Transcoding issues - DTS to AAC for new Samsung 2018 QLEDs

Plex Media Server NAS & Devices
1

Hi there,

I recently bought a new something 2018 TV set and unfortunately Samsung was stubborn enough to remove the DTS support entirely from their QLED series. Now I am facing serious buffering issues when transcoding DTS audio tracks on the fly to aac, even though my network is definitely fast enough and so is my NAS. The NAS is a QNAP TVS-EC1080+ with Xeon CPUs and 32GB Ram. Also there I see no issues. Are there any config tweaks that I could try to improve the situation with DTS or DTS-HD MA transcoding?

I don’t want to run my entire library through an audio converter. Also I tried to run Plex on Ubuntu through VCenter and natively on the NAS but the constant buffering remains.

Thanks,

Martin

2

Not sure but is it normal to receive no feedback at all after 9d with a plex pass subscription? :unamused: That is a very strange business practice…

Regards,

Martin

1 Like
3

Hi,
Did you get any update on this?
Just got a 2018 just to find the same Stutter / Buffer (Transcoding on i7 4790)

4

Nope - not a single response. Seems like you get the same treatment either if you are a paying customer or not. Unfortunately I am EU based so I can’t use Emby on Samsung to see if it it is Plex related. It can’t be my NAS since it is a high-end Xeon one with massive CPU Power and 32GB of Ram.

Regards,

Martin

5

Do you have any more details about the files that are triggering the buffering? Codec? File type? Resolution? When it happens does Plex report that it’s transcoding just the audio and direct streaming the video or is it transcoding both?

6

Having the same issue here… Plex on my 6 year old Samsung 8 series is better than my brand new 4K tv…

Tizen OS 4.0
Plex for Samsung 3.3.4

Latest tv firmware.

The movie I’m trying to play is only a 1080p dts 5.1 audio file that is 7 gigs with x264 encoding. Nothing fancy and it will not play back audio unless I turn off direct streaming or direct play. Even then it stutters and is nearly unwatchable…

What gives?

Plex Media Server version = Latest
Adding Detail: TV Model = QN65Q8FNB
Reciever = AVRX2400H (not that it matters too much)

Network is all brand new Ubiquity Gigabit fully managed ethernet.

Media Server is a Intel I7 with 32Gigs of ram and 20TB of storage.

All movies play just fine on any computer, mobile (iPhone, iPad).

I was looking at the beta that’s available and it seems nearly all are cosmetic fixes and nothing mentioned about fixes to playback, such as the one we are experiencing.

@Krazeh when I play back the movies with Direct Play or Direct Streaming turned on, the video plays fine but there is no audio.

If I turn both of these off, the audio returns but the video’s pause randomly and give the three dot loading screen then continues.

How is it that basic functionality is missing/broken from platform to platform… (Talking TV OS, old TV not being Tizien). From looking through the menu of this new Plex App for the Tizien TV’s it seems to be a very immature product missing quite a few features. Such as Fast Forward and Rewind… can only skip ahead or skip back…

Let me know if you need more info, such as File details and how I would provide more than I already did regarding Codec, etc.

How do we get actual Plex Support/Devs to take a look?

7

Any dev willing to help here? The situation is really annoying. I don’t want to add an Apple TV or Nvidia Shield to my 4K reference series TV just because of the DTS transcoding issues and incompetency of Samsung building proper TV sofware with all common codecs.

@Krazeh - it happens only when transcoding DTS streams but apparently that is done in a very inefficient and slow way. My NAS/media server is Xeon, later gen (2017) and connected with 10G, transcoder directory is on SSD disks. Definitely not a network or hardwarek issue but related to how Plex Server transcodes the audio.

It is a shame that nobody seems to care about issues of paying users.

Regards,

Martin

8

You should share your logs up. That’s the first thing you’ll be asked by anybody that can identify the issue.

9

I am having the same issue when playing DTS movies on my Chromecast (1st Gen).
Transcoder says video is DirectPlay, while the audio needs transcoding and makes the entire thing stutter and lag all over the place. Doesnt matter if the Plex Server is my lame NAS or my powerful Gaming PC, always a lot of lag.

Does Hardware transcoding help this at all? Really cannot find a solution to this problem anywhere.

10

I’m having the exact same issue on a 2018 Q6FN, transcoding DTS to AC3 on any client crashes.

Poor.

11

Confirming this issue on my Samsung. Everything plays well, except with DTS-recodes.
It stutters constantly even when all the hardware is only about 5% load.

Any support or news on this would indeed be very welcome…

I’m also on latest version PMS (64bit) running from DS918+ over gbit LAN to Samsung Q9F default client (also latest version).

UPDATE:
After some more testing, I do not seem to have the issue if the video is 24FPS instead of 23.976FPS and I do not have the issue at all streaming to my desktop.

UPDATE2:
Further testing indicates other audio formats that need transcoding create the same issue.
So it seems there is an issue when plex recodes audio for 23.976fps video.

1 Like
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