"Conversion Failed. Transcoder crashed or failed to start up"

I’ve been using plex for years with little to no issues.

The last few months, every so often (about once a day), a TV show or movie will stop and I will get this error, or a shaka101 error. When I try to re-play the file, it works immediately. I have not found any correlation to what could be causing this. This has happened on different types of video formats (avi, mp4, mkv), has happened with files with subtitles and without subtitles. And on files on 2 different HDDs. And it can almost NEVER be replicated. It happens randomly.
Typically, I have it running overnight in my room and it will stop at some point, but other times it happens when I go to watch a single show after not using the server for a few hours, so I don’t think it’s an issue with the PC or anything.

I have tried EVERYTHING I have found on Plex Forums and Reddit.
Uninstalled, reinstalled.
Deleted libraries
Renamed files
Changed Transcoder directory
Set PlexTranscoder.exe to compatibility mode
Changed permissions of Transcoder folder
I even bought Plex Pass so I could try the Beta, still having issues
Toggled Direct Play/Direct Stream
Optimized Versions
Happens on all devices (Plex web, both through Plex.tv and local, Chromecast to my tv from both desktop and phone, playing on Fire Stick, and Xbox)

My system is older (i5-3570k, 8GB ram) but I haven’t had issues like this until the last 2-3 months. All files play just fine on all other content.

Also, to add on, these files are a combination of downloaded/ripped media, so I’d imagine it shouldn’t be a codec issue or something considering these issues just popped up relatively recently, and the files work in every other program I throw them in.

Update: Had a TV Show on Shuffle, at the end of one episode during the credits, I got the Transcoder error, before it went to the countdown timer. Then after maybe 3-5 seconds (Not the 10 it normally takes), it moved to the next episode

Can anyone help me?

I’ve mainly got it down to any file that is converting AC3 5.1 -> AAC audio only, video format doesn’t seem to matter

Believe I’m having the same issue on my firetv (via surround sound avr).
Transcoding seems fine via web, both direct and transcoded from any of my mic ac3 5.1 and eac3 5.1 videos, yet it crashes and crashes the client when direct playing or transcoding to the firetv.
Unsure whether it’s the device (nothing has changed lately) or the transcoding to a specific format for that device.

I’ve been having some issues with the transcoder for a few weeks/months now.
I made a post here explaining all the steps I took to try to isolate the issue/fix it, all to no avail.

Since then, I have noticed the only issue seems to be when the video is Direct Play/Direct Stream, and the audio is being converted, it crashes. Specifically AC3 5.1 -> AAC. That seems to be the only constant I can find. Attached is the log of the most recent crash.

It seems to me that the relevant info is:
Feb 15, 2018 21:13:25.024 [7272] DEBUG - Jobs: ‘C:\Program Files (x86)\Plex\Plex Media Server\PlexTranscoder.exe’ exit code for process 6388 is 1
Feb 15, 2018 21:13:25.025 [7272] DEBUG - Streaming Resource: Terminated session %p:z0765dk1ocnoj2t8xul3sxbz with reason Conversion failed. The transcoder crashed or failed to start up.
Feb 15, 2018 21:13:25.025 [1204] DEBUG - Thread: Running async task started by thread 7272.
Feb 15, 2018 21:13:25.025 [1204] DEBUG - Killing job.
Feb 15, 2018 21:13:25.025 [1204] DEBUG - Job was already killed, not killing again.
Feb 15, 2018 21:13:25.025 [1204] DEBUG - Stopping transcode session 696y8zso0ats7y97rdw0hq9a
Feb 15, 2018 21:13:25.025 [7272] DEBUG - Thread: Running async task started by thread 1204.

@thehritzinator said:
I’ve been having some issues with the transcoder for a few weeks/months now.
I made a post here explaining all the steps I took to try to isolate the issue/fix it, all to no avail.

Since then, I have noticed the only issue seems to be when the video is Direct Play/Direct Stream, and the audio is being converted, it crashes. Specifically AC3 5.1 → AAC. That seems to be the only constant I can find. Attached is the log of the most recent crash.

It seems to me that the relevant info is:
Feb 15, 2018 21:13:25.024 [7272] DEBUG - Jobs: ‘C:\Program Files (x86)\Plex\Plex Media Server\PlexTranscoder.exe’ exit code for process 6388 is 1
Feb 15, 2018 21:13:25.025 [7272] DEBUG - Streaming Resource: Terminated session %p:z0765dk1ocnoj2t8xul3sxbz with reason Conversion failed. The transcoder crashed or failed to start up.
Feb 15, 2018 21:13:25.025 [1204] DEBUG - Thread: Running async task started by thread 7272.
Feb 15, 2018 21:13:25.025 [1204] DEBUG - Killing job.
Feb 15, 2018 21:13:25.025 [1204] DEBUG - Job was already killed, not killing again.
Feb 15, 2018 21:13:25.025 [1204] DEBUG - Stopping transcode session 696y8zso0ats7y97rdw0hq9a
Feb 15, 2018 21:13:25.025 [7272] DEBUG - Thread: Running async task started by thread 1204.

The actual errors are

Feb 15, 2018 21:13:24.977 [11932] ERROR - [Transcoder] [dash @ 007b8920] Unable to open http://127.0.0.1:32400/video/:/transcode/session/696y8zso0ats7y97rdw0hq9a/d99bd566-bdc3-4546-9201-059713bc03b5/manifest for writing
Feb 15, 2018 21:13:24.988 [10968] ERROR - [Transcoder] av_interleaved_write_frame(): Unknown error

Have seen this before and has been referred to the development team but has not been possible to reproduce
This happened about 26% down in transcoding the The Hangover mp4 file

Is it predictable ? Do you know how to make it error ?

@thehritzinator
unrelated

The logs show database corruption for the gracenote database used for searches for the Premium Music Library
You can delete the database files for gracenote whilst the server is shutdown and they would get recreated when needed

Feb 15, 2018 18:13:12.455 [9916] ERROR - SQLITE3:0x96a684c0, 11, malformed database schema (
I€‚‚€~}|{zyxw"Духови/Медни(v0v8
HP)
Feb 15, 2018 18:13:12.455 [9916] ERROR - SQLITE3:0x96a684c0, 11, database corruption at line 112037 of [fc49f556e4]
Feb 15, 2018 18:13:12.455 [9916] ERROR - SQLITE3:0x96a684c0, 11, database corruption at line 112037 of [fc49f556e4]
Feb 15, 2018 18:13:12.455 [9916] ERROR - SQLITE3:0x96a684c0, 11, malformed database schema (
I€‚‚€~}|{zyxw"Духови/Медни(v0v8
HP)
Feb 15, 2018 18:13:12.456 [9916] ERROR - Gracenote: Playlist locale error -1870658241 (CorruptDB: A database disk image is malformed)
Feb 15, 2018 18:13:12.456 [9916] ERROR - SQLITE3:0x96a684c0, 11, database corruption at line 112037 of [fc49f556e4]
Feb 15, 2018 18:13:12.456 [9916] ERROR - SQLITE3:0x96a684c0, 11, database corruption at line 112037 of [fc49f556e4]
Feb 15, 2018 18:13:12.456 [9916] ERROR - SQLITE3:0x96a684c0, 11, malformed database schema (
I€‚‚€~}|{zyxw"Духови/Медни(v0v8
HP)
Feb 15, 2018 18:13:12.456 [9916] ERROR - SQLITE3:0x96a684c0, 11, database corruption at line 112037 of [fc49f556e4]
Feb 15, 2018 18:13:12.456 [9916] ERROR - SQLITE3:0x96a684c0, 11, database corruption at line 112037 of [fc49f556e4]
Feb 15, 2018 18:13:12.457 [9916] ERROR - SQLITE3:0x96a684c0, 11, malformed database schema (
I€‚‚€~}|{zyxw"Духови/Медни(v0v8
HP)
Feb 15, 2018 18:13:12.457 [9916] ERROR - Gracenote: Music locale error -1870658241 (CorruptDB: A database disk image is malformed)
Feb 15, 2018 18:13:12.457 [9916] ERROR - SQLITE3:0x96a684c0, 11, database corruption at line 112037 of [fc49f556e4]
Feb 15, 2018 18:13:12.457 [9916] ERROR - SQLITE3:0x96a684c0, 11, database corruption at line 112037 of [fc49f556e4]
Feb 15, 2018 18:13:12.457 [9916] ERROR - SQLITE3:0x96a684c0, 11, malformed database schema (
I€‚‚€~}|{zyxw"Духови/Медни(v0v8
HP)
Feb 15, 2018 18:13:12.458 [9916] ERROR - SQLITE3:0x96a684c0, 11, database corruption at line 112037 of [fc49f556e4]
Feb 15, 2018 18:13:12.458 [9916] ERROR - SQLITE3:0x96a684c0, 11, database corruption at line 112037 of [fc49f556e4]
Feb 15, 2018 18:13:12.458 [9916] ERROR - SQLITE3:0x96a684c0, 11, malformed database schema (
I€‚‚€~}|{zyxw"Духови/Медни(v0v8
HP)

Please shutdown Plex Media Server
Then delete or rename the following files

D:\Plex\AppData\Plex Media Server\Cache\gn_colls.gdb
D:\Plex\AppData\Plex Media Server\Cache\gn_cachq.gdb
D:\Plex\AppData\Plex Media Server\Cache\gn_lists.gdb
D:\Plex\AppData\Plex Media Server\Cache\gn_cachc.gdb

and restart the server

@sa2000 said:

@thehritzinator said:
I’ve been having some issues with the transcoder for a few weeks/months now.
I made a post here explaining all the steps I took to try to isolate the issue/fix it, all to no avail.

Since then, I have noticed the only issue seems to be when the video is Direct Play/Direct Stream, and the audio is being converted, it crashes. Specifically AC3 5.1 → AAC. That seems to be the only constant I can find. Attached is the log of the most recent crash.

It seems to me that the relevant info is:
Feb 15, 2018 21:13:25.024 [7272] DEBUG - Jobs: ‘C:\Program Files (x86)\Plex\Plex Media Server\PlexTranscoder.exe’ exit code for process 6388 is 1
Feb 15, 2018 21:13:25.025 [7272] DEBUG - Streaming Resource: Terminated session %p:z0765dk1ocnoj2t8xul3sxbz with reason Conversion failed. The transcoder crashed or failed to start up.
Feb 15, 2018 21:13:25.025 [1204] DEBUG - Thread: Running async task started by thread 7272.
Feb 15, 2018 21:13:25.025 [1204] DEBUG - Killing job.
Feb 15, 2018 21:13:25.025 [1204] DEBUG - Job was already killed, not killing again.
Feb 15, 2018 21:13:25.025 [1204] DEBUG - Stopping transcode session 696y8zso0ats7y97rdw0hq9a
Feb 15, 2018 21:13:25.025 [7272] DEBUG - Thread: Running async task started by thread 1204.

The actual errors are

Feb 15, 2018 21:13:24.977 [11932] ERROR - [Transcoder] [dash @ 007b8920] Unable to open http://127.0.0.1:32400/video/:/transcode/session/696y8zso0ats7y97rdw0hq9a/d99bd566-bdc3-4546-9201-059713bc03b5/manifest for writing
Feb 15, 2018 21:13:24.988 [10968] ERROR - [Transcoder] av_interleaved_write_frame(): Unknown error

Have seen this before and has been referred to the development team but has not been possible to reproduce
This happened about 26% down in transcoding the The Hangover mp4 file

Is it predictable ? Do you know how to make it error ?

It’s not predictable and unfortunately I can’t recreate it. Since I uploaded that log, one of the people in my house watched the movie all the way through and the transcoder didn’t crash at all for them. That’s what’s so puzzling to me, is that it’s not like it always happens to a specific file, it seems random and I’ve tried to recreate (I’ve noticed for other people that had transcoder issues, you’ve asked them to recreate the error/make a short video file to upload, but I can’t seem to ever recreate it with any video file, it’s random)

@sa2000 said:
@thehritzinator
unrelated

The logs show database corruption for the gracenote database used for searches for the Premium Music Library
You can delete the database files for gracenote whilst the server is shutdown and they would get recreated when needed

Feb 15, 2018 18:13:12.455 [9916] ERROR - SQLITE3:0x96a684c0, 11, malformed database schema (
I€‚‚€~}|{zyxw"Духови/Медни(v0v8
HP)
Feb 15, 2018 18:13:12.455 [9916] ERROR - SQLITE3:0x96a684c0, 11, database corruption at line 112037 of [fc49f556e4]
Feb 15, 2018 18:13:12.455 [9916] ERROR - SQLITE3:0x96a684c0, 11, database corruption at line 112037 of [fc49f556e4]
Feb 15, 2018 18:13:12.455 [9916] ERROR - SQLITE3:0x96a684c0, 11, malformed database schema (
I€‚‚€~}|{zyxw"Духови/Медни(v0v8
HP)
Feb 15, 2018 18:13:12.456 [9916] ERROR - Gracenote: Playlist locale error -1870658241 (CorruptDB: A database disk image is malformed)
Feb 15, 2018 18:13:12.456 [9916] ERROR - SQLITE3:0x96a684c0, 11, database corruption at line 112037 of [fc49f556e4]
Feb 15, 2018 18:13:12.456 [9916] ERROR - SQLITE3:0x96a684c0, 11, database corruption at line 112037 of [fc49f556e4]
Feb 15, 2018 18:13:12.456 [9916] ERROR - SQLITE3:0x96a684c0, 11, malformed database schema (
I€‚‚€~}|{zyxw"Духови/Медни(v0v8
HP)
Feb 15, 2018 18:13:12.456 [9916] ERROR - SQLITE3:0x96a684c0, 11, database corruption at line 112037 of [fc49f556e4]
Feb 15, 2018 18:13:12.456 [9916] ERROR - SQLITE3:0x96a684c0, 11, database corruption at line 112037 of [fc49f556e4]
Feb 15, 2018 18:13:12.457 [9916] ERROR - SQLITE3:0x96a684c0, 11, malformed database schema (
I€‚‚€~}|{zyxw"Духови/Медни(v0v8
HP)
Feb 15, 2018 18:13:12.457 [9916] ERROR - Gracenote: Music locale error -1870658241 (CorruptDB: A database disk image is malformed)
Feb 15, 2018 18:13:12.457 [9916] ERROR - SQLITE3:0x96a684c0, 11, database corruption at line 112037 of [fc49f556e4]
Feb 15, 2018 18:13:12.457 [9916] ERROR - SQLITE3:0x96a684c0, 11, database corruption at line 112037 of [fc49f556e4]
Feb 15, 2018 18:13:12.457 [9916] ERROR - SQLITE3:0x96a684c0, 11, malformed database schema (
I€‚‚€~}|{zyxw"Духови/Медни(v0v8
HP)
Feb 15, 2018 18:13:12.458 [9916] ERROR - SQLITE3:0x96a684c0, 11, database corruption at line 112037 of [fc49f556e4]
Feb 15, 2018 18:13:12.458 [9916] ERROR - SQLITE3:0x96a684c0, 11, database corruption at line 112037 of [fc49f556e4]
Feb 15, 2018 18:13:12.458 [9916] ERROR - SQLITE3:0x96a684c0, 11, malformed database schema (
I€‚‚€~}|{zyxw"Духови/Медни(v0v8
HP)

Please shutdown Plex Media Server
Then delete or rename the following files

D:\Plex\AppData\Plex Media Server\Cache\gn_colls.gdb
D:\Plex\AppData\Plex Media Server\Cache\gn_cachq.gdb
D:\Plex\AppData\Plex Media Server\Cache\gn_lists.gdb
D:\Plex\AppData\Plex Media Server\Cache\gn_cachc.gdb

and restart the server

I did not have the file “gn_cachc.gdb” in that folder, but I deleted the others and restarted. Would that be causing the transcoder issues? I didn’t have Plexpass until like a month ago so I didn’t have access to the Plexpass music library until then?

I had this exact same issue and the problem was I was using an external SRT file that seemed to be jamming up the transcoder (don’t ask me the science behind this issue). Once I removed the SRT file, it played back immediately without issue.

1 Like

@blairg23 said:
I had this exact same issue and the problem was I was using an external SRT file that seemed to be jamming up the transcoder (don’t ask me the science behind this issue). Once I removed the SRT file, it played back immediately without issue.

Was your SRT file of the video file that had issues, or just any SRT? Some of my shows with transcoder issues have the SRT, some do not. Was yours fixed by deleting all SRT files?

Still having issues with this…Anybody find a solution yet?

I had this issue for the first time yesterday and I’ve had it a few times since. Has anyone been able to work out what the problem is, and how to resolve it?

@thehritzinator said:
Still having issues with this…Anybody find a solution yet?

@JakeHarrison92 said:
I had this issue for the first time yesterday and I’ve had it a few times since. Has anyone been able to work out what the problem is, and how to resolve it?

There is not a general problem / cause. Each one is different and most are to do with what is in the media files
Ensure you are running on latest version of the server software - see https://plex.tv/downloads

To investigate

  • Server logs with debug logging enabled beforehand and server restarted before reproducing the error and getting the logs
  • a clip that is confirmed to produce the error - taken from the media file that gives this error (eg 5 minute clip)

https://support.plex.tv/articles/201643703-reporting-issues-with-plex-media-server/
https://support.plex.tv/articles/200250417-plex-media-server-log-files/

https://support.plex.tv/articles/201035968-generating-sample-files-from-media/

@thehritzinator said:
Still having issues with this…Anybody find a solution yet?

Is it to do with music or other media now?
Would need diagnostics - as outlined in my earlier post

@sa2000 said:

@thehritzinator said:
Still having issues with this…Anybody find a solution yet?

Is it to do with music or other media now?
Would need diagnostics - as outlined in my earlier post

Still the same issues as I described in the original post…It’s all different media. I only had the music one for a short time when I first got Plex pass to check it out, which was like 2 months after the issues started, so it’s not music related. I replied to your earlier post like a month ago and never got a response, that’s why I re-asked if anyone had found a solution, to kind of bump the thread lol, was hoping you’d see it and thought maybe you’d forgotten about it. As I outlined in my OP and in the comment, I cannot replicate; It is random. I’ve tried to do 5 min clips, but the short clips don’t seem to reproduce the error, because the actual video file doesn’t crash every single time, just randomly sometimes.

I am positive this is a Plex issue, not a file issue. Files that worked fine 100% of the time last year, now randomly have issues I had never even seen this error until November, and I’ve used Plex since 2012. I watched full series of tv shows with no issues, now some have this error. Nothing changed for the media (same files on same drives since last year) The exact same files do not give me issues when using VLC, Emby, or Kodi. That’s why I believe it to be a Plex issue. It started in November and no other software gives me these errors.

It really seems like it’s the audio conversion that makes the transcoder have errors. Any AC3 5.1 → AAC Stereo seems to be causing issues. For the most part, I have verrrry few issues with the rest of my media collection that has any audio other than AC3 5.1

@thehritzinator said:

@sa2000 said:

@thehritzinator said:
Still having issues with this…Anybody find a solution yet?

Is it to do with music or other media now?
Would need diagnostics - as outlined in my earlier post

Still the same issues as I described in the original post…It’s all different media. I only had the music one for a short time when I first got Plex pass to check it out, which was like 2 months after the issues started, so it’s not music related. I replied to your earlier post like a month ago and never got a response, that’s why I re-asked if anyone had found a solution, to kind of bump the thread lol, was hoping you’d see it and thought maybe you’d forgotten about it. As I outlined in my OP and in the comment, I cannot replicate; It is random. I’ve tried to do 5 min clips, but the short clips don’t seem to reproduce the error, because the actual video file doesn’t crash every single time, just randomly sometimes.

I am positive this is a Plex issue, not a file issue. Files that worked fine 100% of the time last year, now randomly have issues I had never even seen this error until November, and I’ve used Plex since 2012. I watched full series of tv shows with no issues, now some have this error. Nothing changed for the media (same files on same drives since last year) The exact same files do not give me issues when using VLC, Emby, or Kodi. That’s why I believe it to be a Plex issue. It started in November and no other software gives me these errors.

It really seems like it’s the audio conversion that makes the transcoder have errors. Any AC3 5.1 → AAC Stereo seems to be causing issues. For the most part, I have verrrry few issues with the rest of my media collection that has any audio other than AC3 5.1

Sorry - I see it now. So it was this unpredictable error

Feb 15, 2018 21:13:24.977 [11932] ERROR - [Transcoder] [dash @ 007b8920] Unable to open http://127.0.0.1:32400/video/:/transcode/session/696y8zso0ats7y97rdw0hq9a/d99bd566-bdc3-4546-9201-059713bc03b5/manifest for writing
Feb 15, 2018 21:13:24.988 [10968] ERROR - [Transcoder] av_interleaved_write_frame(): Unknown error

The issue with this is that the development have not been able to reproduce the error and so could not work out why it was happening

You could consider for a period trying out the preview release of the transcoder
See http://forums.plex.tv/discussion/310828/plex-media-server-transcoder-preview-1-12-2-4896/p1

@sa2000 said:

@thehritzinator said:

@sa2000 said:

@thehritzinator said:
Still having issues with this…Anybody find a solution yet?

Is it to do with music or other media now?
Would need diagnostics - as outlined in my earlier post

Still the same issues as I described in the original post…It’s all different media. I only had the music one for a short time when I first got Plex pass to check it out, which was like 2 months after the issues started, so it’s not music related. I replied to your earlier post like a month ago and never got a response, that’s why I re-asked if anyone had found a solution, to kind of bump the thread lol, was hoping you’d see it and thought maybe you’d forgotten about it. As I outlined in my OP and in the comment, I cannot replicate; It is random. I’ve tried to do 5 min clips, but the short clips don’t seem to reproduce the error, because the actual video file doesn’t crash every single time, just randomly sometimes.

I am positive this is a Plex issue, not a file issue. Files that worked fine 100% of the time last year, now randomly have issues I had never even seen this error until November, and I’ve used Plex since 2012. I watched full series of tv shows with no issues, now some have this error. Nothing changed for the media (same files on same drives since last year) The exact same files do not give me issues when using VLC, Emby, or Kodi. That’s why I believe it to be a Plex issue. It started in November and no other software gives me these errors.

It really seems like it’s the audio conversion that makes the transcoder have errors. Any AC3 5.1 → AAC Stereo seems to be causing issues. For the most part, I have verrrry few issues with the rest of my media collection that has any audio other than AC3 5.1

Sorry - I see it now. So it was this unpredictable error

Feb 15, 2018 21:13:24.977 [11932] ERROR - [Transcoder] [dash @ 007b8920] Unable to open http://127.0.0.1:32400/video/:/transcode/session/696y8zso0ats7y97rdw0hq9a/d99bd566-bdc3-4546-9201-059713bc03b5/manifest for writing
Feb 15, 2018 21:13:24.988 [10968] ERROR - [Transcoder] av_interleaved_write_frame(): Unknown error

The issue with this is that the development have not been able to reproduce the error and so could not work out why it was happening

You could consider for a period trying out the preview release of the transcoder
See http://forums.plex.tv/discussion/310828/plex-media-server-transcoder-preview-1-12-2-4896/p1

Sweet! Thanks! I will try this and get back to you! So I install it just like a normal update?