Server Version#: 1.25.2.5319
Player Version#: 1.35.1.2632-c6783c78
There are a total of 1,238 movie files in the “Movies” library folder on my Windows Plex server. Most are .mkv files but there are a few files with other media file extensions:
.mkv - 1,182
.avi - 18
.m4v - 3
.mp4 - 35
The odd thing is when I run the Plex app on a Roku or a windows PC, both indicate there are only 1,232 movies available in the “Movies” library so there are 6 movies missing. I have no easy way to figure out which files are missing and what may be causing this…
To try and debug the issue, I created a new “Movies 2” library and pointed it to the same file system folder that contains the 1,238 media files. Once the server created and updated the meta data for the new “Movies 2” library, the the windows PC Plex player indicates there are are only 1,234 movies in the “Movie 2” library - so there are still 4 media files missing.
Any suggestions on what might be causing this and how to further diagnose this issue?
A copy of the Plex server log file is attached that was created just after the new “Movies 2” library was created and the meta data was updated for the new library.
The number displayed in your library isn’t the number of movies but “visible items”. If you sort your library by an option except By Title, this will display all movies but no collections (which could bundle/hide some of the individual movies they contain).
Another issue could be files Plex considers similar – those might have been merged. You should be able to filter your library for Duplicates to find those (this is usually supposed to be used for different quality versions of the same movies; Plex will offer you a Play Version option for those)
If you have a number of same-named video files, ending with certain suffixes (e.g. - Part1, - Part2…), Plex will attempt to “stack” those and treat them as different sequential parts of the same movie
Sometimes, bad naming can cause files to be ignored; this applies e.g. to files named according to Plex’ TV Show naming schema if they’re found in a movie-type library.
As you suggested, I set to filter for both the “Movies” and “Movies 2” libraries in the Windows Plex client to sort/filter by “Title”. Both of these libraries are still pointing to the same file folder where there are 1,238 movie media files.
There are no “collections” associated with either of these libraries.
The “Movies” library now has 1,232 visible items and “Movies 2” library has 1,233 visible items. I can’t figure out why the two libraries are off by 1 movie. I also can’t figure out why I’m still missing 6 movies from the “Movies” library and 5 movies from the “Movies 2” library.
All of the media files that have the word “part” in their file names are being displayed individually in the libraries so it does not appear that Plex has stacked them.
The file folder where the media files are located also has only individual movie files and does not contain any TV series files. TV series files are all stored in a separate “Recorded TV shows” library and folder using the standard TV show series naming conventions.
How do I “check the library for duplicates (filter)” ?
Also, does it make sense that duplicates could cause one library to show 1,232 visible items and the other have 1,233 visible items when they both point to the same folder with 1,238 separate movie files?
Each movie is stored in a separate file that has been named (as best as possible) to match the IMDB database. None of the files have any of the following extensions in their names:
cdX
discX
diskX
dvdX
ptX
The only keyword that appears in any of the file names is “part”, for example as follows:
Back to the Future (1985).mkv
Back to the Future Part II (1989).mkv
Back to the Future Part III (1990).mkv
In this example, all three of the movies are visible as separate items in the library so it doesn’t appear they are being stacked. Also, if this was the issue, why would the Plex server stack different movies in the two libraries?
Would it help if I just deleted both of these libraries, clean the bundles and optimized the database, then recreate a new “Movies” library again?
I found the duplicate filter criteria option - thanks!
6 duplicates are identified which would possibly make the 1,232 visible items reconcile with the 1,238 movie files?.
I don’t understand where these extra versions came from and does it make sense that this extra version would reduce the count of visible items in the library?
For example “Arrival” shows up in the library as a duplicate. When I view the library, that movie has the “Play Version” option with two versions - 3.6 Mbps, 180p, and 5.7 Mbps, 480p.
Is there a way I can just get rid of these versions?
Odds are they are not actual duplicates just miss-matches by the scanner, if you use the get info option you should be able to see the two files that Plex thinks are the same movie.
EDIT: and if that is the case, you can split them apart and fix the match on the other files.
If plex is combining videos the number of listed videos does go down.
the same works with the Info tab when editing the movie ().
as @dbirch pointed out… you can then split those items.
Usually such “bad matches”/merged items are due to files where the naming doesn’t allow a 100% match, so Plex goes for the best available match it can find.
All 6 “duplicates” were mismatches with other existing movie files. I went through and split them and fixed up the database. The number of files in the movies folder now matches the number of visible items shown for the “Movies” library as I would expect.
Thanks for all the responsive help and have a Merry Christmas!.
Rather than start a whole new thread I thought i would jump on this one. I recently changed PC. Moved my Plex library (external HD) to the new PC and created a whole new plex server library.
Despite none of the filenames changing at all, the Library scan is missing heaps of the files. No idea how many. I think I had over 1000 movies before and only 892 now. It seems to be missing loads.
For example I had the 3 batman dark knight movies in a folder but where it previously had all 3 only 2 was displaying, it wouldn’t find 1 and 3 no matter how I renamed the file. Eventually I moved them onto my C drive, renamed again and rebooted then it found them.
Is the sheer quantity of data (3TB) causing it to miss files?
The problem is with so many files I have no way to know which ones it’s actually missing unless they are part of a series.
I have searched online and the community extensively for a reason why this is happening and couldn’t see any that match my issue.
@dbirch no there are no duplicates. I have done this search.
Library search is simply overlooking the files and I can’t get my head around why? I have tried re-naming and moving the couple of ones missing identified and there seems to be no rhyme or reason why they are being missed.
With the evolution of the plex scanners, stuff that was scanned in under old agents was upgrade, and never had to be re-scanned. Starting over may highlight issues with non-standard naming schemas that used to be supported, but were dropped over the years.
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