I occasionally replace old media e.g. same movie (same folder) with files of higher quality e.g. old version SD new version 1080p
This historically resulted into removing the old record and adding a new one seen also at the top of the “Date Added” sorting of the Library.
Now, I have replaced a couple of titles and my Last Updated still points to the last “Date Added” movie. Searching the title I can see Plex does find the title and specifically the new version (1080p and not SD any more). This is affecting existing titles only. If I add a brand new title to the library this wtill be considered as it should and put on top of the “Date Added” sorting as expected.
That’s the normal behavior, when you delete the media the metadata still exist in the database until you do a clean up (which can be once a week by default). Imagine what would happen if your media were in a USB drive and for whatever reason the drive is not readable, you do not want the metadata to be deleted automatically by a scan and lose all the metadata.
Anyway, to achieve what you want, delete the SD media and then do a media scan, then delete trash, and sometimes delete bundles is also needed. Then add again the media and scan again.
I hear what you say but this is a new behaviour. I would love somebody to confirm this is indeed a change in Plex as this is entirely my ssumption.
So to recap: Me replacing a .avi file with a .mkv file within the same folder used to be considered by Plex as a “new title” and triggeres a media scan, match and metadata refresh. Now it seems Plex became more clever and classify this case just as a new version of the old title. So only resolution and little more is updated, certainly not the match.
So yes, the Date Added is not affected any more. Not sure I prefer the old or new way but in general I was wondering if there’s a setting allowing me to decide how Plex should behave when a media is replaced (old way or new way)
That has been the default behavior for years, I’ve been as well replacing my SD media for 1080p whenever possible in the past 5 years.
The only thing I can think is that maybe you had “Empty Trash” automatically activated by every Scan, so your old media was really deleted first. Or something was changed in that part. But having automatic empty trash activated can be dangerous.
I already said, if one of your disks is not available then all metadata will be deleted, so you will lose all your view status, which might or might not be important to you.
And not only that. Imagine you have painstakingly adapted the metadata of your collection. By selecting a certain poster version and refining the metadata which where downloaded automatically. Not to mention items which may not get automatic metadata.
If these changes were suddenly lost, just because of a changed folder path or a temporary disconnection…
Woudln’t it be enough to check if the media folder (parent folder) actually exists? If not it’s obviously a filesystem issue and the empty trash prevented. Also said in other words you would likely delete by intention a sub/sub folder but never the very top of the media library.
Just a though that could improve this issue that’s all.
