Plex conversions trigger BSOD WHEA_UNCORRECTABLE_ERROR within minutes of starting

Plex Media Server Desktops & Laptops
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Hi All,
I have been seeing a problem with the transcoding of video files for syncing to remote devices. This has been going on consistently for the past several months, and I am out of ideas on troubleshooting. Whenever I sync data from my server to a TV or remote device, my windows server will blue screen with a WHEA_UNCORRECTABLE_ERROR, bug check code 0x00000124. I have narrowed the problem down to the conversions, and am to the point where I can reproduce a crash within 30 seconds of starting the file conversion. BSOD occurs before syncing takes place, usually towards the end of the conversion process.

Now from what I understand, WHEA_UNCORRECTABLE_ERROR usually indicates a fatal hardware error, with code 124 indicating some sort of hardware distress, like overheating. This does not seem to be the case in my scenario however, as I have monitored GPU and CPU temperatures while transcoding immediately prior to BSOD, and I see no temperature spikes. I am also not overclocking the machine. I can also confirm that I push my CPU and GPU far harder with various intensive computer games, VR, and numerical simulations, with no ill effects.

I have run memcheck on RAM (nothing found ) hard drive diagnostics (nothing found, but defraged and cleaned both of them for grins)

I am suspecting some sort of driver issue, but all drivers that I can find on my device are up to date. mini crash dump reports unknown module as the file name, so it’s of no help here.

Is anybody here aware of which drivers the Plex media transcoder interacts with, so I have some way to narrow it down?

Environment specs:

Server Version#: 1.16.1.1291-158e5b199
Player Version#: NA; but has occurred when syncing to roku, windows surface, and android devices
Server OS: Windows 10, version 1903
Processor: Intel Core i7-7820X
RAM: 16 GB
Graphics Card: NVIDIA GeForce GTX 1080Ti

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UPDATE:

It looks like some freakout between Seagate personal cloud and Plex Media Server.

I’m using a Seagate personal cloud to store all of my media files, as my computer’s hard drive isn’t large enough to host everything. While the personal cloud device supports plex natively, it doesn’t support transcoding, so I opted to instead run the plex server on my PC, and ensure that the PC is logged into Seagate’s “Sdrive” app, which treats the personal cloud device as a mapped drive.

Well… apparently the transcoder doesn’t like that one bit. If I bring the files onto my PC, create a library for them, then sync, it works without a hitch. As soon as I attempt transcoding media hosted on the seagate personal cloud device, BSOD.

Looks like the fix is to shell out a ton of cash for a NAS that actually supports transcoding, or get a huge hard drive for my PC.

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Looks like problem is not resolved after all.

I migrated everything onto a 10 TB WD Blue externally powered hard drive attached to my computer via USB-3. Transcoder still bluescreens computer immediately upon engaging, similar to accessing over seagate personal cloud drive.

At this point I have no ideas moving forward. Anybody have any suggestions?

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First off, I like to say I have see this error a thousand times. Maybe even more, seriously.
It has been my experience that it’s a hardware issue.

  • 90/100 times its mainboard
  • 7/100 times its memory (RAM)
    I strongly suggest you run MemTest86 from passmark.com and run 3 complete, uninterrupted passes!! 2 versions available. One for BIOS only and one for UEFI
  • 2/100 times its driver compatibility problems.
  • 1/100 times its heat related
    Though this can cause permanent damage to the mainboard
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Thanks for the tips NewPlaza,

I can eliminate mainboard, as the BSOD only occurs when plex transcoder fires up, and only occurs within seconds on the transcoder starting. if mainboard was at fault, I would be seeing this more often with non plex related activities. I push the board pretty hard with other processes (VR, gaming, tri-monitor display, numerical simulations with zero issues. Transcoding should be trivial hardware-wise.

I have run a memory scan with nothing to report, but I have not specifically run MemTest86, not to mention several times. I will try this and report back.

Although the crash occurs seconds after starting the transcoder, heat didn’t seem a likely culprit either. I did however monitor all component thermometers prior to triggering the transcoder, and observed no temperature spikes prior to BSOD. Therefore, I can eliminate heat as the problem.

The most likely culprit here is driver comparability problems. However, I completely wiped and reformatted the machine with a stock version of Windows 10, installed Plex, re-attached my media library hard drive, re-indexed, and tried transcoding. I again received BSOD within 5 seconds of transcoder starting up. This suggests that it is not a problem with driver incompatability with any other third party drivers (as none were installed, except for anything Plex may have installed).

The aggravating thing is that the crashdump doesn’t list the actual drivers at fault, so it seems that I’d need more information about what drivers Plex transcoder actually interacts with to troubleshoot further (yes, I manually went through each driver on the machine and made sure they were the latest versions).

Note also, that BSOD does NOT occur when transcoding data on a local internal hard drive. I have tested with media indexed from both internal SSD and internal spinner hard drives with no problems. BSOD only occurs when transcoding data on an external hard disk attached to computer over USB-3 cable or WIFI. I have reproduced BSOD only with media stored on older seagate personal cloud 4 TB hard drive, and with new 10 TB wd blue external hard drive; both with their own power sources.

Thanks again,

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Do you have a integrated NIC ?

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No,no,no… Not NIC, your USB…
Whatever don’t matter. You must have USB2 interface. Can you try that instead of USB3.

Anyway, hows it going with the mainboard replacement?

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