As an update, I’m on 5489 and just did a test and HW transcoding says it’s working however, it’s not for anything which has a high nitrate to start. Just tried a 4K file and the flag HW pops up but the file never starts playing, so unless the latest beta has fixed that, no, it still doesn’t work.
Works fine for me.
You need to remember to turn off tone mapping in the Transcoder advanced options to enable HW transcoding
On the latest Plex Media Server beta for the Nvidia Shield, still unable to transcode live TV from my HDHomerun Prime, using any client.
Tried Roku Ultra 2019 edition, iPhone SE 2020, and Amazon Fire 4k Stick
If the video has finished recording, it will transcode when played back, usually after failing on the first attempt. Direct play works perfectly when on the LAN for Live TV, but any transcoding of Live TV by the Nvidia Shield fails, on every attempt.
I reverted the Nvidia Shield to experience version 8.2.3, as the 9.x experience was too unstable to be useable.
@MovieFan.Plex - Thanks!
All our numerous TVs, except 2 sets, are now UHD and work fine without transcoding for 4K HDR videos.
So for the 2 remaining 1080P TV sets that both use Roku 3 clients, let us know when you get Tone Mapping working, so I can play 4K HDR videos again on those two TV sets.
Luckily these are in barely used areas (rooms), but I am more concerned about when we visit family members who do not have 4K sets…
By the way, when Tone Mapping is enabled, it only converts from HDR to SDR for devices that do not support HDR, right?
Meaning on my HDR10/10+ and Dolby Vision sets, even when Tone mapping is on, Plex plays 4K HDR videos in HDR, not 4K SDR?
Does HW transcoding work again without problems with the latest PMS version 1.27.0.5897 on Nvidia Experience 8.2.3? There is nothing more in the official release notes, only in the penultimate beta version something was mentioned.
Doesnt for me, 8.2.3 with the latest 1.27.0.5897. As soon as I enable hw transcoding, external users come back and complain it hangs at the dreaded 33%.
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With the last update HW transcoding works finally !
BUT, not with tone mapping where it indicates HW but hangs forever
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I confirm, it works finally! on 8.2.3, with latest PMS 1.27.0.5897 , HW transcoding works, you just have to disable HDR tone mapping in Transcoder settings on the server settings. Finally my SHIELD 2019 pro is alive after 6 months!!
Here I am transcoding from a 4K HDR10 file to 720p without issue, without freezes!!
Plus buffering ahead~ SWEET!
Setting disabled:
@anon18523487 , what was the error? Was there new code needed? Can you give us some insight into it? Also I would suggest to disable the Tone mapping feature, since I’ve read that the SHIELD can do tone mapping on its own. Maybe you can write this as a comment in the grey letters below the checkbox in above picture.
Despite all this, I must say if I try to stream on Android mobile I’m still having issues with buffering and speed while transcoding on my local Wifi network.
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Shield Server: 1.27.1.5916
Player: Samsung Tizen: 5.41.2
Shield version: 8.2.3
Since this problem has been reported I have used a backup Shield to test every now and then to see if the problem has been fixed. Current state is that remote access of LiveTV is still failing as it tries to hw transcode the tv channel. Recorded programs accessed remotely via direct play (no hardware transcode) works. By fail I mean I get the spinning dial indicating buffering, but then merely a blank/black picture. Server shows its actively recording/transcoding the Live channel. After about a minute or so the Samsung player reported an unexpected playback error has occurred.
I tried the trick of disabling HDR tone mapping but that didn’t make a difference. Is there still a problem with LiveTV? Remote access? Samsung player? My configuration (i.e. am I missing other settings needed to get this working)?
FYI … what is weird here is that I can remote stream LiveTV (same location as the remote Samsung TV) Only difference is the player and that the web interface uses a secure connection while the Samsung player uses an unsecured connection.
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That sound like an issue with the app. It should be using a secured connection. Turn on the option in the Samsung app to send logging data to your server, reproduce, then get me the server logs.
Wasn’t there a notice last fall that most Smart TVs would no longer work over secured connections – hence the recommendation to change the setting in the player to allow unsecured connections and in the server to only prefer but not require secure connections?
By the way, I do suspect you are right that it is a player issue or at least a combination of the player with the server. I have posted a similar query over on the Samsung Player side of this forum. One weird thing is my main server/nvidia shield that is still running 1.23.xxx plays LiveTV channels just fine on this remote tv – its only been broken in servers later than this (and still is to today) as verified on this backup Shield.
Logs attached: Samsung Player “Log to server” enabled with logging level debug. Attempt to play a LiveTV channel started around 12:07pm.
That’s only the very old Smart TV app that is no longer supported. i.e versions 3.X. The newest app v 5.X works fine with secured connections.
If you turned off the secure connection option, then yes it will connect insecurely.
This shows PMS is transcoding using hardware and the client indicated it played the content. This is when you hit stop.
Jul 08, 2022 12:10:39.502 [8014] DEBUG - Client [do7tol260fnlu1ed02k2ihsu] reporting timeline state stopped, progress of 0/0ms for guid=, playbackTime=82638ms ratingKey=255 url=, key=/livetv/sessions/327d84d8-859c-4367-b9bf-2cba8c096737, containerKey=, metadataId=255, source=
It shows playback of 82.6 seconds. If this appears to you that it didn’t work, then there is something wrong on the client end. Unfortunately, the logging doesn’t show any problems.
Weird, as I didn’t hit Stop. After a while (82.6 seconds?) of just displaying a black screen the client put up an “Unexpected Playback error occurred” message and returning out of this appears to stop the playback. So its surprising that nothing is logged with the error message to provide more clues.
Any suggestions? Would turning on verbose logging vs debug logging provide more info? Something else?
I don’t believe I have turned off the secure connection option – as I believe I have only set the option to “preferred” vs “required”. I.e. the server/client are choosing an unsecured connection? Why would it choose an unsecured connection if it wasn’t needed?
So, I switched the setting back to never use Unsecured connections in this remote situation to see if it was impacting the issue and it is not. Current state is Nvidia Shield running 1.23.xxx on this remote 5.41.2 Samsung player plays both recorded and liveTV shows whether transcoded or not (though I have no guide as it seems it needs a newer server). The NVidia Shield running 1.27.1.5916 plays recorded tv shows streaming via direct play (no transcode) fine as well as transcoded recordings. However playing LiveTV continues to fail as before. Looking at the bandwidth meter in the console I see xfer for about 30 seconds and then the bandwidth flatlines . After about 86 seconds the player puts up the “Playback Error” message saying “An unexpected problem occurred”. So why is the server flatlining on sending data to the player after 30 seconds? Is a handshake or acknowledgement not happening? Is the error message around the 86 second mark (likely 60 seconds after the flatline) a timeout? Any options for digging deeper?
No. The issue and the error you see are on the client end, so it’s something with the TV app and not the Shield.
I don’t believe I have turned off the secure connection option – as I believe I have only set the option to “preferred” vs “required”.
That is on the server. There is a setting in the app too to allow insecure connections.
Seems to have been my fix, too.
In a few tests on my iOS device using cellular data (not local network), transcoding is working. Playback fills my phone with a green screen and plays the video in a tiny corner of that green screen. Forcing the resolution seems to resolve the issue.
Not sure all the bugs are worked out, but at least I’m getting something now.
I’ve just realized that Plex Media Server 1.30.0.6359 has disabled HW transcoding, again.
I’ve tested on an Old Fire TV Stick and Roku 3.
Prior to today it was working on the FireTV Stick and it wasn’t working (failing after getting stuck at 33% due to a issue with tone mapping 10 bit to 8 bit if I recall correctly)
@anon18523487 (Logs attached)
Plex Media Server.zip (318.8 KB)
Looks like it did try to use hardware transcoding but failed so it switched to cpu transcoding. I’ll need to check with the devs why it failed.
What firmware are you running on your Shield so I can check with the same?
Sorry for the late response. I only saw it now.
I’m running on the latest firmware released last week: 9.1.1 (33.2.0.157)
