Plex Direct Play slower than playing directly from Network Drive

Plex Media Server
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Server Version#:1.24.0.4930
Player Version#:1.33.0.2444-a220eae4

This just started happening a few days ago. Maybe a week. Plex is just buffering uncontrollably, no matter what device I’m watching on. It’s barely using a fraction of the bandwidth it has access to. Anything with a relatively low bitrate plays fine, but anything higher than, say, 25mpbs, buffers. Blu-Ray rips buffer less than 4Ks, but they shouldn’t be buffering at all when the actual network speed is fine. I’ve had this happen in the past, but I don’t know what I did to fix it, other than maybe a system restart, which I’ve already done multiple times over.




In the above image, I’m playing from the server directly on the server computer. The bandwidth line on the left is where I played it on my Windows PC, like in the first screenshot.

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bump!

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Playback is successful from the server itself, correct?

macOS beta, by any chance?

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MacOS Catalina Patcher. But I just started having this problem recently.

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I asked because Monterey beta 4 was horrible. :slight_smile:

And it does play well from the server? I’m 99% sure that’s what you’re saying, just confirming.

Wired or WiFi? You say that networking performance is good - how have you confirmed that?

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Computer A = Server computer
Computer B = Different computer

I’m not 100% sure what you’re asking there. It plays well when I’m playing from Plex web on A. It also plays well when I play the file directly from the Network drive on B connected via Ethernet. But not through the Plex app on B. I know the network speed is good because it plays fine from the Network drive on B. Otherwise, both Plex and the network drive would be slow.

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Okay, so. Plex has the strangest fixes imaginable for certain problems. I had been accessing my Plex server mostly through the Windows app, not the actual IP web client. I did so, and was instructed to finish setup. Just to select my pinned libraries. And Bibbidi-Bobbidi-Boo, full throughput. I guess something reset itself during a server update, and the only way to fix it was directly through the IP web client. And here I thought plex . tv, the windows app, and the web client basically all did the same thing.

Edit: Well, I spoke too soon. I think this actually has something to do with my wifi extender. My computer and Mac Pro server are connected via a network switch, which is connected to a TP Link wifi extender. My computer is still having issues. The reason I said it was fixed was because I played a movie on my phone while in the living room. It worked fine. I came back to my room, and my computer was no better, so I tried my phone again. Terrible again. I took my phone into the living room, and as soon as I exited the extenders range, the speed ramped back up. Not sure how this makes any sense, as the extender is still providing the throughput for the server, but it’s working. I’ll try resetting the extender and see if that does anything.

Edit 2: If I disconnect the network switch from the wifi extender, I’m unable to access my Plex server on the computer connected to the same network switch. That shouldn’t happen, right? I should still be able to access it?

Edit 3: Disconnecting the internet still leaves me able to access the network drive, so I’m back to blaming this on some strange problem with Plex, and not my network setup, like I thought it might be there for a second.

Edit 4: After hooking the internet back up, I tried logging into the server with the IP web client from my non-server computer, and got this pop up “This application is at ********* and is not hosted by Plex. Continue only if you recognize this server and wish to grant access.”

Edit 5: I brought the router into my room to isolate some variables. The extender is indeed the problem. There’s only one problem. Why? These computers are connected through a switch and direct access of the network drive is not affected. But Plex is. Why? Why, oh, why? To make matters even more confusing, Plex performance on the non-extender part of the network seems fine, even though the Plex stream is being supplied by the extender. Make it make sense, I tell you.

Oh. also, just as a reminder, this didn’t start to be a problem until about a week ago. I’ve had this extender since the beginning of June.

Edit 6: It would seem the Mac is also somewhat at fault, as I just setup a test server on my other computer, and… it’s fine. Runs fine. No issues whatsoever. It doesn’t care that it’s hooked up to a wifi extender, in the slightest. This makes the problem even more confusing.

1 Like
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PS Maybe the “How to backup your Plex server” page should show both directories to backup instead of just showing one, and putting the other in a “related page” link. Just a thought.

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Installing Mojave seems to have fixed the problem. It obviously wasn’t a problem with Catalina in particular, since it had been working for so long before. I would’ve tried reinstalling Catalina, but I had been having problems with the patcher not opening Chrome. It was probably something I did to corrupt something, but I have no idea what.

So, if someone somehow comes across this thread, the solution is to just reinstall. Or if you have Time Machine, restore to when you know it was working. That should also work.

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I had a similar problem with some mp4 files. Remuxing the file to the same type of container, without any transcoding, of course, solved it.

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