Hello Xbox app developers. I was able to get my hands on a new Xbox Series S console, and to avoid having multiple streaming boxes attached to 1 TV for entertainment, I would like to have the Xbox Series S be my all in one entertainment solution in a few rooms at home. But I have a few questions/concerns after setting up the app on the Series S.
Will Plex update the app to support more audio codecs and/or spatial audio in the future? I know this may depend on Microsoft but are any advances being made with them in regards to better audio support?
Will the UI be more detailed with increased sharpness in the near future? (Some things are a bit fuzzy)
Is original video quality compressed or altered in anyway? I was able to play with some settings and at first couldn’t get picture to look as sharp as my Mac Mini or Roku Ultra, but after a while fiddling it came closer.
I look forward to seeing how the xbox series x/s app will develop. I see this as a huge opportunity to really make plex on xbox a big deal and a high quality alternative to HTPCs, Roku, Apple TV, Shield TV etc.
Any improvements incoming with the launch of Xbox Series S/X you can share? I would love to know more about what’s planned for Xbox on Plex as I’m now invested in the xbox ecosystem. Thanks for reading!
Update: After messing with different HDMI cables and messing with more settings, I seem to be getting some pretty great playback (fingers crossed/will report back any anomalies I see).
This can definitely replace a lot of my plex clients (roku, mac mini etc) and simplify my setup a ton. I know at the moment some trade offs and limitations are present with certain audio codecs not being allowed to passthrough, but if spatial audio and future updates add to what is available now then I see the Xbox app for Plex becoming a lot more popular especially with a new generation of consoles just releasing.
Can’t wait to see how the app improves over time
Edit: Any info about spatial audio, audio codecs etc is much appreciated.
FYI: Xbox Series S so far is direct playing everything I’m throwing at it. My Library is 99% MKV Blu-ray from my personal collection so I am more than pleased with performance “so far”.
That’s really nice to hear! With Spatial audio, do you mean atmos? Because atmos and more direct play without the need of transcoding would be really really nice!
Can i ask for more detail about the files you are playing?
In my experience, Plex on my Xbox One X has been a great client for my 1080p content, but since i recently moved into the world of high bit rate 4K HDR files (just got a 4k projector), it turned into a world of pain as i now get the dreaded buffering issues others complain about.
II would happily buy a new Xbox if Plex behaves better on that.
I would also consider a PS5, but the situation with poor Plex 4K HDR support on the PS4 Pro is a big putoff.
I reinstalled Plex on My Xbox Series X after giving up on it as being useful for the Xbox one X. I noticed that I do not get Dolby Atmos with this and it transcodes the TrueHD 7.1 This is kind of a joke.
I would hope that maybe they can provide a plex app that allows audio pass through like the xbox blu ray player app does.
Any chance of this coming. I do not understand how new hardware with the power of the Series X is still being out performed by something as old as the Nvidia Shield. Was really hoping to retire the shield when the Series X came out.
I think the spatial audio on the Xbox Series X/S (and recently apple with the AirPod pros) are sort of like a simulation of a complete surround setup without you needing the actual surround sound system. So with spatial audio you would in theory get a surround sound experience regardless of the home theatre setup etc.
This would help with the audio limitations within Xbox’s Plex App if this is indeed able to be used by the Plex app. This is from my understanding of how spatial audio has been talked about, I could be wrong though as the articles I came across are very vague and don’t give much detail about this.
Yeah nearly all of my content is sourced from standard blu-ray and put into MKV format. I have a few UHD disk but I haven’t added them to plex as I don’t want to run into any issues (not sure how stable 4K UHD Blu-rays will run on all clients).
I use to have a Xbox One X and that Plex experience was not so great for me either (buffering etc). On the Xbox Series S however I find it to be a much better experience and have not experienced any buffering playing standard blu-ray rips.
EDIT: I did however have trouble playing Season 1 of Sherlock (2010) on blu-ray. When Direct Play was enabled the video didn’t buffer but it did stutter like crazy. This season was shot in 60fps so I’m thinking that could be the problem. Removing direct play fixed the issue but it was still an issue with direct play. It’s the only issue I’ve came across with direct play so far.
