[BUG] Home Users can't watch Live TV for more than 4 minutes

Live TV & DVR
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1

Some Information:

PMS Version 1.15.2.793, 1.15.3.858, 1.15.3.876, 1.15.4.919

Tested on Web client 3.93.1, 3.91.0, 3.83.1, LG TV webOS app, Plex Media Player v2.31.0. On Android app it works .

What’s wrong:

Every home user except the owner of the server is unable to play Live TV for longer than 4 minutes (pretty much everytime stops at 4 minutes). Tested on remote connection (100Mbps symmetrical connection) and even in local mode (Gigabit wired network). It doesn’t matter the quality you choose, it stops at 4 minutes and shows buffering (even TV app becomes unresponsive).

One important point: It doesn’t show on the dashboard that the user is using Live TV , but you can see in the graphs the bandwidth usage (until it stops on buffering) and in the Activity section that somebody is using Live TV.

As stated before: Android app works flawlessly, it shows the user on the dashboard and stream works endlessly as it should.

Any ideas? :-/

I even have tested with the owner account watching the same stream at the same quality as the home user with no success.

Inspecting the logs, I believe the server is killing the stream on its own leaving the user endlessly buffering:

Mar 15, 2019 20:19:11.928 [0x7f51e5ffb700] Debug — Request: [127.0.0.1:49800 (Loopback)] GET /livetv/sessions/f640f813-a57a-4bc4-a762-818513bdac08/tn7nl0vf1ivk7qfr6w0y3gtr/index.m3u8?offset=4.800000 (20 live) Signed-in Token (USER)
...
Mar 15, 2019 20:19:12.139 [0x7f517e7fc700] Debug — Whacked session f640f813-a57a-4bc4-a762-818513bdac08, 1 remaining.
Mar 15, 2019 20:19:12.140 [0x7f517e7fc700] Debug — Streaming Resource: Terminated session 0x7f516c00fb80:f640f813-a57a-4bc4-a762-818513bdac08 with reason Client stopped playback.
Mar 15, 2019 20:19:12.140 [0x7f517e7fc700] Debug — Streaming Resource: Removing session 0x7f516c00fb80:f640f813-a57a-4bc4-a762-818513bdac08
Mar 15, 2019 20:19:12.140 [0x7f51d5ffb700] Warning — Took too long (0.260000 seconds) to start a transaction on ../Statistics/StatisticsManager.cpp:253
Mar 15, 2019 20:19:12.140 [0x7f51d5ffb700] Warning — Transaction that was running was started on thread 0x7f517e7fc700 at ../Library/MetadataItemCluster.cpp:156
Mar 15, 2019 20:19:12.140 [0x7f520d72f700] Debug — Completed: [127.0.0.1:49800] 404 GET /livetv/sessions/f640f813-a57a-4bc4-a762-818513bdac08/tn7nl0vf1ivk7qfr6w0y3gtr/index.m3u8?offset=4.800000 (22 live) 212ms 288 bytes (pipelined: 206)
Mar 15, 2019 20:19:12.141 [0x7f520df30700] Debug — Auth: authenticated user 12384689 as USER
Mar 15, 2019 20:19:12.141 [0x7f517effd700] Debug — Request: [127.0.0.1:52170 (Loopback)] GET /livetv/sessions/f640f813-a57a-4bc4-a762-818513bdac08/tn7nl0vf1ivk7qfr6w0y3gtr/index.m3u8?offset=4.800000 (22 live) Signed-in Token (USER)
Mar 15, 2019 20:19:12.142 [0x7f520d72f700] Debug — Completed: [127.0.0.1:52170] 404 GET /livetv/sessions/f640f813-a57a-4bc4-a762-818513bdac08/tn7nl0vf1ivk7qfr6w0y3gtr/index.m3u8?offset=4.800000 (22 live) 0ms 288 bytes (pipelined: 1)
Mar 15, 2019 20:19:12.144 [0x7f520df30700] Debug — Auth: authenticated user 12384689 as USER
Mar 15, 2019 20:19:12.144 [0x7f520cf2e700] Debug — Request: [127.0.0.1:52172 (Loopback)] GET /livetv/sessions/f640f813-a57a-4bc4-a762-818513bdac08/tn7nl0vf1ivk7qfr6w0y3gtr/index.m3u8?offset=4.800000 (22 live) Signed-in Token (USER)
Mar 15, 2019 20:19:12.144 [0x7f520d72f700] Debug — Completed: [127.0.0.1:52172] 404 GET /livetv/sessions/f640f813-a57a-4bc4-a762-818513bdac08/tn7nl0vf1ivk7qfr6w0y3gtr/index.m3u8?offset=4.800000 (22 live) 0ms 288 bytes (pipelined: 1)

What I believe I see is: The server thinks that the user is not playing anymore and then terminates the stream. The client then tries to get more streaming parts but fails as the session has been killed.

Log when playback stops: https://pastebin.com/8s9AMK0G

Full session log:
.plex.log (5.3 MB)

Could you please take a look?
Thank you

2

Bug present on recently released Plex Media Player v2.31.0 as well.

3

Bug present on recently released Plex Media Server version 1.15.4.919
Plex Media Server
Edit.: Thank you for letting home users use DVR!

4

Bug still present in Plex Media Server Version 1.15.8.1163
and Web client Version 3.100.1

5

Bug still present.
Plex Media Server 1.16.4.1469
Plex Web 4.2.1
and the newest Plex for Mac and Windows desktops

6

I’m seeing frequent buffering (can’t usually watch for more than a minute at a time) on my new LG TV (60UK6200PJA) while attempting to stream live TV via an HDHomeRun PRIME.

Plex Media Server: 1.16.6.1592
Plex for LG: 4.7.1
webOS: 4.1.0

I’ve tried different levels in the Video…Remote Quality options (Original down to 0.3Mbps), as well as disabling all options in the Audio menu. I’ve tried ethernet as well as wifi to connect the TV.

A laptop running the Windows app (Version 1.3.1.916-1cb2c34d) streams this same channel perfectly, so I don’t believe it’s a network bandwidth issue.

Any help would be appreciated.

7

Bug still present:
Plex Media Server 1.18.0.1944
Plex Web 4.10.1
Plex for Mac and Windows has been unable to show the Live TV tab for a while now.

8

This specific issue will be fixed in the next release, coming soonish but not before weekend. PMP does not have this particular issue.

1 Like
9

There’s a preview release available now that should fix this issue:

10

I can confirm it’s fixed in the windows version. Thanks! :smiley:

Unfortunately the bug that this thread is dedicated to is still there :frowning: I think it’s a PMS bug rather than a player bug? I don’t know since Plex Web/PMP/Plex Player seems to use similar UI.

11

These versions are a few months old now. Do you have a computer that you can install the latest stable (non-beta) version on and test with?

12

Yes, I’ve been updating the thread with -almost- every release. I am currently on 1.18.0.1944

13

Can you post full PMS logs (via Troubleshooting in the Server Settings)? I’ll see if I can get someone to take a look…

14

Sure, here they are:Plex Media Server Logs_2019-10-16_17-10-26.zip (9.8 MB)

Just tried once again so it should show up at the end of the file.
The stream fails when the user watching live tv is not the owner of the server. The dashboard shows nothing being played but there’s activity.

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image1360×324 101 KB

Thank you!

15

I’m having something similar but instead of user actually able to play for x time, my home users can’t at all and only the admin can.

1 Like
16

Have you allowed them to do so in the restrictions tab?

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image792×631 121 KB

17

for me yes, My plex has been running just fine for months till yesterday.

18

My Plex also has been running fine for months until the last couple of weeks. There is a bug that only the main admin account can watch Live TV all other family users can not. When they go to Live TV on Fire TV is says “Oops something when wrong”, If they do it on a web browser it says “There was an error loading channels”. Main Admin account works fine and my DVR schedule is recording just fine. All family users have Live TV and DVR enabled.

19

It’s a known issue and hopefully we will be resolved soon. I have no live TV now as my server is remote unless everyone is signed into admin:). As to the original person’s post about running for 4 minutes and then stopping. I have no clue hopefully a Mod jumps on. Please see attach thread.

20

Long time no see. I resubscribed to Plex Pass.

The bug is still present:
Plex Media Server 1.18.4.2171
Plex Web 4.18.1

1 Like