Question Old fart needs help

[RSAofYAP]

Yes, Plex and Jellyfin are great tools, but ... I'm not long for this life and they won't work. I am not sure which son my wife will live with when I'm gone, but regardless, none of them are tech savy and believe it or not, none of my 11 grandchildren are either. I have visions of my wife watching 4TB's of family movies with my grandchildren after I'm gone. She likes the Jellyfin menu because nothing comes up except what is on our hard drive; no suggestions or pictures of things we don't want our grandkids watching. I need a hardware browser. I need something I can add to our hard drive so all that has to be done is connect it to a usb port on a tv or Roku or Amazon. Yes, they all allow us to do that, but there are no images, just a boring list; fine for me, but not for an elderly lady and grandkids. She needs pictures, images, posters to help her navigate. We have over 50 years of memories I want to preserve for her and my grandchildren. Can anyone help, point in the right direction?? Samsung said it was a great idea and something they should add to their tv sets in the future, but ... I really need something now. Thank you.

 

[Ralston18]

I believe that the keyword is "preserve". Followed by "dictate".

Preserve: Simply do all that you can to immediately preserve those family movies in as many ways as you can. Including online.

Dictate: Make your wishes known to your family. I.e., "Jellyfin" if that indeed meets most of the requirements. Consider that no tool or app may meet all of your requirements. You may need some combination of tools with respect to software and hardware.

Understood: 4 TB is a lot......

Document/curate as much as possible by folders, filename(s), summaries, descriptions, dates, and format(s). You hopefully have the ability and full control of all movie files in order to do so.

Even if nothing more than a handwritten list. Every bit helps. Be sure to keep a listing of where the movies etc. are stored/located.

Again multiple storage locations recommended. On and off line.

Accounts, logins, passwords, security questions. Put that information in with your will and other important final documents. Keep it all up to date.

[If you have a lawyer or some other designed personal representative - he or she should be given instructions and information as you deem applicable and necessary to your circumstances and the family movies. Be explicit. I will leave the legal details and requirements to the lawyers. Actually any thing that is not specified by your will will be decided by the courts. If you do not have a will then the movies may be the least of the worries....]

Very likely that some family member will be able to step up and help with getting the videos into some sort of a menu structure to make future viewing easy to navigate, select, and safely watch. Again just simply let them all know about your hopes, wishes, and requirements. Repeat as necessary.

I do not know the ages of your grandchildren (and not asking). However I do know via my own grandchildren that they are more tech savvy in some ways and less so in other ways. Any one or more than one of your grandchildren when motivated for whatever reasons (maturity) may be able to step up and help "make it so" when necessary for you and your wife.

This is more a matter of faith in family than what technology can or cannot do.

Just my thoughts on the matter.

 

[Alabalcho]

If you want to be able to plug this directly into a TV, you are limited by what your TV currently supports. I'd suggest looking for an external "smart" box sitting between the TV and the hard drive, with some app(s) there to control the contents.

And having these 50 years of memory just on a hard drive is kind of dangerous... Where you'll plug this drive (if it is still alive) in 20 years? Short of going back to stone tablets and hierogliffs, I'd say - print most memorable pictures on paper, put them in hard-cover albums, and tuck them somewhere safe.