Gigabit ethernet network not fast enough to stream UHD, or even 1080p, content?

General Discussions
22

Moderator Edit (moderator messed up haha)

Only this much info is needed … Sorry!

<MediaContainer size="1" allowSync="1" identifier="com.plexapp.plugins.library" librarySectionID="4" librarySectionTitle="40 Acres and a Mule" librarySectionUUID="4237b572-7cd6-42f2-8d95-fd5fbdd56f77" mediaTagPrefix="/system/bundle/media/flags/" mediaTagVersion="1520433132">
<Video ratingKey="23900" key="/library/metadata/23900" guid="com.plexapp.agents.imdb://tt3896198?lang=en" librarySectionTitle="40 Acres and a Mule" librarySectionID="4" librarySectionKey="/library/sections/4" studio="Walt Disney Pictures" type="movie" title="Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2" contentRating="PG-13" summary="The Guardians must fight to keep their newfound family together as they unravel the mysteries of Peter Quill's true parentage." rating="7.8" viewOffset="7132690" viewCount="2" lastViewedAt="1520449306" year="2017" tagline="Obviously." thumb="/library/metadata/23900/thumb/1520423293" art="/library/metadata/23900/art/1520423293" duration="8161482" originallyAvailableAt="2017-04-19" addedAt="1508102881" updatedAt="1520423293" chapterSource="media" primaryExtraKey="/library/metadata/24085" ratingImage="imdb://image.rating">
<Media videoResolution="1080" id="59719" duration="8161482" bitrate="4896" width="1920" height="804" aspectRatio="2.35" audioChannels="6" audioCodec="ac3" videoCodec="h264" container="mkv" videoFrameRate="24p" videoProfile="high">
<Part accessible="1" exists="1" id="61246" key="/library/parts/61246/1502293090/file.mkv" duration="8161482" file="/Volumes/Plato/Movies/Guardians.of.the.Galaxy.Vol.2.2017.mkv" size="4995180865" container="mkv" videoProfile="high">
<Stream id="133049" streamType="1" default="1" codec="h264" index="1" bitrate="4512" language="English" languageCode="eng" bitDepth="8" chromaSubsampling="4:2:0" colorRange="tv" colorSpace="bt709" frameRate="24.000" hasScalingMatrix="0" height="804" level="40" profile="high" refFrames="5" scanType="progressive" width="1920"/>
<Stream id="133048" streamType="2" selected="1" default="1" codec="ac3" index="0" channels="6" bitrate="384" language="English" languageCode="eng" audioChannelLayout="5.1(side)" samplingRate="48000"/>
<Stream id="133050" streamType="3" default="1" codec="srt" index="2" language="English" languageCode="eng"/>
</Part>
</Media>

None of the extras were needed

23

Logs

Thank you

24

I found a few problems.

  • In “Allowed Networks” (Settings - Server - Network)

You have a leading space before all the addresses. This alone will drive networking nuts

Mar 08, 2018 00:04:00.940 [0x70000020a000] ERROR - Error parsing allowedNetworks ' 192.168.178.18': Invalid argument
Mar 08, 2018 00:04:00.940 [0x70000020a000] ERROR - Error parsing allowedNetworks ' 192.168.178.89': Invalid argument
Mar 08, 2018 00:04:00.940 [0x70000020a000] ERROR - Error parsing allowedNetworks ' 192.168.178.102': Invalid argument
Mar 08, 2018 00:04:00.940 [0x70000020a000] ERROR - Error parsing allowedNetworks ' 192.168.178.143': Invalid argument
Mar 08, 2018 00:04:00.940 [0x70000020a000] ERROR - Error parsing allowedNetworks ' 192.168.178.221': Invalid argument
Mar 08, 2018 00:04:00.941 [0x70000020a000] ERROR - Error parsing allowedNetworks ' 192.168.178.249': Invalid argument
Mar 08, 2018 00:04:00.941 [0x70000020a000] ERROR - Error parsing allowedNetworks ' 192.168.178.255': Invalid argument
Mar 08, 2018 00:04:00.941 [0x70000020a000] ERROR - Error parsing allowedNetworks ' 224.0.0.251': Invalid argument
Mar 08, 2018 00:04:00.941 [0x70000020a000] ERROR - Error parsing allowedNetworks ' 255.255.255.255': Invalid argument

For your protection, I STRONGLY recommend you remove 255.255.255.255. It opens your server up to the whole world.

  • Turn off IPv6 (Settings - Server - Network)

It’s valid for local lan only and your LAN is IPv4

  • Bad news: Your database is corrupted (abrupt power off / reboot / etc
Mar 08, 2018 00:04:17.617 [0x70000020a000] ERROR - SQLITE3:0x7000006b7590, 11, database corruption at line 59739 of [fc49f556e4]
Mar 08, 2018 00:04:17.617 [0x70000020a000] ERROR - SQLITE3:0x7000006b7590, 11, statement aborts at 47: [insert into metadata_item_settings (account_id,guid,rating,view_offset,view_count,last_viewed_at,created_at,updated_at,skip_count,last_skipped_at,extra_data,changed_at) values (:metada
Mar 08, 2018 00:04:17.617 [0x70000020a000] ERROR - Exception inside transaction (inside=1) (../Library/MetadataItemSetting.cpp:62): sqlite3_statement_backend::loadOne: database disk image is malformed
Mar 08, 2018 00:04:17.617 [0x70000020a000] ERROR - Soci Exception handled: sqlite3_statement_backend::loadOne: database disk image is malformed

Database errors are strewn throughout your logs. This likely has nothing to do with your media , network, or server. The database is bad and PMS is spinning in circles. It’s getting locked up on the DB and can’t service you playback needs

Your media has TEXT subtitles so that’s not a factor.

Sorry to report but time to stop PMS, delete from Library/Application Support/Plex Media Server/* and all below it then start over

25

@webwebster said:
The TV does support .mkv natively; no transcode required (see attached pic) and the audio is not playing through the TV but through an ARCAM 5.1 AV receiver. The TV itself supports Dolby Digital Plus and DTS Premium sound, so I can’t imagine why it would transcode to 2.0

901×80 4.56 KB

941×210 27 KB

Small point here, your tv specs are listing the codecs and the containers separately, but what you really need to see is which codecs in each container are supported directly. This pic supposes every codec listed is supported by every container listed? Doesn’t seem likely to me.

26

A quick check to rule this out would be to put the media on a thumb drive and attach it directly to the TV and then try and play it back on the TV. If this doesn’t work the TV most likely doesn’t support the codec/container combination.

27

Now I know it’s not the TV, since it’s doing the same thing for a file I’m watching on my laptop:

This XML file does not appear to have any style information associated with it. The document tree is shown below.
<MediaContainer size="1" allowSync="1" identifier="com.plexapp.plugins.library" librarySectionID="4" librarySectionTitle="The New Additions" librarySectionUUID="a6452095-0e75-4fdc-9419-d44b8cd9416f" mediaTagPrefix="/system/bundle/media/flags/" mediaTagVersion="1520469772">
<Video ratingKey="10473" key="/library/metadata/10473" parentRatingKey="10472" grandparentRatingKey="10471" guid="com.plexapp.agents.none://10471/1/10?lang=xn" librarySectionTitle="The New Additions" librarySectionID="4" librarySectionKey="/library/sections/4" type="episode" title="The Shining" titleSort="The shining" grandparentKey="/library/metadata/10471" parentKey="/library/metadata/10472" grandparentTitle="The Shining 1980 Uncut" parentTitle="Season 1" summary="" index="10" parentIndex="1" thumb="/library/metadata/10473/thumb/1520537157" art="/library/metadata/10473/art/1520537157" duration="8626159" addedAt="1520350895" updatedAt="1520537157" chapterSource="media">
<Media videoResolution="1080" id="17852" duration="8626159" bitrate="12705" width="1920" height="1080" aspectRatio="1.78" audioChannels="6" audioCodec="dca-ma" videoCodec="h264" container="mkv" videoFrameRate="24p" audioProfile="ma" videoProfile="high 10">
<Part accessible="1" exists="1" id="17857" key="/library/parts/17857/1520350895/file.mkv" duration="8626159" file="/Volumes/Aristotle/The Glory Hole/The Shining 1980 Uncut 1080p BluRay 10-Bit DTS-HD MA 5.1 x264-BluEvo/The Shining 1980 Uncut 1080p BluRay 10-Bit DTS-HD MA 5.1 x264-BluEvo.mkv" size="13698944340" audioProfile="ma" container="mkv" videoProfile="high 10">
<Stream id="40512" streamType="1" default="1" codec="h264" index="0" bitrate="11169" bitDepth="10" chromaLocation="left" chromaSubsampling="4:2:0" frameRate="23.976" hasScalingMatrix="0" height="1080" level="50" profile="high 10" refFrames="5" scanType="progressive" width="1920"/>
<Stream id="40513" streamType="2" selected="1" default="1" codec="dca" index="1" channels="6" bitrate="1536" language="English" languageCode="eng" audioChannelLayout="5.1(side)" bitDepth="16" profile="ma" samplingRate="48000" title="English / DTS-HD Master Audio / 5.1 / 48 kHz / 2178 kbps / 16-bit"/>
<Stream id="40514" streamType="3" codec="pgs" index="2" language="English" languageCode="eng" headerCompression="1"/>
<Stream id="40515" streamType="3" codec="pgs" index="3" language="Français" languageCode="fre" headerCompression="1"/>
<Stream id="40516" streamType="3" codec="pgs" index="4" language="Español" languageCode="spa" headerCompression="1"/>
</Part>
</Media>
<Field locked="1" name="title"/>
<Field locked="1" name="titleSort"/>
<Field locked="1" name="originallyAvailableAt"/>
<Extras size="0"></Extras>
</Video>
</MediaContainer>

Never mind that it doesn’t recognize the film ‘The Shining’. I can fix that easily enough. But it’s transcoding a file to play in OSX through a Chrome browser: no ExoPlayer, no bad codecs, nothing but a brand-new server (downloaded and installed last night, after consulting this thread) and still straining to play it. WTH. BTW, while I am watching it wirelessly, this is my wireless network:

tiuvu44iuepd.png839×290 41.2 KB

Not slouch. So what gives?

28

“The Shining” is a movie, right? The metadata tells me you have it in a TV-type library (Series and Episodes) type="episode" That correct?

This XML segment

<Part accessible="1" exists="1" id="17857" key="/library/parts/17857/1520350895/file.mkv" duration="8626159" file="/Volumes/Aristotle/The Glory Hole/The Shining 1980 Uncut 1080p BluRay 10-Bit DTS-HD MA 5.1 x264-BluEvo/The Shining 1980 Uncut 1080p BluRay 10-Bit DTS-HD MA 5.1 x264-BluEvo.mkv" size="13698944340" audioProfile="ma" container="mkv" videoProfile="high 10">
<Stream id="40512" streamType="1" default="1" codec="h264" index="0" bitrate="11169" bitDepth="10" chromaLocation="left" chromaSubsampling="4:2:0" frameRate="23.976" hasScalingMatrix="0" height="1080" level="50" profile="high 10" refFrames="5" scanType="progressive" width="1920"/>

10 bit (HDR) color in an H.264. Are you using hardware transcoding? What’ the series number of that i7?

For the final time, I request logs of you recreating this.
If you do not wish to then, sadly I cannot help you further. I’m sorry but I can’t trubleshoot what I can’t see.

29

Yes, for the moment the film “The Shining” is logged in a TV library, since that is my DL folder.

For a different film, same problem. In a film library this time, and reading properly - which has never been the problem I was asking about.

and the logs

30

From everything I see in your logs, including the essential point,

Mar 08, 2018 22:02:10.975 [0x700000841000] DEBUG - Session bd4510b7cb09283ba2d42af31476f313 (3) is throttling
Mar 08, 2018 22:02:10.975 [0x700000947000] DEBUG - Completed: [127.0.0.1:51433] 206 PUT /video/:/transcode/session/bd4510b7cb09283ba2d42af31476f313/3951ee0d-94c3-471e-8fb0-f3f46f85b21b/progress?progress=10.5&size=-22&remaining=-1&vdec_packets=15212&vdec_sw_ok=15202&speed=2.1&vdec_hw_status=0 (28 live) 0ms 342 bytes
Mar 08, 2018 22:02:10.976 [0x700001612000] DEBUG - [Transcoder] Throttle - Going into sloth mode.

speed=2.1 meaning the server is transcoding at 2.1x real-time playback requirement.

This is definitive proof it’s not a server issue.

Is the roku wired or wireless? That’s the path for you to research next

31

Wired. All gigabit ethernet, running through an Airport Extreme 802.11ac router. And that doesn’t explain why the Web player would also require transcoding, or the TV which has its own ethernet connection. They do, however, share an ethernet switch (the tV and the Roku). The laptop does not.
This is what happens when I try to watch something on a wired ethernet connection on my laptop

32

That being the case and all things being equal, I assert to you the problem is more with the Roku than anything else

33

How can this be when I have the problem without going anywhere near the Roku? When the server throttles traffic going directly to the TV, bypassing the Roku?

logs for the attempts on the laptop, nowhere near the Roku:

34

My apologies. I misspoke. Long day.

I’m confused.

I will ask one of he Mac guys to step in and take over because I’m not seeing what I expect to see in your logs

35

Thank you very much

36

This is doing exactly what I would expect it to do. You have an H.264 file in MKV that is 10 bit. It’s not going to be supported in a web browser so it will need to be transcoded. Probably the same for your TV as well.

It might play direct if it were either 8 bit OR 10 bit in a MP4 container.

It’s also balking at the 5.1 DTS-HD Audio track as well.

This file is a no go for direct play in the browser and probably not going to direct play on some devices or TVs as well.

The logs you posted didn’t capture the start of playing back The Shining so can’t look to see anything about that.

37

I used to have everything in MKV containers. Used Handbrake to move everything to MP4. everything streams great now, no problems, no transcoding, no buffering, no stuttering no matter where I am streaming it to.

There are some great “How-To’s” on the plex forums on how to convert to mp4 using handbrake. takes time. but I couldn’t be happier with the results. The best part is not have to hear my kids say “dad Plex is not playing again”

38

Couldn’t agree more. MP4 is just so much more mature with different devices.

I’ve got a set of scripts in my thread (sig) that will do the conversions for you. They will remux when possible and transcode when needed. Will also remove subtitle and audio tracks you don’t need (foreign languages) and will create AAC audio track as the default in addition to the existing tracks. Makes for full proof conversions.

39

@cayars said:
Couldn’t agree more. MP4 is just so much more mature with different devices.

I’ve got a set of scripts in my thread (sig) that will do the conversions for you. They will remux when possible and transcode when needed. Will also remove subtitle and audio tracks you don’t need (foreign languages) and will create AAC audio track as the default in addition to the existing tracks. Makes for full proof conversions.

Sadly, all my system is Mac. But it sounds nice. And I have about 12 TB of video files. I would be converting into the next century on this old iMac

40

Yea, that does suck. I had about 40TB of files in use when I converted everything to this format. Had 3 computers going for a long while converting everything over. :slight_smile:

But you can certainly have a script running doing this walking your library 24x7 which is hands off. Then just start converting everything NEW being added to the new format. At least everything new being added will play a lot better on more devices.