Help me understand why this is transcoding?

General Discussions
1

SO my friend is streaming on his Vizio TV using the built in plex app. Why would it transcode from MKV to MKV and at the same resolution, it’s like everything is transcoding to it’s original quality.

My friend also runs his own plex server so he knows to have all settings set to max/original quality. Is there a setting somewhere for remote streams to allow direct play? Or is plex try to tell me his TV which is only 4 years old can’t play MKV’s? My 2 year old Vizio does direct stream on the same file.

I enabled verbose logs and found this,

Sep 09, 2020 10:00:56.299 [0x7f4b8ae72700] DEBUG - MDE: E5 - The Stock Tip: Direct Play is disabled
Sep 09, 2020 10:00:56.299 [0x7f4b8ae72700] DEBUG - MDE: E5 - The Stock Tip: no direct play video profile exists for http/mkv/h264
Sep 09, 2020 10:00:56.299 [0x7f4b8ae72700] DEBUG - MDE: E5 - The Stock Tip: no direct play video profile exists for http/mkv/h264/aac
Sep 09, 2020 10:00:56.299 [0x7f4b8ae72700] DEBUG - The Stock Tip - video.level limitation applies: 50 > 42
Sep 09, 2020 10:00:56.299 [0x7f4b8ae72700] DEBUG - The Stock Tip - video.level limitation applies: 50 > 42
Sep 09, 2020 10:00:56.299 [0x7f4b8ae72700] DEBUG - MDE: E5 - The Stock Tip: no remuxable profile found, so video stream will be transcoded
Sep 09, 2020 10:00:56.299 [0x7f4b8ae72700] DEBUG - The Stock Tip - video.level limitation applies: 50 > 42
Sep 09, 2020 10:00:56.299 [0x7f4b8ae72700] DEBUG - MDE: Cannot direct stream video stream due to profile or setting limitations

Any help is appreciated.

2

There are multiple levels of encoding profiles, this video is apparently encoded at level 5.0, the tv only supports max level 4.2

3

So I know the field you are talking about. On my TV it is set to 4.1, yet I can still direct stream it, is that because I’m on the local network?
I had ruled this out, since my TV played it. Is this only a setting on the client device?

4

FYI, Debug level is sufficient and recommended. Verbose can sometimes cause the log files to wrap too quickly and desired information is lost.

Yes. The client is telling the Plex Server it has a limit of 4.2. Since the video is 5.0, the Plex server transcodes the video.

Have him stream a video that is High@4.2 or lower. See if it direct plays/direct streams.

Just out of curiosity, why is the media at 5.0? Blu-ray video is High@4.1 for 1080p/24fps. Is the video at a higher resolution or frames per second?

5

I’m not sure why it would be 5.0, it is a 720p copy of Seinfeld, that I did not create myself.

According to the properties, it’s 23.98 frames per second, it’s an MKV file. Is there a way I can actually check that it is 5.0? I find it weird that my TV plays it direct stream and my TV is set to 4.1.

6

5.0 is overkill for 720p. You may have a poorly encoded file and need to re-acquire it from a better source. You could possibly run it though Handbrake or similar tools as well. Sometimes re-encoding will clean things up.

Pull the XML information for the episode and attach it to the thread (zip it first, the forum does not allow xml attachments). You can also examine the file with MediaInfo.

See Investigate Media Information and Formats for details.

7

Thank you for your help, they are indeed level 5.0

I’ll change them to MP4 in the future and encode them properly.

I’m not sure how to zip the XML, as it opens in a new window, but you were right, it’s 5.0 and the profile is high quality.

  • Level 5.0
  • Profile high

I guess that’s what I get for , ahem, not creating them myself.

8

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