2 720p MKV H264 sessions use about 60% of CPU, video transcode and audio direct stream.
Client is a Tivo PLEX client and a Mac with Chrome.
PlexPy tells me the CPU gets a consistent 2x transcoding while playing. When doing a ‘convert to mobile resolution’ conversion (a plexpass feature) I get about 5x or so speed.
…and while in playback, the device skipped, then paused for 1 minute or so, then the Plex client quit. Crap. I’m VERY disappointed in this PR4100 so far!
@dclive said:
…and while in playback, the device skipped, then paused for 1 minute or so, then the Plex client quit. Crap. I’m VERY disappointed in this PR4100 so far!
Not sounding too good at the moment, I have ordered one to test. Thanks for the info
@ChuckPa said:
I’m getting the WD Passport Pro to put in the car as my mobile media server. It supplies the media and hotspot, any laptop or phone does the serving
Hi ChuckPa,
Do you have an update on your WD Passport Pro for in car use? That’s exactly the scenario I want to use one for. The only things I have read in reviews is that the SoC within the device is not powerful enough to transcode on the fly. You therefore have to load the drive with media that is native to the devices you are streaming to e.g iPad, Android Tablet etc. I was going to build a Plex Server using a Banana Pi and a 1Tb SATA hard drive but this device seems ideal plus it also portable for taking on holiday. I want to use a pled server with two Nexus 7 Android tablets which will be the playback devices secured to the front headrests. I only need two simultaneous streams in the car but would also like to use a Firestick for connection to holiday apartment TVs
The only other concern I have read about on the Plex Reddit is that some users have found you require an internet connection to stream media?? This appears to relate to Plex Pass and Plex Home and authentication with Plex.tv. Unless I am misunderstanding the comments on this thread it kinda defeats the purpose of this portable device.
Fozzie
No I do not. It is sadly still back-ordered. It appears they can’t keep the thing in stock in the WD store.
I don’t know what the ‘issue’ is but somebody must be having a lot of fun with theirs 
I will let everyone know. Everything is ready for it… if it would only arrive.
@Fozzie Bear said:
@ChuckPa said:
I’m getting the WD Passport Pro to put in the car as my mobile media server. It supplies the media and hotspot, any laptop or phone does the serving
Hi ChuckPa,
Do you have an update on your WD Passport Pro for in car use? That’s exactly the scenario I want to use one for. The only things I have read in reviews is that the SoC within the device is not powerful enough to transcode on the fly. You therefore have to load the drive with media that is native to the devices you are streaming to e.g iPad, Android Tablet etc. I was going to build a Plex Server using a Banana Pi and a 1Tb SATA hard drive but this device seems ideal plus it also portable for taking on holiday. I want to use a pled server with two Nexus 7 Android tablets which will be the playback devices secured to the front headrests. I only need two simultaneous streams in the car but would also like to use a Firestick for connection to holiday apartment TVs
The only other concern I have read about on the Plex Reddit is that some users have found you require an internet connection to stream media?? This appears to relate to Plex Pass and Plex Home and authentication with Plex.tv. Unless I am misunderstanding the comments on this thread it kinda defeats the purpose of this portable device.
Fozzie
Hey Fozzy,
Just field tested the wireless pro and it worked like a dream after some initial set up in the house.i used an ipad to connect to the server. It seems to take a bit for the server to activate once you start the device but after that, it streams quickly and at high quality (i can’t tell on an ipad, but i was running a native 1080p video and it was crisp on the screen). I also tested to download feature in the app for a non-ipad compatible video and it was very, very fast. I had to use a third party client that would run the video, but this is a minor annoyance to me.
I think if people are using this device as a primary PMS, it would get very annoying, but as a secondary/travel PMS this device runs very well, has been reliable so far, and is easy to use. Plex was right up front in all their literature about the non-transcoding and it just makes sense. Given the use scenario of a trip, etc (and especially for a guy like me who travels 20+ hours in planes 3-4 times a year) I think that categorizing the media in Plex and then downloading in a third party client is an easy work-around to both be able to use any file and extend the Pro’s battery life.
As I said, for not being a primary PMS device, this is a great product. The ability to use PMS to easily see all my files is a major step up from my older generation WD wireless hard drive.
Now if only I could get an 6TB one of these puppies to carry more of my collection. Oh well, I am sure it will happen in a few years.
Some SSH work will map NFS shares, I believe (as others have succeeded here), but I still haven’t had any luck with mapping SAMBA shares. WD support said it may be possible via SSH but it is not supported by them.
If anyone else finds a way, I appreciate any tips! Unfortunately, my Linux skills are weak (but growing).
BTW, interested in how many of you got PlexPy installed & working. Did you guys access the logs from another device or install it on the NAS?
This is slightly off topic but is the only place where people are actually talking about the PMS I have which is the WD MyCloud Pro 2100. I’m trying to update Plex to a newer version that is available but am unable to do so. I read that you have to first stop Plex from running then update manually by selecting the updated file downloaded from Plex’s website.
My first issue is that I’m not seeing my version of MyCloud in the list when selecting Western Digital from the list of NAS options on Plex’s own site. I’m seeing options for DL2100 and EX2100 not PR2100 which is the model I have.
Thought maybe it wouldn’t make a difference and tried using the file from the DL2100 but I get a message saying “Update failed”.
If anyone has found a way to update the PMS on their MyCloud PR2100/4100 I would greatly appreciate it if you could share your steps.
@rovindrasingh@gmail.com
I have shared in a few other threads that the PR4100 client is not yet available and it’s perfectly ok to use of the current version (which is really 0.9.17). There is an issue with completing the migration of PMS 1.0 to the device. Since I’m not in that loop with the developers, I have no further details.
Everyone is sorry it’s not yet available. I know they’re doing their best to work out whatever it is. Please try to be patient while it’s being worked out. The actual changes from 0.9.17.x to 1.0.0 were not as significant as the changes from 0.9.16.6 to 0.9.17.0 were.
Mh… i got the PR4100 with 8 TB and i get constant stuttering when transcoding a 1080p file to 4mbit 720p. I guess i will have to return the unit. Does not seem to be defective but simply not powerful enough. The optimize feature gave me a maximum of 3x not 5x as other saw.
The 1080p file: 1080p Bitrate 9766 kbps VideoProfile high.
Not one single transcode possible on my side… i wonder what i am doing wrong. The picture quality is kind of bad too
Hi @André.Je
from my personal perspecitve, the PR4100 does not seem to have low power, it is an Intel Pentium N3170 Quad-Core with GPU onboard. What I can imagine - but too less knowledge to help: it can be related with a transcosing to the wrong codec. I have heard that Plex can be finetuned what codec shall be used for what device. No clue if this is a rumor or not. Maybe some experienced users here can help.
Mh interesting 
Where did you hear this? Do you have a pr2100/4100 yourself? Is your pic-quality when transcoding better? Do you experience any stutters or even the famous error message that the device is not powerful enough (which i get very often)?
Yes, i have PR4100 - I am WD employee in Munich office, Germany. During my tests, I have seen low picture quality on an older low-grade TV but not on two-years old TV. Even the quality on my Smartphone (Huawei with Android 4.2.2 and Plex App) and on iPad with Plex App is OK, nothing to claim.
Right now, I am not that familiar with the internal settings of Plex regarding the transcoding. But I have heard that Plex offers a bunch of trnascode streams to a device asking for this. And the device may pick the wrong stream with low quality instead of the best stream.
Therefore, hopefully some forum member can assist here - my knowlodge about these Plex internals is not good enough.
Ok sounds good. Do you have any direct contact to someone at Plex whom you might give a hint to look into this? I was aware of a decrease in picture quality when using a hardware transcoder but as you saw in my other posting it looks really fuzzy with lots of artifacts. I tested it on my nvidia shield running the latest plex app as well and noticed the same decrease in quality. Were you referring to Samsung TVs with built in Apps that gave you a better experience?
Sorry, right now I don’t have any direct contact but we might try to call @ChuckPa or @trumpy81 for assistance, if they want to join.
The nvidia shield should be able to directplay the content without any need of transcoding.
Yes, I used an old Panasonic TV - one of the first Smart TVs ever - with horrible picture quality.
Our two-year old Samsung UHD with the “Thrid-Party Plex App” can stream without issues; only “showstopper” at the moment, 4K movies can’t be streamed directplay, here I see lags and stuttering. But I am not sure if this is related to the thrid-party Plex app or the PMS. Sorry for off-topic, but this TV can stream 4K using Twonkyvision 7.2.9 with the built-in dlna player of the Samsung Smart Hub. Therefore, the TV is “not guilty”.
@André.Je said:
Mh… i got the PR4100 with 8 TB and i get constant stuttering when transcoding a 1080p file to 4mbit 720p. I guess i will have to return the unit. Does not seem to be defective but simply not powerful enough. The optimize feature gave me a maximum of 3x not 5x as other saw.The 1080p file: 1080p Bitrate 9766 kbps VideoProfile high.
Not one single transcode possible on my side… i wonder what i am doing wrong. The picture quality is kind of bad too
Before making the decision to return it, unless you simply wish to return it for other reasons, let’s look at the source video you are giving it and your settings. For example, if you have high bitrate source material (10+ Mbps) and wish to transcode it down to 1.5 MBps and convert 1080p to 720p/480p, this is a more demanding task. A 3:1 conversion rate is quite good given how intensive a task that is. You’re effectively throwing out 80% of the data and still asking it to keep watchable image quality.
That said, can you share with us the client playback settings, test conditions, and source material video & audio XML?
I will also state for clarification, the WD processor is not an Intel i7-6700K processor. This is a NAS-class processor we’re speaking of. Even the 6700K converting with HandBrake won’t give you ‘blistering’ performance.
Sure! Will do when i am at home later today
@ChuckPa @trumpy81 @JoergAndreas
I am running some tests right now to compare the hardware transcode of an nvidia shield vs the one on my pr4100.
Setting: Safari 9.1 on Mac OSX 10.11.4 used as the recipient playing the exact same file (sitting on the WD PR4100 and accessed via network from the shield server) via the exact same settings regarding the server , transcoder and the player.
I am aware of the fact that i don’t need to transcode locally but i want to show you the difference 
Please visit my Dropbox folder for a quick comparison. I wasn’t able to grab the exact same frame but i think it isn’t necessary to show the dramatic difference. The transcode from the shield show no difference to a software transcode (at least i can’t see one which makes me happy) whereas the transcode from the PR4100 looks like you were streaming from a cheap illegal website. Look at the flames. In addition you can see a refresh of the image every 2 seconds or so on WDs transcode… i guess this is after every GOP or at least after every P frame if i understood the video posted above correctly.
Link: Dropbox - File Deleted
That said i now know that hardware transcode is a real thing and at least working perfectly on the shield server. If this is just a software glitch (and not due to the fact that the wd pr4100 uses another hardware to transcode) than i will likely upgrade my pr4100 8TB to a 16TB model. If the “poor” image is due to hardware limitation than i will have to hope for a shield update that lets everyone store the metadata on adopted storage.
If you would like to have access to my PMS on both devices for testing purposes than please contact me
The My Cloud Pro devices use Intel QuickSync for hardware transcoding, which is intended for speed over quality. That’s why you’re noticing graphical artifacts, however I’m not familiar enough with the Shield’s Tegra X1 to be able to tell you why its hardware transcoding output is noticeably better.
Having tested a CPU transcode of a high bitrate 1080p Blu-ray down to 720p 4Mbps, there is a clear difference in quality to me. I realise that you are talking about two different hardware transcodes but the PR4100 720p transcode looks sub HD compared to the CPU transcode.
As you say the shield uses totally different hardware to decode as it has a 256-core Maxwell GPU, whereas as far as I know the PR4100 uses the Intel HD aspect of the N7310 processor.
The shield will be using Nvidia NVENC for the video encoding
Hopefully we see some pictures quality improvements going forward on the transcode side of things on the PR4100
Updated,
I enabled the PMS on the Nvidia Shield at 720p 4Mbps and it looked just like the CPU transcode to me, whereas the PR4100 looks like a webrip
