Server Version#: 1.30.0.6486 on Ubuntu 20.04
Player Version#: 1.60.1.3413-533a7645 on Windows 10 21H2
I have both 4k and 1080p versions of House of the Dragon. Following this guide, I was able to manually add and use both versions, although I’m not able to play in a way you may expect. In the Plex Web app, I’m only able to play the 1080p version on Firefox, this is fine, I assume its a limitation with the web app/my browser. However, in the Windows player, I’m able to play the 4k version, but not the 1080p version.
The only option is 1080p 20mbps, which is transcoding (clicking show all doesn’t show any more options). The whole point of adding an optimized version is to avoid transcoding. I don’t have a very powerful GPU for transcoding, so I’d much rather use the 1080p copies. When alternative quality options are available you absolutely should be able to select between them.
Made a suggestion post since this probably fits better as a suggestion.
Disabling a feature to reveal a different feature is not a solution. Pre-processed versions should be listed in addition to transcode options. My storage would fill a lot faster if I kept a pre-processed version of every media item for every transcode possibility. I only intend to have 1080p pre-processed versions for 4k content. The majority of my content is 1080p, transcoding 1080p to anything smaller is quite an easy task for the GPU. Ideally Plex should use the 1080p file instead of 4k when transcoding, but I’ll settle for being able to see the 1080p non-transcoded option along with transcoded options.
Where in a show you have to click the triple dots on the specific episode to see that option. And then this option only applies once to the episode selected. You would have to close the player and repeat every time you start a new episode. This is quite an egregious UI design flaw in my opinion.
I noticed that as well, perhaps that should be considered a bug? Selecting quality in a video should stick on that device at least. If not, at least I don’t have to close the player, and dig up the the other menu. Which frankly, didn’t even know existed until you pointed it out. Don’t see how someone who’s not tech savy is expected to.
I’d personally consider it a bug because its a pretty poor design choice. Not very user friendly when the settings keep reverting on you. Also resource inefficient if you have a reduced quality option that gets dismissed in favor of transcoding options. Not only am I wasting storage, I’m also using quite limited transcoding capabilities.
A bug is something not working as intended with the choice made. Not liking the choice does not make it a bug.
if you want to keep a certain quality you can change it for the app as a whole. Just because because someone has multiple optimized version of different episodes does not mean those optimized versions are of the same quality. there could also be multiple versions of same or different quality of the same episode
A bug is something not working as intended with the choice made. Not liking the choice does not make it a bug.
Well I suppose its a good thing this isn’t a bug report. It still presents the element of a very poor user experience.
if you want to keep a certain quality you can change it for the app as a whole. Just because because someone has multiple optimized version of different episodes does not mean those optimized versions are of the same quality. there could also be multiple versions of same or different quality of the same episode
This kind of ties into another thread on app-wide quality settings. And lo and behold the driving point for the suggestion is hardware inefficiencies. The client choice comes first, but having conflicting settings for it is an awful idea.
