Everyone is opinionated about the need to transcode or not, but I think everyone should be able to get behind the option to have some kind of server side control over this. Especially regarding that’s where the actual transcoding happens.
In my personal experience I notice that every stream I start playing will transcode unless manually specified in the player. Even if the setting on the device is set to maximum (I guess this is trying to replicate a feature like Netflix, where the starting speed is prioritized over video quality). This results in a slow-to-start stream and needing to switch to ‘original’ quality when the player begins. Then, suddenly, the player starts the stream in original quality without further hiccups. Probably because less horsepower is required to stream an original quality video than it is to transcode. Assuming the client can always play every codec, which in my case has always been true.
So even if the Plex client is trying to pick the best quality video stream for the device’s connection, you would still want the option to turn that off to save on performance and speed up the video delivery.
The same happens when downloading a video using Plex Pass. The video will always ‘transcode’ for me, even if the player is fully capable of displaying the original video and audio natively and ‘original’ quality was selected beforehand. I generally download video’s directly from the server because of this. Much faster than downloading through Plex.
I also regret the impossibility to allow (or not) people to transcode. It is why I have to do not share too much and be sure that my friends understand the difference between transcoding and direct stream… (My NAS cannot transcode several heavy videos at the same time.)
Also, I do not understand why Plex always transcode a video before synchronizing it. It often ends by failure in the synchronization, as I have to double check that the transcoding ended well and that it started / finished the downloading… It’s quite “dumb” when you consider I can download the file from “DS file” (which does a simple copy paste)… and it plays well.
If the aim is to save space on my tablet… I do have more than 400GB free on it… so I don’t mind to spend few GB per file. (I remove them once seen.)
So… it would be great if :
I could share the libraries with an option to allow people to transcode or limit to direct stream. (I have the bandwidth to do so… and understand they would also need to have a good bandwidth.)
If I could synchronize doing a simple “copy paste” (moreover when I do it from home, on the same network than my NAS).
Agreed. I am honestly GOBsmacked that you cannot disable transcoding on a per client basis.
Why can’t I go into settings and tick ‘disable transcode’ on a per device basis, ie Android, iPhone, Windows etc.
Its really silly that they also make it so confusing for anyone non technical to disable transcode on the end client, its always hidden away in the worst spot. Example: Windows 10 Plex Media Player is incredibly confusing for the average Jo, once switched between desktop mode and TV mode etc. even just changing that is difficult for a non technical user let alone finding the stupid setting to stop transcoding. Need to look around at other options.
I started with Plex on day 1 back when it originally forked and was OSXBMC. Got fed up not having the ability to turn off transcoding at the server years ago (all my clients Direct Play but randomly transcoding would kick in for some files). Fed up of checking log files I jumped to Emby a few years ago as they had an option to turn off transcoding at the server. More recently moved to Jellyfin. I still check back on Plex every so often to see if it’s been added - but always end up at threads like this. No idea why Plex is still holding out (technical reason, which would take a lot of work to implement or the cost/benefit ratio is too low?).
I don’t want to add a GPU, I don’t share my library with anyone - not even ‘idiots’, I don’t want to re-encode my files, I play everything on my local network so don’t want/need to set max quality, I don’t want to turn off subtitles.
Both Emby and completely free Jellyfin have the option to turn off transcoding at server level. And it works.
I’ve just got tired of this too. I’ve come back to the forums one last time to see if there is a solution. I’m now in the situation where I can’t get a single file to play on any client (PC, TV or tablet) using the latest Synology version of plex because of transcoder issues. All the files work fine using alternatives (e.g. Synology player or mounting the directly using SMB) but plex fails. It should not be this hard; I have 1 server and about 20 different clients some of which are not even under my control (kids tablets) and yet Plex thinks it is easier to manage 20 clients than 1 server. Thanks for the suggested alternatives. I’ll check back now and again to see if there is a fix because I still like the UI.
I would like to clarify this a bit more.
Specifically, you have to set the Transcoder temporary directory to a path that Plex has no write access to.
Simply setting a path that does not exist will cause Plex to create the path. And if Plex can not create the path specified then it will fall back to the TEMP folder(I’m talking WindowsOS here).
I have been a Plex member from the start, now with Lifetime Plexpass, I also really want to see this option, I know it is possible. Make it a Plex-Pass feature, because I do not want friends/family or even me to transcode 80 GB 4K bluray remuxes. I do not see the point, if it does not play on the device, too bad, get one that does or look at the settings. So I’d love to see a DIRECT PLAY option only.
I will be trying @dane22 's option above, so thank you for that, but I really hope that the Plex team does know that this is a feature that will be well loved.
I made a topic in a feature requests sub forum as well, but nothing on that there yet. For me it would be perfect to have the option of Transcoding per Library.
Just my 2 cents.
EDIT; I made a directory on Ubuntu with root and set it as temp transcode directory in Plex, and indeed it now errors out and does not transcode at all (errors at the client). Now let’s wait for an official method.
