Playback Error This server is not powerful enough to convert video

Plex Media Server Desktops & Laptops
1

Hi There,

First i will tell what i have done.

I had a Raspberry as server, so i understand he cannot transcode 4K HEVC with HDR.

So i get new hardware, a i5 8500T with 2x8GB DDR4 RAM and 256GB NVME SSD.

Installed with Debian 11 (x64) without desktop envoirement, only commandline.

Running on Plex version: 1.31.2.6810

And migrated the data from my Raspberry to the new hardware with this guide: Move an Install to Another System | Plex Support
Works great, all settings and complete libraries are working like a charm, everything is MUCH faster en very smooth!

Only i still get the error that the server is not powerfull enough to convert video when i try to play something in the webbrowser.

In the Plex app on my phone (iPhone) and my tablet (iPad) en TV (Sony with Android TV) it works perfect and plays all files (doesn’t transcode i think?)

But why not when i’m using my Plex server from a remote location in the webbrowser?

The new hardware is powerfull enough i think to play and transcode 1 stream i think???

With kind regards,

Buck Baggen

2

That’s neither new, nor will it provide the performance boost you’ll need to transcode 4K HDR video properly.
https://www.cpubenchmark.net/cpu.php?cpu=Intel+Core+i5-8500T+%40+2.10GHz&id=3231
It is certainly an improvement over the RasPi, but still not fast enough to be able to handle UHD remuxes.

Back on the RasPi, did you disable the transcoder? If you’ve migrated the data, chances are that transcoding is still disabled on the new hardware. Verify the setting in
Settings - ‘Show Advanced’ - Server - Transcoder

It is also possible that you are missing some critical driver or have the wrong driver software version.
But I am unfortunately not able to advise on that, as I’m not using Linux at all.

3

Thanks for the quick reply. Seriously? Heavy job that transcoding!

I tested with other media files, 1080p and 4k works fine. Only 4k including HDR he says not powerfull enough :frowning:

To bad, maybe upgrade the hardware to a better CPU in the future.

These are the settings in Plex:

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image714×700 54.5 KB

4

Yes, and the video stream transcoding is still disabled. Remove the checkmark.
And tick “Use hardware acceleration…” instead.
Otherwise you are not using the hardware transcoding abilities of this CPU at all.

Stop and restart the server after making these changes.

5

Seriously. Real-time video transcoding requires several bucket loads of computing power, unless you can use specialized hardware (like the video transcoder in Quicksync-capable CPUs).

Here you’ll find the passmark scores you’ll need to transcode 4K HDR video without hardware transcoding enabled: https://support.plex.tv/articles/201774043-what-kind-of-cpu-do-i-need-for-my-server/ – and these numbers are without tone mapping from HDR to SDR, which requires additional computations on top!

You current CPU doesn’t deliver that much raw computing power (see my above link). The only chance you have is to employ the Quicksync unit in that CPU.

6

Thanks, now it works! So the CPU however powerfull enough? (Yes, it uses quicksync, i specialy picked a cpu with quicksync support).

Without quicksyn (so when i turn off hardware transcoding) it indeed doesnt work and is not powerfull enough)

7

Is this CPU powerfull enough to trancode 4K HDR easy? (Without hardware transcoding enabled)?

https://www.cpubenchmark.net/cpu.php?cpu=Intel+Core+i7-1260P&id=4707

8

Probably not, considering that you’ll already need ~17.000 passmark points withouth tone mapping.

9

Ah oke, then i keep mu current hardware with hardware acceleration on.

Most of the time i’m watching home on my television and there is transcoding not needed.

But, how can i see if my television still plays directly without transcoding? (Because i have now disabled the option ‘Disable video stream transcoding’

10

The Dashboard in the web app can tell you what’s going on: https://support.plex.tv/articles/200871837-status-and-dashboard/

11

Cool, my television still uses directplay.

But now i noticed, the audio is always trancoding from aac to ac3, is this normal? Or does audio transcoding not request a lot resources like video transcoding?

12

If it’s going from 5.1 AAC to AC3, then yes. Many TV devices don’t have support for anything above stereo in AAC.

Much less so. Particularly at lower bandwidths.

13

Ah oke, i changed the settings in Tdarr to AC3, so everything can use directplay :slight_smile:

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