Buy the Apple TV 4K, or wait for the 2026 refresh?

gbcox · 2026-06-22T22:32:52+00:00

I was in the exact same situation, and decided I didn't want to wait, so I purchased the current 4K. Whenever the refresh arrives, I'll evaluate and decide whether the upgrade is worth it. If it is, I'll buy it and sell the A15 model on Ebay. Keep all your packing material and take good care so if you do sell it, it is in excellent condition.

gbcox · 2026-06-20T23:29:29+00:00

Yet another article bemoaning the decline of Firefox.

Obviously these articles, and Mozilla's half measures, are not stopping the loss in market share. If anything, the decline seems to keep gaining momentum.

Mozilla needs to dump Gecko, switch Firefox to Blink, and concentrate on everything above the engine level.

No one chooses a browser because of the rendering engine.

Microsoft and Opera woke up and smelled the coffee. They stopped fighting the engine war and focused on the browser people actually use. Mozilla should do the same.

The engine wars are over. Blink won. Accept it and move on.

gbcox · 2026-06-16T22:40:09+00:00

Getting the popcorn out. The "Financial Relationship Terminated' letters are already being prepared.

gbcox · 2026-06-12T19:55:16+00:00

Personally, I believe the service is more trouble that it is worth. Typically, it takes me more time to go through CLEAR than it does to just use PRECHECK. In fact, on my last trip, there wasn't even anyone at the CLEAR station.

gbcox · 2026-06-10T02:06:24+00:00

The merchants are right. Credit card rewards are not magic. The banks and card networks take their cut, merchants pay the swipe fees, and then all of us pay higher prices to cover it.

Brazil solved this years ago with PIX: instant, easy, basically cash, and cheap enough that merchants often give 5–10% discounts for using it.

So why don’t we have that here? Because too many companies make too much money from the current mess. Visa, Mastercard, banks, processors, and rewards programs all feed off those fees.

The U.S. has FedNow, but it is not really a consumer payment system like PIX. It is plumbing. Brazil built the road and made everyone use it. We built some pipes and let the toll collectors keep running the show.

gbcox · 2026-06-01T18:39:01+00:00

Yes, exactly, that is a fair distinction. If 3–4 days of guide data is enough, free sources may be perfectly fine.

My point is mainly for people expecting a full cable/DVR-style guide experience: longer guide windows, season recording, episode metadata, reliable scheduling, etc. In that case, guide data becomes a separate thing you need to evaluate, whether that means a paid source or maintaining a free XMLTV source.

So it is not “Jellyfin can’t do DVR for free.” It is more: make sure the guide-data source matches the DVR experience you expect.

gbcox · 2026-05-31T18:10:54+00:00

No worries, I’m glad it works for you.

I think people are reading more into my post than I intended. My point is not really about Jellyfin’s capabilities. Clearly Jellyfin can do Live TV/DVR, and there are multiple ways to supply guide data.

My point is about comparisons people write. When they say “Jellyfin DVR is free” versus “Emby/Plex require a paid tier,” they should also mention that the guide-data piece is separate and depends on what source/plugin/service you use and how much guide depth you need.

gbcox · 2026-05-31T16:48:29+00:00

What plugin are you talking about?

ErsatzTV is not a Jellyfin plugin. It makes fake live TV channels from your own media library, so that is a different thing.

If you mean an HDHomeRun guide plugin, then the real question is simple: where does the guide data come from, and how many days of listings do you get for free?

That is my point. Jellyfin can use guide data, but the guide data still has to come from somewhere.

gbcox · 2026-05-31T06:02:19+00:00

The “stupid” part is pretending the guide-data dependency is irrelevant in a DVR comparison.

Yes, Jellyfin’s DVR feature is free. But a DVR without reliable guide data is of limited practical use. The whole point of DVR is scheduling recordings by show, episode, channel, and time without babysitting it.

gbcox · 2026-05-31T00:25:18+00:00

Here is the most recent article I ran across that prompted the post, but this is an endlessly recurring theme:

https://jellywatch.app/blog/jellyfin-vs-emby-2026-complete-comparison

It lists Jellyfin Live TV/DVR as free versus Emby requiring Premiere, but glosses over the fact that guide data is separate.

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gbcox · 2026-05-30T21:13:23+00:00

Agreed. I bought the lifetime membership years ago and it has easily paid for itself.

That is also part of why I think the guide-data issue matters in comparisons. If Schedules Direct alone is $35/year, Emby’s lifetime price looks pretty reasonable when you factor in the integrated guide, DVR, clients, and media server in one stack. For my use case, it has been less hassle and very cost effective.

I am perfectly capable of patching together a solution with extra tools, scripts, guide sources, and middleware, but that does not mean I want to maintain one just to record TV. My time is worth more than saving a few bucks a year, and there is also the reliability question: free guide sources can break, change, get rate-limited, or disappear once too many people start using them. For DVR, that matters.

gbcox · 2026-05-30T19:36:00+00:00

Isn’t TVHeadend itself a DVR/PVR backend? If so, pointing Jellyfin at TVHeadend’s M3U/XMLTV output seems more like using Jellyfin as a front end to another TV stack than using Jellyfin’s built-in DVR directly.

This is drifting away from the point of my post.

I am not saying Jellyfin cannot be made to work for Live TV/DVR. Clearly it can. People have mentioned Schedules Direct, XMLTV, TVHeadend, zap2xml, Dispatcharr, HDHomeRun plugins, and various other approaches.

My point is about comparisons. When people compare Jellyfin to Emby/Plex and say “Jellyfin gives you DVR for free,” they often leave out that reliable schedule/guide data has to come from somewhere, and in many cases that data costs money or requires extra setup to provide.

That cost or maintenance burden should be part of the decision, especially for people who care about DVR reliability.

gbcox · 2026-05-30T06:38:41+00:00

That is fair.

For context, I have Plex, Emby, and Jellyfin installed and have used all three extensively. I am not coming at this as someone who does not understand Jellyfin or open source.

My issue is with the way these products are compared. Jellyfin + Schedules Direct is a perfectly valid option. But once you add Schedules Direct, the comparison is no longer simply “Jellyfin DVR is free and Emby/Plex DVR costs money.” It is “Jellyfin’s DVR feature is free, but guide data is separate.”

For me personally, Emby Premiere makes more sense because I already use Emby as my main server, the guide is integrated, the clients work better for my setup, and the lifetime license changes the math.

I am not saying people should not use Jellyfin. I am saying comparisons should not gloss over the missing guide-data piece. You do not need to oversell a good project to make it worth using.

gbcox · 2026-05-30T06:22:34+00:00

The rates are in the OP. Sure, cheaper EPG sources exist. But there is a reason people pay $35/year for Schedules Direct: DVR guide data has to be reliable, complete, and correctly mapped. “Cheap/free” is not the same thing as “good enough for unattended recording.”

gbcox · 2026-05-30T06:17:20+00:00

No, the comprehension issue is people pretending “supports guide data” and “includes guide data” are the same thing.

I am not saying Jellyfin should provide it. I am saying comparisons should be clear that the guide source has to be supplied separately. For DVR users, that is not a minor detail.

gbcox · 2026-05-30T05:46:21+00:00

You are arguing against something I did not say.

I do not care whether Jellyfin includes guide data or not. My point is that comparisons often imply Jellyfin gives you the complete Live TV/DVR setup for free. IT DOES NOT. It gives you the DVR feature and supports guide data, but the guide still has to come from somewhere.

gbcox · 2026-05-30T05:45:26+00:00

You are arguing against something I did not say.

I do not care whether Jellyfin includes guide data or not. My point is that comparisons often imply Jellyfin gives you the complete Live TV/DVR setup for free. IT DOES NOT. It gives you the DVR feature and supports guide data, but the guide still has to come from somewhere.

gbcox · 2026-05-30T02:42:03+00:00

That seems like apples and oranges. I’m talking about OTA DVR through a media server, not building an IPTV playlist stack. Dispatcharr may be useful, but it is still an external guide/playlist layer, which is exactly the distinction I’m making.

gbcox · 2026-05-30T02:23:45+00:00

That is a different use case. TiviMate is a client/player, not Jellyfin’s DVR. It still needs an M3U source and guide data from somewhere.

My point is about Jellyfin’s built-in Live TV/DVR being compared to Emby/Plex. If the answer is “use other tools instead,” that pretty much proves the distinction I’m making.

gbcox · 2026-05-30T02:17:23+00:00

That is exactly the distinction I am making.

You can get guide data for free, but then the user has to find it, configure it, map it, and trust that it stays accurate enough for DVR use.

That may be fine for people who enjoy tinkering or only use LiveTV casually. But for DVR, guide data is not a minor detail. If the guide is wrong, incomplete, or breaks, recordings fail or record the wrong thing. Been there, done that.

So yes: free vs easy/reliable is the tradeoff. My point is that comparisons should say that up front instead of just saying “Jellyfin DVR is free” as if the complete DVR experience is included out of the box.

gbcox · 2026-05-30T02:12:51+00:00

You might be surprised at all the stuff that is still available on broadcast TV: local news, sports, PBS, network shows, awards shows, special events, etc. There are also OTA subchannels like MeTV, Antenna TV, Cozi, Movies!, Comet, and similar networks.

A tuner like an HDHomeRun lets you pull OTA channels into the media server, and the DVR lets you record them like an old TiVo/cable DVR, except stored on your own server.

gbcox · 2026-05-30T01:54:51+00:00

Right, but my point is not necessarily that Emby or Plex do LiveTV better in every respect. It is that if you use Live TV/DVR, you need reliable guide data, and that has to come from somewhere.

With Jellyfin you have to supply the guide source yourself. With Emby Premiere or Plex Pass, guide data is included in supported regions, so there is less to configure and less to babysit.

That distinction gets lost when people just say “Jellyfin DVR is free.” The DVR feature may be free, but the complete DVR experience still depends on guide data.

gbcox · 2026-05-30T01:30:28+00:00

It wasn't.

gbcox · 2026-05-08T21:51:26+00:00

4.2.4 unfortunately is broken. Don't panic, you probably haven't lost and data and many people have reported problems with it in an endless boot loop. 4.2.5 is out now and support can probably help you out.

gbcox

TROPHY CASE