Sorry it took awhile to reply, the system blocked me as I had replied too much as a new user I guess.
I know you have nothing to do with Plex’s build on NVIDIA, but since you’re such a whiz, you don’t have any insight into repairs of plex (player I think is the issue) on NVIDIA Shield pro do you? That’s our main plex server and player and it has been super glitchy and crashing and stutters ever since their OS 9 which I believe loaded Android 11. Again, no expectation for you to know a single thing about this, just curious.
I have a NAS and prefer to use that CPU because the data is right there and runs at SATA speeds. Running the Shield server will be either USB3 or Network and both of those will be sluggish by comparison. If you don’t need it fast, you have the shield server and USB drive(s) at your disposal or over the network to a NAS.
As for the player, make certain Experience is fully updated (the OS). Plex plays without issue. I hit it with 4K HEVC HDR 59.94 FPS Gemini Man (180 Mbps spikes) and it doesn’t flinch.
I’m not sure which NAS you are using. I’m using the DS1618+ and while I do have it setup as a plex server it’s noticeably slower than the shield and some 4k content it can’t handle. The Shield had always run flawlessly until recently. I tried the plex player on the LG OLED w/ the Shield as the server and everything is snappy and great so I’m sure it’s a player issue on the shield and not the server. I tried uninstalling and re-installing of course but didn’t help. Thinking it’s an android os or plex player issue on that.
I can run 4K files with Atmos that at 60gb+ per file and the Shield used to run it perfectly and was very quick. This is still the case w/ the Shield as the server and using another player. The data file is on the NAS so all of that data can come in at gigabit speeds (it’s hardwired) and the shields GPU and cpu make better work out of it. I can transcode say from 4k down to 480p to watch content on my phone while traveling and the shield can handle it while the NAS can’t even play the same 4k file in original format. Their DS1621XS+ has the XEON but they just don’t put GPU’s in them which if I’m not mistaken is pretty helpful for plex (not the transcoding part). I hope they drop new models soon and maybe I’ll upgrade.
thanks for all your help over the last 24 hours and your responsiveness. Much appreciated.
I have Plex app version 9.1.0.32210 (Shield Pro 2019)
With:
Home Streaming - Maximum/Original
Subtitles - Automatic
HDMI - Passthrough
It will DirectPlay from every NAS in my office (including the tiny ARMv8 ones with no acceleration) .
The only “requirement” is the NAS and network be able to deliver 20+ MB/sec to the Shield. (200 Mbps == 150 Mbps for worst case video + 25 Mbps for insane audio + 25 Mbps for worst-case latency / collisions over WiFi)
I think this is the appropriate thread for this query, if not apologies. Plex cannot see any photos since I enabled and started using Synology Photos…? Plex cannot eve see the folder anymore
Synology Photos always takes control of the predefined photos shared folder.
Check the access in Control Panel - Shared Folder
If the permissions still exist then there is nothing you can do except put your photos in a new shared folder (you create) and point both Plex and Synology at the new shared folder.
This has been a long standing conflict with how they write their applications
(Photo Station, Audio Station, and Video Station)
Yeah after reloading the shield it’s good to go. I hope Synology releases some units with hardware transcoding soon. would be nice to be able to downsample those for remote viewing.
There are many reasons, as a developer, why I don’t like DSM 7.
Personally, this is another reason for me not to like it . It’s a huge step toward a closed architecture.
right, got it to work. Synology disable the permissions for the “Home” that is needed for Photos, and presumably their other apps, they can be turned back on again, even though the permission is greyed out
Plex always needs permission to see your files. It has no administrative privileges as of version 1.15.4.994
DSM 7 changed the username and how it’s defined
– PlexMediaServer is now the “System Internal User” username. This is a “Service” account name. It’s not a Login-capable user.
– Username “Plex” was abandoned in DSM 7 due to how Synology packaging changed.
All the changes are documented here:
Because the entire packaging system changed, we had to rewrite the entire Synology package installer and control mechanisms from scratch.
In doing so, we added the packaging menus (as you install) with reporting windows giving you the results upon completion of the installation.
If you look at that final popup, it tells you exactly how to grant permission for System Internal User PlexMediaServer to read your media again in DSM 7.
Since it appears you missed it, I’ve placed the procedure (with screenshots) here:
Hi Chuck, I wanted to make you aware of an issue that effected me when upgrading my Synology DS3617xs Plex media Server from DSM 6 to DSM7. I followed the instructions you posted to prepare the DSM 6 for upgrade, upgrade to DSM 7 and attempts to migrate my Plex installation. Upon the first attempt I did not get any error about permissions during the install. I just received a message that installation was successful. Upon further investigation the installer is not attempting to upgrade/migrate my installation (no migration message is present in the “success” dialog). For some reason the installer is installing a fresh version of the server with no reference to the previous installation. I changed all permissions to FULL CONTROL on “Plex” and “PlexMediaServer” folders as described for the “Plex” and “PlexMediaServer” users and still no success (I uninstalled Plex and reinstalled several times). After much troubleshooting I realized that I am having issues with access to the “Plex” folder that are abnormal. For security reasons I have deactivated the “admin” account and added another user with admin privileges. However, while DSM sees that account as administrator, I was having issues copying the contents of the “Plex” folder (for backup if I needed to try more extensive diagnostics/attempts to migrate) I found I was not able to initiate a copy through the web GUI. I then set permissions on the “Plex” folder for my other user with admin privileges to Full Control and was successful copying the Plex folder. I then attempted another install/migration of Plex. This time the installer took several minutes to install (before it was done in less than 10 seconds). Upon completion I received the success dialog with a DSM 6 → DSM 7 migration notification. Also, the migration.log file was present in “Plex” folder with no other files/folders. After a NAS restart and a little “troubleshooting” the connection. I am up and running under DSM 7 with a migrated Plex media server. It appears that by adding specific permissions to the “Plex” folder for my current admin account was the key to getting it to work. I don’t know if you are aware of this issue, but it might be worth mentioning in the instructions that if using a non-standard “admin” account that permissions to the “Plex” folder should be added.
On DSM 7, I don’t actually do the installing like we did on DSM 6.
DSM 6 installer –
Ran as ‘root’
Had full access to the entire NAS
Created or modified what it needed to install PMS (including “Plex” share & User “Plex”.
Let DSM 6 place the package binaries & control scripts in their @appstore location.
While Plex ran as a non-privileged user , it had root access to install & setup.
DSM 7 installer -
DSM 7 Package Center
Reads request for user PlexMediaServer and creates if needed
Reads request for shared folder PlexMediaServer and creates if needed.
Reads request and grants access to transcoding hardware if present.
Launches my installation menu to gather & confirm final configuration info from the user
Launches my scripting as non-privileged user PlexMediaServer.
This is where “migration” occurs.
There are a couple requirements here:
The Plex shared folder must be readable (Full Control) for System Internal User (not Local User) PlexMediaServer.
The Plex shared folder must contain a valid PMS installation Library/Application Support/Plex Media Server (these folders must exist and be readable)
Shared folder PlexMediaServer MUST BE EMPTY. The installer will not overwrite a PlexMediaServer/AppData/Plex Media Server structure.
– Uninstall w/ ERASE option clears that folder for you as it uninstalls.
DSM 7 took away so much from us. Synology decided, for whatever reason, to reign-in on applications having administrative / root privilege at the Linux level.
In the end, the DSM 7 package is totally dependent on the user granting all the shared folder permissions correctly.
There’s unfortunately nothing I can do about that but help educate.
I’ve placed as many error checks in the scripting as I can but if it can’t find (see) an existing installation, it has no choice but to consider this a “Fresh Installation” and proceed as such.
When I download Plex from plex.tv and install it manually, I have issues connecting securely to Plex.
On TrueNas this is caused by missing rights of Plex to configure the Cert and can be fixed with a setting. Such setting doesn’t seem to exist in DSM.
When I use the Plex from the beta section of Package Center it works fine, i.e. secure connections are possible but bugs me about upgrading, which needs to be manually.
As soon as I upgrade manually with the downloaded package, it turns to the same state “cannot establish a secure connection” as directly installing the package from Plex.
What am I missing? Do I need to regrant access to sth?
Certificates on TrueNAS are different because you’re using both TrueNAS and a container.
On DSM, you’re using the native package.
What you’re describing sounds like you don’t have the native production package (from plex.tv/downloads) claimed properly to your account.
You must be careful with the old beta package (from Package Center) and the production package.
The beta package (Package Center) version 1.21.0.3744 was created for DSM 7 BETA and the PMS internal & metadata storage locations are different from what is now production.
The two are not interchangeable . Once you’ve installed 1.22.4.4793 or higher, you cannot go back to Package Center (but that’s not a bad thing… The old package isn’t fully compatible with DSM 7 final release anyway)
Looking at your account shows me you have 3 servers with the same name.
I see the Package Center version (two instances) and the 1.27.0 PMS (one instance)
Are you attempting to connect to PMS on the Syno using any of the following ?
Indeed, I did a quick cleanup to remove the old instances.
HAH! I was clicking on the link in DMS which I was accessing via IP, so I ended up at an IP link (which could never work, no certs for IPs)
I have rebooted my Synology and now, all of a sudden the new server is green in the sidebar when accessing via app.plex.tv.
I could have sworn that didn’t work the first time. But, hey, not gonna complain. Thanks for all your insights, that has certainly helped me get on the righjt track!
