How to Turn Your Computer Into a DLNA Media Server

How to Turn Your Computer Into a DLNA Media Server

Many boxes you plug into your TV, including the Roku, Xbox 360, Xbox One, and PlayStation 3 offer DLNA (“Digital Living Network Alliance”) streaming support. They can stream video files and music over the network from your PC — as long as you set up a DLNA server first.

This feature is also known as “Play To” or UPnP AV. Using it is easier than you might think, as the server software you’ll need is built into Windows. if you want to play media files from your computer on a DLNA-enabled set-top box, it’s useful.

Enable the DLNA Media Server Built Into Windows

There square measure many various items of a package which will operate as DLNA servers. however you don’t ought to install something special to urge started. Windows has Associated in Nursing integrated DLNA server you'll be able to modify. To activate it, open the board and explore for “media.” Click the “Media streaming options” link.

How to Turn Your Computer Into a DLNA Media Server

Click the “Turn on media streaming” button to enable the media-streaming server. Although this Control Panel doesn’t mention the term “DLNA” at all, the media-streaming feature in Windows is a DLNA-compliant media server.

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How to Turn Your Computer Into a DLNA Media Server

You can currently customise the streaming settings. This window doesn’t really tell you ways to feature video, music, and movie files which will be streamed over the network. However, the media-streaming feature depends on your Windows libraries.

If you wish to stream video, music, or image files, add them to the Videos, Music, or footage libraries. You don’t ought to move the files to this library folders — you'll add new folders to the libraries. On Windows eight.1, you’ll have to be compelled to unhide the libraries to access them.

How to Turn Your Computer Into a DLNA Media Server

You can currently access the DLNA media player on your different devices. as an example, if you have got a Roku, you'll install the Roku Media Player channel and open it. DLNA servers on your native network can seem within the list, thus you'll choose your PC and stream media files from it.

In addition to browsing your shared media library from the device, you'll use the Play To feature to seek out media on your PC and begin taking part in it directly on the networked device. Or use the DLNA media-streaming options to share media between your PCs.

Plex, PS3 Media Server, and More — For Mac and Linux Too

The Windows DLNA server is the easiest and fastest one to set up — all it takes is a few clicks. However, it’s not necessarily the best option. Due to the way DLNA works, you can only stream certain types of media codecs, for example. If you have other types of media, it just won’t work.

Other DLNA servers improve this by offering real-time transcoding. If you try to play an unsupported file, they’ll transcode it on-the-fly, streaming the video in a supported form to your DLNA device.

Many different media servers support DLNA, as well as the vastly standard Plex computer code. Plex supports DLNA still, therefore you'll be able to install the Plex media server on your laptop and use DLNA on another device to access your media if you would like. Plex’s own interface is additional featureful, however, your Plex library can even be accessed via DLNA.

You might even be inquisitive about the fully free PS3 Media Server. It began as a project designed to stream media from your laptop to a PlayStation three via DLNA, however, it’s expanded  to support different devices.

The nice factor concerning Plex, PS3 Media Server, and different third-party DLNA-compliant servers is that they support raincoat OS X and UNIX still as Windows. Macs and UNIX PCs don’t have this feature inbuilt, therefore, a third-party media server like these area unit ideal.

How to Turn Your Computer Into a DLNA Media Server

DLNA looks to air its resolution. Sony doesn’t support it on their own PlayStation four, for instance — albeit Sony essentially created DLNA quite a decade past. DLNA is basically targeted on taking part in back media files you have got downloaded on your laptop (video files, music files, and image files) on different devices. The fashionable solutions area unit sometimes targeted on streaming media from the cloud. And, although you wish to manage your own native media library, an answer like Plex is a lot of full-featured and higher.

This standard’s strength remains its wide scheme of supported devices. albeit it’s not a perfect answer, it provides the glue to link a good sort of devices along with none third-party apps. Devices that don’t have internet browsers or apps you'll use to access Plex might support DLNA.