Kodi Community Forum

Hi there. I'm sure this has been answered somewhere but I cannot find it. Maybe I'm using the wrong terminology! This will be my first time installing/using Kodi or anything similar (Plex, etc) so I have a very, very surface understanding. But here is what I'm trying to accomplish:

We moved into our new home on Tuesday where there is no cell signal and satellite is the only internet available. That ends our Netflix, Amazon Prime, etc. for streaming. So I purchased the desktop version of PlayOn and have been downloading to my external HDD everything we've ever bought on YouTube or Amazon Prime Video, etc. while at my store so I can watch it offline when I get home.

I wanted a media player so that in our home theater it's not just looking through files and folders on a computer to try and find what we want to watch, especially for the kids. Something like Kodi is appealing for that for the interface and media organization. I know I probably need internet to initially download album covers, description, etc. 

These are the questions:

1) Once I take my HDD home and plug it into my home PC for the theater, if I have Kodi installed on that PC will it load the screens and album covers, etc. if I unplug the internet from the PC?
2) Will Kodi even work without being connected to the internet for what I'm wanting it for?
3) Can I play the movies from the PC using HDMI to my receiver from the Kodi interface directly or does it have to stream to a device that then has the player software on it?
4) Am I over-complicating this? lol Is there a different solution that works better for what I need than Kodi? Again, all I want is the locate media on my home theater PC, download album art and info and then let me unplug the internet and use the Kodi interface as my video carousel to pick, read descriptions and watch the videos.

I realize these are utterly newbie questions - I've just never used this before and didn't want to go through setting it all up and then it not work as I hoped.

Thank you so much for any help!

What you are after is achievable, but just requires a couple of extra steps - mainly exporting from your internet connected library then importing into your home pc.

Kodi can use information stored locally. Metadata is stored in small text files know as NFO files (wiki) which are used in the export and import process. Artwork can be saved locally and Kodi will find those artwork files and use them if they are correctly named and saved in the correct location.
The links in My Signature below will be of help to you.

Addons can be installed via zip file after downloading from this location here... http://mirrors.kodi.tv/addons/leia/
Skins are more complicated as they use multiple addons so you will need to find which addons it uses and download them as well then install those addons first before installing the skin.

The only issue I see if the constant unplugging of the portable HDD. To ensure that the same drive letter is always used by Windows ensure you reserve a drive letter by right clicking the Start button, select Disk Management, find your portable drive and allocate a drive letter. Use a letter at the end of the alphabet to ensure no other program or drive grabs it first when rebooting Windows.

Once you have scraped your media into your internet connected library, run an Export to Separate Files. This will export the nfo files and artwork. Then when you plug the drive back into your home PC, run an Update Library and this will read the information into the library.
Be aware that Artwork is modified by Kodi when it is first scraped, and when you export, Kodi exports the modified artwork which is usually smaller. To avoid this, add the code shown in section 8 to your advancedsettings.xml file... https://kodi.wiki/view/Artwork/Cache#Kod...on_updates

(2020-09-04, 00:34)TS10FAY Wrote: [ -> ]1) Once I take my HDD home and plug it into my home PC for the theater, if I have Kodi installed on that PC will it load the screens and album covers, etc.

Yes, after your run the Update Library.

(2020-09-04, 00:34)TS10FAY Wrote: [ -> ]2) Will Kodi even work without being connected to the internet for what I'm wanting it for?

Yes

(2020-09-04, 00:34)TS10FAY Wrote: [ -> ]3) Can I play the movies from the PC using HDMI to my receiver from the Kodi interface directly or does it have to stream to a device that then has the player software on it?

Kodi is designed to be installed on hardware that is plugged directly into your AVR or TV via a HDMI plug.
If you are streaming using DLNA / UPnP, then Kodi just becomes a dumb file server and you will lose most of the Kodi functionality

(2020-09-04, 00:34)TS10FAY Wrote: [ -> ]4) Am I over-complicating this?

No. But as you will have a missing internet connection, it will require a couple of extra steps to get it all working.