I just purchased the PlexPass for the LiveTV/DVR and can’t seem to get it working.
All my ripped media play and stream fine. (h.264, 720p)
Live TV chokes on the Plex server (specs below) and all other streaming devices (on Android and in the web app of another i7 computer with 16GB RAM)
Playback of recorded shows using the Plex media server itself (not streaming) chokes
Playback of recorded TV shows using VLC works flawlessly
My server is an older desktop, so I know my CPU is not the top of the line, however, all my other media works fine. I certainly don’t need the highest quality for LiveTV (or recordings). I am perfectly fine with dropping the quality if needed but I can’t seem to find any option to do so.
It seems that the shows are recording as mpg2ts (1280x720), and I can play them back fine in VLC.
Since this is a supported video card, I can’t seem to figure out why I can’t get this to work.
I’ve checked the forums and if I’m reading correctly, the only way to change the quality of Live/Recorded TV (or transcode LiveTV to h.264) is through the use of a HDHomerun Extend. Is this correct? Isn’t there any way to do this within Plex?
Any help would be greatly appreciated.
Thanks!
Server: HP Pavilion Desktop
Windows 7 Home 64 bit
AMD Athalon 64 x2 Dual Core Processor 5400+ 2.8 GHz
8GB RAM
Hauppauge WinTV-quadHD
Mohu Leaf (but same result with big ol’ antenna in the attic)
When you are trying to do playing of Live TV (which you say chokes) or recorded shows on the Plex Server (which you say chokes), was does task manager CPU look like? Start up task manager and see if the CPU is being max’ed out.
There is a setting on my HDHomeRun Connect that directs Plex to do transcoding on-the-fly. This is not doing it in hardware on the HDHomeRun. This requires an HDHomeRun Extend. It says it is experimental and I have not used it.
The CPU is maxed out with live tv. It is only approximately 30% when playing back my other media.
However, back when Windows Media Center was operational (before Microsoft pulled the plug) it played and recorded fine. So I’m not sure what’s different with Plex.
And I do have that option with my WinTV-quadHD tuner, but doesn’t seem to make a difference.
The other media you mentioned playing you said is h264 720p which most if not all clients will have no problems playing so do not need the Plex Media Server to transcode the stream before sending to the client. In the server it would show Direct Play if you looked at the Status screen in Plex Media Server.
Live TV on the other hand is received by the Plex Media Server as a mpeg stream from the tuner that the client more than likely can not handle directly so the stream must be transcoded before sending to the client. Which is why you are seeing high CPU utilization on the server. Whether transcoding or not depends on the client, as you can see from the image below my Fire TV stick does not require transcoding apparently as it is able to direct play Live TV.
I follow you here but I’m having trouble at the server. I understand that I won’t get a good stream on a client if it’s not right at the server so I’m not really concerned about clients right now (unless the interface/web app) on the server where the Plex Media Server is installed is also considered a client (on the same machine)???
To clarify - taking streaming and clients out of the equation at this point, I can’t get LiveTV or recordings to play properly on the server/machine where the Plex Media Server software and video card are installed.
What’s more confusing is why VLC would play a recorded show (recorded with Plex), fine, whereas it won’t play properly within Plex (on the server, on the same machine as VLC).
Hope this makes sense.
And thanks for your help! Keep it coming!
I understand that I won’t get a good stream on a client if it’s not right at the server
Actually, that’s not true. It takes a lot less resources to record the show then it does to playback the MPEG2 video. You can have a server that is old (like yours) that is capable of recording but not so good at playing it back. If you have a client, like an Amazon Fire TV box, that will DirectPlay (no transcoding required) the show, then it does not take much in the way of resources for the server to send the stream to the client. If the server has to transcode the stream first, then it takes a beefier server to handle this.
Within Plex you can use the optimization option for shows to convert the mpegts recording to mp4. https://support.plex.tv/hc/en-us/articles/213095317-Creating-Optimized-Versions. Playing within Plex using the video player Plex utilizes can require transcoding from what I understand, whereas VLC uses a different player that can apparently handle the mpegts files without transcoding.
Since your signature says you are running Windows I will also mention that you can use mcebuddy for converting your recordings to mp4 as well, added benefit of mcebuddy is it using comskip to remove commercials. the last free version can be found on their codeplex page: https://mcebuddy2x.codeplex.com/releases/view/105099 but all newer paid versions are on their official site: http://www.mcebuddy2x.com/. The same can also be done using ffmpeg, HandBrake, and Comskip installed manually and configured but mcebuddy installs the tools and provides a nice GUI interface for setting up your conversion tasks.
Although optimized versions and MCEBuddy will help with recorded shows, this will not help in regards to streaming Live TV. LiveTV requires a beefier server or a client that supports DirectPlay (no transcoding). A tuner device that saves directly to MP4, like the HDHomeRun Extend, makes it more likely that transcoding will not be required for the client (like a Roku box or an iPad).
Thank you both. I tested the Fire TV stick. It fared much better with very minimal stuttering when streaming the recorded show. LiveTV, on the other hand was stop-and-start, but much better than it plays on the server.
@JohnM, thank you for the tip on Plex Optimization and the MCEBuddy info. I heard of MCEBuddy for commercials, but didn’t know it converted as well.
@rodgerzeisler, thank you for all your replies. I think replacing my current video card with the HDHomeRun Extend will probably be the next step as I really don’t want to put the money into a new computer/server. Sub $200 is right about where I wanted to be, especially since my movies work fine and TV is really just to replace the Slingbox which I find particularly aggravating.
If you start with mcebuddy you can start another thread or PM me with any questions. I have been using mcebuddy since December 2016.
I concur with @rodgerzeisler on the requirement for the better client to handle Live TV I have a Fire TV Stick and see literally no transcoding on the server as the image in previous post showed direct play to Fire TV Stick. I am not sure about the Live TV and the Extend, I will probably be getting an Extend to play with the settings on it versus within Plex. I have commented on several Extend threads on the forum but don’t have one to really test with myself.
A $100 Amazon Fire TV box would stream the MPEG2 without any transcoding. Is Live TV a big deal? If not, then just using MCEBuddy might be the answer. It just matters how many shows you plan to transcode each day. Without any hardware assist from the CPU/GPU, like Intel QuikSync, transcoding will be slow and you might get behind.
edit
Adding this note for anyone who comes across this thread… make sure you follow the direct link to MCEBuddy provided by @johnm_ColaSC above. If you go to the main MCEBuddy page on codeplex, there is a big purple download button that downloads an rtf pointing you to the main site for the paid version. johnm’s link above takes you directly to the right version… see his note below.
He truly is a Plex Ninja! /edit
@johnm_ColaSC and @rodgerzeisler
Yes, I knew going into my test that the Amazon FireTV stick would be a bit underpowered, but thankfully I was able to successfully use it for the test. I was able to find the quality settings in the Plex client app on both the Fire TV Stick and the Roku, so simply dropping the quality for playback of recorded shows is certainly an option.
I’m testing MCEBuddy right at this moment. The Comskip seems like it will be a nice feature.
@rodgerzeisler LiveTV is not essential, but I really would like it to work. I don’t record much TV as I primarily stream Netflix for shows, but I do put the news on when I am working from home. The LiveTV/DVR is the main reason I paid for the PlexPass. None of the other features really matter to me. So I can potentially live with selecting the reduced quality streams of my recorded TV on the client apps, or converting with MCEBuddy (pending the outcome of my current conversions).
Granted, I know the bottleneck is at my server, it’s just a shame that I need to invest in either a beefier server, or possibly an HDHomerun to make the LiveTV work.
The HDHomerun increased in price on Amazon between yesterday and today so I’ll probably hold off until a sale, and keep using Slingbox for the live TV.
Ah!!! Thanks. And that’s my bad for not following the exact link. I actually had this thread on one machine and manually typed in the main URL on the other machine (the server). The big purple “download” button on the overview tab is what downloads the rtf.
Thank you for pointing this out!! I’ll revise my previous post.
The paid versions of MCEBuddy and Comskip are worth it if you have the right hardware to take advantage of hardware-based encoding/decoding. It zooms! A 1/2 hour TV show is processed in about 5 minutes, removing commercials and transcoding from mpeg2 to mpeg4. My hardware is a couple of years old. It is a Core i3 and can the advantage of Intel QuikSync.
