[Release] UnicornTranscoder, create a Plex Transcoding Cluster

Dev Community Dev/API Corner
84

Here is the forum post for the new transcoder version:

I am not very familiar with Linux, but hopefully I could play around with Ubuntu and get it working.

I am open to any suggestions as to the best hardware / price point combination. =)

85

Update time!

Changes

We pushed updates to support the following builds:

  • 1.16.5.1554-1e5ff713d => v2.3.4
  • 1.16.6.1559-a71394a45 => v2.3.5-dev
  • 1.16.7.1574-4215f2c66 => v2.3.6-alpha

Update notes

  • Shutdown your transcoder/load-balancer
  • Update Plex (with one of the supported build)
  • Remove Plex Relay
  • Pull / Download the compatible transcoder for your Plex build
  • npm i
  • npm run install
  • restart

Choose the right version for your PMS here: https://github.com/UnicornTranscoder/UnicornTranscoder/releases

If someone can try 2.3.5-dev and 2.3.6-alpha releases on their Plex setup and could be nice to give us feedback :grinning_face_with_smiling_eyes:

Have a nice day!

1 Like
86

Unicorn Transcoder Release 2.3.8

Changelog

  • Support for Plex 1.17.0.1841-d42cfa161
  • Minors changes to support FFmpeg 4.2

Update notes

  • Shutdown your transcoder/load-balancer
  • Update Plex to 1.17.0.1841-d42cfa161
  • Remove Plex Relay
  • Pull the 2.3.8 version
  • npm i
  • npm run install
  • restart

https://github.com/UnicornTranscoder/UnicornTranscoder/releases/tag/2.3.8

87

Unicorn Transcoder 2.3.10 / Load Balancer 2.4.0

Changelog

  • Support Plex 1.18.0.1944-f2cae8d6b
  • Fix parsing issue with FFmpeg 4.2.x
  • New Image Resizer API
  • Use 307 instead of a 302 redirect to avoid cloudfront cache issue (AWS)
  • Update dependencies

Update notes

  • Shutdown your transcoder/load-balancer
  • Update 1.18.0.1944-f2cae8d6b
  • Remove Plex Relay
  • Pull the Unicorn Transcoder 2.3.10 and the Unicorn Load Balancer 2.4.0
  • npm i
  • npm run install
  • restart

Note: In general we publish updates few days after and official plex release, all the minors versions aren’t released here, feel free to subscribe to our github to be informed of each update :wink:

88

Does this software take advantage of GPUs that are in a system or does it strictly only use CPU for the transcoding?

89

Not actually, feel free to make a pull request to support it

Plex Remote Transcoder - A distributed transcoding backend for Plex
90

Do you mean that you have set this all up on a windows 10 machine? That’s what mine is running on and I want to try this out on there.

91

Will this work on Windows 10 machines?

92

In docker it works. We don’t support windows natively at the moment. Feel free to make a PR to support it

93

Hi there,

ist the latest version compatible with Plex (linux) Server 1.18.8.2527

1 Like
94

Unicorn Transcoder 2.4.0 / Load Balancer 2.4.2

Changelog

  • Fix major DASH issue (since an old ffmpeg update)
  • Update mkdirp dependency (Security)
  • Remove unused parameter in config.js
  • Update notes about Plex Relay
  • Support Plex 1.18.8.2527-740d4c206

Update notes

  • Shutdown your transcoder/load-balancer
  • Update 1.18.8.2527-740d4c206
  • Remove/Disable Plex Relay
  • Pull the Unicorn Transcoder 2.4.0 and the Unicorn Load Balancer 2.4.2
  • npm i
  • npm run install
  • restart

Note: In general we publish updates few days after and official plex release, all the minors versions aren’t released here, feel free to subscribe to our github to be informed of each update :wink:

95

Unicorn Transcoder 2.4.2

Changelog

  • Support Plex 1.18.9.2578-513b381af
  • We have a sexy logo now :smiling_face_with_three_hearts:

Update notes

  • Shutdown your transcoder/load-balancer
  • Update Plex to 1.18.9.2578-513b381af
  • Remove Plex Relay
  • Pull the 2.4.2 version
  • npm i
  • npm run install
  • restart
Transcoder Assistant Helper Service
96

@Maxou44 I’ve got a lot going on over here.
How can I help your team get GPU based hardware encoding working on this?

97

To support this feature we need time, we don’t use hardware transcoding on our side, it will be really complicated to support :thinking:

98

Does this plugin support quick sync transcoding, or is it strictly cpu power?

99

We don’t support hardware transcoding

100

Since you use ffmpeg to do the transcoding and ffmpeg supports hardware transcoding, why not just make that an option in your ffmpeg setup?

101

Because it’s not so easy :upside_down_face:
Plex generates ffmpeg arguments itself based on the current machine and current streams. If we want to support that, we need to recreate a “streaming brain” and generate ffmpeg args on our side

102

Ahh okay so you pass through the settings on raw to ffmpeg so the user can control their profiles - makes sense.

I do think a quality/profile converter that allows for injecting hardware transcoding should be on the roadmap for you guys :slight_smile:

Or someone get Plex to add an “advanced” option to force hardware transcoding on the server regardless if hardware has been detected - that way you don’t need to reinvent the wheel :slight_smile: In fact they should make an option to enable 3rd party transcoding and make “always hardware encoding” an option you just enable for 3rd party transcoders. Now you have better integration and you can support hardware transcoding.

Imagine the amount of low power plex server options this enables - by having remote transcoding hardware you could run the server of a tiny thing like a Raspberry Pi and have your gaming rig do the transcoding - I could imagine that would increase the Plex installbase considerably :slight_smile:

Even a low power NAS could be a proper Plex server setup this way.

103

There is a lot of rules for hardware transcoding, we can’t always force it. Some graphic cards have a limited transcoding capacity and all servers don’t have the same hardware.
The best way is to create a “streaming brain”, I am working on it for a side project, I hope one day, we will be able to plug it on Plex :relaxed: