Server Version#: Doesn’t matter
Player Version#: Doesn’t matter
<If providing server logs please do NOT turn on verbose logging, only debug logging should be enabled>
Plex preview apps make this worse by presenting “High medium low” options with zero indication on bitrate, resolution, etc. but even without that the options for downloading are well over a decade outdated and need to be completely torn out and redone. Here’s a laundry list of current issues:
There’s no option to transcode just audio or just video. Some players have issues with just one like Apple devices having difficulty with x265 sometimes, but not audio.
There’s no way to detach resolution and bitrate. IMO a 4mbps 4k stream looks better than an 8mbps 1080p stream.
Actually, the current options tie bitrate to resolution directly. Like if I have an aforementioned 4mbps 4k stream, I literally can only transcode it to 720p 4mbps or lower resolution.
Bitrates need to be grounded in the reality of modern transcoders. 12mbps is not “medium” bitrate for 1080p nowadays. At least on my 32-thread system. Especially not for x265. 2mbps (a sixth the size!!!) is “medium” bitrate. And yes I know transcoder speed presets mess with this. Maybe adjust the bitrates for the server’s selected preset as well as the number of cores. I’m not sure how much the load average of the server would affect this.
Downloads specifically should have a specific quality target and bitrate maximum, wheras streaming transcoding should have a specific bitrate target and quality minimum (or maybe option between choosing both). The quality can be abstracted away to say, low being quality level 40, medium 30, and high 16? This would require some feedback/error message work such as “your video is buffering because server cannot keep up with your selected quality settings”
No option to choose x264, x265, AV1, VP9, etc. I’d be very fine with this being an advanced setting, even statically set in app settings.
While I know it’s not going to happen given the absolute shambles Plex is in at the moment, I would like to see more control but it would have to be server side, not client side, to avoid frustration and confusion.
I know they want to move away from showing the client as much technical jargon, which is fine, but unless plex fixes the supposed auto-negotiation of bandwidth available it’s just going to make things harder for people sharing their private media libraries.. which I don’t want to be conspiratorial but I think they are going to intentionally make it worse and worse slowly and gradually to shed users like us who were once their core userbase, enthusiasts, nerds, and those that sail the seven seas, yarr, as they shift to their legitimate and legally clear VOD platform..
Yes we can limit stream bandwidth etc, but we cant do it on a per user or per client device level, so being able to manually add or remove transcode presets, control audio codecs used, etc, at the server level would solve so many headaches for clients that have no idea what they are doing, but want the best experience possible.
I understand they avoided adding things like this previously to restrict dodgy paid server managers from selling transcode tiers etc, but it would be a welcome feature to have some control or tuning adjustment over those presets.
