Two Emby servers on same Windows 10 computer?

[MarcusJ 18]

Can I run 2 Emby servers on same Windows 10 computer - accessing different media from one another?  

 

My current Emby server accesses movies stored on a local NAS, and is running great, and I don't want to booger it up doing something wrong.

 

I want to create a new and entirely separate Emby server on the same Windows machine, and have it access movies from locally-attached (via USB), individual hard drives.  I'm doing this with a view toward moving this second Emby server to a new Windows computer (which I haven't purchased yet) and then moving that new computer and the individual hard drives to a different location entirely.

 

I'm not very technical, so I'm not sure exactly how to do this.  For example, do I need to install Emby Server a second time, or is there some way to simply add a second logical server to the existing sytem? Any steps or common sense tips on how to keep the two environments completely separate and discrete from one another would sure be appreciated.

 

Thank you!

[Happy2Play 9780]

I guess you have a normal install and a portable install.  I was able to launch both on different ports.  The restriction must have been removed.

 

[MarcusJ 18]

Happy2Play:  Thank you for responding, but I don't understand what you're saying - at all... I don't know what a "normal" or "Portable" install is.  I simply downloaded Emby server for Windows and installed it on a Windows 10 PC. For 6 months I have been cleaning up the metadata from my 5,000+ movies.

 

It looks like you're saying "yes, it is possible to run multiple servers on the same machine", which is great, but beyond that I am clueless as to how. Can you be more specific for me, please?

 

If running 2 servers on one PC is possible:

1. Do I need to do another complete install of Emby Server?
   • If so, how do I install it without screwing up my existing installation?
   • How do I install/configure it to be independent from the existing installation (so there will be 2 separate and distinct server instances)?
2. If I do not need to do another installation, how do I set up a 2nd "server" within the current installation?

Sorry for being dense, but I am simply a user - not an Engineer.

 

Again, thank you for the help.

Edited October 14, 2016 by MarcusJ

[MadibaJ 20]

Can you set up 2 profiles?

 

I have a profile for kids tv off a hard drive with their stuff that goes to their tv. And a profile for me which gets my stuff off the nas.

[PenkethBoy 2068]

simply "portable" means it can run from any directory on the computer/usb drive etc as long as the computer is windows without an install program

 

Link to portable version is same page you downloaded the server from https://emby.media/windows-server.html

 

Follow the basic instructions on that page

 

Before you run the portable version - shut down the original Emby server - run the new one - go to the advanced>hosting settings in the dashboard and change both local ports to new numbers - you cant have two web servers on the same machine working of the same ports (which are the numbers after the : in the url. - if you look at Happy's screen shot he has one on 8096 the default and 9096 for the second server - change your local http values to match those numbers and the https to 9920 - do something similar with the public ports even if you dont use them - save the changes

 

Now shut down and restart the portable and old server - now access new with the url http://localhost:9096/web/dashboard.html and the old server with http://localhost:8096/web/dashboard.html

 

An issue you might have although very unlikely is that another web server on your pc uses the ports you have just given Emby so just change them to something else if necessary

 

Good Luck

[swhitmore 781]

2 servers may not even be nessacery. What exacty are you trying to do?

[MarcusJ 18]

SWhitmore:  My current Emby server for my home has a single user profile (USER 1) and accesses movies stored on a local NAS. I want to create a new and entirely separate Emby server for an entirely different location in another state. The new server will access movies from locally-attached individual hard drives. I have the hard drives here with me today which are already loaded with movies (the exact same movies as are on the NAS), but I don't yet have the new PC hardware which will ultimately be moved to the new location along with the hard drives. So today, I want to get the new (2nd) emby server built and scrub all the metadata using my existing Windows 10 PC which runs my current emby server.  In other words, my current Windows 10 PC is only being used temporarily as a tool to get the emby server built. Then I will move it to a different machine. Make sense?

 

One idea I had was to simply add a new user (USER 2) to my current emby server running on my current PC (see MadibaJ's comment above) and only give USER 2 access to movies on the hard drives (not the NAS). Then, scan the hard drives' contents into separate media library folders and scrub the metadata there. Once done, I could buy the 2nd PC and copy the entire emby server over to the new machine and simply delete the first user profile (which is my current profile which accesses everything from the NAS), and only keep the second user profile on the new PC.  Would that work?

Edited October 14, 2016 by MarcusJ

[ebr 16184]

I would suggest setting up a VM.  The server is not designed to be run twice on the same machine.

[rbjtech 5284]

Are you running Windows 10 Home or Windows 10 Professional ?

 

If you are running Professional, then you can install Hyper-V and run multiple 'machines' on your single piece of hardware.  Once the Virtual Machine (VM) is created then you can install Windows 10 on it and install a totally independent version of Emby.   You'll need to learn about VM's and Hyper-V, but it's all standard Microsoft tech so well documented on the net.

 

[PenkethBoy 2068]

I would suggest setting up a VM.  The server is not designed to be run twice on the same machine.

 

 

Are you running Windows 10 Home or Windows 10 Professional ?

 

If you are running Professional, then you can install Hyper-V and run multiple 'machines' on your single piece of hardware.  Once the Virtual Machine (VM) is created then you can install Windows 10 on it and install a totally independent version of Emby.   You'll need to learn about VM's and Hyper-V, but it's all standard Microsoft tech so well documented on the net.

Guys you are assuming a lot for a guy who admits he is not very technical - i did not go that route as he wanted a simple way of doing it - as its only a (hopefully) temp solution

 

What i should of added was that @@MarcusJ - you need to decide which is the master and which is the slave with regard to saving metadata - i.e. turn it off on one of the servers if they are going to be looking at the same content as you might get spagetti - if they are exclusively looking at different content then not a problem - same issue would arise with VM/Hyper-V.

[rbjtech 5284]

In my personal opinion, you are going to get yourself in much more of a mess and potentially break your current working system by attempting something which has clearly not been designed to run multiple times.  How do we know that registry entries are exclusive ?, how does FFMPEG know which instance to use when both are transcoding? ... err..

 

I wouldn't even contemplate running multiple versions (even main and 'portable') on the same base OS personally, the SAFEST way to play is with VM's - if it all goes wrong, then you just recreate the VM and start again and you don't touch your working system ...

 

But I do agree this may be too involved for the OP. 

[PenkethBoy 2068]

sorry but 

 

diff instances of ffmpeg - diff server path diff metadata path etc

 

and i assume a portable version should not use the registry to store any "data" as it would defeat the object of being portable (usb stick)

Edited October 14, 2016 by PenkethBoy

[MarcusJ 18]

Thanks everyone.  I think I am going to steer clear of trying to pull this off, and just wait until I can get the 2nd computer.

 

Again, thank you all...

[Apotropaic 41]

Marcus

 

I take you don't have the Metadata save option turned on for the media on the NAS drives - any reason why not?

This would have saved all your previous effort at scrubbing the metadata i case you ever lose your Emby library, and could be simply copied over to your new local hard drives.

[snake98 10]

Thanks everyone.  I think I am going to steer clear of trying to pull this off, and just wait until I can get the 2nd computer.

 

Again, thank you all...

do the vm, that what I did so it's independent of the computer, and you can move to another one temporarily if you need to.

[PenkethBoy 2068]

Just an update now have two instances of emby working on the same pc with different ports - to confirm i was correct in my suspicion - works fine - no need for a vm which will just consume more resources and the extra config for direct hardware access - if you want portability use a good fast usb drive/stick - unplug and go

 

might be the way of the future if ACD actually works out as a viable option - Emby in you pocket -

 

Only issue i have is they fight over the HDHomeRun tv tuners - but thats the same if you have two on the same network so just need to change a couple of things