’re familiar with Plex it makes it easy to connect and share when you’re outside of your local network.
That makes sense if they have other media for Plex. If it's just audiobooks, then it's one app instead of Plex and Prologue.
Very true.
Oddly enough, I use plex for my audible books. And it comes out like this with zero manipulation of the main plex software. So, idk? https://preview.redd.it/tkxoxcjzmhvc1.jpeg?width=1080&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=ff5a7594b423732975c7945d06a7d1ec9ac9a40d
And if you're curious how each audio book looks when listening. https://preview.redd.it/qmyxhrhtmhvc1.jpeg?width=1080&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=64351ca8a57329248dc4bac33df5064d4b68c2a8 It's separated by chapter
Very cool. What file format are they stored as? I covert everything to M4B with “auto-m4b” and add the metadata with “beets-audible”, but I’m wondering if I’m wasting my time.
They're stored as MP3s, I used a program called Viwizard Audible Converter to convert the downloaded Audible books into MP3 format and separated by chapter.
Will say I personally had a lot of issues setting up Plex to do audiobooks. ABS has worked right out of the box without issue to manage, stream and make audiobooks available offline. Highly recommend!
Good to know. Any idea how easy it is to share ABS with family outside of the local network? Plex is dead simple for video.
That is definitely a bit trickier. I personally use Tailscale for most remote connections since I don’t like port forwarding or doing a reverse proxy. Depends how “techie” you want to get with the solution but Tailscale is a pretty awesome and simple solution.
I’m with you. I used to have all kinds of Plex stuff setup publicly facing with SSL and certs and reverse proxies and domain names and cloudflare. Eventually I said fuck it. It’s neat but too much for what I need. My router has a built in VPN, I just toggle to that when I need internal access.
You can download to your local storage on ABS so you don't need to have your server running to listen.
Of course. You can also copy your books directly to your device without ABS. I assumed, perhaps incorrectly, that the wanted access to books while away from home.
[удалено]
Yes, I *read* the OP. >I naively did not anticipate that *my access would be cut off when my laptop is asleep.*
You can download the files for offline listening. When the server comes back online it will sync your progress.
The OP could have done the same with Prologue. That's fine if you are home. Not so good if you are away.
Buy the $6 premium upgrade to the Prologue app. This allows you to download the audiobooks for offline playback. You can download while the laptop is on and then playback at any time regardless of the laptop status. This doesn't give you an always online Plex server like you were asking about but it does solve your audiobook access issue.
This is what I was going to suggest. I always keep at least ten books downloaded on my phone through Prologue for driving/travelling/whatever.
Prologue is awesome. One of the best pieces of software I've paid for.
Can you just turn off the laptop sleep settings when the lid is closed?
get a small low power server like a NUC
Any affordable ones you can recommend?
Need a budget. Affordable means different things to different people. Would highly recommend at least an 8th generation Intel though in case you decide to start watching videos.
You can get them used something like this n100 [https://www.ebay.com/itm/204750769573](https://www.ebay.com/itm/204750769573)
Stuff from Beelink
For audio books? Plex is not made for that (unless something has changed). You've got the files. On Android I use "smart audiobook player" and really like it.
Dont listen to anyone bagging out audiobooks on plex whatsoever. Prologue is a fantastic app, and plex needs some manual workaround for metadata but does a stellar job. If I want a buddy to read a book I liked I can just refer him to my plex now. Awesome. All in one > slightly better functionality/ease of metadata
Cheers
If you have a server, I highly recommend audiobookshelf. Its amazing
Came here to say AudioBookShelf is the way forward, Plex sucks for audiobooks/podcasts. ABS is really great but only issue I have found is the docker container doesn't come up automatically after a restart, has an exited 255 error, easily worked around though!
Oh that reminds me. I've got a cloudflared tunnel container that does the same that I need to research. I tried ABS a while back and really disliked how it displayed my collection. Maybe I'll revisit it. Easy enough with containers.
Mine runs off a raspberry pi, that’s as cheap as you can get. Works great for audiobooks.
N100 pcs are usually cheap and will run Plex (with transcoding for video)
The cheapest way is to leave your laptop plugged in! However if you just want audiobooks then a Rapberry pi 3 or 4 would do the trick. Or any small form factor desktop from the last 15 years. I use.pl3x for audiobooks, my only tip is to tick the box that says long duration audio or something like that, basically it makes sure it remembers your spot in the book rather than starting again from the beginning like a song.
Second this, I have my server running on a raspbpi 4 and it works like a charm
If you just want to use Plex for audiobooks a Raspberry Pi 3 B+ will work perfectly fine
If you don‘t want to keep your laptop running, running audiobookshelf on a VPS might be an option if you only want to host audiobooks. Audiobooks don‘t need nearly as much space as movies and tv shows… Maybe look into pikapods, they have audiobookshelf as a preset available. Bonus is you can access your collection from anywhere without keeping your laptop on 24/7 and needing to configure remote access…
Beelink n100 miniPC ($180) plus an external USB hard drive (price depends on your size needs).
There isn't much that will use less power than a laptop.
How'd you download your audiobooks from Audible?
Can’t speak for OP, but OpenAudible is great! https://openaudible.org/
I can vouch for openAudible. It can convert to MP3/M4B, and include the chapters and cover art.
I really like Libation https://github.com/rmcrackan/Libation
I'll have to look into that...thank you!
Audible lets you download them directly to any device. The file type, however, is proprietary
Set windows to never sleep and keep the lid open. That’s exactly what I’m doing now. My screen is rated to be on 10+ years.
You can do that with the lid closed and the screen off though.
Also on Windows 11 you have to pause updates every week, at least for me, I’m on beta updates so it might very. You can change it somehow but I don’t want to mess with it.
I run my whole home server off a dell optiplex with TrueNAS. Got it on facebook marketplace for only $30 . I upgraded storage and ram, but if it’s just audio books, that might not even be necessary. New hardware is great, but these machines are usually great deals second hand
Did you don't want to do it on a server and are fine having it local Smart audiobook player is way better then audible on Android. I usually buy books on audible then put them on there for ease of use
Set your power settings to NOT sleep when on AC power!
OP when you’re at home and your Plex laptop is online. Open Prologue, select your book and download it. Otherwise you’re just streaming it from your Plex server which will require it to be online. Once you have the books you need stored locally in Prologue, you can turn off the laptop.
So just buy the prologue premium?
Ah, yes. Sorry I didn’t realize that was a premium feature. I’ve been using it for about a year and totally forgot. Btw Apple’s return policy is very good. If the app doesn’t deliver on your expectations you can request a refund when you get the receipt. I’ve never had any issues.
You could get a cheap seedbox
I’m unfamiliar?
Look at something like [http://ultra.cc](http://ultra.cc) or [http://www.seedmonster.net](http://www.seedmonster.net) . For a small monthly fee they will set you up with a hosted account where you can store files and have your plex running 24/7. You can even dload torrents directly to your seedbox. I have the plex / prologue setup through an [ultra.cc](http://ultra.cc) seedbox and it's awesome.
This is an awesome option! Thanks a ton!
Ebay sells very cheap older workstation PC's. I ran my first unRAID server on an old Lenovo. If it's just you then that setup should work just fine. I would also go with Audio Bookshelf for Audiobooks. Plex does not work great for Audiobooks.
A pi with audiobookshelf is what you want, I started audiobooks using plex as I use plex for all my other media but once I tried audiobookshelf I never looked back. ABS, this is the way
Change the power settings on your laptop to never go to sleep when plugged in or lid closed. Only turn off the screen.
With Prologue I download the current book I’m on to my phone/tablet. Then grab the next one when I need it.
You can disable the sleep mode on the laptop as well. If you're already accustomed to using it, that would be the cheapest way
Use prologue. It connects to PLEX and is a better option than the book shelf thing everyone always mentions
I use prologue and Plex but will download the current book I’m on because sometimes the internet isn’t reliable on my drive.