Restarting definitely doesn’t fix the issue where certain video files aren’t transcoding and refuse to play. The only way to fix the issue is to downgrade to 6.12.
The issue is being ignored apparently, which means the only long-term solutions are a.) To use 6.12 indefinitely, or b.) To use Plex for Kodi indefinitely.
I am more than willing to provide whatever logs, files, samples, etc. the Plex team wants, but they appear to not care about this issue and won’t acknowledge it or respond to anyone mentioning it. I’m talking to a friend of mine about including this in a web article about the current state of Plex.
I’ve been discussing the issue with MovieFan.Plex over PM. The issue might have something to do with the audio being misidentified as 192kHz instead of the correct 48kHz, and Plex refuses to transcode anything. You can check my logs above.
Is there a plan to fix this issue on Amazon Fire TV Sticks and other Android devices? Today is Day 692 since this bug was introduced on the Fire Stick.
I figured out I get this error when I play interlaced video on a fire stick, the majority of channels on my hdhomerun are interlaced so I get the error when watching live TV and DVR recordings.
To fix the recordings I have set my DVR to transcode in Live TV & DVR, device setttings, concert audio while recording “Transcode” but this only fixed recordings it doesn’t help with live TV. For live TV I have to start the stream and go to the client settings very quickly and set it to transcode, sometimes I’m not fast enough though and then have to restart the stick and try again!
The problem with interlaced video has been reported in several posts but is still a problem, why can’t Plex just transcode anything interlaced when the client is a fire stick?
It is very sad. It is also very inconvenient that I have to, preferably in person, manually sideload 6.12 for anybody using a Fire Stick who wants to connect to my Plex server. Otherwise, they can’t use half my library. This problem is a big deal and needs to be fixed. It has been 695 days since the problem was first introduced. The Plex team either doesn’t care about fixing the problem and/or can’t fix the problem. A little communication from the Plex team would at least be nice.
@sixones can you please give us an update? With windows 7 stopping updates next year a lot of people will be looking at switching to a new platform. Right now I can’t recommend Plex because of issues like this.
Same issue has surfaced here. I recently spent a couple of hundred on a GTX1660 to get fast hardware transcoding and suddenly barely any movies in my library will transcode at all. It simply throws up the “Connection to server has been lost” message whether it’s on Shield, MiBox or Android phone/tablet - 4K or 1080p. Direct play still works fine. Please fix this!
You can solve this problem by downgrading to Plex 6.12 or by using Plex for Kodi. The Plex team is unlikely to fix the problem. It has been about two years since the problem first appeared.
I saw a comment in another thread on this forum that version 7.25 had fixed this issue. I have a gen 2 Amazon Fire TV Stick so did some investigation.
The latest version on the Amazon App store is 7.25.1.xxx (I’m at work so working from memory), this version has stuttering video and randomly freezes with the lost connection error, usually within 15 minutes.
The latest version I could find (APKmirror.com) was 7.25.3.xxx. I sideloaded this (need to uninstall the Amazon store version or it fails) and it is better, but still the occasional stutter in the playback and I got a few hours in before it froze up with the old error.
I went back to version 6.12.xxxx as other have reported is the last working one and bingo. No stuttering at all, perfect video performance. Sadly the UI is 2 years old and not as smooth as the newer versions, but I can live with that for now.
Please Plex - whatever you did in the change from 6.12 to 6.13, it’s not working, take it out.
On the Fire Stick, certain formats will refuse to play completely on 6.13 and higher, including with 7.26. I’ve narrowed the problem down to just about all of my HEVC Main 10 files, although it looks like the problem might have something to do with the audio being misidentified as 192kHz. Whatever the reason, Plex thinks the files need to be transcoded, but it refuses to do so. I’ve posted my logs several times above.
It’s too bad the Plex team won’t fix the issue. As you said, the interface on 6.12 is a little stale. Users trapped on 6.12 also cannot use new features, such as the ad-supported videos provided by Plex. That’s ad revenue the Plex team is losing.
I have this issue intermittedly as well. On the old player it was “fixed” but returned with new player. Switching to old player helped, but it’s there.
