Chromecast stream stops after xxx mins

[PrincessClevage 173]

HI There,

I have a lenovo smart display, from an IOS device with Emby client i am able to select this chromecast device to play livetv and the stream starts and plays fine for a short amount of mins (up to 10 mins ish) and then the stream stops and i have to reconnect from the IOS device to the chromecast device and start the stream again. 

after the stream is started i can see that transcoding is occuring to H.264 (AVC) and i have tried chaning the priorty of prefered decoder/encoder. I have also tried disabling hardware acceeration, forcing cpu ffmpeg conversion and this seems to allow the stream to run on the chromecast client for longer but eventually the stream still stops. Any thoughts why this might be occuring and what i can try to stabile this stream to this chromecast device ?

Device reports in emby dashboards as:

Chromecast

Emby for Chromecast 2.1.0

[Happy2Play 8321]

Can you provide server and ffmpeg logs for a specific example?

[PrincessClevage 173]

PM you the requested Logs

[Luke 37151]

HI, just to help narrow this down, if you use the chrome browser on the server machine to play this to Chromecast, does it happen that way as well?

[PrincessClevage 173]

5 hours ago, Luke said:

HI, just to help narrow this down, if you use the chrome browser on the server machine to play this to Chromecast, does it happen that way as well?

Just tried on the server casting from chrome to the device and it did the same thing after around 6 mins 

[PrincessClevage 173]

I have a local tv recording on the server and casting this file to the same device seems to play fine 19mins so far, only difference i can sse it is not live tv stream and using mpeg-2 >h264 (avc) transcoding 

 

[Luke 37151]

Can you try the same content just to eliminate that variable? Thanks 

[PrincessClevage 173]

6 hours ago, Luke said:

Can you try the same content just to eliminate that variable? Thanks 

The loally recorded file also plays fine when cast to the same device from IOS. I notice that transfoding occurs very fast for this local file and is competed within 1 min 

[Luke 37151]

And what if you try live tv again?

[PrincessClevage 173]

On 12/11/2021 at 1:49 PM, Luke said:

And what if you try live tv again?

Tried live tv again, casting from the iOS device and same issue

[PrincessClevage 173]

 

I have noticed that when i disable hardware acceleration the Mbps is lower and the connection is held stable for much longer, where as with hardware acceleration enabled the Mbps is around 15Mbps, could this be the issue? I will check the locally recorded video Mbps and compare

I have also tested some streaming some other locally store media and it is stable at 36Mbps, so it sees only the live tv component needs a lower bitrate to be stable. Any way to apply lower bitrate for a specific device for live tv only or update the defaul chromecast profile to include a lower bitrate if streaming live tv content (or perhaps it is the way software>software decode/encoder delivery works)?

Edited December 15, 2021 by PrincessClevage

[Luke 37151]

So it still only happens with live tv?

[PrincessClevage 173]

6 hours ago, Luke said:

So it still only happens with live tv?

So far, yes only livetv

[Luke 37151]

Can you try the same live tv channel casting from the web app and see how that compares? Thanks.

[PrincessClevage 173]

On 12/20/2021 at 1:25 PM, Luke said:

Can you try the same live tv channel casting from the web app and see how that compares? Thanks.

I have already tried this by casting from chrome on the emby server to the device with the same symptoms, if the bit rate is low <5Mbps and or software encode>software decode is in use it is stable for live tv while other locally stored video file play fine at 30+Mbps

Edited December 22, 2021 by PrincessClevage

[PrincessClevage 173]

Might it be possible to change a config file and set a specific profile for chrome cast device?

[PrincessClevage 173]

On 12/28/2021 at 2:05 PM, PrincessClevage said:

Might it be possible to change a config file and set a specific profile for chrome cast device?

Happy to do this manually if you can guide me 

[Luke 37151]

Are you still running into this?

[PrincessClevage 173]

On 1/7/2022 at 3:17 AM, Luke said:

Are you still running into this?

Yes still have the issue intermittently with live tv

[Luke 37151]

OK we'll take another look at it. Thanks.

[PrincessClevage 173]

Reporting back that I now am able to maintain a stable livetv stream to chromecast device after the recent “play on” changes with the caveat that I have to disable hardware encoding and decoding (uses more overheads from cpu and ffmpeg than hardware encoding/decoding) for the used media format, otherwise the stream and video stops after xxx period

[Luke 37151]

OK there will also be playback related changes coming to Chromecast soon in conjunction with the 4.7 server that may help with this. Thanks.

[PrincessClevage 173]

I have observed when playing some Australian channels emby will attempt to direct play these channel to the chrome cast device and every time the direct play streams fail to strart. Is it possible to force a all chromecast sessions to be transcode to AVC which seems stable with software encoding 

[Luke 37151]

Some Chromecast firmware updates have gone out and other users have reported some surprising improvements with it. Can you try re-evaluating with that? Thanks.

[PrincessClevage 173]

On 3/3/2022 at 7:56 AM, Luke said:

Some Chromecast firmware updates have gone out and other users have reported some surprising improvements with it. Can you try re-evaluating with that? Thanks.

Thanks for the chromecast rate limiting option, works great and great thinking for  an easier fix Luke.