Upgrade to 1.15.2.793-782228f99 breaks plex -- Prevents from Starting

[HarryShowerdrain]

You sir, get one gold star!

That has worked. Thank you!

Is it possible to restore Preferences.xml now to pull my settings, or should I just manually put them back?

[CaptainKokanee]

Chuck, if you need a “broken” VM to work with, I can give you access to mine securely.
PM me and I’ll give you the details.

[ChuckPa]

@HarryShowerdrain

Notice how I had you rename Library -> Library.keep?

This kept everything you had saved .

With a working example in hand, let’s swap them and compare:

1. Stop Plex
2. Rename Library -> Library.new
3. Rename Library.keep -> Library
4. Now start it.

Should this fail, let’s do it incrementally.

1. Flip them back to the working state: (Library -> Library.keep, Library.new -> Library)
2. Drill into Library -> “Plex Media Server”
3. Rename Preferences.xml -> Preferences.xml.orig
4. Copy Library.keep/Application Support/Plex Media Server/Preferences.xml to Library/Application Support/Plex Media Server/Preferences.xml
5. Doublecheck the ownership (plex:plex is needed)
6. Start it up again.
7. If it works, there is a corruption in your database
8. if it fails, your Preferences file has something so illegal in it / corrupted, Plex can’t start. (PM me both files please.

[cyrax137]

Renaming /var/lib/plexmediaserver/Library to Library.keep along with renaming the preferences.xml helped me get running again (Ubuntu 18.04). Unfortunately, trying to restore any of my content did not work as I believe my old Library and Preferences.xml were both corrupt after the attempted upgrade. I have now rolled back to the previous PMS version and have rebuilt my library and preferences from scratch.

Thank you for the help @ChuckPa!

[ChuckPa]

If you have rebuilt, please remember to delete the keep directory as it’s occupying space in the root partition.

[MeatWheels]

For Windows users, this worked for me:

1. Uninstall Plex
2. Download and Install a previous version.
3. Reboot
4. Open plex on reboot in web browser. Make sure to click “Skip the new update”…

I was having the same issue of Plex server not starting and in turn wouldn’t load in my web browser. I rolled back to version ‘Server-1.14.1.5488’ and all is well now… I think I’ll skip the next few versions as well

[ChuckPa]

Please keep Windows-related posts where they will do the most good in server-windows tagged threads. Windows and Linux are entirely different in storage implementation

[HarryShowerdrain]

@ChuckPa In my case, I read the first post before the part about renaming the Library, so I have everything as it was, except Preferences.xml. That worked, which I assume means it was something corrupt in Preferences.xml. I’ve wanted to re-do my settings for a long time anyway, so this is a bonus.

I have the broken Preferences.xml(.old) is there anything in it I need to take out before I upload it here?

[ChuckPa]

Harry, i
If you wish, I will open a PM with you. I offer to go through your Preferences.xml and help you with it.

Please advise.

[hakdig]

For my experience, i have a problem on a docker PMS with plexpass after an update to the last version of plex.

My error was an SQLITE3 request, and my webui show a 503 server error.

I have resolve my problem with these steps : https://support.plex.tv/articles/201100678-repair-a-corrupt-database/

Don’t forget to do a backup of your DB and stop your docker plex container.

[ChuckPa]

Please keep docker within docker tags?

This is about the native Plex server.

[HarryShowerdrain]

Yeah, that sounds good to me. Thank you

[Jagaines]

Can roll back on a Mac… Please help.

[ChuckPa]

Not a Mac guy (in the Linux threads here).

Uninstall the package / reinstall the package. AFAIK, ~/Library will remain for you.

[Jagaines]

Thank’s I just found the thread for Mac Rollback

[mlocher75]

@ChuckPa

look in /var/lib/plexmediaserver/Library/Application Support

If those files are your username and group, then you need a customization override

1. Look at the file for anything which looks unique to you.
2. Delete /etc/systemd/system/plexmediaserver.service.
3. Create the new override in /etc/systemd/system/plexmediaserver.service.d/override.conf

It looks like this:

# Change Plex default variables
[Service]

User=YourUsernameHere
Group=YourGroupHere
#
# put other changed **Variables**here  (UMask, TMPDIR, etc)
#

4. Save the file (will be owned by root)
5. systemctl daemon-reload
6. systemctl restart plexmediaserver

@ChuckPa
Thanks man! You really are a plex hero!
Your instructions worked perfectly also for me.
Plex should have warned the linux users about this customization issue before rolling out the update!

Again thanks and best regards!

EDIT: One additional question: Would it also work to chown all files in /var/lib/plexmediaserver/Library/Application Support to root:root in order to revert back the customization to normal state?

[ChuckPa]

Changing them to root:root denies user plex:plex access to them.
Remember, Linux is extremely strict on permissions. It will not let one user see another’s files without permission. Root is the “Super User” and has special privileges above all. Running PMS on a system with “root” privilege is dangerous for your media (accidental deletions are common) and why I don’t use ‘root:root’ by default.

[apogeefreak]

Awesome! Where can we find the previous versions?

[ChuckPa]

Your only choices are Public and Plex Pass.

I always suggest everyone keep at least one or two older versions handy (one they feel is the most stable for their use case as a fallback )