Running Plex server on a 5tb Seagate Cloud. Got a library of around 2500 movies and we’ve noticed that loading the artwork thumbnails is getting slower and slower. Got to the stage where it will load up about 2 pages/scrolls worth of thumbnails then will take around 3-5 seconds to load the next pages worth of thumbnails. This makes picking a movie to watch each evening a bit slow and cumbersome considering the moderate library size. This is across all 3 of our clients (Roku, 4K Sony Android TV and my 2015 MacBook Pro).
Firstly - as the topic asks - what handles the speed of the thumbnails loading? Is it the client or server?
Secondly, assuming the answer to question one is the latter - thinking of getting a QNAP TS-453A, upgraded to 16gb RAM. Is this considered a good NAS to get a snappier feel when using Plex? I need a new NAS for work storage regardless so am looking to make sure it serves both uses well.
I have the same issues. Not a huge deal really but would be really nice if they loaded super fast. IMO it’s a simple as upgrading to faster hardware, CPU firstly, then disk speed & network speed. I have an Intel i3 media server where even loading thumbs locally (no network) via local install of OpenPHT or PlexWeb is a little slow sometimes (talking ~2 sec but still…). Compare that with my new i7 quad core laptop running OpenPHT and/or PlexWeb connecting to same (remote) media server and it’s super super fast.
I’ve always wanted to understand if better caching algorithms can be used in the code for Plex Clients. And I don’t mean disk caching I mean memory caching - I always seem to have >60% of my memory free so why not have an configurable option in Plex to use that memory for super fast caching. Also maybe more intelligent read-ahead caching - ie don’t wait for the user to scroll down before loading the thumb, can it be “pre-loaded” before it’s actually needed on screen so it’s sat there ready.
How do the stock Android gallery type apps do this ? I’ve never seen even a milli-second delay when swiping through photos - they’re just there, instantly. Gotta be a better way Plex can handle thumbs more efficiently for a smoother user experience.
