Why wont my movies play smooth

Plex Media Server Desktops & Laptops
1

Server Version#:1.13.9.5456
Player Version#:newest

I have a home server running my PMS. It has a Xeon E3-1245 v5 CPU running at 3.50 GHz (quad core, hyper threading), 32GB RAM, 600Mbps down and 20Mbps Up

I should have zero problem running @ 1080p. But my movies constantly buffer. Most of the time when i start to watch, right off the bat Plex tells me that my server is not powerful enough. That is not true at all. Some movies play better then others. They are all MKV files. I’ve tried all different kinds of settings. Nothing works. Is plex just that bad?

2

You don’t mention what type of Plex Player you are using and whether the server is in the same local network.

“MKV” is not precise enough, since MKV containers can contain a whole lot of different audio and video formats.
Please post the Plex XML info of an affected file. This will provide the necessary detail information.

3

What bitrate are you playing the films at ?? Mine always seems to buffer with anything above 8mbits.

4

Sorry, Version 2.22.1.917-2a5a2e01. Ill have to get the XML info when i get home

5

I have it set to 12 Mbps

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Here is an --------- file for The Dark Night that always gives me issues.

It’s on my home network over wifi from server to Amazon Fire Stick

[edited by moderator. files on a foreign server cannot be accessed]

7

Please copy the contents of the xml file into a post.
Don’t set a link to your server.

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This XML file does not appear to have any style information associated with it. The document tree is shown below.

<MediaContainer size="1" allowSync="1" identifier="com.plexapp.plugins.library" librarySectionID="1" librarySectionTitle="Movies" librarySectionUUID="361e7677-72ee-4b6b-b55b-86d50757ea04"mediaTagPrefix="/system/bundle/media/flags/" mediaTagVersion="1540920962">
  <Video ratingKey="1322" key="/library/metadata/1322" guid="com.plexapp.agents.imdb://tt0468569?lang=en" librarySectionTitle="Movies" librarySectionID="1" librarySectionKey="/library/sections/1" studio="DC Comics" type="movie" title="The Dark Knight" titleSort="Dark Knight" contentRating="PG-13" summary="Batman raises the .... Joker." rating="9.4" audienceRating="9.4" viewOffset="63398" viewCount="1" lastViewedAt="1542775470" year="2008" tagline="Why So Serious?" thumb="/library/metadata/1322/thumb/1542794641" art="/library/metadata/1322/art/1542794641" duration="9133332" originallyAvailableAt="2008-07-16" addedAt="1503716696" updatedAt="1542794641"audienceRatingImage="rottentomatoes://image.rating.upright" chapterSource="mixed" ratingImage="rottentomatoes://image.rating.ripe">
    <Media videoResolution="1080" id="6957" duration="9133332" bitrate="25318" width="1920" height="1080" aspectRatio="1.78" audioChannels="6" audioCodec="ac3" videoCodec="vc1" container="mkv"videoFrameRate="24p" videoProfile="advanced">
      <Part accessible="1" exists="1" id="6957" key="/library/parts/6957/1503716635/file.mkv" duration="9133332" file="E:\The_Dark_Knight_t00.mkv" size="28904825074" container="mkv" deepAnalysisVersion="2"requiredBandwidths="36084,35141,33828,32506,31331,30489,28350,27565" videoProfile="advanced">
        <Stream id="14045" streamType="1" codec="vc1" index="0" bitrate="24038" language="English" languageCode="eng" bitDepth="8" chromaLocation="left" chromaSubsampling="4:2:0" colorPrimaries="bt709"colorSpace="bt709" colorTrc="bt709" frameRate="23.976" height="1080" level="3" profile="advanced" refFrames="1" requiredBandwidths="34801,33856,32539,31216,30038,29194,27037,26252"scanType="progressive" width="1920" displayTitle="1080p (VC1)"/>
        <Stream id="14046" streamType="2" selected="1" default="1" codec="ac3" index="1" channels="6" bitrate="640" language="English" languageCode="eng" audioChannelLayout="5.1(side)"requiredBandwidths="640,640,640,640,640,640,640,640" samplingRate="48000" title="Surround 5.1" displayTitle="English (AC3 5.1)"/>
        <Stream id="14047" streamType="2" codec="ac3" index="2" channels="6" bitrate="640" language="English" languageCode="eng" audioChannelLayout="5.1(side)"requiredBandwidths="640,640,640,640,640,640,640,640" samplingRate="48000" title="Surround 5.1" displayTitle="English (AC3 5.1)"/>
        <Stream id="14048" streamType="3" codec="pgs" index="3" language="English" languageCode="eng" requiredBandwidths="54,54,54,54,54,54,54,54" displayTitle="English (PGS)"/>
      </Part>
    </Media>
  </Video>
</MediaContainer>
9

This video uses the VC-1 video codec. It appears to be a straight off Bluray rip with a relatively high bandwidth.
AFAIR the Firestick cannot play this type of video, so the server needs to transcode it.
Unfortunately, the transcoding of VC-1 video can only run on one cpu core, so that may be the bottleneck here.

Or, in case I am misremembering, if the Firestick can indeed play VC-1 video, it will have issues with the bandwidth of the file. The WiFi hardware in those devices is very bad and doesn’t reach the bitrates you’d need for smooth streaming of high-bitrate files.

If you don’t plan on switching to a different playback device soon, you’ll be better off if you change the video stream to H.264 (with a relatively high quality setting of RF 19 or so.)
You could use Handbrake or maybe the Plex Optimizer (Preset: Custom, Universal TV, 20mbps).

10

Thanks. I’ll give that a shot

11

So used handbrake on The Dark Night and Plex optimizer on another movie I was having playback problems with. Both made improvements. The movies no longer buffer and pause. But, they aren’t completely smoothe. About every 30 seconds it looks as though the frame rate drops significantly. Choppy.

12

You might want to enable ‘Refresh Rate Switching’ on your Firestick Plex app.
(under the Extended options )

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