Upgrade Thoughts - Client & AVR for 4k HDR

General Discussions
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Hello all, looking for some upgrade advice from the great minds here.

I’ve been using Plex many years now, hosting a small library of ~1000 movies and ~500 tv shows for close family members. All has been well. However, I’ve recently purchased my first 4k HDR TV and now the issues are coming up as I begin to start adding some 4k HDR content to my Plex library.

What I’m trying to solve for:

  • Avoid transcoding and/or having to mess around with re-encoding media for 4k HDR. I just want it to play! I was hoping to use the built-in Plex client on my new TV (Vizio E70-F3) for 4k HRD content, as my ATV and AVR are not 4k HDR compatible. This has proven to be an exhausting exercise, and I’m ready to give up. Vizio’s Plex client is horrible. I’ve spent countless hours playing with client and server settings, creating my own HTML TV App profiles and Handbraking a bunch of HEVC stuff. I cannot for the life of me get this to Direct Play… I’m having a bit of success with non-HDR 4k H264 content, but cannot get H265/HEVC with HDR to play. Netflix, Youtube and Amazon content is all fine using the built in TV apps. TV is hardwired and HDMI ARC to receiver.

What I’ve tried:

  • Creating HTML TV App profile that supports 4k. The one in my plex folder (that the TV is using) seems to lack support for pretty much all 4k. This allowed me to Direct Stream some H264 content.
  • All the settings in the Client (Direct Play/Stream settings, Max H264 level, AAC/EAAC, etc…)
  • Ensuring audio selection of AC3 5.1 on the title in plex web on the server. (titles have several audio streams, TV client doensn’t allow me to select one…)
  • Handbraking videos to remove all audio tracks but 5.1 (ARC) and convert from .mkv to .mp4

What I think I need:

  • A real streaming box, and to stop using the garbage Vizio app. Leaning towards the Nvidia Shield as a client only. Seems to be the best, but is there anything else I should consider? Anything it cannot do? Anything new expected soon? I’ve always been an Apple TV guy (3 in the house currently).
  • A new AVR. Currently have both an Onkyo TX-NR636 and Pioneer VSX-70. Both support 4k but I don’t “think” they support HDR? Any suggestions on something new? I’m happy to sell off some old hardware to help purchase some new hardware. Don’t need anything super fancy - main requirements are 4k HDR, able to deal with all the audio stream formats, and discrete inputs (I like using Harmony…)

My setup for context:

  • PMS runs on a Windows 10 box with an Intel Core i5-8600k Coffee Lake cpu with lots of storage drives. No dedicated GPU.
  • Network runs wired cat5e to needed components via an unmanaged switch in the basement. Routed by Orbi (wired backhaul).
  • Clients run the gamet… 3x Apple TV, 6+ iOS devices, Roku, few Windows laptops, MacBooks, and a couple TV apps.
  • 4k content is walled off in a separate library and shared users do not have access.

Appreciate the help and thoughts around this.

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I have a similar setup to what you’re trying to achieve.
The Shield as you suspect is probably the best bet. I’m happy enough with mine for sure.

As I have a new HDR capable TV I upgraded my AV receiver to one that also supported HDR. My current one is a Denon, however Onkyo, Yamaha and the others all do relatively inexpensive receivers with the adequate spec.

I added a pair of Atmos speakers to my existing 5.1 set up and so I’m all set now for 4K HDR with Atmos.
I will say that HDR is stunning, whereas Atmos is just nice (but thats probably just down to limitations of my speaker placement.)

I barely wanna leave the house nowadays.
:grinning:

With the rest of your setup it seems fine.
Pretty much how I have mine set out.
W10, isolated 4K content etc…
Receiver aside you seem pretty much well set up.
I’m at about 80TB used of 120TB on my Windows rig.
I have them pooled with Stablebit Drivepool, because I just don’t like raid.

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Agreed, the Shield TV is right now the only Set top with the power and the updates to be able to play pretty much anything. There are however a couple of Caveats.

With Plex I have no issues with my Wireless speed. Kodi however has issues keeping up with my UDH rips. Not all of them have this issue but enough where it makes Kodi a non starter. BluRay rips work just fine. So if you intend to use Kodi then you may want to make sure you are using Gigabit ethernet.

Playback of the VP9 codec is not supported on the Shield TV. Not sure why as it is constantly backed up as the most powerful hardware in a set top today. So the end result is that Youtube HDR isn’t supported on the Shield TV.

Recently the Hulu app started supporting 5.1 audio on the shield TV and it is one of a very small amount of devices that has that feature.

Amazon Primes supports 5.1 audio and 4K HDR, and considering that it is the year 2019 you would be surprised that it is still one of the only set tops not made by Amazon that does.

Lastly one of the most overlooked things is your HDMI cables. To support 4K with HDR (among other things introduced with ) you need cables that support 18 Gb also called (Category 2 cables) Your average HDMI cables are not going to cut it so you are going to want to head to Monoprice and get ones that fit your needs. I use the following

https://www.monoprice.com/product?c_id=102&cp_id=10240&cs_id=1024021&p_id=34201&seq=1&format=2
the thinner cable makes them a lot easier to dal with. Some 18Gb cables can be way thick. I also chose these because they support pretty much everything you might want to send across HDMI including YUV 4:4:4 Chroma Subsampling

which means that if the source video device can send ALL the color and luminance data and all of your equipment does, it will insure a better picture than without it. There are cables out there that WONT have this feature and that could keep you from getting the picture quality you want.

One last thing is the HDMI version on your TV and Receiver that you may end up getting. 2.0b is the latest that is avail on the streets but you will see talk of 2.1. That standard will not be usable for at least 2 years because to get the advantage of it you will have to replace EVERYTHING including the Shield TV and your brand new HDMI cables because it introduces yet again a large bandwidth requirement over 2.0a or 2.0b. So Don’t worry about it unless you want to wait and are rich.

Good luck. :grinning:

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Agreed, 4K and ATMOS/DTS-X are incremental steps. But the expanded color and contrast that HDR brings is way more important. Though 5.1 or better sound was always important to me. Then again I still remember when Terrestrial TV had just begun supporting stereo so there is that.

TimT

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+1 for nvidia shield + 4k/hdr/atmos compatible AVR

+1 for points regarding both proper hdmi cables, and for mentioning the hdmi mode. Some TV’s and AVR’s are set to hdmi 1.1 by default for compatibility purposes, and there may be a configuration setting available to force it to hdmi 2.x mode.

Unless I missed it, I did not see it mentioned that subtitles can often cause transcoding too, so ensure that they are disabled while testing.

you also want to make sure the plex client quality settings is set to maximum or original quality for both local and remote, at least until you can identify the source of the issue(s).

regarding troubleshooting your tv app;

I would suggest starting with a known good 4k/hdr demo file with a simple stereo audio stream. (ie not some ripped or downloaded full 4k/hdr movie, not something you converted yourself)

Google will provide you with any number of downloadable demo files.

I would recommend something mp4 with x265 main 4 and stereo audio.

If you cannot direct play a simple demo file on your smart tv, then you most likely have other issues going on.

All that said, if you really want troubleshooting help, start a new thread with the standard plex client, the demo file info, your server details and version info, and log files of trying to play that keeps transcoding.

you can monitor and download logs from your server @ https://app.plex.tv/desktop > settings > scroll down left side to console (real time log display) or troubleshooting (downloading of logs).

settings > general you should have debug log enabled and verbose logs DISabled, and allow tokens in logs disabled.

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Thanks for the advice guys, appreciated.

Thinking about pulling the trigger this afternoon on Nvidia Shield with Onkyo TX-NR676 receiver. Both are on sale. Seems like these fit specs and budget.

1 Like
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That looks like a good receiver. FYI I used to have an Onkyo last gen but chose to go with a Denon this Gen and have been very happy with it. You might want to see if the feature parity Denon looks good as well. But don’t forget the HDMI cables if you are still running non HDMI 2.0 18Gb versions.

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Thanks @ttringle , forgot to mention I also picked up those cables. Quick (dumb) question:

  • With this setup (Shield > 4kAVR > 4kTV), which device is or should be doing 4k up-scaling on non-4k content? Should I be allowing the Shield to do this, or the TV? Perhaps the AVR. Do I even have a choice with settings?
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Usually the TV does a better job, but my TV does not let me disable upscaling. So to make sure the TV is doing it I have Plex set to change the resolution automatically so if I send an SD Signal that is what the TV gets and so the TV is then responsible for upscaling that to 4K.

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