Plex intermittently transcoding files for xbox one.

Plex Players Gaming Consoles
1

Hi everyone! First time posting, let me know if I’m doing anything wrong.

I’m using
Plex for Xbox One v1.8.0.0
Plex Media Server v1.4.3.3433 on Windows 10 x64
Everything is connected with Gigabit Ethernet on the same subnet.

I have been using Plex for a few months, and I was pleased with the Xbox One’s recent update, allowing direct play/stream for HEVC encoded video, and FLAC audio.

I have digitized my entire DVD/BluRay collection and nearly all of the files were Handbraked as MKVs with HEVC video and lossless or best effort audio. (DTSHD/TrueHD/FLAC, or AC3/DTS if no lossless was available.)

In my testing, the Xbox One was chewing through all of that like a champ, Direct Play, no transcoding. Awesome.
Today though, it seems that it’s only direct playing videos with 5.1 FLAC or 5.1 AC3.

For example:
Cars (1920x802 HEVC, 24-bit FLAC 5.1) WILL Direct Play
Cars 2 (1920x802 HEVC, 24-bit FLAC 7.1) WON’T Direct Play
Btmn Bgns (1920x800 HEVC, 24-bit TruHD 5.1) WON’T Direct Play
Allegiant (1920x800 HEVC, 24-bit TruHD 7.1) WON’T Direct Play
Boxtrolls (1920x1080 HEVC, 24-bit DTSMA 5.1) WON’T Direct Play
Deadpool (1920x802 HEVC, 24-bit DTSMA 7.1) WON’T Direct Play
Day & Nght (720 x406 HEVC, AC3 5.1) WILL Direct Play
Alien (718 x310 HEVC, DTS 5.1) WON’T Direct Play (and actually this can’t get going at all… for some reason, it just says buffering and won’t start)
It doesn’t need to do this, the Xbox has been able to play these files raw in the past.

Most alarming:
Big Buck Bunny (3840x2160 H264, 24-bit FLAC 5.1) WON’T Direct Play (and it definitely did before.)

This is really important to me, because x264 on veryfast or whatever the transcoder uses, is much higher bitrate than x265 on Slow (which is what my files are encoded with) plus my server is kind of a potato, so this is really difficult for it.

Nothing much has changed, except for a Plex Media Server update the other day. (Now running: 1.4.3.3433)

I’m hoping this is a bug, but would love some feedback on the situation.

I’d be glad to provide any logs or additional information, just let me know what you need.

EDIT: Added version numbers and extra info about issue.

2

@chrisbphoenix said:
For example:
Cars (1920x802 HEVC, 24-bit FLAC 5.1) WILL Direct Play
Cars 2 (1920x802 HEVC, 24-bit FLAC 7.1) WON’T Direct Play
Btmn Bgns (1920x800 HEVC, 24-bit TruHD 5.1) WON’T Direct Play
Allegiant (1920x800 HEVC, 24-bit TruHD 7.1) WON’T Direct Play
Boxtrolls (1920x1080 HEVC, 24-bit DTSMA 5.1) WON’T Direct Play
Deadpool (1920x802 HEVC, 24-bit DTSMA 7.1) WON’T Direct Play
Day & Nght (720 x406 HEVC, AC3 5.1) WILL Direct Play
Alien (718 x310 HEVC, DTS 5.1) WON’T Direct Play (and actually this can’t get going at all… for some reason, it just says buffering and won’t start)
It doesn’t need to do this, the Xbox has been able to play these files raw in the past.
I can tell you right off the bat, no it hasn’t been able to direct play all of those. Anything with HD audio or DTS has always needed to transcode on the Xbox One. Plex has never had access to any HD audio or DTS decoder and until Microsoft releases one for 3rd party developers those audio codecs will always need to transcode.

Now because you’re using HEVC and have an audio stream that needs to be remuxed the video needs to transcode as well. This is because currently HEVC is not a part of the HLS streaming standard that is used to stream the videos to the Xbox One.

Nothing has changed the ones you show above that are not direct playing now. Besides the case below, the only other exception is the 7.1 audio. It has never been enabled for direct playback, but during the last round of testing 7.1 audio was causing playback failures so it remained disabled.

Most alarming:
Big Buck Bunny (3840x2160 H264, 24-bit FLAC 5.1) WON’T Direct Play (and it definitely did before.)
This was the only one that was able to direct play previously. But there was a major problem with h264 at 4K that caused the team to need to disable direct playback of 4K H264 files. In addition, since it’s 4K@h264 it has to transcode down to 1080p because Plex can’t stream HEVC over HLS so the only option is H264 which the decoder has issues with.

With all of that being said, Microsoft is actually testing passthrough modes which can lead to other options for the Plex developers. But it also needs to wait until these modes are enabled for 3rd party dev’s.

3

Thanks for the quick reply.

I must’ve been mistaken about the Xbox’s previous performance. I have a household of different devices and I must be mixed up on what was able to play where. My bad.

You mentioned that Xbox cannot handle HD audio, I assume you mean the prevailing industry standards (TruHD and DTSHD).
The Xbox can handle FLAC correct? With support for 7.1 coming back after some bugs are ironed out?
If so, I’ve actually been impressed with FLAC’s compression ratio vs DTSHD and TruHD, and have been meaning to remux my BluRays with FLAC audio instead.

As for oldschool DTS, I’ll just have to wait on support for that. I don’t want to reencode an already lossy source. (Not on the original copy at least…) :wink:

I’ve tried to maintain the highest possible quality with the lowest feasible bitrate, so HEVC was an obvious choice. With 4k becoming more prevalent, the support will come. In time.

Meanwhile, I might have to bite the bullet and give my server some extra horsepower. An FX-4100 really doesn’t cut it if it has to encode on the fly.

Thanks again for the info!

Cheers,
Chris

4

@chrisbphoenix said:
I must’ve been mistaken about the Xbox’s previous performance. I have a household of different devices and I must be mixed up on what was able to play where. My bad.
Anytime multiple devices are involved it’s bound to happen. Especially now with the interfaces being pretty much on par it gets even trickier trying to always remember what went where!

You mentioned that Xbox cannot handle HD audio, I assume you mean the prevailing industry standards (TruHD and DTSHD).
The Xbox can handle FLAC correct? With support for 7.1 coming back after some bugs are ironed out?
Correct! And I know 7.1 is definitely slated to be tested again and with all the updates Microsoft has done lately there is a possibility one of them could have fixed the previous issue.