Hardware Encode/Decode Support for x264/x265 in Emby/FFDSHOW

[justdrooit 3]

Apologies in advance if this has been answered already. I didn't see it.

I appear to be a little behind the game. I have much of my video content encoded in x264 1080p but in the last couple of weeks I've noticed from a friend how well x265 HEVC works with a lower file size. Now I'm curious... Obviously the x265 codec is blowing up my A8-5500 server's CPU utilization and I've noticed that the GTX 950 and GTX 960 seem to have full x265 hardware encode/decode capability. If I were to set up a GTX 950 on my server, would Emby use it to offload its decoding process when I'm viewing x265 content on a client system/device?

The price of those video cards aren't *quite* where I'd bite and get one solely for this purpose, but it is getting close. 

[ebr 14902]

Actually there is quite a bit of discussion out here about GPU transcoding.  Most of it here: GPU Transcoding (Intel QuickSync and nVidia NVENC)

 

In short, we're working on one side of the equation (encoding) right now but the whole piece isn't there yet.

[justdrooit 3]

Wonderful. Thank you for the speedy response. I'll watch it on your link.

[RanmaCanada 335]

The problem with this is that nvidia only supports a max of 2 streams.  That's it.  If you want 4 as the max, you need to get a quadro.  

[anderbytes 139]

The problem with this is that nvidia only supports a max of 2 streams.  That's it.  If you want 4 as the max, you need to get a quadro.  

 

What about CPU transcoding? Does Emby support it natively?

 

I'm looking forward the new x265 HW accelerated CPU's...

[jds828 24]

I've been having a good test with x265 and some very good results. Emby hasn't moaned about any of them either which was a nice surprise.

 

Program: Staxrip

CPU: i7 4790

RAM: 16GB

GPU: GTX 970

 

Nvidia x265 is fast but very limited to what you can tweak. In Staxrip I've found it better to create a template from scratch. I have a 10bit x265 with HE 5.1@320 that gives great results but it's slow...very slow! It takes about 6 hours on the above hardware to do a 1080p 2 pass. It does drop the size from about 12 to 2GB. Feedback I've had from people is that most can't see/hear any difference but some say it's not as sharp.

[RanmaCanada 335]

We just need to know what clients/hardware will allow us to direct stream x265.  I have been converting my entire library to x265 with my e5-2670 and the space savings is massive.  Now, if I could know what hardware would be able to have everything direct streamed to it, that would be fantastic.  Not using 10bit yet as the sources aren't 10bit to begin with.  For the record, stay away from allwinner chipsets in Android boxes.  They claim to do x265, but don't.

[spon 24]

Hi guys. Bumping an old topic here instead of starting a new one....

 

I have a GTX 960 and often transcode x265/HEVC content to a fire stick on my bedroom. It mostly plays ok, but Emby doesn't seem to be using the 960's hardware decoding. Is it possible for me to tweak something in a XML to allow for the hardware decoding?

 

Thanks

[Luke 36999]

Hi guys. Bumping an old topic here instead of starting a new one....

 

I have a GTX 960 and often transcode x265/HEVC content to a fire stick on my bedroom. It mostly plays ok, but Emby doesn't seem to be using the 960's hardware decoding. Is it possible for me to tweak something in a XML to allow for the hardware decoding?

 

Thanks

 

Hi, no, sorry, this is not available right now.