Everything was fine last night, now today most of my videos won’t play on my Amazon firestick or my phone (android PMS app). But I can play anything I want on my laptop (using chrome) and on my Samsung TVs. Checked file permissions, we’re square there. Anyone else having this issue?
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Are you getting some sort of error message?
Error
Playback has stopped because the connection to the Plex Media Server has been lost. Please ensure the server is available and retry.
It appears to be happening on only a few files, but they were working yesterday.
Usually that means the network is slow or the server cannot transcode fast enough but could be other things. Have you tried rebooting the server/router etc.
I rebooted the server already. My network is not the issue, I assure you of that. And I don’t transcode anything really, my clients are set to direct stream/play. And it works on my laptop (in Chrome) and on my Samsung TV. The problem seems Android related, but I could be wrong.
Can you get the logs from one of them after playback fails https://support.plex.tv/articles/201573117-android-android-tv-fire-tv-logs/
This is the debugging log from my android phoneplex-log-maxroberts22.zip (295.4 KB)
still looking into it and am waiting on someone to ask about an error i have not seen before but i was curious if on your phone if you take it off wifi and use cellular does it work? ( the error is related to network but I’m not sure why it is failing yet)
Wow, yeah, that tells us something. Took it off wifi and the episode played fine. Back on wifi, it failed. I’m rebooting my network and apologizing for my previously overconfident remark
Okay, so this got weirder. The Plex app on my Fire tablet works. And that is on my Wi-Fi. When my phone is on the Wi-Fi, I can’t play certain episodes. But then I get off Wi-Fi and on the cellular network and it works just fine. I just got to work and connected to the Wi-Fi there. And I can play all the episodes. So at this point I have no idea what’s going on.
Are you using Android beta apps? I discovered a flaw in the recent beta which didn’t allow me to Direct Stream most of my .ts recordings. Switching to transcode solved the playback issue, which might be happening when you switch off your WiFi.
I link my thread for @BigWheel, maybe it helps drawing a conclusion. If this is something different, just ignore it:
I’m not kidding you when I say I have no idea what’s going on. The first odd thing is that it is only a select few videos that won’t work when I’m on my home wifi. I know the file permissions are correct b/c 1.) I can play the files (read) and 2.) I can delete the files (write). I even went so far as to re-download a copy of the one video file, thinking maybe it was corrupt (even though my wife had been watching it), and that didn’t work either. It really is just the one firestick and my cell phone that are having the issue. No issues rendering the video files on my Surface Pro using Chrome browser, no issues on my Samsung TVs, no issues on my fire tablet 8 HD.
I wonder how it could be localized to a cell phone and a firestick?
I grasping at straws to find a smoking gun here…
This?
Not that I can tell. The latest android version of the app is 7.27.1.15203, released Jan 30, 2020.
I looked all over Google Play, doesn’t look to me like I’m using beta apps.
True, it is the latest stable version.
Than your problem might have a different source than mine… Good luck with yours 
This seems to be an issue with secure connections. not sure what sorta router you have but can you check if it has DNS rebinding protection and if so try turning it off.
another thing to try. in the allow insecure connections setting in the app try changing it to “on the same network”
You may checked this already but check if there is a firmware update for your router.
Also could you be running into wireless channels overlapping with say your neighbours router?
I have a Unifi USG router, and I do not have DNS rebinding on. I do run through a PiHole for my DNS resolution, with the Pi running its own DNS server. I didn’t do it last night, but I’m going to suspend the PiHole for 15 minutes and see if the problem goes away.
But what is odd is that it’s only a particular set of videos/files that have the issue. How could that be? Any only over wifi? But okay over the cellular network? And only on my phone and the firestick?
I have turned on “allow insecure connections”, but not when I was home. I will test it when I get home.
Thanks for the ideas. I do not have a firmware update for my router, it’s good to go.
And my neighbor’s wifi doesn’t stand a chance against mine. I have 3 Unifi APs and have run a full RF Environment scan and tuned the APs for optimal performance.
I’m not sure how of the thread you’ve read, but my issue is really odd and very much lacking anything resembling a smoking gun. There is a finite list of videos on my PMS that I cannot play from my Android phone app and cannot play from Amazon firestick. But, if I take my phone off my wifi, and use the cellular date, then I can access those videos. Also, those videos are accessible from a laptop (using Chrome), my Fire Table 8 HD and from my Samsung TVs. It’s a really odd situation…
Very odd indeed. Have you tried forgetting the wireless connections on your devices, restarting and connecting afresh again?
