From what I can tell the videos i'm testing with don't have subtitles.
However, I might have mis-spoke about what's going on here. After digging a bit further, I noticed using the Xbox one media player initiates a DLNA direct play connection.
If I use the Plex app it is transcoding the file. I'm a bit confused why Plex needs to transcode when the Xbox One supports the native file format.
So, I guess there's gotta be a way to tell it not to transcode the files.
It turns out that the file is being trans-coded. However, when I initiate playback from the media player through DLNA it starts up a direct play connection.
This leads me to believe that the format is natively supported on the Xbox One and question the need to trans-code at all. As a side note the files are MKV.
As a test, I changed the transcoder to the "Make my CPU Hurt" setting. I didn't see any change in the quality level during playback.
The stream shows throttled which means my system is keeping up and it's not a horsepower issue.
While writing this I've been searching around and came across this:
Yeah, there is a client side setting for quality as well, which is what I was referencing. I assume you have done this, but you can adjust this setting by pausing the video being played (Button A) and then moving across to the right to the settings menu. I suspect in your case the quality is best set to "highest" (which is still limited to 20mbps) if you want to maximise picture quality (and I see you're on a wired network which shouldn't limit your bandwidth). If this was previoiusl;y set below this then this can cause the quality problems you have been noticing.
You shouldn't have any issues from the MKV support, the Plex Server just converts the .mkv wrapper to one that is supported by the Xbox. It is the same with the lack of DTS support. This is pretty light on CPU. Anything above 20mbps is transcoded which will be CPU intensive. I'm hoping this ceiling will be lifted soon. Along with MKV support, 24p support and DTS support....
I verified that the Quality setting is on high. Thanks for pointing that out (it's located in a strange place on the xbox one).
I tried increasing the IPC from 4Mb to 8Mb and increased the transcoder default throttle buffer from 60 to 120 seconds.
Somethings weird though. I decided to test on a couple of other devices and here's what I found:
Xbox One:
Dlna media player plays everything perfectly (Direct play - no transcoding)
Plex app hit or miss some shows look great others are bad quality. (transcoding -h264 aac
Xbox 360:
Built in dlna media player plays but looks extremely pixelated (transcoding -h264 aac)
The plex app plays just as poorly (transcoding -h264 aac)
Chromecast:
Plex app casting. Same poor quality (transcoding -h264 aac)
Roku XD:
Plex App - Same poor quality (transcoding -h264 aac)
The only thing I can take away from this is the Xbox One has a GB Ethernet connection while the rest of the devices are either 2.4Ghz wireless or 100Mb ethernet.
I would expect a level of consistency on at least on 1 device.
Perhaps I'm missing the super secret server configuration button that seems to make this work for others.
Maybe i'm hitting the quality limit with 20Mb? Who knows but 20Mb should still be attainable on these slower connections.
I'm really starting to question investing in the Plex pass for what's turning out to be a half baked piece of software.
You have something weird going on if you are having trouble with all these different clients. The only things in common are the server and the operator. :)
First make sure each client is setup to use the maximum resolution/bitrate.
Pick one 1080p (whatever) video file.
Make sure it's encoded as h.264 with an AAC audio channel for testing purposes.
Verify the video bitrate in this file is under 8mbit (for this test).
Make sure it's an MP4 video file container.
Play it on all devices and check to see if any transcoding is going on. Check from both the web interface and also check you CPU usage and report back what the CPU usage is for each device.
Give us the details of the XML file for the video being tested.
Also let us know how this "test" video looks on each device.
You should provide the xml info for a file you are having trouble with as well as some server logs while the issue is happening..
Xbox/Windows store apps don't allow mkv to be played natively, only the built in players (such as the dlna player) can use this, plex cannot. This will result in a remux at the minumum (which should not degrade quality as it's just a container change).
I have noticed that sometimes the info window in plex web will say transcoding instead of direct stream for files that have the same container and codecs while others seem to direct stream. All my stuff is ripped the same with handbrake (mkv, h264, either aac or ac3 depending on when it was ripped). I haven't noticed the degraded quality that you have noticed however, my library is 99% mkv right now and everything shows up just as well as if it was direct played on my raspberry pi.
When you are on specified media in plex web. Look for the 3 dots on the left, then click info. Make sure to create them as attachments and not just dump them in a post, makes it hard to read the post if you do that. :)
Could this be a "Reference Frame" issue for your problem file? Not sure what the profile is for the Xbox to trigger true transcoding rather than a remux. I know the Chromecast and Roku (and ATV3 via plexconnect) have issues with higher number of reference frames.
So, it's been a great while since I've posted an update and the issue still persisted. So, today here's what i did after a buddy of mine (another Plex user) suggested it. I'm not really sure why i didn't think to try this until today. As a test I stood up another Plex server on one of my other systems and loaded my movie library. Now here's the kicker transcoding works flawlessly on the FireTV. Does anyone know of anything in Windows Server 2008 R2 that might mess up Plex's ability to transcode properly? Maybe installing a 3rd party codec pack or another media server like Tversity or subsonic because I've had these all installed on this server at one time or another? So, i'm going to uninstall any other codec related servers and software, then uninstall and reinstall Plex and hope this fixes it.
So, cross your fingers for me. I really don't want to rebuild my server and let me know if you have any suggestions?
Thanks again everyone for the help considering it's most likely a self inflicted problem...
I found when I use Handbrake to covert my BluRays using the problematic system the output is also poor quality and blocky.
I checked the benchmarks for my Opteron 1356 and while it's old, it should at least be able to trans-code 1 stream.
My solution for now was just to move the Plex server onto another computer.
The only other test I can think to do is stand up a virtual machine (probably BSD or Linux) on the problem server with Plex and see if the same problem exists.
However, I haven't gotten around to it and am starting to wonder exactly what it will prove.
mines started doing after last few updates with plex hammering my cpu on my server its mega fast i7 64gb ram, with over 100tb space, yet it struggles when playing one MKV, starting to p me off, plex sort ya act out going backwards with designing the app im paying for , please fix the stream issue its not my end its software , either go full hog and play mkvs for dont, as its like watching mind craft it got more blocks on new 1080p movies, than a little… any help on settings MKV mode on lastest plex version, just installed and its worse than ever, unwatchable , plex Version 3.37.2
