Theatre app too aggressive on transcoding quality

[adkeyz 2]

Hi all,

Has anyone else found that the "auto" quality setting for remote play is far more aggressive on the Theatre app for Windows/Xbox?

On the same PC, on the same network, if I play a 1080p file for example, the Theatre app will transcode to 720p 1.5 Mbps but the same file in the browser version will play direct.

For a 4K file, Theatre will once again choose 720p, sometimes 3 Mbps if I'm lucky, but the browser and Android app will usually choose 1080p 6 Mbps.

I know I can manually change it, but for users that I share with that watch with the Theatre app on Xbox, they're not tech savvy enough to know the difference between Mbps and won't know what to choose that wont buffer either because it's too high for my upload rate or because there's other users also streaming or I'm uploading a bunch of files to the cloud for work and the upload rate is lower than usual.

Could the Theatre app get a little update to not be as aggressive? Also, when on "auto", does Emby only decide one time what the transcode rate should be when you first play a file, or does it adjust up and down during playback like Plex does?

Thanks in advance!

[Luke 38491]

Hi, on the same network as the server on auto, all of our apps will ignore bitrate when making transcoding decisions, so that shouldn't be an issue.

[adkeyz 2]

1 hour ago, Luke said:

Hi, on the same network as the server on auto, all of our apps will ignore bitrate when making transcoding decisions, so that shouldn't be an issue.

What I mean, is the same remote network, on the same remote device (my laptop for example), the browser will pull in 1080p and the app will only pull in 720p.

[Luke 38491]

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

[adkeyz 2]

2 minutes ago, Luke said:

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

Thank you. I look forward to an update. I have a couple of users that watch remotely with Xbox and they also confirm that auto will always negotiate a much lower resolution/bitrate than other apps on their phones or tablets, so Theatre is definitely being a bit too aggressive.

Could you also tell me if Emby will continuously re-negotiate during playback and adjust up/down if the connection gets better/worse, or will it only negotiate what resolution/bitrate to transcode at once at the beginning of playback?

[Luke 38491]

55 minutes ago, adkeyz said:

Thank you. I look forward to an update. I have a couple of users that watch remotely with Xbox and they also confirm that auto will always negotiate a much lower resolution/bitrate than other apps on their phones or tablets, so Theatre is definitely being a bit too aggressive.

Could you also tell me if Emby will continuously re-negotiate during playback and adjust up/down if the connection gets better/worse, or will it only negotiate what resolution/bitrate to transcode at once at the beginning of playback?

It is currently at the beginning of playback.

[adkeyz 2]

13 hours ago, Luke said:

It is currently at the beginning of playback.

Thank you for the very speedy replies! So glad I made the switch from Plex!