DVR only records short part of shows and not entire show

Live TV & DVR
1

Server Version#: 1.41.7.9823
Player Version#: 10.28.0.3441
Tuner Make/Model: HDHomeRun FLEX 4K
Guide/Lineup name: Unknown/cannot find
Using XMLTV?: I don’t think so.
Channel number/Name: All channels.

My system: Nvidia Shield Pro 2019 (purch. early 2024); HDHomeRun Flex 4K tuner; Samsung S7 SSD ext. drive; Plex media server & Plex client (latest versions) installed on Shield; Plex Pass lifetime; ClearStream 2V external antenna. EPG: Indianapolis
I’m having a lot of trouble recording OTA shows on Plex from my HDHR tuner. The shows end up recorded for 8 minutes, 12 minutes, 34 seconds, etc. Random amounts. Rarely am I getting complete recordings. Sometimes they appear to be fully recorded but when I watch the recording the end of the show is cut off by a minute or two. Typically shows have their beginnings cut off (for example, a local news broadcast is scheduled to record from 6:00PM to 6:30PM, but when I play it back it started at 6:17PM). None of this makes sense, and I have been chasing this for over a month. I have searched on Reddit and the Plex forums. I have factory reset the Shield and set everything up from scratch multiple times. I don’t have hardware transcoding turned on in the DVR settings and never have. I set each show to record new & reoccurring shows. I’ve left the commercial skip feature turned off. The problem happens on every channel, so I don’t think it’s a signal problem. My channel signal strengths are excellent as I live only 8 miles from the towers. I use the Indianapolis EPG.
I’ve been using this system for over a year, and it used to work fine until a few months ago. Is this due to a bad update to Plex server? Should I back-level my Plex to a previous version? If so, how do I do that? I’m not an expert so if anybody has detailed instructions, I would be grateful.
OTA DVR is the only thing I use Plex for right now, and I’m feeling very frustrated.
Does anybody have any suggestions I can try?
Thanks.
Log of recent recordings:
Late Show with Stephen Colbert (1 hour show): June 18th Episode 133 says it recorded 64 minutes (why 64?). Starts 13 seconds before show begins. Pixelation in first 2 minutes of recording, then clears up. More pixelation at about 6:55 into recording. At 7:04 Plex is now spinning (clocking). Was able to skip forward but now more pixelation. Clocking again on 8:41. Gave up and exited recording.
Late Show with Stephen Colbert June 19th Episode 134 says it recorded 22 minutes. Starts in middle of show. Recording ends a minute or two early while Paul Simon is playing the final act. So I lost both the beginning and the end of this show.
Late Show with Stephen Colbert June 20th Episode (unknown) says it recorded 63 minutes. Recording starts correctly. At first commercial break I click Skip Ads and it skips them, but playback starts pixelating. Show becomes intermittently unwatchable. Show seems to end during last commercial break, so nearly at the end.
NBC Nightly News (30-minute show): June 21 Episode 18 says it recorded 21 minutes starting in middle of show and plays to end.
CBS Evening News (30-minute show): June 21 Episode 154 says it recorded 22 minutes. Recording starts in middle of broadcast and only runs about 3 minutes before ending.
13News at 6:00PM (30-minute show): June 16 Episode says it recorded 4 minutes. Recording starts a few minutes before end of broadcast. Plays to end of broadcast.
13News at 6:00PM (30-minute show): June 21 Episode says it recorded 30 minutes. Recording starts in a commercial before show begins. “Skip Ads” button works OK on some commercials, but not on others (typical). Show plays OK completely to end.
ABC World News (30-minute show): June 21 Episode 172 says it recorded 21 minutes. Recording starts in middle of show. Skip Ads works OK. Show plays OK completely to end.
Meet the Press (1-hour show): June 22 Episode 25 says it recorded 59 minutes. Show plays OK completely to end. Skip Ads does NOT appear for any commercials.
MotorWeek (30-minute show): June 20 Episode 42 says it recorded 29 minutes. Show starts perfectly on time. Show plays completely to end.
Jimmy Kimmel Live! (1-hour show): June 11 Episode 127 says it recorded 61 minutes. Recording starts correctly. Show plays completely to end. Skip Ads works fine on first commercial break. And second. Does not work on third break, which is 10 minutes long.
In weeks past I have seen many shows that only record for a few minutes or less. Today they seem to be a little better. But it’s been totally messed up for at least 2 months.

2

Plex Media Server Logs_2025-06-22_17-40-06.zip (2.7 MB)
Here is my latest log.

3

Plex is looking into it. Might be worth posting logs on that discussion and tagging the Plex employee to let them know.

4

I have spent a lot of time and effort over the past few months doing factory resets on my Shield and reinstalling Plex Server and Plex Client on the Shield over and over. Trying to see if I get a “magic solution”; fearing that if I did, I wouldn’t have a clue what the original cause was. I installed everything as much “stock” as possible (i.e. not messing with many settings).

Last night was a real pain. I had started recording the NBA Playoffs on ABC at 8:00PM with the intention of waiting several minutes for it to “buffer” before I started watching. That would let me skip commercials while watching.

Later, I selected the game from the EPG and was given the option to either “Play from beginning (20 minutes ago)” or play live. I chose Play from Beginning. I was able to watch for awhile then I suddenly got an error message saying “An error occurred while attempting to play this video. Please check your connection and try again.” What connection?? My Plex Server and Plex Player are running on the SAME Shield. My TV is connected to the Shield via HDMI.

So I went back to the EPG and selected the show again. This time it gave me the choice of “Play from the beginning (2 minutes ago)” or play live. I could not go back to the actual beginning of the recording, and had to join the show from 2 minutes ago. So I missed about the first quarter of the game. Note that the recording doesn’t appear in my TV Shows folder until it is done, so I couldn’t play it from their either.

This error has happened to me multiple times over the last few months. I have what I believe to be a robust network. My Shield and HDHR tuner are Ethernet connected to the same Ethernet switch. My antenna signals are strong. My ABC affiliate is 8 miles away.

I have attached another log if that helps.

5

Plex Media Server Logs_2025-06-23_15-02-17.zip (3.0 MB)

6

Sorry the text in the previous box is all run together. I had composed the letter in Word and then copy and pasted it into the chat. Apparently that doesn’t work well.

I’m fairly new to Plex Forum so please don’t hesitate to tell me if I am posting wrong. Or give me any tips.

Thanks in advance for any help I can get with Plex because it has been a bit of a nightmare the last several months. All I use it for is OTA DVR (for now) and frankly that is all I can handle right now.

7

I wanted to add that my Shield and my HDHR Flex 4K are both connected to the same ethernet switch, on short cables, in the same equipment closet. The only thing attached to the Shield is my external SSD drive.

8

I tried to do some more debugging today, and I’m getting an inkling that Plex is losing connection to the HDHomeRun for some reason. Even though both the Shield and the HDHR are cabled to the same ethernet switch in my equipment closet.

I watched Live TV for a couple hours today on my desktop computer using the Windows App as well as using Firefox to the IP address of the Plex server. On several occasions it simply stopped playing the live TV show and I had to start it again. This smells a lot like the DVR failures I’ve been having for months.

Here are notes from today’s observations. Note that there are several warnings and errors in the log, which I do not understand. If anybody can help, let me know!

Plex Repeatedly Drops Live TV Shows
20250623
I started watching a Live TV show (Dateline) using my Windows App on my powerful desktop PC at approximately 15:58 Eastern when suddenly the show stopped and the player window went away. In the HDHR Log I see:
20250623-19:58:49 Tuner: tuner2 tuning 6.1 WRTV-HD (8vsb:539MHz-3)
20250623-19:58:49 Tuner: tuner2 streaming http to 192.168.0.158:32768
20250623-20:03:55 Tuner: tuner2 http stream ended (remote closed)

I started watching the next show (Judge Judy) at 16:20. The window closed itself a minute later. HDHR Log shows:
20250623-20:20:16 Tuner: tuner2 tuning 6.1 WRTV-HD (8vsb:539MHz-3)
20250623-20:20:16 Tuner: tuner2 streaming http to 192.168.0.158:37576
20250623-20:21:17 Tuner: tuner2 http stream ended (remote closed)

HDHR shows tuner strength is 100%. I kept refreshing the HDHR system info page for several minutes and it never went below 100%:

I resumed watching the show again at 16:24.
Program fails again a couple minutes later. HDHR log shows:
20250623-20:24:25 Tuner: tuner2 tuning 6.1 WRTV-HD (8vsb:539MHz-3)
20250623-20:24:26 Tuner: tuner2 streaming http to 192.168.0.158:38368
20250623-20:26:46 Tuner: tuner2 http stream ended (remote closed)

I resumed watching the show again at 16:27. Show stops at 16:38. I see some sort of “Unable to connect” error on screen for a couple of seconds:

HDHR log shows:
20250623-20:27:12 Tuner: tuner2 tuning 6.1 WRTV-HD (8vsb:539MHz-3)
20250623-20:27:12 Tuner: tuner2 streaming http to 192.168.0.158:39920
20250623-20:38:29 Tuner: tuner2 http stream ended (remote closed)

Plex log shows:
Jun 23, 2025 16:38:30.492 [197631245504] WARN - [CERT/OCSP] getCertInfo failed; skipping stapling

Then later:
Jun 23, 2025 16:38:31.167 [197987519680] ERROR - NetworkInterface: Error seting up netlink socket (13).

Then later:
Jun 23, 2025 16:38:41.335 [196104748224] WARN - [Req#63] Invalid library metadata ID plex://show/67f0b30e3f30d4113a41a611 passed.
Jun 23, 2025 16:38:41.335 [196104748224] ERROR - downloadContainer: expected MediaContainer element, found html
Jun 23, 2025 16:38:41.335 [196104748224] WARN - Subscription: No container available for /tv.plex.providers.epg.cloud:2/metadata/plex%3A%2F%2Fshow%2F67f0b30e3f30d4113a41a611
Jun 23, 2025 16:38:41.335 [196104748224] ERROR - Subscription: Error refreshing sub: No container found

Then later:
Jun 23, 2025 16:38:41.595 [196103707840] WARN - [Req#de] Missing X-Plex-Container-Size header. This will fail with status code 400 in the future.
Jun 23, 2025 16:38:41.595 [196103707840] WARN - [Req#de] Missing X-Plex-Container-Size header. This will fail with status code 400 in the future.
Jun 23, 2025 16:38:41.596 [196103707840] ERROR - [Req#de] SQLITE3:0x1, 1, no such column: media_items.begins_at in “select metadata_items.id from metadata_items join metadata_items as parents on parents.id=metadata_items.parent_id join metadata_items as grandparents on grandparents.id=parents.parent_id where metadata_items.library_section_id in (1) and (metadata_items.metadata_type=4 and metadata_items.id in (select taggings.metadata_item_id from taggings join tags on tags.id=taggings.tag_id where tags.id=154)) order by media_items.begins_at asc, metadata_items.id asc, media_items.width desc, metadata_items.originally_available_at asc, media_parts.id asc”
Jun 23, 2025 16:38:41.597 [196103707840] ERROR - Got exception from request handler: sqlite3_statement_backend::prepare: no such column: media_items.begins_at for SQL: select metadata_items.id from metadata_items join metadata_items as parents on parents.id=metadata_items.parent_id join metadata_items as grandparents on grandparents.id=parents.parent_id where metadata_items.library_section_id in (1) and (metadata_items.metadata_type=4 and metadata_items.id in (select taggings.metadata_item_id from taggings join tags on tags.id=taggings.tag_id where tags.id=154)) order by media_items.begins_at asc, metadata_items.id asc, media_items.width desc, metadata_items.originally_available_at asc, media_parts.id asc
Jun 23, 2025 16:38:41.597 [196103707840] ERROR - downloadContainer: expected MediaContainer element, found html
Jun 23, 2025 16:38:41.597 [196103707840] ERROR - Subscription: Error refreshing sub: Failed to fetch remote metadata

I start watching the show again.
Playback fails again at 16:49.
HDHR Log shows:
20250623-20:41:04 Tuner: tuner2 tuning 6.1 WRTV-HD (8vsb:539MHz-3)
20250623-20:41:04 Tuner: tuner2 streaming http to 192.168.0.158:46980
20250623-20:49:06 Tuner: tuner2 http stream ended (remote closed)

Plex log shows:
Jun 23, 2025 16:41:03.483 [197994802368] ERROR - [Req#1d/Grabber/5fc76d754f44c300304dae72-5fc705fe088e7d002d4c730b-ipr44g29girsfio8wjqscipw] Unable to find title for item of type 5
Jun 23, 2025 16:41:03.483 [197994802368] ERROR - [Req#1d/Grabber/5fc76d754f44c300304dae72-5fc705fe088e7d002d4c730b-ipr44g29girsfio8wjqscipw] Unable to find title for item of type 5
Jun 23, 2025 16:41:04.964 [197994802368] ERROR - [Req#1d/Grabber/5fc76d754f44c300304dae72-5fc705fe088e7d002d4c730b-ipr44g29girsfio8wjqscipw] Unknown metadata type:

Then later:
Jun 23, 2025 16:49:05.351 [197787282624] WARN - JobManager: Could not find job for handle 14161

I switched to using the Plex Web App connected to the IP address at 17:19.
At 17:20 the playback freezes and the spinning circle appears. It never stops. I click the Stop icon (small white square) and return to the program guide. It now just displays “No channels currently available”. I hit F5 and the EPG refreshes.

HDHR log shows:
0250623-21:18:37 Tuner: tuner2 tuning 6.1 WRTV-HD (8vsb:539MHz-3)
20250623-21:18:38 Tuner: tuner2 streaming http to 192.168.0.158:52566
20250623-21:20:12 Tuner: tuner2 http stream ended (remote closed)

I start watching show again. It plays OK until I give up and stop watching at 17:50.

HDHR shows:
20250623-21:26:16 Tuner: tuner2 tuning 6.1 WRTV-HD (8vsb:539MHz-3)
20250623-21:26:16 Tuner: tuner2 streaming http to 192.168.0.158:53552

9

Here’s the Plex log file.

Plex Media Server Logs_2025-06-23_18-02-37.zip (2.1 MB)

10

I installed the latest beta server software on my Shield on 7/10. Every show recorded since then is being recorded correctly.

Thank you to the Plex developers for this update!

11

This topic was automatically closed 90 days after the last reply. New replies are no longer allowed.