*REQUEST* Permanent transcode file

It's no secret that transcoding taxes the CPU in a big way. This has numerous drawbacks, such as limiting the amount of simultaneous streams, and sacrificing picture quality for performance.

The feature i'm asking for the ability to "have our cake and eat it". it would be awesome to have the choice of having permanent alternate files for certain clients. That way the server wouldn't have to star transcoding every time you try playing from a mobile device or a Roku box, or other clients for that matter. this has also the added benefit of being able to lower the bit rate and have a much better looking file than an even higher bitrate real-time encode.

For this to be practical, it should be user configurable (and obviously optional), by letting us choose the directory we want the alternate files stored on (so it plays nice with third party programs such as sickbeard, etc) and also letting us choose the bitrate and encoding quality. 

I think this would be an amazing feature for people that want to keep their source files for some clients, but would like to be able to stream on other devices with out taxing the CPU a lot every time they use it on those clients.

Some users might even want their source files deleted after the conversion, if all they care about is certain clients and bitrates. or don't mind losing their source files in the name of space.

 

 

So think about it please. I think this would be an amazing feature for people that would like to either:

-Keep their original files, but don't want to tax the CPU when their roku/mobile clients use plex.

-People that want their transcodes to look better.

- And even people that want to keep their libary size in check for various reasons such as specific bitrates or simply because they want their libary converted to save space.

-It would make "sync" a much faster process too!

 

There's plenty of benefits for this feature and since it would be user configurable it would fit pretty much everyone's needs.

 

Anyway, thanks for reading this!

convert all your source material over to h264/AC3/mkv.. just about every player can handle it.

convert all your source material over to h264/AC3/mkv.. just about every player can handle it.

I realize that. But it wouldn't be automated, and it wouldn't give me nearly as much flexibility. And having Plex doing it would be the best way to do it, because:

-Plex already knows about my whole library.

-Plex is already doing transcoding in the first place.

-Plex already differentiates between clients, so for clients wanting to keep two versions, such as say origrinal and roku/ipad, etc. (or even more if they have different bitrate needs) it would be the best way to go about it, since that way it would be transparent to the user.

-It would be automated. This would be better than using something like handbrake, because if you did it that way it would turn out to be a long tedious affair, instead of having it be automated and seamless.

+1

+1

I like this idea but I'd like to change it a little bit.

Not all the shows/movies I watch will ever get watched on a mobile client. How about once a file is transcoded then keep that file and move it to an alternate directory so it can be used it.

One time transcoding on demand and then future plays of that same version will already be transcoded.

Josh

I realize that. But it wouldn't be automated, and it wouldn't give me nearly as much flexibility. And having Plex doing it would be the best way to do it, because:

[...]

-It would be automated. This would be better than using something like handbrake, because if you did it that way it would turn out to be a long tedious affair, instead of having it be automated and seamless.

StaxRip with Blu-Ray profile and Batch processing mode..

To be honest it works well for me. I download a lot of collections, like BSG, in the older Xvid/MP3/AVI format & convert them to h264/ac3/mkv before saving it to a data-dvd. Works alright for me.

The problem with transcoding the file & then keeping it, inflates the size of the library by a lot.

The problem with transcoding the file & then keeping it, inflates the size of the library by a lot.

How is it a problem if it's optional? some people (like me) have no storage issues. And for those that would rather keep the lower quality file, they would simply need to check the option that would say "delete source after conversion is done".

A feature which i mentioned in my original post.

+1

I like this idea but I'd like to change it a little bit.

Not all the shows/movies I watch will ever get watched on a mobile client. How about once a file is transcoded then keep that file and move it to an alternate directory so it can be used it.

One time transcoding on demand and then future plays of that same version will already be transcoded.

Josh

Yes, i did think about such an option myself. Since some users would have a HUGE library and converting the whole library would take a very long time. So I guess there could be triggers for files that aren't used so often. such as maybe add an option to not transcode older content unless it's requested by a client first. (recently added content would be transcoded as soon as it's added to the library, kind of the same way it is for indexing right now)
 

I really like this idea, it totally rejoins my own feature request here: 

http://forums.plexapp.com/index.php/topic/71519-plexweb-add-on-the-fly-stream-quality-control-button-to-player-interface/

+1

Early 2021 clean-up: implemented (optimized versions)