Plexamp initially garbled playing on Linux desktop server system

Plex Labs
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I have PMS installed on a Linux Mint desktop system (Dell Optiplex - Intel© Core™ i5-6500T CPU @ 2.50GHz × 4). Not a speed demon, but I think it should be OK, and I’m the only user. It’s been working fine since I got it about a year ago.

I have Plexamp 4.10.1, Linux Mint 21.3, everything fully updated as far as I know.

It’s been working well for a long time, but lately, it has been having a problem that I’m not sure how to troubleshoot beyond what little I’ve done.

When I go to play a song, it starts out with just static, but eventually starts playing OK, sometimes after a about half a minute, sometimes withing a few seconds. While doing this, the entire screen sometimes goes black for a few seconds. Once it starts playing, I can restart and it plays fine.

I have no problems with any other media players on this system, including Plex on the same system, and no problems streaming to my phone.

I have tried disabling most things in playback such as the equalizer, limiter, loudness leveling, and any other controls (changed them, tested, then reset).

I haven’t made any changes to any of these settings, and it never used to do this. I think it might do it to all music; I know it happens with both MP3 and Flac.

I’ve noticed some errors in the log files, but I have no idea what they mean. Here are the two errors I see when it’s not working correctly…

1. INFO - Networking: Error parsing JSON from request 895: 404 Unexpected token '<', "<html><hea"... is not valid JSON

2. WARNING - BASS: Mixer underflowed.

The second one is repeated over and over with occasional info in between, such as:
INFO - Cache: Network buffer is now ahead of read buffer, which has 2080768 bytes. Godspeed.
and

INFO - Discovery: There was a change to Recent Plays.
INFO - Discovery: Are we offline? 6 hubs, network is 2 => offline: false.

DEBUG - PQCache: Ignoring refresh as a newer one came in.

I’m not sure if anything else is important. I could probably try to produce a file without too much normal output and post it somewhere if that’s needed.

Anyone have any ideas?

Plexamp Visualizer Stopped working
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almost 100% a linux desktop/driver issue and not a plexamp one. those logs are fine.

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Out of interest, are you using the flatpak or appimage package of Plexamp?

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I thought of that first, but why would the standard Plex app and all of my music apps work perfectly?

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I’m almost certain it’s the appimage. I’m not sure what the Plex app is; maybe I’ll try the flatpak and see if it has the same problem. (?)

Sorry, it’s the flatpak I installed. I checked the properties for the launcher.

I’ll try the appimage, I guess, if I can.

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Very sorry to inform.

We don’t support Mint for reasons like this. It’s fine one minute and even for a long time then, suddenly, it fails without reason.

Recommend Ubuntu or Debian. Both offer customization of the desktop environment and you’ll be able to get “Mint-like” appearance but have stable Ubuntu/Debian underneath.

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Is Mint only a problem for Plexamp - ie, is it OK for the PMS?

I used Ubuntu for many years, from it’s early days until a few years ago, and I have found Mint to be much better for my use. I don’t think I want to change, although I can adapt the configuration, if needed… or just put up with waiting until it starts working when I want to play on the desktop.

I will say that this is the first problem I’ve had with the combination since getting Plexamp.

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Mint is not OK. Plexamp and especially not PMS.

I can’t count how many hours I’ve worked with folks to try and solve problems which would work for me but not for them.

I’ve had basic Linux commands deviate from standard (not good).

Once it was discovered Mint was being used, the customer reinstalled using Ubuntu and had immediate 100% success.

For you to share that Playback is garbled … that’s a OS driver problem. This is exactly what we see. System-level problems.

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OK, thanks. The Dell Optiplex I have is on of the mini sized boxes, which I got thinking it might one day be a dedicated Plex server, which I could connect to my A/V system. It’s not a powerhouse, but it has lots of USB3 ports, and internal storage, so maybe I’ll see about installing Ubuntu on it, and either using my laptop for Mint, or getting a new bigger, better Optiplex for a desktop (I like the Optiplex, and they are pretty cheap used).

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If you are “OK” with command line ( are you ? )

You can run “Ubuntu Server” on an older machine and get a lot of utility out of it.
You can add the minimal Gnome or other desktop (GUI) without all the overhead of “workstation” Ubuntu (heavy)

I have an older xeon CPU, the per-thread speed is low. It still gets a lot done because of the thread count AND lack of GUI dragging it down with a Nvidia P2200 doing the video heavy-lifting for transcoding.
–BUT–
a headless Plex server doesn’t need a gui

the only issue you will have with the 6500T is if you want 4K HDR.
the SkyLake CPUs don’t have HDR support (SDR only)
The KablyLake (-7xxx) has HDR.

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Thanks. I am above average on the command line, including ssh, and have worked with servers in my day. I’m retired from about 25 years of programming PCs, and started out before Windows (or even IBM PCs). Before that, I worked with audio systems, but got more interested in software than hardware and never found time to learn about the details of the hardware beyond the basics. So any input on suitable hardware is greatly appreciated.

I’m not a big video consumer. I like movies, but don’t have the time or patience to sit down and watch for very long. And when I do, I’m not that picky about quality beyond basic “full HD”, and right now, I don’t have anything beyond 1080p except my phone, which I don’t care about HD anyway. My main use of Plex is for Plexamp, and I think that doesn’t require much horsepower. So I assume my cheap Optiplex will be fine, assuming I have enough storage (I have 16GB ram, 4TB SSD). It’s good to know I’ll need to upgrade if I ever want HDR.

However, I’ve had no problems with Plex for years; the only problem is with the Linux Desktop Plexamp app, and I suspect it is not really a problem with Mint, although I’ll concede that it’s likely a problem with my system. So, I think I’ll do some poking around first, probably reinstalling Plexamp itself in case it’s simply some small corruption in its data. I had hoped to get some hints, but as is often the case, I’ll probably do better on my own anyway. Fortunately, troubleshooting is my strong point. I’ll post back if it goes away.

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Fair enough and I agree with your approach here. The use-cases I see for Mint are all HEVC/HDR grade loads with multiple users. In those cases, Mint would inevitably ‘fold’ under the workload.

I’ve been around computers since well before the IBM PC.
I built my own CPU in high school (it took up two big folding tables)

Probably best to say “the dinosaurs and I were on a first-name basis”.
My first bonafide microprocessor was the 8080 with a whopping 4KB RAM card. LOL

I started programming in '77 (officially) on a Prime 300. A few years later, I had a dedicated Prime 200 in a rack with twin 10MB HDD platters (one removable) – the old Hawk drives.

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I also built my first computer, from reject parts from a Northstar Computer employee. Bare boards and chassis parts, where I had to scrounge all the components and solder them. And fabricate some parts. Fortunately, I was working as a technician at Dolby Labs at the time, and had access to lots of good equipment. But it had a full 64K of ram and 2 DSHD floppy drives! A real powerhouse.

I’m retired now, but was a programmer of one sort or another for over 25 years, starting with MSDOS, Mac II, Windows, and then some Linux server. One thing I learned early on was the “Works for me” trap, usually due to configuration differences. I guess it can really only be solved by lots of testing and access to lots of systems, and I realize that resources are limited for you, so you can’t solve all the problems. And you’re allowed to not support whatever you can’t support, but please don’t make the mistake of blaming the system unless you define exactly what the system must be. I’m pretty sure that Mint is not deficient in some way; it’s really not much different than Ubuntu under the skin, and in my many years of using it, I’ve found that any problem I’ve had is also in Ubuntu, and maybe even Debian. You’d probably be better served by specifying the kernel version you support, as different distros will have different kernel versions, and that probably makes more difference than anything else.

And now for the embarrassing part… Since PMS has been running perfectly for many years, and Plexamp worked everywhere else, including my Mint laptop with the same version and configuration as the desktop, I decided to remove all things Plexamp, and then reinstall. That did not work. But later (and this is the embarrassing part), I realized that I have been remiss and have not rebooted my system for a while (like a week or so), so I shut down totally, restarted, and now the problem is not happening. It’s embarrassing because I often tell others to reboot when having some unusual problem. Sorry for the omission on my part, and thanks for your input.

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