Any chance you could fire up plex media player then look at activity monitor to see if qbwebengineprocess is using up high cpu when nothing is playing and you aren’t navigating in plex at all?
Min is hovering around 40% for no apparent reason.
I had this happen when I switched to Plex for MacOS instead of the web interface. As soon as I went back to the web interface the problem went away. I have reported this issue before but obviously the problem is still there.
Be careful about uninstalling the Plex for MacOS app (if that’s what to decide) as went I did it, the Plex server database also deleted and I had to start from stratch even though this isn’t suposed to happen. Hope this helps. I have noticed that the Plex server is very memory hungry especially during a reflesh and the M1 starts to run low on memory.
Hi ozsmac
I have had a look on my system
The Plex Media server is running and taking 0.1 to 0.2 of one CPU
I cannot find qbwebengineprocess running, (isnt qb qBitTorrent related?)
Keith
Qt here refers to the Qt framework, a set of libraries which were used in building the Plex app. Completely unrelated to qBittorrent.
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This is interesting, because numerous posts in this thread indicate that Plex Media Server should run fine on M1 Macs. I just set up my new Mac Studio, M1 Max with 64GB RAM, and for me Plex Media server crashes immediately after launch - or at least stops running (I don’t get a crash report).
I guess I’ll play around with it more later when I have more time.
I set PMS up on a brand new M1 Mac mini and it crashed constantly. I then set it up on a new M1 Ultra Mac Studio and it runs fine. Go figure.
I have the same specs in my M1 studio and have only had a couple issues with what you’re describing. I found that it happens on mine only after it has been switched off at the wall (after a safe shut down of course) so there’s no power getting to the Mac. If the Mac is left off but switched on at the wall it has no issues with PMS at all.
Interesting. So how do you recover after the machine has been disconnected from power? I did disconnect from the wall to put the machine into place after performing the migration from my old computer, so it seems like the same scenario you describe having issues with (switching off at the wall so there is no power going to the Mac).
Good to know, I don’t actually run Player on the same machine that I have my PMS running on. My temporary fix for my client machine is to run the Plex for iOS best from TestFlight that is a universal app, overall the CPU usage appears to be about the same during playback, but no stuck processes that hit the CPU constantly even when nothing is playing and no navigation is taking place (I get that the qtwebengineprocess is basically driving the Plex Player GUI, and requires fairly constant communication with PMS to get various live information, however the CPU hit seems excessive to me).
Appreciate the response, believe it or not each time I’ve typed “qtwebengineprocess”, I’ve had to correct myself from typing QBT each time (I do run that app on another host). As others have pointed out, it’s a different process that basically drives the Plex Player client GUI (if you crash it during video playback, you loose any navigation or buttons, but video still works).
I’ve got no issue with a key process using ~45% of a CPU whilst in use or doing something, that is fair enough, but this is constant no matter what you are doing in Plex Player.
This screen shot from the energy usage in Application monitor sums it up better than I can, remembering that Plex isn’t doing any form of video playback, just that the app is running.
I do note this specific discussion is about Plex Player MacOS and nothing to do with PMS, hence I created a seperate thread to take this discussion to the relevant area of the forum
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Hello, greetings to all.
I’m having problems lately with the plex media server and maybe someone has the same problem or an idea that can help me. Above all, thanks in advance.
I have the mac mini M1 2020 with Monterey where the server is installed, and a Yottamaster system of several HDDs with USB 3.0 is connected to it.
In the living room I open plex through an apple TV connected by cable.
In the kitchen I open plex with an Amazon fire stick connected by 4G wifi.
I have always used that system and it worked fine. But for some time now I have noticed cuts in the videos, loss of quality in playback and the biggest problem: I cannot turn off the mac mini because of the Media server app. When I try to force exit it does not respond either or it takes a long time to do it.
I have not changed anything and I don’t know what could be wrong.
Thanks again for your attention.
All,
Thoroughly enjoyed reading this thread. Long-time Plex user and have run the PMS since its infancy 10 years ago.
MacMini 6,1 - Intel Quad-Core i7 Chip w/16GB of RAM. Storage is all external with a Thunderbolt-connected Areca 8050T2 (8-bay) DAS x 2. Cat6 cabled connected from server to network. I’ve been running this server for nearly 10 years and have encoded my entire legally purchased media collection of 2,800 titles. Few, if any, real issues have been seen on this setup since it’s inception.
On the above setup, I started noticing the Buffering components commented on throughout this thread…but only with 4K Titles where a “Subtitle” track was needed (for foreign or alien languages). Outside of that, normal play and service…whether local or remote was used (and had the HDR Tone Mapping component enabled) and the same 4K file would play fine without the subtitles.
Figured eventually this MacMini would give up the ghost, so I ordered a 2022 Mac Studio (M1 Max Chip (10 core CPU | 16 core GPU) and 64GB RAM) and waited the 2+ months for it to arrive this past Friday! Fresh OS install and patches, then a fresh install of the Plex Media Server to avoid bringing over any garbage from a Migration Assistant.
Kept the same configuration as the MacMini to start on the Mac Studio. When trying a 4K title, I ran into the same problems as seen on the MacMini noted above. The 4K file plays just fine with no subtitles used (and having the HDR Tone Mapping enabled). Turned off the HDR Tone Mapping and chose the 5.1 Channel audio track (instead of the 7.1 MA version included to the same) and I’ve been able to go through a 4K title with no issues and limited CPU and Bandwidth being used (even though the RAM usage for the “System” is at a constant 80%).
If there is another way to address this without an extensive recode/conversion of this library…I’m happy to try it. If I’m reading this thread and not missing things… “possible” that a native M1 version of the app could take better advantage of all my new Mac Studio resources, but likely that’s still a ways off.
Thanks!
Steve
fantastic news!
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Wow. Finally here.
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Now released as Beta. Running fine so far. Cheers Plex Elves. Now can we move on? 
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Access is definitely faster form M1 to Apple TV via ethernet now. Overall better than previous Intel version. Thanks Plex…
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Yes we can indeed move on.
One minor point of clarification, just so people don’t get confused, this isn’t available via the Beta server update channel at this point in time.
To get M1 support, you need to manually install the “Preview” release, do read the instructions (and think if this is something you really need to do), as it won’t auto update, meaning you will need to manually install updates until auto update is included.
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As we’ve had some time collectively as a group to try this out, who has installed the preview and could offer the rest of us some feedback on it? Good? Bad? Noticeable difference in transcoding quality or speed?
As a Preview, is there a channel to let the devs know of bugs or do we just wait for the next update to drop?
Mindblowing.
These forums are good 
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I have frequent crashes on my Mac Mini M1 Plex server. Either the server logs me out, or crashes completely, at least 3-4 times weekly. No idea why.
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