Until recently, I have been running PlexConnect from my five-year old MacBook Pro with a 1.53 gHz processor with 4 GB RAM. I have had Plex set to 1080p 40.0 Mbps transcoder quality and have not had any issues with buffering/pausing during movies. I did initially when I hooked up PlexConnect, but found that when I wired everything (rather than using wireless connections) the issues went away.
I recently purchased a new desktop, an Asus m11bb-us002o. The processor is a 3.9 gHz AMD A-Series and it has 8GB ram. Based on my experiences above, I assumed this would be more than sufficient for the purposes of running a Plex server. I now have everything hooked up and wired. I have written-in exceptions for Plex Media Server into my firewall, and I have PlexConnect up and running with the PC. It works fine, except for the fact that I keep experiencing buffering issues. I will start a movie and the movie pauses, takes a few seconds to load, and then continues on playing. I tried this with Saving Private Ryan a little earlier today, and it paused a few times at the beginning of the film and finally continued on playing without any remaining issues. While I'm happy that the issue was ultimately resolved, I'm a little frustrated that I can't just play a movie without going through these issues each time. I have tried searching for solutions via Google, and while I'm reasonably tech savvy, the solution seems to be beyond me.
I think I can safely rule out network issues and PC speed issues. When I run a movie using a PlexConnect, I'm looking at my computer's task manager and seeing that it isn't being overrun (either CPU or RAM). Additionally, if I use the Plex app on my phone, Saving Private Ryan plays absolutely fine at 40 Mbps with no buffering whatsoever. Based on this information, I am convinced this is an issue between the connectivity of the PC, Plex Media Serve, PlexConnect, or Apple TV itself. I'm happy to post what my settings are, I'm just not sure which settings to post.
Any and all help is greatly appreciated. Looking forward to putting this issue of frustration behind me. Thanks!
It maybe an issue with Apple TV CPU possibly, did you try knocking the transcoder settings on client to anything lower (I enjoy 2M 768p on most everything except the most visually killer movies).
Could try server settings> transcoder, set transcoder from auto to prefer higher speed encoding (in my tests no real quality difference noticed unless there is A TON of movement between frames and even then not really), but this is more server and not client side as much. May also want to be sure to disable sending Dolby Digital if enabled (click show advanced in transcoder section) and also enable down-mixing of Dolby Digital this may help if surround sound data is messing with the Apple tv somehow.
Until recently, I have been running PlexConnect from my five-year old MacBook Pro with a 1.53 gHz processor with 4 GB RAM. I have had Plex set to 1080p 40.0 Mbps transcoder quality and have not had any issues with buffering/pausing during movies. I did initially when I hooked up PlexConnect, but found that when I wired everything (rather than using wireless connections) the issues went away.
I recently purchased a new desktop, an Asus m11bb-us002o. The processor is a 3.9 gHz AMD A-Series and it has 8GB ram. Based on my experiences above, I assumed this would be more than sufficient for the purposes of running a Plex server. I now have everything hooked up and wired. I have written-in exceptions for Plex Media Server into my firewall, and I have PlexConnect up and running with the PC. It works fine, except for the fact that I keep experiencing buffering issues. I will start a movie and the movie pauses, takes a few seconds to load, and then continues on playing. I tried this with Saving Private Ryan a little earlier today, and it paused a few times at the beginning of the film and finally continued on playing without any remaining issues. While I'm happy that the issue was ultimately resolved, I'm a little frustrated that I can't just play a movie without going through these issues each time. I have tried searching for solutions via Google, and while I'm reasonably tech savvy, the solution seems to be beyond me.
I think I can safely rule out network issues and PC speed issues. When I run a movie using a PlexConnect, I'm looking at my computer's task manager and seeing that it isn't being overrun (either CPU or RAM). Additionally, if I use the Plex app on my phone, Saving Private Ryan plays absolutely fine at 40 Mbps with no buffering whatsoever. Based on this information, I am convinced this is an issue between the connectivity of the PC, Plex Media Serve, PlexConnect, or Apple TV itself. I'm happy to post what my settings are, I'm just not sure which settings to post.
Any and all help is greatly appreciated. Looking forward to putting this issue of frustration behind me. Thanks!
Did you ever resolve this one ? I also have had no issues for a long time until recently and now see more buffering.
I also find something else interesting. Play a movie using the web from 1 of my media servers and in the settings option (top right of web player) I see highest but rate of 1080p 40mbps however from another media server I see 720p. All media server settings are the same and its the same movie, any ideas ??
