For audio, plex needs to do a much better job of utilizing existing tags within the files, and even (optionally) UPDATING the tags if a user makes changes. Just like any normal music library manager.
this is one of the biggest issues with using plex for music.
its a great music PLAYER and distribution platform.
I’m not sure about the idea of Plex altering media files, even if it’s just id3 tags. Emby’s solution is to create and alter xml files to store tags in rather than to alter the media files themselves.
I don’t know. It’s not a stupid idea; I’m just not sold on it.
Yes, I’m aware. I sometimes use MusicBee, which is similar to MediaMonkey.
I’m just saying I thought both Plex and Emby kind of made a point to not alter the original files. Even if they create optimized versions of files they still never actually overwrite the originals.
Personally, I’ve just learned to be rather handy with mp3tag… although mp3tag can’t change the “Sort Title” tag data, which is annoying.
Yup understood, and of course any file modification should be optional.
That said when something as simple as the original Winamp player could read and update tags properly 20+ years ago yet that this basic functionality remains absent Plex/Emby, despite obvious differences in intended usage, remains exasperating.
I know if you’re a real computer user to you can log-in on the new UI app and disable those extra add-ons or you can go to the computer login to your Plex information and go to settings and take it off to so it doesn’t even show up when you log into Plex on your TV it’s called look at all the settings I’ve gone through every single one of them
@elan the lack of codec controls in the Android app is really starting to bug me now, mainly via the wife and child who have films and TV shows that they cannot play because Plex insists on sending DTS or EAC3 instead of me allowing the server to force transcodes to AC3 which my soundbar can cope with.
I’ve even bought some external hardware in the hope of being able to trick something in the chain into believing that only AC3 is supported, but I’ve not had a chance to play with it much and it’s complex and I’m not even sure i’ll Be able to achieve this.
On for a simple list of checkboxes in the Android app which allows us to override what audio codecs the player purports to accept…
I did have a script running to remux, but it’s not complete and there are edge cases for conversions that need to occur when ac3 exists but is in a different language, so I’m less than thrilled at having to modify the already complex script even further.
I used to have a similar problem but have since changed around some hardware and it no longer really bothers me. I always thought it would be nice if plex would expose more advanced settings in the web UI on the “properties” of an authorized device. That would be a great way to give advanced users access to more complicated settings without requiring a UI at every client. I know Codec selection isn’t that advanced but it seems to me like it would keep development work to a minimum while allowing administrative access to some of these things that just need to be manually changed once in a while.
There’s plenty of threads on here detailing the problem, the issue is that they’ve been pretty much all been ignored by the devs.
I took a punt in this thread when elan was commenting and replying to people’s issues and thoughts and problems and managed to get a response, elan wasn’t even aware that the functionality was missing as the client he uses has the ability, it’s something that should have parity across all players, it’s a simple request that solves a lot of issues with audio codec selection.
We (those of us affected by it - particularly Sonos users) have a feature request outstanding for it, but we know that little happens with feature requests.
If Plex is outputting DTS and EAC3, that’s because your equipment is telling Plex that it supports it. Yes, the app does believe what it’s told and tries to comply. If your equipment lies, not sure what to say. Are you using an optical connection? The devs are working to support checking codec capabilities via optical, so that should help. If you’ve provided logs before, please point me to it so I can check what is going on.
This is something that has been considered. I don’t know if/when this will happen.
Not sure what you are saying. Are you asking for more codec options in Web? If so, a web based app has little control over your system’s hardware.
No I was saying a settings UI that displays the more advanced options a specific client has could be displayed here. The client would have to read them in and apply them appropriately.
I was replying to @fizzyade comment about being able to control which Codecs a client is allowed to use.
Rather than putting a UI in every client to control “advanced” settings that are used very infrequently (but are sometime required based on the circumstance) the web client could have a properties page on the authorized device allowing you to set things like this.
On each client the app would pull the codecs it thinks the device supports and shows these codecs in a config page. Then the user can override what is supported.
I don’t suppose one of those settings is to automatically select the “surround” audio track if available, instead of the first audio track in your preferred language (usually stereo, as suggested on these forums for years) It annoys me to no end that the Roku can do it perfectly every time, but few other devices can.
As you know, once you have manually selected an audio track, it’s selected forever, for all apps and devices. I recently re-played a video that at some point in time (about two years ago according to tautuli) I had chosen “Directors Comments” Guess what I had to do right away…
