Why doesn’t SRT Subtitles work with Plex on the Ruko? They seem to be supported on every other device that Ruko supports.
SRT subtitles are supported on the Roku, and in the Plex channel. Can you provide more info, and possibly a sample of the media that isn’t working?
I’m using the standard app on a Roko Ultra. The backend is plexmediaserver-1.19.2.2737-b69929dab on Fedora. I’m muxing SRT subs with h.265 video in to a MKV container. I can get PGS, volsubs, and ASS to work just fine but the bitmap subs need to be re-encoded. I can pull SRT subs just fine with the Windows Plex app.
What else do you need?
As you noticed, PGS and vobsub will burn, as Roku cannot handle image based formated.
ASS subs will also burn, unless you have selected “Only Image” for the Burn Subtitles setting, so it’s possible these are also being burned in.
I’d check to verify the the Roku Captions mode is set to On, otherwise non-burned subtitles will not display. This is a Roku platform requirement, which we have to follow for non-burned subtitles.
We’ll need a sample of the media if setting Roku captions to On doesn’t fix it. It’s possible the Roku does not like the formatting of the SRT subtitle, and ignores it. Roku firmware can be picky about the the SRT format.
Well here is your problem with that. Turning on the Roko captions turns it on for everything, which is unacceptable. So if I’m watching something in Plex with forced subtitles, I want to see those subtitles, doesn’t mean I want to see the subtitles for every app on the Ruko.
I would be perfectly fine with burned subtitles coming across since the are processed on the back end and transcoded. The problem I’m seeing with this is the when it transcodes for the Ruko is down grades 4K to 1080p. It doesn’t do this when I’m feeding it to the native Plex app on my Samsung smart tv. It translates 4K h.265 to 4K h.264 on the Samsung.
I don’t mind back end transcoding, I just want to know how to enable 4K transcoding on the Ruko.
I agree that is not desirable, however this is a hard requirement for all Roku channels. The caption mode is global. If you change it in one channel, it changes the system preference. Quite some time ago we didn’t require the mode to be set. We simply used the subtitle choice and rendered it. However, our channel was blocked by Roku due to this, so we had support their requirement.
I would be perfectly fine with burned subtitles coming across since the are processed on the back end and transcoded. The problem I’m seeing with this is the when it transcodes for the Ruko is down grades 4K to 1080p. It doesn’t do this when I’m feeding it to the native Plex app on my Samsung smart tv. It translates 4K h.265 to 4K h.264 on the Samsung.
The Roku does not support converting 4k H265 content to 4k H264 right now. We will investigate this, but the current method to make this work, would be to enable global captions to let the video direct play, and disable captions when you don’t want to see them.
Yeah, I started this journey this morning thinking these where limits with Plex. But I’m finding out that these are hard limits set by the Ruko device. I am not happy. I’ll just have to replace the Ruko with something that makes me happy.
Understand. The requirement isn’t ideal. You can change the captions mode quickly from any channel by pressing the * button during playback (once the video starts).
Replaced the Ruko with a nividia shield. It works just like I want it too.
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Unfortunately - you now have to deal with the Shield’s UI.
A single press of the * key - anywhere - will flip the subs on or off.
Users were NOT thrilled with the change Roku made, but now, after dealing with it for a few years - it’s hardly noticeable. In fact, I have Plex turn the subs on always. I just flip 'em in or out with the * key.
If there’s a show-stopper in here anywhere - it would be when my eyeballs hit that Shield UI and I’d be back so fast it would make your head spin - about like mine does getting back from the FireTV app. I understand they are equally disappointing.
Times have changed. The Preplay screen is unchanged sadly. (Nothing other than that is even slightly different to the Roku other than performance.)
However player controls are now best in class. Subtitle/Audio switching is completely intuitive and seamless.
Even switching between various PGS casuses no more than a milisecond audio loss and no stoppage whatsoever in video playback on a 4K 80+ Mbps remux playing remotely.
Yep it’s poorer cousin (any AFTV device) still sucks. But beyond the fact that they’re both Android devices they can’t be mentioned in the same breath.
Sure, It’s all down to the hardware, or at least if it isn’t, and only UI/UX matters, then we would all be using the smart TV apps.
It’s been several days now and I actually do like the Shields UI as much as I did the Ruko. I keep my favorite apps along the favorites row. Plex, Netflix, Plex, and a few others. Honestly, I like the Shield better than the Ruko. I still have two Ruko’s on my HD TV’s and plan to keep them there but the Shield is on my 4K tv.
@ljunkie is this still a requirement even with the new version of Roku OS now supporting forced narrative subtitles? Seems like it should now be possible for subtitles to be displayed independent of the global Roku captioning setting, no?
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