Cayars, what is the extension of the output file? Just curious.
You can generate MKV or MP4 but it's really designed to create MP4 files. All the "extra goodness" is focused on MP4s that work well with Plex.
You can generate MKV or MP4 but it's really designed to create MP4 files. All the "extra goodness" is focused on MP4s that work well with Plex.
While there is no issue running this multiple times on the same files I'd suggest if you want to run this against your whole collection you do it in sections feeding in the proper high level directory. The only reason I mention this is because it would suck to get say 75% done and have an issue that causes you to reboot and start over!
Carlo
Ok I see. Was thinking of maybe embeding the subs. But it's not that important. But I can report that processing your whole collection seems harmless. Since it precess file for file and if it hangs it will restart at the file it were at for a new run when you start up the script. Tried it thought the script had hanged, restarted the script and I went right ahead to process that file again, it jumped right by the already processed ones.
I enabled this by setting convert-mp4 = False instead of true ins autoProcess.ini
If you already know EVERY MP4 on your system is correct and has h.264 (not mpeg4) and has an AAC audio track as the first track you are good to go this way.
By having âconvert-mp4=falseâ it wonât touch the MP4 and will just work on the other file types. So in a nutshell it will start where it left off just as you already found out!
Itâs bad from the standpoint of not being able to reprocess existing MP4 if they arenât already in the correct format. However, this really isnât much of a problem. Once you are done processing your whole library come back and ask for a SQL script I already have.
What this SQL script will do is look at the database for all MP4s and will check to make sure they are web optimized, have an AAC audio track, have h.264 video, etc. If any of them donât it will create a batch file that you can drop into the CONVERT directory and run that will processing these files individually.
Makes for a nice âfinal cleanupâ of your library this way,
Carlo
You can generate MKV or MP4 but it's really designed to create MP4 files. All the "extra goodness" is focused on MP4s that work well with Plex.
I am not a video extension expert by any means and so here is what I have:
Years ago, I ripped a group of movies and they were really, really low quality. The extension on those files is MP4 (in my library). In the past nine months, I changed and did higher quality, now using Handbrake (as my previous posts showed) and the output extension is M4V. I have been re-ripping when I can and now about 40 or so files still exist in the lower quality. Seeing the settings of your script, I would like to run through it all of my M4V files and the output would be MP4, which I don't care one way or the other. It will only make it harder to tell which movies I need to replace to get better quality (but that is an issue I can work around).
You could use Plex2CSV to get an idea of what you need to re-rip yet. I created a spreadsheet in Google sheets will some goodies for parsing my library. Every now and again I dump a fresh csv into the first sheet to update my forms and charts.
If you already know EVERY MP4 on your system is correct and has h.264 (not mpeg4) and has an AAC audio track as the first track you are good to go this way.
By having "convert-mp4=false" it won't touch the MP4 and will just work on the other file types. So in a nutshell it will start where it left off just as you already found out!
It's bad from the standpoint of not being able to reprocess existing MP4 if they aren't already in the correct format. However, this really isn't much of a problem. Once you are done processing your whole library come back and ask for a SQL script I already have.
What this SQL script will do is look at the database for all MP4s and will check to make sure they are web optimized, have an AAC audio track, have h.264 video, etc. If any of them don't it will create a batch file that you can drop into the CONVERT directory and run that will processing these files individually.
Makes for a nice "final cleanup" of your library this way,
Carlo
Awesome. I might ask for that already. Have not gone through my whole library yet. But it sounds handy! You have some really nice addons to plex.
1 - Install SQLITE3
2 - Put the following in a text file called transcode.txt and put this in the same directory as the sqlite files.
âeverything after this line----
.open âC:\PlexData\Plex Media Server\Plug-in Support\Databases\com.plexapp.plugins.library.dbâ
.output Transcode.bat
SELECT âc:\python27\Python C:\convert\manual.py -a -i "â || file || â"â FROM media_parts join media_items
on media_parts.media_item_id=media_items.id
where container=âmp4â and optimized_for_streaming <> 1
order by file;
âeverything before this lineâ
2A - Modify the first line so it points to your DB file
2B - Modify the third line so it points to your convert directory
3A - from command window change to sqlite directory and type
3B - sqlite3 < transcode.txt
You should now have a new file called transcode.bat. Open it up and look at it to make sure it looks good. But you should be able to run this.
As a precation I would remove all lines from this transcode.bat file but the first line (so it can only process one file). Make a backup of that directory and test.
This way if something goes wrong you donât lose anything.
I didnât get a chance to look this over as Iâm at work and just grabbed it and posted this on a tablet. Let me know if you have any problems or if itâs not quite working and Iâll help adapt it to your system. But as you can see in the WHERE clause this is just looking for MP4 that arenât web optimized. Itâs not looking for AAC audio or anything like that but we can make it so. Let me know what you need and weâll tweek it. However as a first run if it isnât web optimized it needs to get processed anyway. If you know SQL you can also do a check for anything not MP4 and run them too.
Just let me know what you need,
Carlo
This thread is a treasure trove of great information. I'm curious as to why Plex isn't even seeing some of your music, while I've had problems with matching I've never encountered invisible files. Did you ever discover why this is?
I donât really have this problem anymore. Since the Premium Music addition to the Plex server it has picked up much more and in now in line with the numbers I get from Emby and Madsonic/Subsonic.
Carlo
PS Thanks for the nice comments.
So i have been testing more with netdrive...and it has been interesting
Use as test machine super, super old core duo laptop attached over gigabit ethernet to main computer that was running netdrive. Â So no issue with that part being slow as the machine is just pulling the data as if it is from a networked drive. Â First off scanning is incredibly, incredibly slow. Â This happens no matter what the hardware because you are pulling over the internet. Â Has been scanning for 3 days and is not yet completed (btw this is from data on google drive). Â On the same computer that is running the netdrive here is plex home theater playing back the media. Â No issues at all with 720p content in the 5-6 mb/s range. Â For those wanting to do high quality bluray rips and then reencode and send it out i would recommend a speed over 50/mbps (which is what i have). Â
I also have this running on a much more modern server and the only way you know it is not local content is that there is a 5-6 second hang when you start media and start reencoding where it pulls down the media. Â Otherwise it is basically the same. Â I have moved some less watched shows permanently this way.
For comparison here is a high bitrate 1080p video (10 mbps) and it is struggling (no reencode) running at about 3-4 fps even after pausing to let it buffer up
We are using Netdrive in two different ways. Iâm using it strictly for backup purposes and you are using it to mount drives and to play back from. Scanning in your case is going to take a long time as it needs to open every file to interrogate it.
If I were going to do that I think Iâd first setup a mock drive letter locally. Move all the data that I was going to move into the cloud to that spot. Let Plex scan it locally first, then move it to the cloud and change the drive letters. This way Plex wonât know the difference. This technique would only be good for the âseedâ scan however.
Carlo
that's actually not bad...might try that if I move this out of test and into production
Also cayars if you need something for backup...I would recommend sycovery. Instead of mounting a drive it will sync across with scheduled backups and different backup styles...it is really an excellent product
Off to google that one. Havenât heard of sycovery before.
Thanks for the tip,
Carlo
Off to google that one. Haven't heard of sycovery before.
Thanks for the tip,
Carlo
I think he'd lost an 'n' :ph34r: - We are using Syncovery as well. Like it. Many, many setting-options, capable of a lot of things and really good support! http://www.syncovery.com/
Yea, I had checked that out previously but it doesnât support Amazon Cloud Drive which is my primary offline backup at the moment.
Yea, I had checked that out previously but it doesn't support Amazon Cloud Drive which is my primary offline backup at the moment.
I use goodsync and it suites my needs in general. Since i live in Canada, i dont have access to the Amazon Cloud Drive 59$/year deal...
Where can i get the script for transforming to MP4?
I tried the FTP but it is empty
Sorry, try again. I was shuffling some files around on my storage pool and forgot about this one. 
All fixed.
Carlo
I just updated the 1st message in this thread with some newer stats which mostly are in my sig:
My media:
160 - 3D Movies
6,200Â - Movies
1,150 - Educational
18,700 - Music Videos
850Â - NFL Games
10,100Â - TV Episodes (132Â Shows, 613Â Seasons)
Music: 4,400 Artists, 12,900 Albums, 105,000 Tracks
My current storage mostly consists of StableBitâs DrivePool mounted as drive F: with 10 drives thus far.
Drives are a combination of 4TB and 6TB drives. 2 of these drives sit in my server along with 1TB SSD drive and 8 reside in an external enclosure.
I also have 2 small NAS boxes I use for non-media storage and for holding 2 copies of SnapRaid parity. While saving the parity to ânetworkâ drives is a bit slower than having the drives local it frees up the local drives purely for media storage use where I want the drives to be as fast as possible. Plus the parity once built/seeded is quick to update thereafter even over the network as long as the drives arenât changing much (the case with media drives).
I currently have 25TB of media uploaded to Amazon Drive Cloud but have stopped uploading using the previous methods detailed in this thread. The files are still in the cloud but Iâve just started a different method Iâm testing that will be more automated (a good thing) which Iâll describe in an upcoming post.
I previously was using index/bif files and had done a server rebuild and started completely over to get a clean start. I had turned on BIF creation until I started moving data around when I added DrivePool. I just today turned this feature back on and would guess only about 30% of my media has been indexed. At present the meta-directory is sitting at about 212GB. I wonder how big it will be when complete?
Carlo
