I have had a Plex Premium Music Library for over a year now, and the base music file folder structure has not changed, short of adding new content. However, over the past few weeks, I have noticed a constant “Downloading Metadata…/Matching…” going on all the time. Like, almost constantly. If I stop Plex, and restart it, it will not occur until I add something new. It does seem to focus in on similar titles but it’s moving at the speed of light through a ton of files. It happens to stop on a few constant titles, but they are either very popular albums, custom albums, or personal items that would not be found. Point being, all walks of life in terms of matching.
Now, this has not been a problem for 1+ years. Only recently and the items that have recently been added do not seem to pop up on the scrolling list, yet of course, I can not read everything nor have sat and watched it completely stop.
Current: Version 1.12.1.4885 (Issue has spanned 4 server versions)
I have also emptied the cache for most agents, reset the agent list to default order (I had moved the Plex Premium Agent first under Artist/Albums), and other normal things like restarts, power cycles, etc.
I can also provide logs to anyone that would like to read them.
Just checking in to see if there are any suggestions? If I even open a folder in the Finder (Mac) the server goes nuts and won’t download things for about an hour or two since it is doing that scanning.
General theories -
It’s possible something in the folder is changing when you open it in finder. Antivirus? Malware scan? Anything that might cause a file lock or touch could be considered a change, so, Plex scans.
I think I’ve seen discussion somewhere (couldn’t find it in release notes) regarding scans of data being fixed where, after first scan couldn’t find data, there would be no more scans. That was ‘fixed’, so, Plex will continue trying to find the data.
Considering you have personal music/audio files that no data will ever be found for, I theorize it’s quite possible that Plex keeps trying anyway.
Options (more work-arounds, not necessarily fixes (as I’m not even sure this is a bug))
Play around with options in PMS - Settings - Server - Library
Disable automatic on change. Set scheduled task only
The loudness detection for audio tracks is a recent addition I think, ensure it’s set for scheduled only, or perhaps even disabled. Though I’ve no idea of your audio library size, it even mentions high CPU and long time for completion.
That might be combining with the ‘you have audio plex will never find online metadata for’ and be double bad for continuously scanning.
@JamminR said:
General theories -
It’s possible something in the folder is changing when you open it in finder. Antivirus? Malware scan? Anything that might cause a file lock or touch could be considered a change, so, Plex scans.
I think I’ve seen discussion somewhere (couldn’t find it in release notes) regarding scans of data being fixed where, after first scan couldn’t find data, there would be no more scans. That was ‘fixed’, so, Plex will continue trying to find the data.
Considering you have personal music/audio files that no data will ever be found for, I theorize it’s quite possible that Plex keeps trying anyway.
Options (more work-arounds, not necessarily fixes (as I’m not even sure this is a bug))
Play around with options in PMS - Settings - Server - Library
Disable automatic on change. Set scheduled task only
The loudness detection for audio tracks is a recent addition I think, ensure it’s set for scheduled only, or perhaps even disabled. Though I’ve no idea of your audio library size, it even mentions high CPU and long time for completion.
That might be combining with the ‘you have audio plex will never find online metadata for’ and be double bad for continuously scanning.
There, that’s my nickel.
Thanks for the response, and your time. The loudness was already set as scheduled. I am hesitant to uncheck the Partial Scan, as that is necessary since I add content a lot (beyond music). That would be a functionality decrease, and would bum me out. I suppose my irritation is that it is a new problem, with no other (known) changes.
It certainly seems to focus on “Unknown” media per se, but there are a ton of artists that it is searching through that would not qualify as unknown. For instance, of my 27,000+ songs, probably 5,000 are non-commerical songs, and I (thought) I was relying on Personal Media Assets for those scans. All was well for 1 and a half years. But it also seems to constantly scan, and get stuck on, Reality Bites and Forrest Gump albums for instance.
Again, thanks for your help, and if you think of something else, let me know. I hope that a Plex Employee can jump in and take a look at the logs?
I know it is not something trigger the folder (no Anti Virus or anything is installed on the Mac) because if I restart Plex, and do not touch a file/folder in a music library, this will not occur. At least, to a point of noticing. I have Plex up on a monitor in my office all the time, and the scanning thing is distracting, so I know I would have noticed it at least once or twice in a week if it was occuring. It goes on for over an hour to two hours each time.
And since I have been very close attention the past few days, it does indeed seem to hover around the same 200 artists/albums it seems. Who knows if it is really 200, but TONS and TONS of repeats, but they all seem to be the same repeats.
@“Kyle Verry” said:
Again, thanks for your help, and if you think of something else, let me know. I hope that a Plex Employee can jump in and take a look at the logs?
which logs ?
Logs would need to show completion of one scan and start of another - so may need to increase number of log files through preferences
if there are errors during analyze media then it may try and do it again afterwards
If there is a specific set of directories being continuously rescanned, please also provide directory listing showing directory/sub-directory/file names, last modified date/time, size
These logs are from a clean start. The library scan completed and then the repeat metadata “downloading” has started. I have a previous log as well if requested.
Here’s another, shorter log (I would presume). This one will show that there is a library scan (triggered by me going to a folder), and the scan completes relatively quickly. Then the constant matching of the same items starts. Hope this is helpful.
I thank you very much for your time in this matter. It is stopping the server from matching other items like TV Shows, Home Movies or Movies as such.
Here is an item being re-scanned a bunch:
Drive 2/Current iTunes/Music/Gallows/Maiden Heaven_A Tribute To Iron Maiden/10 Wrathchild.mp3
Created: 7/18/14, Edited 7/18/14, 7.2MB
It really seems to be compilations, as I am watching this thing run through. And custom (personal music) items.
@“Kyle Verry” said:
These logs are from a clean start. The library scan completed and then the repeat metadata “downloading” has started. I have a previous log as well if requested.
That was me trying to get a file listed in properly. It had been added, but there was no auto metadata found. Turned out, I had to close Plex (the only way to stop the syncing cycle), refresh the metadata on the one new item, it loaded instantly, and then I looked at a folder in the music library, and the cycle started up again (It is still going as I type right now in fact).
so which of the above scans I listed is the problem and I need to see more than one scan job for a library
One thing to note is that when a scan completes for a directory, Plex Media Server does check if there are any items that did not successfully get matched before and would try to match those
Here is another with another scan. I hope I finding you what you are looking for. To be clear, the issue is AFTER the scan…the constant “downloading metadata” notifications and network data/CPU for the task. That is what is causing another item that was added to not get proper metadata for hours…or until the server is shut down.
Here is a video of the notifications that are constantly fluttering by. After about 30 minutes, the same items will appear again as “downloading.”
I think the issue is that there is a lot of unmatched media and at the end of scans, it tries to match any unmatched
so for example after completing this directory scan for this library
Mar 28, 2018 19:05:14.776 [0x700004894000] DEBUG - Scanning section 39
for directory '/Volumes/Drive 2/Current iTunes/Music/Dinosaur Jr_/'
it then discovered all these unmatched
Mar 28, 2018 19:05:31.253 [0x7fffcc31a3c0] DEBUG - Refreshing section 39 of type: 8
Mar 28, 2018 19:05:31.270 [0x7fffcc31a3c0] DEBUG - The artist 'The 5th Dimension' needs refreshing, no match yet.
Mar 28, 2018 19:05:31.277 [0x7fffcc31a3c0] DEBUG - The artist 'Adam Paskowitz' needs refreshing, no match yet.
Mar 28, 2018 19:05:31.279 [0x7fffcc31a3c0] DEBUG - The artist 'Adrenaline Mob' needs refreshing, no match yet.
Mar 28, 2018 19:05:31.284 [0x7fffcc31a3c0] DEBUG - The artist 'Albert Collins' needs refreshing, no match yet.
Mar 28, 2018 19:05:31.293 [0x7fffcc31a3c0] DEBUG - The artist 'All For The King' needs refreshing, no match yet.
Mar 28, 2018 19:05:31.294 [0x7fffcc31a3c0] DEBUG - The artist 'The Alliance (Kris & Kyle)' needs refreshing, no match yet.
Mar 28, 2018 19:05:31.295 [0x7fffcc31a3c0] DEBUG - The artist 'Aloha ■■■ Juice' needs refreshing, no match yet.
Mar 28, 2018 19:05:31.298 [0x7fffcc31a3c0] DEBUG - The artist 'American Hi-Fi' needs refreshing, no match yet.
Mar 28, 2018 19:05:31.304 [0x7fffcc31a3c0] DEBUG - The artist 'Ann Wilson' needs refreshing, no match yet.
Mar 28, 2018 19:05:31.306 [0x7fffcc31a3c0] DEBUG - The artist 'Antti Martikainen' needs refreshing, no match yet.
Mar 28, 2018 19:05:31.311 [0x7fffcc31a3c0] DEBUG - The artist 'Artie Shaw' needs refreshing, no match yet.
Mar 28, 2018 19:05:31.311 [0x7fffcc31a3c0] DEBUG - The artist 'Arturo Hassan' needs refreshing, no match yet.
Mar 28, 2018 19:05:31.312 [0x7fffcc31a3c0] DEBUG - The artist 'Ashley' needs refreshing, no match yet.
etc
etc
@sa2000 said:
I think the issue is that there is a lot of unmatched media and at the end of scans, it tries to match any unmatched
That makes sense. What should I do? And why do you think this only started in the past few weeks? I have 5,000+ custom items. I kinda thought the Personal Media Assets or Local Media Assets was supposed to address this?
To reaffirm, these items have been in Plex for 3+ years, and in Plex Premium Music Library for 1.5+ years. No change. And it’s been giving me this problem for a few weeks now, constantly, but not prior. (It is still “downloading” as I type).
This will come off rude, but I do not mean for it to be; but are we just not supposed to have items that Last.fm can’t find? Again, I do not want this to be misconstrued as disrespectful, but I think it is odd that a music album or artist that is not common, can not be in the library? I kinda like having my friend’s music or old classical music that I have in my library. It was never an issue before, so I suppose I am confused why it is requiring the item to be on Last.fm (or whatever the agent is) to work.
I kinda think this should be a configuration issue. I started a brand new server, looked at the default configuration for the agents and mirrored that exactly yesterday, hoping it would address the problem, but it obviously didn’t. Any recommendations there to try and fix this?
