I have a large existing database of movies and TV Shows that were recorded with Channels DVR. I prefer that DVR system for recording TV shows and Movies. However, I prefer Plex as a user client.
I installed Plex, setup the libraries to have access to my existing recordings and made sure I did all of the following (see below):
I have a lifetime Plex Pass
On the latest Plex Server Software (it is up to date)
I have the DVR setup with one of my HDHomeRun Tuners.
ad-detection is enabled in the DVR’s settings (detect commercials and mark for skip)
I’ve setup the libraries for TV Shows and Movies to include the advanced option (Ad detection=for all items)
I’m running Plex on my Windows 11 Core i7 9700k PC. I noticed once I added my libraries that Plex immediately started detecting for Intros and Credits and I can see those tasks running. However, I don’t see any mention of commercial detection running. Nothing in the Dashboard or logs about commercial skip.
I’ve tried clicking “Analyze” on specific shows or programs just to see if it would trigger the commercial detection (it does not).
Is it possible that Plex wants to do all the intro and credit detection Before it will do any commercial detection? My library is about 25TB so it is still chugging through the intro and credit detection and I expect will take some time (it has already been several days).
Does anyone else have this issue? Is there something I am missing? Any ideas?
It’s possible. I think that the image analysis needed to detect commercials is probably the same mechanism that Plex uses to do credit skipping. Since that engine is currently busy working on credits, it makes sense to me that it cannot do commercial skip until after that finishes.
To force a commercial analysis, I think you need to do “analyze” on the episode level, not on a show, library, or even season level. If this is the case, it’s annoying, but give it a try. Of course, it’s possible that it still won’t do commercial analysis until after it’s done with all other tasks.
So for now, I’d suggest you attempt analysis on a single file (or multiple, using the multi-select circle that appears when you hover over the list of items) to see if you can force it now. If that fails to do anything, wait for credits to complete, and see if it moves on to commercials. If it does not, then try again to force analysis of a single item (or multiple), and see if it works then.
Thank you for the Speculation, I will try the analyze on the episode level and see if that does anything for now.
Without any official comments from Plex (hopefully the will still respond), I will wait until all the other intro processing is done before trying this again. While my computer is more than powerful enough to do intro processing and comskip, it may be a limitation of Plex.
A clarification, all media that isn’t recorded off a tuner is only processed during your “Scheduled Tasks” windows. Movies can be individually selected for Analyze but TV shows in episode format have to be Analyzed at the Season level. This was a compromise for having to multi select episodes.
Not sure I would have pointed Plex at all the media at one time. The commercial scanner can fail to process a file and will reschedule it for the next task window. What you eventually end up with is the whole task window being used up trying to process failed Commercial, Intros and Credit detection.
I should also mention, are all the files in Plex naming and file structures. If not the they could just be ignored by the scanner.
