Emby won't play on Shield What Am I Missing?

[ebr 14935]

22 hours ago, KenFlix21 said:

I’m not interested in trading one problem for another. 

Hi.  Not sure what you mean there but the server needs to be installed on internal storage for it to have access to all the components it needs for some playback.  So the issues very well may be related.

[KenFlix21 0]

1 hour ago, ebr said:

Hi.  Not sure what you mean there but the server needs to be installed on internal storage for it to have access to all the components it needs for some playback.  So the issues very well may be related.

I know, that’s been stated ad nauseam. Though it’s simply not a practical solution; or as the devs want us to believe, by design. Shield owners can not pick and choose which data to migrate.in either direction. It’s all app data for every app or no app data for every app. 
 

The only data left on shield internal when app data is migrated to external is OS core services. Shield internal storage is much too small to house app data and that’s the problem I’d rather avoid. 
 

 

[ebr 14935]

23 hours ago, KenFlix21 said:

I know, that’s been stated ad nauseam. Though it’s simply not a practical solution; or as the devs want us to believe, by design. Shield owners can not pick and choose which data to migrate.in either direction. It’s all app data for every app or no app data for every app. 
 

The only data left on shield internal when app data is migrated to external is OS core services. Shield internal storage is much too small to house app data and that’s the problem I’d rather avoid. 
 

 

So, the answer to our question is "no, the app is not installed on internal storage"?

If that's the case, then we know it isn't going to work properly.

[KenFlix21 0]

1 hour ago, ebr said:

So, the answer to our question is "no, the app is not installed on internal storage"?

If that's the case, then we know it isn't going to work properly.

“We” do now. 

[Luke 37119]

Unfortunately it's something that came up following the Shield OS update.

[KenFlix21 0]

43 minutes ago, Luke said:

Unfortunately it's something that came up following the Shield OS update.

That's understandable. It seems to me that installing Emby data on internal is a work-around (for now or forever?). The only pertinent question I have is whether or not the emby development team plans to restore the functionality vis-à-vis the shield  that was lost with that update.  If not, that's ok, I won't need to come back here for updates and I'll simply explore other options. 

[Carlo 4330]

You could call it a work around I guess but the problem is with the ShieldTV OS not with Emby.  Been a while but I think the issue with external media is that there isn't a way to give Emby proper permissions to access the location.  Yet other programs built into the OS have no issue as they run at a different user/system level. Internal player, UPnP, DLNA probably all work regardless of file placement. I don't want to pull this topic in a different direction but if you're hell bent on not setting up internal media even though it's pretty much a known requirement with Android 11 you may want to try accessing the external media using network shares vs local files.  Perhaps you could plug your external drives into your router (or PC) and share them with the network like this. Android 11 has no issues I'm aware of with network files so it's a possibility to try.

Most home routers, even those provided by your ISP support USB3 sharing of disks so this could make it a lot simpler for you and remove the external issue completely.

ShieldTV has no problems accessing network files and allows setting permissions correctly.

[KenFlix21 0]

1 hour ago, cayars said:

You could call it a work around I guess but the problem is with the ShieldTV OS not with Emby.

Been a while but I think the issue with external media is that there isn't a way to give Emby proper permissions to access the location. 

...if you're hell bent on not setting up internal media even though it's pretty much a known requirement with Android 11...

I don't agree with any of these statements. My guess is - any development work on Emby for Android is at a halt due to the Emby/Google conflict. But thanks for your input. I'm doing fine without it.

[ebr 14935]

10 hours ago, KenFlix21 said:

My guess is - any development work on Emby for Android is at a halt due to the Emby/Google conflict

Hi. That is not correct and completely unrelated to the issue being discussed here - which is changes in permission levels with the change in Android version.  Google seems to change their mind with each version on what apps can and can't do with internal and external storage.

[KenFlix21 0]

okie dokie

[Carlo 4330]

Don't take our word for it.  Go read the forums at Nvidia concerning this.

This change in Android 11 affects a lot of different software that runs on the Shield TV.

[Bigmack3000 84]

After reading this thread, I just wanted to check:

I currently have a synology nas with the emby server on it.  And then I have the Emby app on my Shield to watch media.  Should I avoid updating to Android 11 for the time being?

[KenFlix21 0]

3 hours ago, cayars said:

Don't take our word for it.  Go read the forums at Nvidia concerning this.

This change in Android 11 affects a lot of different software that runs on the Shield TV.

I have a shield pro running 11, the only app I have problems with is Emby.

[KenFlix21 0]

5 minutes ago, Bigmack3000 said:

After reading this thread, I just wanted to check:

I currently have a synology nas with the emby server on it.  And then I have the Emby app on my Shield to watch media.  Should I avoid updating to Android 11 for the time being?

I run the emby server on my shield and can view on my apple tv and iphone. The emby client on the shield or iphone will not play anything. I say, If it ain't broke don't fix it. 

[Carlo 4330]

4 hours ago, Bigmack3000 said:

After reading this thread, I just wanted to check:

I currently have a synology nas with the emby server on it.  And then I have the Emby app on my Shield to watch media.  Should I avoid updating to Android 11 for the time being?

You should be fine if just using the ShieldTV for playback and not as a server. It's actually ok as the server as well if you have the media mounted as internal or willing to do so.  Android 11 on Shield TV with external media is the issue. The permissions are messed up for non system users running apps and needs fixing. However it sounds like this was done on purpose for security reasons so I'm not sure what the back-story is.  All I know for sure is that they clearly changed functionality between 10 and 11.

4 hours ago, KenFlix21 said:

I have a shield pro running 11, the only app I have problems with is Emby.

Internal storage or External?  See above and many other threads for issues with External storage on Android 11. Short answer is not to use external storage with Android 11. Use either internal storage or move the USB drives to a computer or your router where they can be network shared.  The ShiedTV can mount the drives over a network just fine with either Samba or NFS.

Edited April 28, 2022 by cayars

[Bigmack3000 84]

44 minutes ago, cayars said:

Android 11 on Shield TV with external media is the issue.

 

Okay, great.  Just to clarify this point, since the above is my current set up. Even though my media is external on a NAS, it will feed into the Emby app just fine on Android 11 if I'm using it for playback?  

[Carlo 4330]

If the media is on a NAS it would work as you'll be accessing it via Ethernet using Samba or NFS mounts.  But if you have a NAS with QuickSync on board I'd run Emby Server on the NAS as it's basically a Linux PC. If you don't have a ZEON CPU or Celeron with Quicksync at the heart of your NAS the ShieldTV is probably the better server since it can do hardware transcoding.  Which NAS do you have?

The ShieldTV wasn't really built to be a server but a powerful player. It happened to be powerful enough with hardware transcoding to stand in as a server on a limited basis which might be all some people will ever need. In my playing/testing the ShieldTV seems to work well with a couple drives attached (Pre-11) but I can only load about a 1/4 of my full library on it as it runs out of memory. Not surprising however as I've got a few times more content then Netflix, Amazon & Hulu combined so I'm not sure that's fair or anything a normal person would do.

I've had no problems using the ShieldTV as a server on portable systems with a few drives plugged in (pre-11). Between my buddies RV and our family sailboat the portable system was used a lot for a couple years.  We've both since switched to permanent systems, him with a Pi and me a Tim Allen "More Power" NUC with 4 marine APs (20-30 boats tied together all streaming).

I personally wouldn't run out to purchase a ShieldTV with the intention of making a server as there are better choices, but if you already have it and want to make better use of it and have a moderate size library it should do you well. So go for it, especially since you're not moving the media and it's going to stay on the NAS.  That makes the process to setup pretty easy.

I'd say it depends for your last question. Some people have reported problems with slight pauses or stuttering when transcoding (for another playback device) and watching high end 4K video on the ShieldTV. I've don't recall hearing any issues with normal HD media like 1080p.  The combination of transcoding and handling high bitrate 4K video might be too much for it to handle at the same time. That of course is something you can test if you will be transcoding for others and playing back yourself. You can push the ShieldTV pretty hard and get it to do things you wouldn't think it should be able to handle but it's not a PC and does have limits.  Keep that in mind and you'll be fine.

[Bigmack3000 84]

Ok, this is reassuring.  I have a ds1817+ so I'd much rather keep the server on my NAS.  So as long as the Emby app can still playback those files I'll be upgrading to 11.

[Carlo 4330]

You may want to check to see if your NAS has the Alpine AL-314 quad-core 1.7GHz or the Atom C2538 @ 2.4 Ghz. Neither will do hardware transcoding but the Atom can do some lower resolution transcoding in software.  The Alpine can't do any type of video transcoding just remuxing and audio transcoding.

If it's just you using this then you can can probably run the ShieldTV as a client only with the server running on the NAS.  The ShieldTV can play most videos so the NAS will hopefully not need to do any transcoding.  If you need to be able to playback media on things other than a PC using Theater or ShieldTV you may need to try using the ShieldTV as a server in order to transcode.  That's kind of a tuff call and really depends on the clients doing the playback as well as the format of the media itself.