No Audio in Plex HTPC for Windows

Plex Players Desktop Players
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1

Server Version#: 1.42.2.10156
Player Version#: 1.71.1.346-f62ce923

Logs for Plex HTPC: Plex HTPC.log (761.7 KB)
Logs for Plex Server: Plex Media Server.log (2.9 MB)

Audio fails to play in Plex HTPC for Windows, i.e. if I play a video (TV show or Movie) the video plays without audio. Same thing happens if I try playing music, i.e. no audio.

Windows system audio works OK.

Everything worked perfectly last night, i.e. 03/10/2025. Tonight, 04/10/2025, Plex HTPC has decided to shİt the bed.

I rebooted the HTPC and tried playing an episode of Babylon 5 that I watched last night when audio worked, but tonight there is no audio.

I have made no changes to setting in Plex, and I have not updated Windows.

If I play the same video (i.e. TV show or movie) in the web interface it plays with audio.

I tried playing a video (an episode of Babylon 5) @ 19:59 in Plex HTPC, result: Video plays, no audio

I tried playing the same video (the same episode of Babylon 5) @ 20:04 from the Plex Server web interface, result: video and audio plays OK, no issues.

In video settings I tried setting the audio device to “Autoselect device” and “Realtek Digital Output…” but audio still fails to play in Plex HTPC.

When I checked the Plex HTPC logs I noticed this:

Audio:
Codec: ATSC A/52A (AC-3)
Bitrate: ?
Channels: ? → ?
Output driver: ?

Does anyone have any fixes or suggestions because I have no idea what to do now to resolve the issue and the web interface is a pile of .CRAƤ, frames get dropped all over the place.

2

When it worked yesterday but not today, it makes me think about power cycling all your hardware, then only opening HTPC, in case some other program is holding exclusive access to your audio device and HTPC can’t grab it back.

Your HTPC log mentions Exclusive Audio is enabled but no codecs listed for passthrough under audio-spdif. So I’m curious whether you have a receiver or speaker system that’s supposed to decode those, but if so, why the checkboxes for those codecs aren’t checked under HTPC settings → audio?

When it worked in the hosted web app, the audio is never passed through encoded, avoiding whatever is the underlying issue here.

@gbooker02 is the pro. Let’s hope he’s available :slight_smile:

3

When it worked yesterday but not today, it makes me think about power cycling all your hardware, then only opening HTPC, in case some other program is holding exclusive access to your audio device and HTPC can’t grab it back.

Already tried that. It was the first thing I tried.

I’m curious whether you have a receiver or speaker system that’s supposed to decode those

I have the HTPC connected to an AMP but it does not do any decoding, hence why I haven’t checked the codec checkboxes.

I have tried all sorts of different audio options in the settings but unfortunately nothing works.

4

I no longer work for Plex. Sadly, in the past two rounds of layoffs, Plex has removed everyone who works on the native side of these apps along with all those who advocated for their existence in the first place.

I hope you find your answers.

1 Like
5

That sucks, sorry to hear that. That also explains why Plex is slowly but surely becoming more enshitified.

I hope someone else can help too!

6

One of the first things I would try is changing settings on the HTPC Settings → Audio page. Maybe disable Exclusive Audio and specify the Audio Device etc.

It’s also a long shot but there’s a couple of errors in the log for PMS where it complains it can’t delete a cache folder that relates to transcoding.

Oct 04, 2025 19:44:16.364 [11160] ERROR - Failed to delete session directory (boost::filesystem::remove_all: Access is denied [system:5]: "C:\Users\Jingles\AppData\Local\Plex Media Server\Cache\Transcode\Sessions\plex-transcode-89izbrg83fyfdyvpbsnqxa1s-59070bf5-a1b0-496e-bf4d-eca15bcbf470\chunk-00019")

Oct 04, 2025 19:44:45.310 [12404] ERROR - [Req#589] Transcoder: Failed to delete session directory (boost::filesystem::remove_all: Access is denied [system:5]: "C:\Users\Jingles\AppData\Local\Plex Media Server\Cache\Transcode\Sessions\plex-transcode-u6w5t752yueae972b5wp9mcl-7b44f220-370c-4362-8d93-4220effff918\chunk-stream0-00010.m4s")

Oct 04, 2025 19:52:31.406 [2824] ERROR - [Req#81f] Transcoder: Failed to delete session directory (boost::filesystem::remove_all: The request is not supported [system:50]: "C:\Users\Jingles\AppData\Local\Plex Media Server\Cache\Transcode\Sessions\plex-transcode-o7dyr8enyqn40tigio306zbr-52bfc1e0-03b0-4438-9822-b5f49b0ef604\header")

Oct 04, 2025 20:04:27.078 [3384] ERROR - [Req#8729] Failed to delete session directory (boost::filesystem::remove_all: The request is not supported [system:50]: "C:\Users\Jingles\AppData\Local\Plex Media Server\Cache\Transcode\Sessions\plex-transcode-fd6otjjeohtu44n3bpo0fot0-fc38599b-fe4a-4746-a9b5-8fb7153e66bd\chunk-stream0-00012.m4s")

Those errors occur around the time you’re trying to play a video being transcoded. The HTPC player needed a transcode to Opus audio, while the web player required a transcode to AAC audio.

Maybe there’s a way to delete the cache, but I don’t have enough experience to know if these errors are significant.

7

One of the first things I would try is changing settings on the HTPC Settings → Audio page. Maybe disable Exclusive Audio and specify the Audio Device etc.

Cheers, I have already tried that, it was the second thing I tried. But no amount of fiddling with the settings got it to work.

It’s also a long shot but there’s a couple of errors in the log for PMS where it complains it can’t delete a cache folder that relates to transcoding.

Cheers, I’ll look into that and figure out how to delete the cache and see if that makes any difference.

Edit: Deleting the cache made no difference, i.e. it didn’t resolve the issue and Plex HTPC still fails to play audio.

8

Ensure that your Windows machine has the necessary codec(s) installed locally.
My go-to is the LAVfilter collection: Releases · Nevcairiel/LAVFilters · GitHub

A second thing to check would be accidental muting of the audio in HTPC.
Start playback, then press and hold the + button on the keyboard.

Do also verify that the settings in Plex HTPC don’t point to the wrong audio interface.
If there are external audio interfaces in use, or some are only occasionally connected/powered on, then the “default” audio interface of Windows can switch without you noticing.

If you use other apps which can output audio, ensure that they are not running. Because one of them could occupy the audio interface exclusively, thus preventing other apps from outputting audio. (Exclusive mode is usually a setting in the preferences of the respective app.)

1 Like
9

Thank you! This resolved the issue. It appears that somehow the audio in Plex HTPC was muted. Don’t ask me how because I was not aware this was even a thing, I have never used this feature.