Beyond hardware compatibility, some users prefer 0.9.17.0 (or its immediate sub-versions like 0.9.17.3) for specific technical reasons: Transcoder Improvements:
Added support for director and writer images for compatible clients Quick Search: plex media server version 0.9.17.0
Older WD NAS devices and PowerPC-based systems reached their end-of-life for Plex updates with this release. Plex Support Why Users Still Seek This Version Beyond hardware compatibility, some users prefer 0
Improved search functionality across all libraries of the same type Where to find it Since Plex typically only hosts recent versions on their official download page Beyond hardware compatibility
Because Plex has updated its metadata agents, older servers may struggle to download movie posters or descriptions from modern databases. Plex Forum How to Maintain an Older Server
If you are still running 0.9.17.0 today: