Hevc encoding is working with this beta version ?
Doesn’t seem. I still have hevc to h264
Running kernel 6.8, latest plex beta, and alderlake
It is not yet out, AFAIK.
I upgraded to 1.40.3.8555-fef15d30c on my Linux/Proxmox server under a LXC, using the 6.5 kernel.
It still works to play back video to the iOS app, or on my Mac with Chrome or Safari when transcoding isn’t required, but if I enable transcoding, it doesn’t work in Safari (though it does in Chrome or the iOS app).
On Safari, I receive this error message:
Error code: s3016 (Media)
Hi ChuckPa,
Is HEVC HW transcoding only going to be a Linux thing or will be also be for Windows as well?
HEVC encoding, for those CPUs / GPUs which support it, AFAIK, will be for all platforms.
I don’t know if it’s fair to expect it from a Nvidia Shield server though. That’s really pushing the Tegra chip hard. (Remember, that’s a player, not a server box)
The Intel workstation CPUs (e.g. -7xxx and above) are capable.
The J and N series CPUs (BXTs) aren’t with the IMD / VAAPI but might with QSV API.
Frankly, it’s a huge MESS (can anyone say “Cluster…” ? 
)
There is VAAPI and, separately, QSV. The two have gotten blurred together since 2017 but they are distinct. That’s what we’re working on now; going through what we have, should have, and need to add for HEVC.
With the base updated and status known, we can move forward (long overdue).
3 Likes
Thanks ChuckPa. This is excellent news!! I’m personally looking forward to better utilization of my limited upload bandwidth using my i7-7600. Hopefully capping users at 4 Mbps streams will result in some 1080p videos or at the very least some excellent quality 720p. Plus, my one 2 Mbps user might see some 720p finally.
Sorry it’s all causing you a bit of a headache to develop. Thanks for the hard work!
i7-7600U ? Industrial ?
I have the workstation i7-7700 in my QNAP and i7-8809g in my NUC.
While I’ve largely transitioned to DirectPlay/DirectStream (audio convert only) because I finally got decent internet speds, HEVC will be great to have.
To manage expections (not that you guys would EVER jump ahead… ),
the following make sense:
- HEVC HDR input → HEVC HDR output
- H264 input → HEVC SDR output
Dolby encoding is not be something I’d talk about. That’s a level of licensing which would blow the lid off PlexPass pricing and won’t be applicable to everyone. ( Don’t think you want to buy a professional dolby license, or do you? lol)
2 Likes
From some casual research I’ve done, hevc encoding quality has improved significantly from older generation intel chips to the newer generations - with apparently the 12th generation and newer having excellent results.
I don’t know quite what is reasonable to expect on the 7th generation, but of course it’s great to have the ability to try - and if you want to already start experimenting, you can use Jellyfin to do so.
With that said, I’ve done some experimentation on an i9-14900k with jellyfin, and hevc encoding is honestly shockingly good… and I’m very much looking forward to having it on Plex, so I can have the best of both worlds - Plex’s significantly better UI, with hevc encoding.
1 Like
I have only ever used software HEVC encoding when using handbrake so this will be interesting to see how it plays out using the iGPU and GPUs. I assume it also depends on a lot of of factors in terms of settings used by Plex for the HEVC transcodes.
You got everybody excited both here and on Reddit, lol. Any timeframe? Or maybe can you tell us how long you guys have been working on the HEVC encoding feature?
Wouldn’t be terrible if it can be a standalone one-time per server fee. Similar to how Dolby Access is for audio on Windows. and some headsets have the license embedded in the firmware.
I’d be down for like a $25-50 one time Dolby license fee.
1 Like
Oh whoops! I meant i5-7600.
As for expectations, I’m not expecting anything amazing except higher quality video on smaller streams.
One question:
Is there any plans to offer 5 Mbps or 6 Mbps transcoding? It’s a pretty big jump from 4 to 8 Mbps when trying to balance limiting user bandwidth with quality. I tend to also find most of my HEVC encoded files direct play around the 5-6 range and it would be nice if they fit into the set limit without having to bump up to 8 Mbps.
Good point to raise.
To me (Chuck speaking here – not Plex) 
- Update the presets to something more current with today’s tech & bitrates
- Allow a ‘Custom’ field
– User selects desired resolution
– User enters desired max bitrate
1 Like
That would be nice but we’re not so lucky.
Dolby offers several different licenses for Dolby Vision, including:
* Dolby Vision mastering and playback perpetual license: Costs $1,000 and can be used on multiple machines in a facility
* Dolby Vision eCMU license: Costs $500 and is non-refundable, but includes three years of free access to future updates. This license is specific to one machine and cannot be shared. To purchase an eCMU license, you'll need a system-specific Host ID and to ensure your mastering or color correction system supports Dolby Vision content creation and the eCMU. You may also need to plan for a review process that could take up to seven business days
* Dolby Vision annual license: Costs $2,500 and allows content creators to manually adjust video by activating trims
This is commercial stuff – and Plex isn’t “commercial user” stuff 
Audio is not in the same class as Video.
Plex already includes the Dolby audio decode license (the EAE you see)
1 Like
I have two questions:
- Can Plex automatically detect the client’s hardware information to switch between H.264 and H.265 encoding? If so, can this feature also be applied to automatic quality adjustment?
- Does support for HEVC transcoding mean that I can perform real-time transcoding of 4K HEVC 10-bit HDR videos on my N100 (running Windows), possibly with tone mapping as well?
I cannot speak to windows. What little I know of windows is that all hardware transcoding is controlled by Windows. I seem to remember (apologies if wrong) DirectX layer.
In Linux, we have direct access to the hardware via the Intel Media Driver and the Linux kernel driver(s) for that CPU.
Q1: PMS does detect hardware on Linux. PMS does know what that hardware is capable of and adjusts (downward) if it needs to for each transcode.
Q2: To answer what the N100 is capable of depends on its classication.
Is it a Boxton (BXT) or something better ? I seem to remember AlderLake-N series .
Lastly, refer to the Intel-provided capability matrix (column major)
For Windows, see [Plex Media Server] Forum Preview for Tonemapping on Windows with Intel iGPUs .
The preview supports hardware accelerated tone mapping when running PMS on Windows based systems.
The encode is still to H.264 8-bit.
Note that Alder Lake N CPUs, such as the N100, are awaiting an Intel driver update (see first post).
Plex is looking for volunteers to test the new drivers: [Plex Media Server] Forum Preview for Tonemapping on Windows with Intel iGPUs - #181 by chris_decker08
ALL:
There is a lot of excitement in the air about this … for good reason.
Please just be patient with us as we work through it.
To quote my teammate, who is transcoder lead engineer,
Ref: Reddit post
I am going to jump in here to manage some expectations. This feature is still in active development and we do not yet have an estimated window for release. PMS was originally designed to only transcode to h.264 and instead of shoehorning in HEVC I am refactoring the code to properly support multiple target codecs, this mean that it will be MUCH easier to add AV1 support but is more work in the short term. HEVC support will be hardware only (thus require a plex pass), this is for 2 reasons 1) HEVC encoding is much more CPU intensive and most servers would struggle and 2) We would need to license libx265 for software encoding and would prefer not to have to pass the cost onto users. Also, to begin with PMS instances hosted on the shield will not have the capability to transcode to HEVC as we need to we need to coordinate with NVIDIA to add support.
As long as both your GPU and client support HEVC plex will prefer this codec over the current h.264 when enabled. On the plus side this should eliminate the need to preform tone mapping in many cases.
7 Likes
i think a lot of people are running beelink s12 pro for plex which has an alderlake n100 in it. I believe that means it is capable according to that github link but i could be reading something incorrectly.
I’ll wait to update PMS until it settles out. I’m on 22.04.4 lts. Just been following this thread for the past few months! didn’t realize we were this close. thanks for all the work and updates.
We have one other important task to complete (still baking in the oven) before going full bore on the HEVC thing. This is a major step for getting the PMS architecture to be more flexible & adaptive.
