PMS crashing when recording live TV

Plex Media Server
1

Server Version#:1.42.2.10156
Player Version#: 4.147.1

What am I looking for?

72DE6833-F329-4DEF-99F8-1D4651FEF6DE.log (6.2 MB)

2

I just updated to version 1.43.0.10492. See how that goes.

3

Knocking on wood, no crashes today running 1.43.0.10492.

4

Crashed today. Please advise.

Archive.zip (652.2 KB)

5

Do you happen to use a RAM drive for your transcoding directory? Live TV uses that location as temporary storage during recording. If it fills up, the server will crash.

6

Thanks for the reply.

No RAM drive in use.

7

See if this helps:

8

It does appear to be related to transcoding. I’ve already tried disabling “Convert video while recording” and “Use hardware-accelerated video encoding”. This appears to help with recording, but if I try to watch live TV it still crashes. Also, I’m running MacOS 10.13.6.

9

macOS broke SOMETHING related to hw acceleration of MPEG2 with a recent-ish update. i would disable hw decoding as well as encoding when watching these recordings until I get this figured out.

10

Let me know if there’s any particular testing you’d like me to do.

11

I’ve found that going back to version 1.42.1.10060 with “Settings/Transcoder/Use hardware acceleration when available” disabled has returned me to stability. Again, I’m running macOS 10.13.6 from 2019.

12

I don’t think you ever mentioned the hardware on which you’re running your server. My primary is a Late 2012 Mac mini running macOS 15.7.3 (via OCLP, because reasons).

macOS 10.13.6 suggests you might be running on even earlier hardware.

13

It’s a Mac mini (Late 2014), 2.6 GHz Intel Core i5. macOS 10.13.6 is still supported by PMS.

14

You have this hardware connected to the Internet, right? I mean you have to to be running a Plex Media Server on it.

15

Yes. It has an Internet connection. Why do you ask?

16

So what I’ve determined is:

Live TV and transcoding = bad

Recorded program and transcoding = good

17

I have the same problem but on a different setup. Live TV crashes and recorded programmes are fine.

I used AI to have a look at the logs and it appears that the client is the issue rather than the server. It’s almost like the client is dropping the connection as there is no crash on the server side. I’m hoping someone from Plex can pick it up. Might be worth posting logs when it happens again

18

I’ve done that, and with 1.43.2.10528, PMS still crashes. I’m at a loss.