Server Version#: 1.25.0.5246
Player Version#: 7.26 (1744)
Trying to use the scroll wheel / trackpad on the Apple remote to scroll through a TV show or movie. If you pause playback, then swipe to the right, it’s supposed to scroll through the show. But it always jumps back to the initial spot.
In other words, to reproduce, do the following:
Pause playback.
While paused, swipe right on the trackpad/scroll wheel. The display will show the indicator moving later on in the timeline.
Once you get to a spot later in the timeline, click Play/Pause button.
When you do this, I would expect it to jump to the spot later in the timeline that you have scrolled to. Instead, it jumps back to the original position from before you started scrolling.
I have also tried clicking the center of the trackpad instead of clicking Play/Pause, but I get the same results. No matter what I try, it always jumps back to the initial spot from before I started scrolling.
I’m not sure when this started happening, but I’ve also tried rolling back to the release version of the Plex app, instead of using the beta, and I still had the same problem.
Sorry, I wasn’t completely clear in my explanation, but that’s what I was describing in the next to last paragraph. I’ve tried clicking the middle of the trackpad with the same results.
Ok so I just found something very interesting. I have two servers, both running on the same version, and both accessing the same media (mounted cloud drive via rclone). I tried the same thing with scrolling through and pressing play, and on the other server, it worked.
The server that fails is running server version 1.25.0.5246, but the OS is Ubuntu 20.04.
The server that works correctly is also 1.25.0.5246, and the OS is macOS 11.6.
So I’m not sure why it would be working on one server but not the other, since they are identical server versions. The only difference is the operating system (which, I know, is a big difference)…
The server OS shouldn’t matter at all in this case as the ffwd’ing happens in the client. I’ll have a look on my Apple TV later… fwiw I’ve seen some weird issues with the Siri remote in the last few weeks/months, not sure if this might be related.
I agree, it doesn’t seem that the server OS should make any difference. However the evidence is there in front of me. It’s most likely something other than the OS that’s causing the issue, but it works on one server, doesn’t work on the other.
Also, even though it’s a completely different app, I should point out that I also have Infuse installed on my Apple TV, and scrolling on it works perfectly with both servers.
I’m interested in hearing whether you find out anything while testing on your Apple TV. Thanks for your help so far!
Tested this with some movie and the Plex tvOS app was perfectly scrolling through the content… in the end both options worked for me to get it to play from the selection (pressing play/pause or clicking the touchpad).
Does your issue persist if you restart the server on your Ubuntu machine?
When comparing behavior between the two, are the Library types the same on both of them? On the two servers, is it consistently a Movies Library, vs. TV Shows or Other Videos, or perhaps a Photos Library?
The two servers actually have the same content, with the same library structure. So I have tried the exact same item on both, although I have only tried TV shows … I’ll try a movie later tonight and see if I get the same result.
I don’t have any Other Videos or Photos libraries on my server, so I only have TV Shows and Movies libraries to choose from.
Hi @Volts, thanks for your reply. I didn’t even think to try the “Old Player” since I always use the new one. I tried switching to the old one, and now the scrolling works as expected. When using the new player, it shows Direct Play (on both servers). But when I switch to the Old Player, it shows Direct Stream. Switching to the old player is certainly an option to fix this issue, but I would rather get it working correctly with the new player, since that is obviously the direction for the future.
So, to sum up:
Ubuntu server - New Player - Direct Play - scrubbing doesn’t work.
Ubuntu server - Old Player - Direct Stream - scrubbing works as intended.
macOS server - New or Old Player, doesn’t matter - scrubbing works as intended.
Also, something else I remembered about the Ubuntu server, which may or may not be a contributing factor. But it does constitute a difference between the two servers, so I thought I should mention it. Since the server is located in Finland and the connection between the server and me has a high latency, I set up an SSH tunnel with a VPS located closer to me, and all the Plex traffic gets sent through the VPS. I used this guide to set it up: Routing plex traffic through an SSH tunnel · GitHub
Again, I don’t think this would be causing this issue, but I thought I should mention it.
Just a quick update, I removed the SSH tunnel and set Plex up the “normal” way, to test it out, and the problem persisted. Also, other users with Apple TVs have reported the same thing to me. Unable to scroll using the new video engine.
With what Apple TV model and tvOS version are you experiencing this?
I’m on an Apple TV 4K (1st gen) w/ tvOS 15 and the new player enabled – and I cannot reproduce this in my setup
So I figured out my issue… it had to do with the fact that I was routing Plex through Cloudflare and using their CDN to improve performance. (I have a rule in Cloudflare to bypass caching for the actual video). Somehow this was causing the Apple TV to not be able to scroll or jump the timeline. Very strange, not sure why that was happening, but at least now I know the cause.
