Help! CPU not powerful enough to handle HD 4 Channels

Plex Players Desktop Players
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Evidently my XEON 3.2Ghz CPU is not powerful enough to handle processing 4 Channels of HD (1080p), how can I set to record in SD (720P)? Note: It takes all of my CPU just to play a HD (1080p) recording.

PLEX MEDIA SERVER: 1.14.1.5488
On ROKU: 6.1.1.5282-4907f3688-Plex
I’m using a HP Z400 (64 bit Window 7 Professional, XEON 3.2Ghz, 8GB RAM, 1TB HD, Ethernet Connection) as a server. There’s basically nothing on the computer except PLEX and HDHomeRunDVR Software. The sole purpose of the server is recording and watching OTA TV.
HDHomeRun CONNECT Quatro 1072A6EC Version 20180817
I found a link to upgrade to 10. As of 12/30/18 Windows 10 Professional

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The HDHR should do most of the work and Plex should simply be recording an output video stream from the HDHR so your CPU should not be touched.

what do you mean by not powerful enough to handle 4 channels of HD?
it cant record 4 at a time?
are you trying to live stream 4 at a time?

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It’s a 4 Channel Tuner.
I say processing, I can’t play back the HD recording.
Hopefully, then HDHomeRun will tell how to lower it’s output to SD.

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which model xeon, because it matters a lot. not all xeon are really that powerful. especially older or cheaper ones.

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You mentioned that it is a HDHR 4 tuner model so assuming the Connect Quatro which does not have any transcoding ability built-in. The HDHR Extend is the only tuner device that has transcoding built-in. So your HDHR tuner device will not be able to do the transcoding itself.

1 Like
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It’s not new. It’s in a desktop running Windows 7.

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John, it is a Connect Quatro. That means HDHR won’t be able to help me and any means of lowering HD to SD will have to be from PLEX.

8

If you install the Roku Preview (6.2), you’ll be able to play the OTA recordings (MPEG-2) without transcoding.

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Correct. Possibly some sort of post processing to reduce the resolution or finding clients that can Direct Play the material thereby eliminating the need for any transcoding by Plex.

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Where can I find info and download for “Roku Preveiw 6.2”?

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Plex preview channel 6.0 with default settings doesn’t improve my playback. It does however provide a Comcast/DirectTV type TV guide - which I like.

It’s looking like I can’t do with hardware that I have.

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Your Plex settings gives you the option for transcoder quality. Set that to auto. Also your window power schedule should be changed from conservative to performance.

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The Xeon should be more than enough to handle live TV transcoding .

15

In addition right now the latest releases are having issue with live TV playback. Use the retro app until the team fixes.

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I found a link to upgrade to 10. As of 12/30/18 Windows 10 Professional
Hopefully this will solve some of my problems.

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Transcoding is a resource taxing on any CPU.
If you are running a desktop OS, chances are you are using a default power budget.

I would suggest changing it to performance before going from W7 to W10.

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I’m a 66 yr old and not a hacker. Already 10, Can I still change to performance and how?

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Yes, go to your windows icon in the lower corner of the desktop screen option control panel, power and performance, and change from balanced to performance.

If you are having performance hits based on transcoding. This may help.

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I changed to performance with no noticeable change. I then decided to take another approach and uninstalled PLEX in hopes of getting the HDHomeRun DVR app running. After 8 days of working with their support. HDHomeRun has not been able to resolve the issue (their website still indicates the DVR is operation, but their app says “No DVR Configured”). Their site says:
“Use of 3rd Party Firewall/Security software may cause problems.
3rd party anti-virus software should not be used on the PC being used for recordings. It impedes performance and can block necessary network traffic. Native Windows software is sufficient.”
I uninstalled my Norton and still have the same issue with the HDHomeRun DVR app.
I would rather have PLEX, the DVR did record and try to playback but was to slow, and kept pausing to download every 30 sec.
Could Norton have been the reason the DVR was slow with PLEX?