Plex 1.42.2.10156 (Linux/Docker) - Transcoding TrueHD to LG OLED 77C2PUA fails

Plex Media Server
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Server Version#: 1.42.2.10156
Player Version#: Latest LG client

Hi all - I’ve been running PMS/Plex Pass on a couple of LG TVs. The primary one I want to resolve is an OLED 77C2PUA with whatever is the most current LG client app. The client exports audio via eARC over an 8K HDMI (yes, overkill) cable to a Denon AVR-X3800 receiver (Dolby Atmos 9.1 compatible, but I’m only running 7.1). I know there are limitations passing TrueHD via eARC, and when I do play a HD file, it plays 4K video fine as direct play and transcodes the TrueHD to EAC 5.1, which sounds a ton better than the lossy 5.1 options. Unfortunately, that will only last about 10-20 minutes, at which point buffering kicks in and then playback fails with a transcoding error.

I’m running Ubuntu Desktop (latest) on a Core i9-13900HK with 32GB of RAM. PMS is installed on Docker, and while I have a few other services running, there should be plenty of headroom to transcode the audio (or at least I’d think so).

Thoughts? Would love to get the audio quality up to where it should be to match the 4K video. Yes, I know the easy button is a NVIDIA Shield, but I’d like to avoid that if at all possible.

Thanks in advance,

Jason

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I don’t know if this is related, but I also had issues with truehd, but I am using firetv. The workaround that solved it for me was to change which audio track was marked as preferred. If the video has multiple audio tracks, you could try using MKVToolNix to change truehd so it’s not the preferred audio track and something else is. The strange things for me was the truehd was still picked up and streamed fine, but the transcoder stopped crashing.

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Thank you! It may have been an issue with the transcoded file. I was able to use Handbrake to reencode to EAC3 and that seemed to play fine with acceptable audio. I did get another encoded file to actually output Atmos, so it seems like it will pass it through if the settings are right. I’ll keep playing around and see if I can get it to work consistently, but it does now seem to be transcoding TrueHD to EAC3 on the fly without bombing out. The new Intel server running QuickSync is so much nicer than my old AMD box!