Some Videos Now Not Playing on AppleTV, iOS (Have Before, Though)

General Discussions
1

Hello!
I’m having a bit of an issue with some of my movies playing. Here’s some background info:
-I’ve been using Plex for over a year, and am pretty well versed with it.
-My PMS runs on a fairly top-of-the-line Windows 10 machine I’ve built.
-PMS version 1.2.0.2716
-My Internet speed is 250mb/s, and videos typically start instantly (after the initial request wakes the HDD they’re on)
-We watch our Plex videos primarily on 2 AppleTV’s (4th gen)

 So the issue I'm having is: my wife told me today that she was having problems playing a specific video on our bedroom AppleTV last night.  The file would not load at all.  This is a video we've had for many months, and as it's marked as watched, I believe we've watched it previously on our AppleTV.  After she told me about the issue, I tried it on our living room AppleTV, and it also wouldn't work.  I trotted into the office to my PC, and the file plays fine directly on the PC, and through the PMS web portal as well.  I tried it on my iOS app, and it would not play it.  The file is mp4, h.264, w/aac stereo, and should Direct Play through all these players.  Even if it did require transcoding, my machine regularly transcodes 3+ 1080p streams with no issue.  I tested several other videos, and while most play fine and instantly (including some with the same exact stats as the problem file), did find another with the same issue.  When the files do not work, the loading circle spins a few times, and then it takes me to the "replay" screen, as if I'd just finished the video, and may want to replay it.

 Attached is my log zip.  Here's what should be encompassed in the log:

I restarted PMS, played the OTHER video I found that was having issues (FotB part 1) in the web app-WORKED
I attempted to play FotB part 1 via iOS on my iPhone with the most up-to-date version-DID NOT WORK.
I attempted to play FotB part 1 via the bedroom AppleTV with the most up-to-date version-WORKED
Surprised that the video worked on the AppleTV, I attempted to play the original problem file (FotB part 2) on the same AppleTV-DID NOT WORK.
I believe there were a couple attempts after this for FotB part 2, probably on iOS and web app, but I’ve forgotten after typing all this out, haha.

So can anyone decode the log and tell me what issue is happening? I’ve got a rather extensive library of personal backups, and it’s frustrating me a bit to find out that some videos I’ve had for eons and have worked before, are now, for some reason, not working.

Thanks in advance for the assist!!

2

Does this file have a second audio track?
I have found some similar behavior.
If I try to play track 1 AAC and the 2nd track is AC3 it will play on iOS
But if I try to play track 1 AAC and the 2nd track is DTS it will NOT play on iOS.

Try to play the same file but chose the 2nd audio track and will play on iOS but transcode the audio track.

At last that is the way for me.

3

So it looks like being able to turn off universal transcoder on iOS has been removed.
So the best I could get on the previous tracks that wouldn’t play AAC direct play was to turn OFF Allow Direct Play on the iPhone and leave on Allow Direct Streaming and now the AAC track will play as directed “Direct Stream”.

Not Direct Play but better then turning on the DTS track and transcoding it to AAC.

Seems like something is broken.

4

Same issue here. Forcing the server to transcode fixed the issue for me.

5

How does this get reported? I would like to get direct play back.

6

Both the files mentioned in my post have 2 audio tracks: A stereo AAC set as default, and a DTS stream set as secondary.

I really hope they fix the issue here. I’m in the process of reprocessing all my DTS audio (which have been passedthrough via encode from the original source) to AC3, because most systems can’t tell a difference, but the extra 1GB HD space I save by going AC3 certainly DOES make a difference. So while eventually my files may not be impacted, it’s kind of a huge deal to not be able to direct play media, eh!

7

I am keeping my 2nd track dts for the moment. I don’t want to re-encode all my files. The space savings would be good.

8

Yeah it’s not going to be easy. I’m starting with the largest of my files, and re-encoding with AC3 and in many cases HEVC instead of h.264 (also passing through PGS subs instead of having external SRT). Taking 13GB movies down to 4GB is making a lot of difference with my library. It’s mostly because I know the wife isn’t down with the prospect of spending $400 for 2 new 6TB WD Red HDDs to expand storage (I have them in mirrored redundancy).

9

It would be really amazing if Plex could even just acknowledge this bug. I’ve emailed, I’ve attempted contact on social media, and have not once received a response.

ALL WE WANT IS TO KNOW THAT YOU’RE AWARE OF THIS AND WILL FIX IT EVENTUALLY, FFS!