Plex on Android Mobile Consistently Fails to Make it Past Certain Point in File

Plex Players Mobile Devices
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Test environment

PMS Version:1.19.1.2645
Arch Linux: Current
PMP Version:7.31.16802
Android Version: 10, Build QQ2A.200405.005

Summary

This and a few other files on my server play to a certain point and then stop (typically within a second or so of a specific point in the video). This behavior is seen on an Android phone and on Android TV (direct play); the video plays fine in the web client (transcoded), mpv and VLC.

The linked sample file exhibits this behavior at approx the 1:38 mark.

Sample File

https://www.dropbox.com/s/0i8xxmeso9sryfy/sample.mkv?dl=1

Steps to reproduce

  1. Play linked sample file

Current behavior

  1. At ~1:38 playback stops

Expected behavior

  1. Video should continue for full duration of 2:58
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Any additional information that would be useful in troubleshooting this issue?

3

Is it only this file which fails?

Log files (DEBUG logging) which capture this are needed to perform proper diagnosis. (Settings - Server - Troubleshooting - Download Logs) Attach the ZIP

From your description, this sounds like a Player-specific issue?
Please confirm.

Also, be advised. If OS-related, Arch is not supported. Plex doesn’t package for Arch.

4

Hey @ChuckPa, thanks for the instructions on the DEBUG log. Generated a new log and attached:
debug_log.txt (22.3 KB)

There is one other file that fails in a similar manner (specific moment in video). Both files have a relatively high bit-rate. Not sure if relevant but the other file is h264 and the the one uploaded here is h265.

I agree that player seems to be at fault as the video will play through:
Plex web app - Linux
mpv - Linux
mpv - Android

The video did hang in a similar manner with VLC on Android, however.

5

Some additional detail about the state of the android player when this issue occurs:
When this issue arises, the play/pause button offers the option to play (as if the video were still playing). The play/pause button is unresponsive however. The +30 s button still works and the ‘glitch’ can be skipped over allowing proper playback after this moment in the video.

Unfortunately there is another ‘glitch’ in the video several minutes later so this is not a viable workaround for this issue.

6

I’m going to back this up a step;

With this also occurring, it cannot be conclusively blamed on the app.

Sorry but that’s more than one point of failure.

7

Hey @ChuckPa,

So just went and double checked this behavior:
mpv on android (launched through Plex interface): slight stutter in framerate at ~1:38
VLC on android (launched through Plex interface): paused for a fraction of a second at ~1:38 but recovered
mpv (from local file): no issues
VLC (from local file): no issues
Plex (from local file): stops at ~1:38 (never ending ‘loading/thinking’ orange spiral)
Note: in the “from local file” cases the exact file uploaded here was downloaded to my Android device, ie, the file was not synced/re-encoded through the Plex server.

Edited to include update of results from playing file locally through Plex player.

8

So that is it? Bug report closed as “won’t fix” on a technicality?

No interest in passing this information along to the devs in the hopes that they could make the player more robust in future releases?

Plex is just cool with the fact that their player crashes when others don’t?

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