Well try what I said to isolate if it’s just connecting to the TV that’s the issue. Or your phone.
Isolating the issue allows Plex to know whether this specific issue is fixed or not. Right now, your concern it getting it on your TV, in which I understand that.
But are you able to test playback just on your mobile phone without casting it?
Test casting to a different TV?
Test casting from a different phone to your normal TV?
That way we’ll know if the topic here is the issue still for you. Or whether it’s your device, or your TV.
So I own a Samsung Galaxy S21 Ultra and several weeks ago the Plex App on my phone stopped working. Anything I tried to play just would spin and never start. For weeks this issue has frustrated me. I tried everything from powering off the phone, reopening the app multiple times, uninstalling and reinstalling, clearing cache etc. Nothing worked until NOW! Disabling notifications under settings - apps - plex, fixed it completely. I hope Plex staff are able to figure out what is causing this bug soon.
I had some streaming issues and I uninstalled then reinstalled. Streaming works, but whenever I try to change my phone’s friendly name Plex crashes. I’m guessing the android update messed up some Plex stuff. I updated mine earlier today and I wasn’t aware of any bothersome issues.
I tried the beta version of Android and I can edit the friendly name again without crashing and videos are working. I have a pixel 4xl for reference. Android 12.
I can confirm the ‘screen zoom’ method mentioned earlier does indeed work… You just change it up or down one notch then back again and plex seems to work. Changing permissions for plex seems to break it again, but the zoom method fixes it regardless of permission settings. Watching plex on my S21 now for the first time in weeks.
Temporary fix is to go into Android Settings for the app and turn off Picture-in-Picture. Although it will still randomly stop working after some time of the phone running; a reboot of the phone will make it work again…
Well this has been frustrating, but I’ve found the issue (or at least the one I’ve been able to replicate). There’s a bug in the Samsung firmware that tells the notification to close whilst it’s opening, this then triggers the player to terminate itself whilst loading which prevents playback.
If you can please install the build below, re-enable media notifications and verify playback begins as expected.
I previously had the issue and it was fixed by disabling notifications. Just installed this build, re-enabled notifications and played several movies and TV shows. All played instantly without issue, for me this build fixed it. Sincere thanks for taking time to look into this very strange bug.
This build was to solve the thread issue where playback wouldn’t start on the local device rather than the casting issue you are experiencing. Would you be able to fetch a new set of logs from the client for me? Steps for fetching the logs are available here; Android, Android TV, Fire TV, Portal Logs | Plex Support
I launch the Plex app on my phone. Hit the “cast” button and choose my Chromecast in the menu. My TV screen displays the regular message, waiting for me to launch a video.
I choose a random video on my phone in the Plex App and hit “Play”. The white arrow in the lower left corner of the TV screen begins to load, one or two seconds, then crashes with the “Something went wrong” message.
As mentioned before, if I use any other device (girlfriend’s or son’s phone) there’s no problem at all, eliminating any server side issue I guess.
Another confirmation here that experimental build 8.29.0.30144 fixes media not being able to play on Samsung phones on Android 12 when the media notifications enabled! Thanks for your hard work @sixones!
