Plex Media Server: 1.28.0.5999
Media Server: NVIDIA Shield TV
Plex Player: 9.6.0 (NVIDIA SHIELD)
OK, so I noticed some random topics talking about this but all of them are very different from one another. Hopefully I can get some traction on this one to solve an ongoing problem I have had for months and months. My setup is as follows.
NVIDIA SHIELD TV PRO - Samsung Q950A Soundbar - LG C1
So here it goes, I have the SHIELD TV directly going through the soundbar (thanks LG for not supporting DTS), and then the soundbar going into HDMI4 in the TV. Why HDMI4? eARC on the LG is all over the place, it freezes up Atmos playback aswell unless I go to another HDMI and disable eARC.
The only issue I have now at the moment is watching back DTS:X playback. It is totally random, might be about 1 hour into the film before the video stutters and the audio drops out. It will try it’s best to come back but keeps lagging until I stop playback and resume. My only assumption is that the LG is causing it (I know weird, but I know someone with a similar setup but with a SONY TV and no issues).
Watching back the same content through KODI, I get zero issues. PLEX is my go to over KODI, so I’d really like to see if a solution is available here.
Movies in question are all the Harry Potter films in 4K remuxed in MKV format. Everything is playing as DIRECT PLAY. Is this still a common issue or am I just unfortunate now at this point?
Happy to include logs over the weekend when I sit down and watch the next Harry Potter in the queue.
Will the TV play a USB stick? If so, will it play the format that you stored this on Plex? Since you have concerns about the TV this would answer whether the issue TV has sufficient horsepower to play it.
Note – I don’t have your TV or Shield so bear with me. Maybe the request may get some traction from others.
How does Plex connect to the Shield? Is it Ethernet or WiFi. If WiFi is it WiFi 5 or 6? Recently I created a 4K video that caused my WiFi, Apple TV and Samsung to hiccup. In my case I am on WiFi 5:-(. I had to reduce the bitrate to fix.
Questions:
– what does your router say the bitrate between Plex and the Shield is? Is it similar or higher than movies that work?
– same question when KODI is playing it.
– have you verified Direct play is working? Reason: I have seen many Plex posts where people reported Plex transcoding when they knew it shouldn’t.
Clearly you have a bottleneck somewhere. Good luck finding it.
Good shout on trying direct play on the LG. I will do so over the weekend and let you know. The TV will probably default to a supported audio track from the file and play fine knowing my luck.
So my Server is also on the Shield so i’m directly playing from the Shield and my hard-drives are connected to the SHIELD (no network mounting). Not that it matters, but it’s hardwired directly into my TP-Link router and the connection is always solid.
Direct Play definitely is working. I probably threw you off a bit by referencing my TV as the cause of the issue even though the TV is just acting as a monitor so to speak. It’s the joys of an LG TV. Great picture quality but hates DTS content and just freezes up even if I am not attempting to send sound to the TV. I have no way to disable that.
I literally played a Atmos track last week when I had eARC setup. Froze within 2 mins. Disabled eArc and changed HDMI inputs and boom movie played fine. Incredibly strange and almost impossible to troubleshoot.
