My library is getting rather big by now, and I back it up every now and then just in case of a crash.
I am doing full backup into tar.gz file, which takes a few hours every time.
Is it “safe” to use rsync to update my backup, or do I need to make a full backup every time I do this?
With Plex stopped, rsync is good and reliable, (rsync -av --delete blah blah)
Your other option is to “update” the existing tar image. Being in a gz does complicate it as you’ll have that CPU overhead to contend with.
My Library is about 15GB of metadata and easily manageable either way.
I was thinking of using rsync -avu for updating the first full backup.
My library folder is around 40GB now (for some reason), so making a full backup with over two million files takes forever, which is why I want incremental backup.
You may have the same issue here.
Seems like I might… Was this ever resolved?
Relevant info, I’m running plex in docker on ubuntu. latest plexpass version.
I’ve cleaned bundles, emptied trash and optimized database without any decrease in used space on drive.
Not that I know of. I wasn’t able to find a resolve to it. Sorry.
For anyone using rsync
Do not forget to include the –delete option. This is what cleans up bundles and temp files which are no longer on your main system. -a --delete is all you need (I use those options to sync my entire media library NAS to NAS)
-v will be verbose and will scroll like mad and slow down the sync substantially
Do you know if there is any way to slim down the library size? It feels quite excessive, especially with NewPlaza’s link in mind…
If you don’t need Chapter index (thumbnail) indexing images ( Edit Library section -> Advanced Tab). The image files require a great deal of storage.
Disabled both chapter index and video (trailer), and pressed the delete button for those.
Cleaned bundles, emptied trash and optimized database again.
No change in used storage space
du -sh Library actually has it at 65G now, so it’s increased by 20G in a couple of weeks 
while there, did you uncheck then"Delete Thumbnails" and Save ?
This must be done for each Library section.
Yes. And when I did that, it started scanning the library, but no changes seems to have been made.
Can I delete these files manually without impacting anything?
If you want to search for bif and BIF files, sure. Just scan and Clean Bundles when done.
How many items do you have indexed? Metadata size is directly proportional to count.
I have approx 30,000 items, inclusive of music.
Movies: 3170 (including documentaries)
TV Episodes: 57052
So about twice the amount of yours, which “logically” would put my library size at 30GB is yours is 15, but I’m at twice that.
I came to think about permissions, since I am running in a docker with the library path mounted to the docker, plex:plex isn’t the owner of the library folder. Could this be why files aren’t deleted? Since the plex user only exists inside the docker that is being run by the user that is owner of the library folder? Chmod is drwxr-xr-x
If it has permission to write the data, it has permission to delete it.
Plex would be screaming at you long ago if it had no permission to scan files and download (requires saving) metadata.
How many extras are you downloading?
I had Include Cinema Trailers from movies in my library checked, which is now unchecked.
Would be nice to know which folders are safe to remove though.
The sinner seems to be Library/Application Support/Plex Media Server/Cache/PhotoTranscoder
That folder is 40GB and has shitload of image files that I assume don’t serve any useful purpose. (besids sending small images to clients, If I am correct. The server is powerful enough to regenerate these when needed, so I guess I’m asking for a blessing to remove the contents of this folder, confirming that it won’t break something)
Purging caches, with PMS stopped, is a good step. I do not put my photos in PMS as this will cause bloat.
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