Is Mezzmo still alive?

[andreas.h]

After some breaking changes in my private infrastructure, a new from scratch setup of my media server is necessary.
I am wondering if Mezzmo is still the right choice.

Mezzmo 6.0.6.0 is still the newest version offered for download.
According to this forum, the latest software update happened 2020.
On the conceiva homepage the overall "latest news" is even of 2016 (Mezzmo 5).

So obviously active development has been stopped.
Similar situation on the downloader side by the way.

Seems I now should better invest time in searching alternatives which fit my needs.
We can be thankful about this forum being available and Peter still giving support for existing users. But thats it.
Is Peter the last one at conceiva and will he switch off the lights in the foreseeable future?


Any thoughts on this?

[jbinkley60]

After some breaking changes in my private infrastructure, a new from scratch setup of my media server is necessary.
I am wondering if Mezzmo is still the right choice.

Mezzmo 6.0.6.0 is still the newest version offered for download.
According to this forum, the latest software update happened 2020.
On the conceiva homepage the overall "latest news" is even of 2016 (Mezzmo 5).

So obviously active development has been stopped.
Similar situation on the downloader side by the way.

Seems I now should better invest time in searching alternatives which fit my needs.
We can be thankful about this forum being available and Peter still giving support for existing users. But thats it.
Is Peter the last one at conceiva and will he switch off the lights in the foreseeable future?


Any thoughts on this?

You might want to read this thread which is the same theme. One thing to realize is that local media streaming is a fairly mature technology at this point so expecting major new features isn't probably realistic unless the desire was to take the product in a different direction. Patches continue to get rolled out to fix bugs and add minor features. For instance I asked Peter to add PNG artwork support to align with some new features I am planning for the next release of the Mezzmo Kodi Addon.

Most of the development for Mezzmo is on the client side, ancillary tools, Mezzmo Channels and not the server side. I am looking to compile a new version off ffmpeg v6.x in the near future. I've been waiting for some bugs to get fixed and it to stabilize.

You can look at other platforms but I expect you will find that they have gone off in other areas and maybe require subscriptions or are attempting to focus on the online streaming space, which is where a lot of development is underway, again due to a subscription revenue model.

I've been running Mezzmo for 12 years and at this point it is a rock solid local streaming media server. I have over 22K+ video items, 12k+ music items and 2k+ images all running on over 500TB of storage with over a dozen clients accessing it in my house. From a maintenance perspective it is almost all automatic for me with minimal labor involved. I see other platforms lacking features, being unstable, requiring tons of support overhead and more. I always suggest that one's choice in a platform best be guided by their specific needs. No platform is a one-size-fits-all and all have some trade-offs.


Thanks,

Jeff

[Stu57]

+1 for Jeffs reply. I have tried most other media players periodically and still i find Mezzmo far and above the best.

[ftanner]

I, too, am still running it. Other than some minor features, like natively supporting modern remote control options (arrow keys/dials), it's still one of the better ones out there.

[smitbret]

I, too, am still running it. Other than some minor features, like natively supporting modern remote control options (arrow keys/dials), it's still one of the better ones out there.

I used Mezzmo for more than a decade but sadly, I left for Emby a couple of years ago. The biggest reason was that my library has just outgrown Mezzmo; it really seems to struggle once it has to deal with 1000+ files and the accompanying active playlists. Just browsing seemed to take forever and updating the library was an hours long affair.

If you are library is modest in size and you really need the granular control that Mezzmo allows then it's still as good as anything. Otherwise, $100 spent on an Emby Premier membership is a lights out investment.

[jbinkley60]

I used Mezzmo for more than a decade but sadly, I left for Emby a couple of years ago. The biggest reason was that my library has just outgrown Mezzmo; it really seems to struggle once it has to deal with 1000+ files and the accompanying active playlists. Just browsing seemed to take forever and updating the library was an hours long affair.

If you are library is modest in size and you really need the granular control that Mezzmo allows then it's still as good as anything. Otherwise, $100 spent on an Emby Premier membership is a lights out investment.

I am happy Emby is working for you. It's been awhile since I heard of someone moving to it. I know it has strong community support. As for Mezzmo handling large libraries, I have almost 30K items in my library (~17K video, ~12k music and ~3K images0, with 12-15 clients running, and have no performance issues. I do agree that you need to be careful with active playlists. I deleted a few that came stock with Mezzmo that I never use, especially the actor/actress active playlist. I also moved my database to a fast SSD.

Browsing hasn't been an issue for me. The Mezzmo Kodi addon tracks browsing performance for me and the breakdown between Kodi / Mezzmo. I typically see over 100 items/sec on random smart playlists and upwards of 300 items/sec on ordered playlists. I try to limit my playlists to 300 or less items. After that I get tired of paging.

I've been considering adding a tuning section to the Mezzmo Kodi Addon wiki to help folks tune their databases better. I've also considered adding a reindex feature to the Mezzmo Artwork Checker so you can reindex your Mezzmo database.



Jeff

[ftanner]

I used Mezzmo for more than a decade but sadly, I left for Emby a couple of years ago. The biggest reason was that my library has just outgrown Mezzmo; it really seems to struggle once it has to deal with 1000+ files and the accompanying active playlists. Just browsing seemed to take forever and updating the library was an hours long affair.

If you are library is modest in size and you really need the granular control that Mezzmo allows then it's still as good as anything. Otherwise, $100 spent on an Emby Premier membership is a lights out investment.

I have about 5,400 files in my movie folders, about 26,000 files in my TV series folders, and about 19,000 files in my music folders. Mezzmo is handling them just fine. Updating the library is something that is a "background task" anyhow and doesn't really eat up much CPU power. Browsing files is plenty fast.

Seems like your system may have been a bit under-speced.

[Jman3030]

What are the problem with the active playlist? Do they use a lot of resources? Is there a way to minimize issue on it?

[jbinkley60]

What are the problem with the active playlist? Do they use a lot of resources? Is there a way to minimize issue on it?

Not all active playlists are created equal and some can become very complex and eat up a lot of resources. Most are fine and work very well. There are ways to address this by simplifying the playlists, limiting the number levels, limiting the number of results and deleting active playlists which you don't use. I personally removed the actor / artist playlist.


Thanks,

Jeff