Standalone Samsung TV Media Player App

N2TE · Sep 9, 2020

Is there a media player app available for the Samsung QLED TV? I'm helping a friend who wants to be able to open a video player app on his new Samsung TV, browse to a shared folder on his PC HDD over his home-network, double-click on a desired video file (i.e. mp4, avi, mkv, etc) that resides on the PC HDD and subsequently play the selected video content on his Samsung. I do this ALL the time on my Sony TV using the VLC app and it works like a charm. He would like the same on his Samsung TV. When I tried to set this up this same capability on his Samsung TV we seemed to have discovered that VLC is NOT supported. (bummer) And then in addition there doesn't appear to be any simple standalone media player available (at least that we could find) to install that would allow him to do what I do with VLC on my Sony TV. Am I missing something here? Is VLC not supported by Samsung? There HAS to be an equivalent standalone media player app for the Samsung. Y?N? There sure doesn't seem to be any shortage of paid $$$ streaming apps available however! Can someone provide some info on this? Thanks.

Deleted member 433786 · Sep 9, 2020

N2TE said:
Is there a media player app available for the Samsung QLED TV? I'm helping a friend who wants to be able to open a video player app on his new Samsung TV, browse to a shared folder on his PC HDD over his home-network, double-click on a desired video file (i.e. mp4, avi, mkv, etc) that resides on the PC HDD and subsequently play the selected video content on his Samsung. I do this ALL the time on my Sony TV using the VLC app and it works like a charm. He would like the same on his Samsung TV. When I tried to set this up this same capability on his Samsung TV we seemed to have discovered that VLC is NOT supported. (bummer) And then in addition there doesn't appear to be any simple standalone media player available (at least that we could find) to install that would allow him to do what I do with VLC on my Sony TV. Am I missing something here? Is VLC not supported by Samsung? There HAS to be an equivalent standalone media player app for the Samsung. Y?N? There sure doesn't seem to be any shortage of paid $$$ streaming apps available however! Can someone provide some info on this? Thanks.

Hi mate I do not think there is a standalone player which can browse a SMB share on Samsung TV’s

You have 2 options which will work.

1. Create a DLNA based share on the PC, this will then show up on the samsung under sources, you can then select this, browse and playback the file using the built in media player.

2. Create a Plex Media Server on the PC and install the Samsung Plex client on the TV.

Best option is dependent on the content, for example Samsung TVs post 2017 do not support DTS based audio, fortunately Plex has the ability to transcode this into DD which will then work with the TV.

N2TE · Sep 10, 2020

DLNA works like a charm! THANK YOU! Easy setup with instructions found on the internet. And easy navigation to access and launch the movie file from the TV's home screen. Perfect.

One additional question. I wish we could also, simultaneously, access the audio (via the PC) from the movie being played on the TV (in room 'A') and connect the movie's audio to the home theater amp via the PC (both in room 'B'). The home theater surround sound speakers are located and connected wirelessly in the TV room. When the movie is playing on the TV, there is no indication on the PC that a file is being accessed and served up to the TV. Any way to 'grab' that movie audio from the PC (via DLNA) and do this? Does DLNA allow for something like this? Not a show stopper. But would be nice to route the audio over to the home theater sound system. Any suggestions?

Deleted member 433786 · Sep 10, 2020

N2TE said:
DLNA works like a charm! THANK YOU! Easy setup with instructions found on the internet. And easy navigation to access and launch the movie file from the TV's home screen. Perfect.

One additional question. I wish we could also, simultaneously, access the audio (via the PC) from the movie being played on the TV (in room 'A') and connect the movie's audio to the home theater amp via the PC (both in room 'B'). The home theater surround sound speakers are located and connected wirelessly in the TV room. When the movie is playing on the TV, there is no indication on the PC that a file is being accessed and served up to the TV. Any way to 'grab' that movie audio from the PC (via DLNA) and do this? Does DLNA allow for something like this? Not a show stopper. But would be nice to route the audio over to the home theater sound system. Any suggestions?

That cant be done mate, but what can be done is mirror your PC screen to the TV, using this method you should be able to configure audio to use the PC speakers