Server Version#: 1.18.0.1944
Player Version#: Plex Web 4.10.1
PMS is running on Ubuntu 19.04 in a VM on Proxmox with GPU passthrough
like described in [1].
It’s working to the point that vainfo in the guest returns:
rror: can’t connect to X server!
libva info: VA-API version 1.4.0
libva info: va_getDriverName() returns 0
libva info: Trying to open /usr/lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/dri/i965_drv_video.so
libva info: Found init function __vaDriverInit_1_4
libva info: va_openDriver() returns 0
vainfo: VA-API version: 1.4 (libva 2.4.0)
vainfo: Driver version: Intel i965 driver for Intel(R) Skylake - 2.3.0
vainfo: Supported profile and entrypoints
VAProfileMPEG2Simple : VAEntrypointVLD
VAProfileMPEG2Simple : VAEntrypointEncSlice
VAProfileMPEG2Main : VAEntrypointVLD
VAProfileMPEG2Main : VAEntrypointEncSlice
VAProfileH264ConstrainedBaseline: VAEntrypointVLD
VAProfileH264ConstrainedBaseline: VAEntrypointEncSlice
VAProfileH264ConstrainedBaseline: VAEntrypointEncSliceLP
VAProfileH264ConstrainedBaseline: VAEntrypointFEI
VAProfileH264ConstrainedBaseline: VAEntrypointStats
VAProfileH264Main : VAEntrypointVLD
VAProfileH264Main : VAEntrypointEncSlice
VAProfileH264Main : VAEntrypointEncSliceLP
VAProfileH264Main : VAEntrypointFEI
VAProfileH264Main : VAEntrypointStats
VAProfileH264High : VAEntrypointVLD
VAProfileH264High : VAEntrypointEncSlice
VAProfileH264High : VAEntrypointEncSliceLP
VAProfileH264High : VAEntrypointFEI
VAProfileH264High : VAEntrypointStats
VAProfileH264MultiviewHigh : VAEntrypointVLD
VAProfileH264MultiviewHigh : VAEntrypointEncSlice
VAProfileH264StereoHigh : VAEntrypointVLD
VAProfileH264StereoHigh : VAEntrypointEncSlice
VAProfileVC1Simple : VAEntrypointVLD
VAProfileVC1Main : VAEntrypointVLD
VAProfileVC1Advanced : VAEntrypointVLD
VAProfileNone : VAEntrypointVideoProc
VAProfileJPEGBaseline : VAEntrypointVLD
VAProfileJPEGBaseline : VAEntrypointEncPicture
VAProfileVP8Version0_3 : VAEntrypointVLD
VAProfileVP8Version0_3 : VAEntrypointEncSlice
VAProfileHEVCMain : VAEntrypointVLD
VAProfileHEVCMain : VAEntrypointEncSlice
But if I turn on hardware transcoding in Plex, the video never starts playing, it just sits
like it’s buffering.
The transcoding session folder looks like this:
drwxr-xr-x+ 2 einar einar 4096 okt 14 13:48 .
drwxr-xr-x+ 3 einar users 12288 okt 14 13:48 …
-rw-r–r-- 1 einar einar 24 okt 14 13:48 chunk-stream0-00371.m4s
-rw-r–r-- 1 einar einar 24 okt 14 13:48 chunk-stream0-00372.m4s
-rw-r–r-- 1 einar einar 24 okt 14 13:48 chunk-stream0-00373.m4s
-rw-r–r-- 1 einar einar 24 okt 14 13:48 chunk-stream0-00374.m4s
-rw-r–r-- 1 einar einar 24 okt 14 13:48 chunk-stream0-00375.m4s
-rw-r–r-- 1 einar einar 24 okt 14 13:48 chunk-stream0-00376.m4s
-rw-r–r-- 1 einar einar 24 okt 14 13:48 chunk-stream0-00377.m4s
-rw-r–r-- 1 einar einar 24 okt 14 13:48 chunk-stream0-00378.m4s
-rw-r–r-- 1 einar einar 24 okt 14 13:48 chunk-stream0-00379.m4s
-rw-r–r-- 1 einar einar 24 okt 14 13:48 chunk-stream0-00380.m4s
-rw-r–r-- 1 einar einar 24 okt 14 13:48 chunk-stream0-00381.m4s
-rw-r–r-- 1 einar einar 24 okt 14 13:48 chunk-stream0-00382.m4s
-rw-r–r-- 1 einar einar 24 okt 14 13:48 chunk-stream0-00383.m4s
-rw-r–r-- 1 einar einar 24 okt 14 13:48 chunk-stream0-00384.m4s
-rw-r–r-- 1 einar einar 24 okt 14 13:48 chunk-stream0-00385.m4s
-rw-r–r-- 1 einar einar 24 okt 14 13:48 chunk-stream0-00386.m4s
-rw-r–r-- 1 einar einar 24 okt 14 13:48 chunk-stream0-00387.m4s
-rw-r–r-- 1 einar einar 24 okt 14 13:48 chunk-stream0-00388.m4s
-rw-r–r-- 1 einar einar 24 okt 14 13:48 chunk-stream0-00389.m4s
-rw-r–r-- 1 einar einar 24 okt 14 13:48 chunk-stream0-00390.m4s
-rw-r–r-- 1 einar einar 24 okt 14 13:48 chunk-stream0-00391.m4s
-rw-r–r-- 1 einar einar 0 okt 14 13:48 chunk-stream0-00392.m4s.tmp
-rw-r–r-- 1 einar einar 206170 okt 14 13:48 chunk-stream1-00371.m4s
-rw-r–r-- 1 einar einar 205927 okt 14 13:48 chunk-stream1-00372.m4s
-rw-r–r-- 1 einar einar 103125 okt 14 13:48 chunk-stream1-00373.m4s
-rw-r–r-- 1 einar einar 204788 okt 14 13:48 chunk-stream1-00374.m4s
-rw-r–r-- 1 einar einar 102468 okt 14 13:48 chunk-stream1-00375.m4s
-rw-r–r-- 1 einar einar 205795 okt 14 13:48 chunk-stream1-00376.m4s
-rw-r–r-- 1 einar einar 205151 okt 14 13:48 chunk-stream1-00377.m4s
-rw-r–r-- 1 einar einar 103264 okt 14 13:48 chunk-stream1-00378.m4s
-rw-r–r-- 1 einar einar 205464 okt 14 13:48 chunk-stream1-00379.m4s
-rw-r–r-- 1 einar einar 102602 okt 14 13:48 chunk-stream1-00380.m4s
-rw-r–r-- 1 einar einar 205811 okt 14 13:48 chunk-stream1-00381.m4s
-rw-r–r-- 1 einar einar 204592 okt 14 13:48 chunk-stream1-00382.m4s
-rw-r–r-- 1 einar einar 102409 okt 14 13:48 chunk-stream1-00383.m4s
-rw-r–r-- 1 einar einar 205451 okt 14 13:48 chunk-stream1-00384.m4s
-rw-r–r-- 1 einar einar 102488 okt 14 13:48 chunk-stream1-00385.m4s
-rw-r–r-- 1 einar einar 205778 okt 14 13:48 chunk-stream1-00386.m4s
-rw-r–r-- 1 einar einar 205881 okt 14 13:48 chunk-stream1-00387.m4s
-rw-r–r-- 1 einar einar 102553 okt 14 13:48 chunk-stream1-00388.m4s
-rw-r–r-- 1 einar einar 206619 okt 14 13:48 chunk-stream1-00389.m4s
-rw-r–r-- 1 einar einar 103687 okt 14 13:48 chunk-stream1-00390.m4s
-rw-r–r-- 1 einar einar 205804 okt 14 13:48 chunk-stream1-00391.m4s
-rw-r–r-- 1 einar einar 0 okt 14 13:48 chunk-stream1-00392.m4s.tmp
-rw-r–r-- 1 einar einar 834 okt 14 13:48 init-stream0.m4s
-rw-r–r-- 1 einar einar 741 okt 14 13:48 init-stream1.m4s
The PMS log shows that it is attempting hardware transcoding, and the dashboard
in Plex Web confirms that:
Oct 14, 2019 13:47:59.799 [0x7f41dcff9700] DEBUG - TPU: hardware transcoding: using hardware decode accelerator vaapi
Oct 14, 2019 13:47:59.799 [0x7f41dcff9700] DEBUG - TPU: hardware transcoding: zero-copy support present
Oct 14, 2019 13:47:59.799 [0x7f41dcff9700] DEBUG - TPU: hardware transcoding: using zero-copy transcoding
Oct 14, 2019 13:47:59.799 [0x7f41dcff9700] DEBUG - TPU: hardware transcoding: final decoder: vaapi, final encoder: vaapi
Oct 14, 2019 13:48:01.084 [0x7f41dcff9700] DEBUG - TPU: hardware transcoding: using hardware decode accelerator vaapi
Oct 14, 2019 13:48:01.084 [0x7f41dcff9700] DEBUG - TPU: hardware transcoding: zero-copy support present
Oct 14, 2019 13:48:01.084 [0x7f41dcff9700] DEBUG - TPU: hardware transcoding: using zero-copy transcoding
Oct 14, 2019 13:48:01.084 [0x7f41dcff9700] DEBUG - TPU: hardware transcoding: final decoder: vaapi, final encoder: vaapi
Oct 14, 2019 14:01:02.379 [0x7f41dcff9700] DEBUG - TPU: hardware transcoding: using hardware decode accelerator vaapi
Oct 14, 2019 14:01:02.379 [0x7f41dcff9700] DEBUG - TPU: hardware transcoding: zero-copy support present
Oct 14, 2019 14:01:02.379 [0x7f41dcff9700] DEBUG - TPU: hardware transcoding: using zero-copy transcoding
Oct 14, 2019 14:01:02.379 [0x7f41dcff9700] DEBUG - TPU: hardware transcoding: final decoder: vaapi, final encoder: vaapi
I realize that with running this in a VM I’ve added many, many things that could be stopping
this from working, but before I stop pursuing this, I decided to post here to see if anyone knows exactly why Plex is behaving this way 
[1] [GUIDE] Intel Intergrated graphic Passthrough | Proxmox Support Forum
