Audio but no video using Plex server

Plex Media Server
1

Server Version#: 4.145.1

Some videos have only a green screen with full audio when played on my desktop PC using Plex server. The same video plays normally using VLC on the server or using the Plex client app on my Amazon Fire TV cubes. Again, this only happens with a few videos. I have included the relative video information. below. This is not a critical thing as I only occasionally watch videos using the server.

Thanks.

<Media id="25499" duration="1279841" bitrate="1494" width="1280" height="720" aspectRatio="1.78" audioChannels="2" audioCodec="aac" videoCodec="hevc" videoResolution="720" container="mkv" videoFrameRate="24p" audioProfile="lc" videoProfile="main" hasVoiceActivity="0">
<Part accessible="1" exists="1" id="25592" key="/library/parts/25592/1572538778/file.mkv" duration="1279841" file="N:\TV Shows\*****.mkv" size="239622626" audioProfile="lc" container="mkv" deepAnalysisVersion="6" requiredBandwidths="1814,1748,1748,1748,1748,1748,1748,1748" videoProfile="main">
<Stream id="57193" streamType="1" default="1" codec="hevc" index="0" bitrate="1322" bitDepth="8" chromaLocation="left" chromaSubsampling="4:2:0" codedHeight="720" codedWidth="1280" colorPrimaries="bt709" colorRange="tv" colorSpace="bt709" colorTrc="bt709" frameRate="23.976" height="720" level="93" profile="main" refFrames="1" requiredBandwidths="1634,1581,1581,1581,1581,1581,1581,1581" width="1280" displayTitle="720p" extendedDisplayTitle="720p (HEVC Main)"> </Stream>
<Stream id="57194" streamType="2" selected="1" default="1" codec="aac" index="1" channels="2" bitrate="172" language="English" languageTag="en" languageCode="eng" audioChannelLayout="stereo" profile="lc" requiredBandwidths="173,173,173,173,173,173,173,173" samplingRate="48000" title="Stereo" displayTitle="English (AAC Stereo)" extendedDisplayTitle="Stereo (English AAC)"> </Stream>
</Part>
2

I tried converting the video as close as I could with Handbrake and it plays fine using the desktop server. The following is the video information for the recode…

<Media id="81555" duration="1273918" bitrate="1146" width="1280" height="720" aspectRatio="1.78" audioChannels="2" audioCodec="aac" videoCodec="hevc" videoResolution="720" container="mp4" videoFrameRate="24p" optimizedForStreaming="0" audioProfile="lc" has64bitOffsets="0" videoProfile="main 10" hasVoiceActivity="0">
<Part accessible="1" exists="1" id="82132" key="/library/parts/82132/1744478395/file.mp4" duration="1273918" file="N:\TV Shows\***.mp4" size="182472304" audioProfile="lc" container="mp4" has64bitOffsets="0" optimizedForStreaming="0" videoProfile="main 10">
<Stream id="177973" streamType="1" default="1" codec="hevc" index="0" bitrate="977" bitDepth="10" chromaLocation="left" chromaSubsampling="4:2:0" codecID="hvc1" codedHeight="720" codedWidth="1280" colorPrimaries="bt709" colorRange="tv" colorSpace="bt709" colorTrc="bt709" frameRate="23.976" height="720" level="93" profile="main 10" refFrames="1" streamIdentifier="1" width="1280" displayTitle="720p" extendedDisplayTitle="720p (HEVC Main 10)"> </Stream>
<Stream id="177974" streamType="2" selected="1" default="1" codec="aac" index="1" channels="2" bitrate="162" language="English" languageTag="en" languageCode="eng" audioChannelLayout="stereo" profile="lc" samplingRate="48000" streamIdentifier="2" displayTitle="English (AAC Stereo)" extendedDisplayTitle="English (AAC Stereo)"> </Stream>
</Part>
</Media>
3

I was having a similar issue when direct streaming certain titles. The workaround for me was always just setting the video to transcode and then it worked smoothly. I imagine its something with the .mkv container but unfortunately it takes a wiser man than me to determine that.

4

I’m having the same problem, immediately after I both purchased a Plex Pass and updated the server version last week.
After rolling back the server version, playing through the browser worked, but the TVs still just have a green screen.

5

Try disabling Hardware Transcoding in the server settings. It’s only available with Plex Pass, so this could be the ultimate cause.

2 Likes
6

Thank you, I will try that

7

Disabling Hardware Transcoding has fixed it! Thank you

1 Like
9

Is that the checkbox " Use hardware acceleration when available"?

10

Had this same issue and found this thread while looking for a solution. Desktop pc running plex server playing the audio but displaying green screen instead of the video on a few files but playing fine on vlc and on plex on my samsung tvs.

Solution i found after playing with some settings was to change the hardware transcoding device setting from auto to use my gpu. Now plays no problem

11

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