Newer Media (Especially Movies) Slow to Play

Plex Media Server
1

Server Version#: 4.108.0
Player Version#: 2.58.0.1079-38e019da
<If providing server logs please do NOT turn on verbose logging, only debug logging should be enabled>
Hello!

First post on this forum, usually able to troubleshoot my own Plex problems but am currently stumped.

I’ve noticed that with more recently added media to Plex (especially movies) there’s a pretty long lag from when I click play, versus when the movie actually starts. Sometimes I don’t even think it’s going to play. While other movies/shows start almost immediately, even larger 4K content.

I have tried cleaning bundles, optimizing the database, and have seen no improvement. I’ve also tried many different clients (web, iOS, AppleTV, desktop) and the issue persists across all of them. I am on the same LAN as the Plex Media Server also.

I have pulled the attached logs. I started playing some media at 10:49AM in the logs. I play some movies and TV shows that start immediately. And then get to some movies that take a long time to load. Any suggestions would be greatly appreciated!

Thanks!

Plex Media Server Logs_2023-10-11_10-50-50.zip (5.4 MB)

2

This player (PMP) is no longer supported.
Please change to either “Plex for Windows/Mac/Linux” or “Plex HTPC”.

3

Thank you for pointing that out. Updated information below.

Server Version#: 4.108.0
Player Version#: Plex HTPC 1.48.1.3982-eacf6f65
<If providing server logs please do NOT turn on verbose logging, only debug logging should be enabled>

Same issue as describe in the original post. Updated the client player software, reran the tests to see how slowly the media was to load.

In the attached logs, started playing the media at 11:45AM. Thanks again for any suggestions.

Plex Media Server Logs_2023-10-11_11-47-29.zip (4.9 MB)

4

What kind of drive is D: ? How much storage space is left free on it?

Where are your media stored? Are they on a NAS?

Do you let the hard drives spin down their platters when they are idle?

How much RAM is in your server machine?

Side note: it appears you have pointed Plex directly at “naked” drive letters (e.g. M:). Never do that. Always use an overall folder as target for a Plex library (i.e. M:\TV Shows). Otherwise automatic library scans won’t function and library scans in general may take much longer.

Furthermore, your tv show folder hierarchy is missing per-season subfolders. It might not be an immediate problem, but if you ever run into matching issues, this is something you should fix. https://support.plex.tv/articles/naming-and-organizing-your-tv-show-files/

5

Answers to your questions:

Drive D: is a striped array of two SSDs with 645GB/1.81TB free.

The media is stored on an Unraid NAS.

Don’t spin down the drives.

The server machine has 32GB of RAM and generally sits at 28GB/32GB free.

I have mapped Unraid shares as drives in Windows. So I should move all my media to another folder?

I will audit my TV shows to ensure that they all follow the appropriate structure.

Thanks!

6

I doubt that the striping is necessary. All it does is raising the likelyhood of data loss.

Apart from that, the specs should pose no problem.

Perhaps create the shares one level higher already on UNraid. This should remove the necessity to actually move the data.
I understand this is a rather large change though, so if it currently doesn’t give you any trouble, maybe only use it for newly added media.

I have no other idea than giving this tool a go: GitHub - ChuckPa/PlexDBRepair: Database repair utility for Plex Media Server databases
You will have to edit the bat file to point it at your custom data folder location on drive D:

7

I ran the database repair and am still facing the same issue. I think I’ll try swapping out drives to see if there’s a hardware issue.

8

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