NVidia Shield: Can't Rewind with Subs correctly or play a movie with VOBSUBS

Plex Players Streaming Devices
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Server Version#:1.22.3.4523
Player Version#:8.18.2.25859

When I watch a movie with Subs the rewind and fast-forward are broken. When I fast forward the picture freezes after hitting play but the audio still moves forward. Then if I try to rewind the movies starts to buffer and then jumps 20 minutes or 10 minutes forward rather than rewinding. If I turn subs off then I can rewind. Which is very frustrating when I am watching a foreign film especially. Having to stop the subs, rewind then add the subs back is just annoying and no other video player makes me do this.

Also when loading a movie that uses VOBSUBS the video player just crashes and wonā€™t load the movie over and over again. Which makes it really hard to watch movies I transfer from a DVD or Bluray. I am hard of hearing so I need subs pretty much whenever I watch a movie but constant crashing and rewind not working makes it hard for me to want to use plex.

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With 8.17 & 8.18 Android & Android TV clients, when MPEG2 video is transcoding and VOBSUB subtitles are enabled, the player will crash.

This is fixed in v8.19, currently in beta (release notes). I tested it on a Nvidia Shield and Android phone.

I did not see this with the 8.19 beta client on my Shield.

I played a DVD rip with VOBSUB subtitles enabled. Rewind & Fast Forward both worked OK, whether the movie was direct playing or transcoding.

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Interesting maybe it is fixed, but I also watch a movie with SRT or any subs type american or foreign and when I rewind or move the playhead back it works the first time a lot of times but then freaks out and does the behavior described. especially if I donā€™t pause it or remove the subs first. It also happens if I try to rewind then again, it will buffer and skip ahead. I get it 99% of the time on the Nvidia shield. Hopefully it is fix in the beta as you arenā€™t seeing it. If needed I can send a log or something (I would just need to be told how)

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How can I get the beta on my nvidia shield?

Greg

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Two methods: Sideloading or joining the beta program.

Sideloading lets you load a specific release to your Android / Android TV device. It is somewhat of a pain, but it works, and you have immediate access to the beta version.

Joining the beta program provides you with all the releases. You receive them via the Google Play store, just like the non-beta releases. I am not sure how quickly beta signups are processed. I signed up quite some time ago. At that time signups were not handled immediately.

Sideloading

Google ā€œsideload Nvidia Shieldā€ or ā€œsideload Android TVā€ for all the details.

  1. In Shield Security settings, enable installation of apps from unknown places (i.e. places other than the Google store)
  2. Install Downloader by AFTVnews from the Google store (free).
  3. In the Downloader app, install the browser plugin (free).
  4. In the browser of the Downloader app, do one of these two:
  • a) Go to forums.plex.tv, navigate to the Android TV beta announcement thread (in the testing area), navigate to the bottom, select the arm64v8a version, and load it.
  • b) Enter the URL for the last (most recent) entry in the announcement thread, https://forums.plex.tv/t/release-announcements-android-tv-beta/154124/441. Select the arm64v8a version, and load it.

Downloader should then install the apk on your Shield.
Once installation is complete, launch the Plex app, sign in if needed, etc.
You can verify the app version by going into the app settings and look at the overlay in the lower right corner of the screen.

There is most likely a way to put the apk on a USB stick instead of all the ugly navigation steps above.

Note that sideloading disables auto updates for the sideloaded app (any app, not just Plex). To load future beta versions, repeat the sideload process using the new version.

If you wish to return to the non-beta release, simply delete the sideloaded version and reinstall from the Google Play store. Auto updates will work again as well.

Join Beta Program

See Join App Betas: Android (mobile), Android TV, Apple TV, iOS . Follow the link to the Google Play store to sign up for the beta program.

If youā€™ve an Android phone with the Google Play store, you can also sign up in the play store app. I did not see a way to sign up in either the Android TV or web versions of the Google Play store.

Once in the beta program you will receive beta updates for the Plex Android TV app. If your device is configured for auto-updates you will receive them automatically.

Follow the same link to be removed from the beta program.

Note that beta is exactly that. The release includes new features, fixes, etc but is not considered ready for production release. The release schedule is irregular. There may be several releases a week, multiple releases in a single day, or several days between releases. You can see the release dates in the announcement thread. The releases are generally stable, but sometimes new features do not work correctly or existing features may break (hence the name, beta).

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Thanks I bought a plex pass as I thought that was needed to get in the beta x(. But I finally tested it on the beta player build and it seems to no longer have that problem. The VOBSub loads fine and I was able to rewind and fastforward multiple times with no issues.

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Good to hear it is working for you. You can subscribe to the announcement thread to receive email notifications when updates are released. Scroll to the bottom of the thread and change ā€œNormalā€ to ā€œWatching.ā€ This works for any thread in the forum.

Obligatory marketing blurb :slightly_smiling_face:: There are multiple benefits to having a Plex Pass, one of which is removing the one minute limit for video playback in the mobile apps (iPhone/iPad, Android mobile phones & tablets). See Plex Free vs Paid for additional details.

If you no longer want the Plex Pass you can contact the billing department. They may issue a refund. I do not know their refund policy, but it never hurts to ask.

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Plex for Android v8.19 was released today with the VOBSUB fix previously available in the beta release.

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Iā€™m getting pretty much exactly the same issues using the Shield TV as a client on a windows 10 server. I only noticed it in the last few months, and Iā€™ve had the shield for 3ish years now so it hasnt always been there for me.

Iā€™m on server 1.24.1.4931 and client Nvidia Shield (and android phone) ver 8.21.2.27212.

Hereā€™s what Iā€™ve noticed:

  1. The shield client appears to be the worst offender. Windows 10 client has none of these issues and android phone only has a portion of the issues. For nvidia shield, with subs on (SRT) and transcoding on, playback is often worthless ā€“ all i get is a spinning loading icon that goes forever.

  2. With subs on but directplay on (on the shield), the movie loads and plays fine, but hitting rewind ends up fast forwarding the video by several minutes. Sometimes hitting fast forward causes video to freeze while audio plays.

  3. With subs OFF, everything seems to work fine.

  4. On my android phone, the bug isnā€™t nearly as severe, though it does happen sometimes. With subs on and transcoding on, the ā€œforever loading iconā€ bug sometimes happens. With either subs or transcoding off, the bug goes away.

  5. However, the ā€œrewinding ends up fast forwarding 5+ minutes instead when subs/transcoding are onā€ bug is much less severe (only 30-60 seconds forward, and less consistently) on my android phone. Turning off subs or going to direct play fixes the bug.

Iā€™ve read a ton of threads here on this issue and no one really seems to have a solution to it (other than not using subs) but hopefully thereā€™s an update in the future that will fix this.

1 Like
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I am getting this issue again. Version 8.23.0.27774. Was watching a movie with subs and it would keep jumping ahead when I did back 10 seconds and then when I tried to go back to my spot, it would keep freezing the picture or jump ahead by 10-20 minutes. Really making the movie unwatchable.

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