Android TV app - music playing error & inability to play certain videos

Plex Players
,
1

Server Version#: 1.40.4.8840-70008840
Player Version#: 10.22.0.1579 (6a8017c9)

The plex server runs on my Synology NAS. The server runs fine and the clients on my phone and desktop are fine, too. The android TV app is really unreliable though.

  1. The music player stops playing after a few songs and reports “An error occurred while playing this item.” None of the other clients have the same problem playing the same songs.

    IMG_2487
    IMG_2487816×612 76.2 KB

  2. It cannot play videos recorded from my DJI Air 3. It doesn’t start even with transcoding enabled. Here’s the detailed info on the video files:

  • Codec HEVC
  • Bitrate 90010 kbps
  • Bit Depth 8
  • Chroma Location left
  • Chroma Subsampling 4:2:0
  • Codec ID hvc1
  • Coded Height 2160
  • Coded Width 3840
  • Color Primaries bt709
  • Color Range tv
  • Color Space bt709
  • Color Trc bt709
  • Frame Rate 29.97 fps
  • Height 2160
  • Level 5.0
  • Profile main
  • Ref Frames 1
  • Stream Identifier 1
  • Width 3840
  • Display Title 4K (HEVC Main)
  • Extended Display Title 4K (HEVC Main)
2

Your DJI video files are using raw data that is compressed with HEVC (hvc1). Even VLC can have difficulty playing such files.

I would recommend that you re-encode those files with Handbrake or XMedia Recode before adding them to Plex.

As for your music files, it is difficult to say what the issue may be, but using WiFi maybe a factor.

You should also make sure you adhere strictly to the Plex file naming rules for music and make sure your files have been properly analyzed in Plex.

When you have playback issues, always analyze the file/s in Plex as the first step in troubleshooting the issue.

https://support.plex.tv/articles/categories/your-media/naming-and-organizing-music-media/

I also recommend you tag your files correctly using Mp3Tag or similar.

I recommend you only use the following tags, all other tags should be blank:

Artist
Album Artist (Use Various Artists if the album is a compilation)
Album
Title (Track Name)
Year
Genre
Disc Number
Track Number
Cover Art

3

Thanks for the reply.

I googled hvc1 and now understand why the video files can play without transcoding on my iPhone. But it is a bit frustrating to know that even with a paid subscription, there are still unsupported codecs. HVC1 is not that new either. If the client player cannot support the codec, why can’t it even hw-transcode it?

For music though, I’m an organization freak. Not only all the tags are meticulously filled and double checked, the files are all in a strict genre-artist-album folder structure. Both the TV and the NAS are connected to the router through ethernet. And the error only shows up after about 8-10 songs. The Plexamp on my phone does not have this problem at all. I am totally at a loss here…

4

That is good to hear, you’d be surprised by the number of people who don’t bother to do that at all.

For the DJI files, make sure Plex is doing nothing else and then try playing one of the troublesome files. When you see the issue/s, wait a minute or two, then go to Plex/Web Settings > Troubleshooting > Download Logs and attach the .zip file to your post.

Let me know the name of the file you played, please.

For your music, the only thing that comes to mind is possible DB corruption.

Try using @ChuckPA’s DB repair script. You can find it here: GitHub - ChuckPa/PlexDBRepair: Database repair utility for Plex Media Server databases

Chuck is a Plex employee, so it is safe to use, but backup your DB files just in case, although I think his script does that anyway.

That may or may not help, but it can’t hurt to try it at least.

5

Thanks again for your suggestions. I really appreciate it.

But I’m going back to Emby, whose UI might not be as polished as Plex, but it works. Their android TV app doesn’t have either of these issues, on the same devices for the same files.

The Plex TV app feels neglected. Just look at its rating on the Google Play Store. And there’s no official support. Don’t get me wrong, I appreciate the help from the community, but many problems on this forum have no official response. Plex asks us to come to the forum for technical support. And Plex does not monitor or provide assistance on their forum.

I got tempted to Plex due to Plexamp’s aesthetics. Now I realize Plex wants to pivot into streaming, while I only want a server and a few device clients to work for my library. My bad then.