Problem with playback on some files: false presentation.

[accelleratii 2]

This has been occurring recently, probably with one of the latest updates. 

Setup:

TV: Panasonic Viera 

Server: Windows 10, emby 4.6.7.0 (portable) 

Problem:

Some files are being falsely presented as MPEG2-TS, and therefore not playable on TV's dlna player: "File not supported" error.

Example:

Video format is AVC (Advanced Video Codec/High@L3.1/V_MPEG4/ISO/AVC) and file extension is MKV in both cases. One is presented as MPEG2-TS and is not playable. Second is presented as MKV and plays without a problem.

Avenue.5.s01e01.WEBDL.720p.NewStudio.mkv.txt Avenue.5.s01e02.WEBDL.720p.NewStudio.mkv.txt

[Luke 37060]

Hi, please attach the emby server and ffmpeg log files. thanks.

[accelleratii 2]

1 hour ago, Luke said:

Hi, please attach the emby server and ffmpeg log files. thanks.

It looks like emby tries to transcode the file that is presented as MPEG2-TS on TV, playing other file does not involve transcoding therefore no log. 

hardware_detection-63783417007.txt embyserver.txt ffmpeg-transcode-bbab098d-6503-4263-a3fd-04fe4ea5c4b5_1.txt

[Luke 37060]

The TV does not support the subtitle format, so that's why it wants to transcode, in order to burn them in. What you could do is go into your emby user subtitle preferences and set your subtitle mode to never show any subtitles by default. That may prevent the transcode here.

[accelleratii 2]

Thank you. Solution worked.

But does it fail to transcode, or something else renders the file unplayable?

Wonder if adding unsupported format to custom subtitle profile for TV in dlna tab with method set to "External Download" would help.

Disabled everything related to subtitles for now (inc. "Allow subtitle extraction on the fly" in transcoding section).

[Luke 37060]

What model is this Samsung?

[accelleratii 2]

5 hours ago, Luke said:

What model is this Samsung?

Panasonic VIERA TX-LR39E6W

Edited March 23, 2022 by accelleratii

[Luke 37060]

Is that a 2018 model? It's hard to find much info on it. I would have guessed it's even older than that based on what that interface looks like.

[accelleratii 2]

6 hours ago, Luke said:

Is that a 2018 model? It's hard to find much info on it. I would have guessed it's even older than that based on what that interface looks like.

Probably 2012-2014, it's basically same thing as: https://www.panasonic.com/uk/support/discontinued-products/televisions/tx-l39e6b.specs.html

DLNA 1.5		yes (RUI2.0/DTCP-IP/DMP/DMR/DMS)

 

Support Format	AVI/MKV/WMV/MP4/M4v/FLV/3GPP/VRO/VOB/TS/PS, MP3/AAC/WMA Pro/FLAC/WAV, JPEG

source: https://rus.panasonic.ru/discontinued/tv/viera/lcd_tv/TX-LR39E6W/spec

Edited March 24, 2022 by accelleratii

[Happy2Play 8281]

From the manual

[Luke 37060]

For a device that old it's good to see that it even plays at all. The transcoding doesn't fail, but the TV just doesn't like it for some reason and so it disconnects. Unfortunately solving this can be difficult without having this device on hand to test with. Often times with devices of that age the format of the transcoding mpegts that we're sending is fine but we need to advertise it a little differently with a different Content-Type response header. It's just a matter of trial and error with all these little things until you find a combination that works. 

My suggestion for a device this old would be to focus on formats that can direct play. If you really want to dig into the transcoding problem, if you could find dlna profiles for this model for Serviio and Plex we might be able to learn something from those.

[accelleratii 2]

Today I held a send-off for my old media hard drive which happened to be same age as the TV, old things have to go at some point, so it would be counter productive and a waste of your time to look for additional solutions, given the fact that workaround above just solves it.

I would not want to transcode anyway, especially that all files are playable directly. Will try to avoid any subtitles from now on until the TV is also replaced. Not that I ever had subtitles on, they just happen to be left in on some remuxes...

Thank you for support!

[accelleratii 2]

@Luke Really hate bumping this, but been getting more and more unplayable files lately, that emby tries to transcode (sometimes it's TranscodeReasons=AudioCodecNotSupported, or VideoCodecNotSupported); I remembered your note about Serviio profiles and installed it just to test it out. Every single one of problem files are playable via Serviio with transcoding option off, now i'm not going to critique Serviio here, but I prefer how emby does the presentation of my media content, I like the easy option to control where meta stuff is stored, and the free app emby has.

 

This is what can be found in profile.xml regarding the TV which Serviio Console identifies as: 

Panasonic VIErA

Panasonic Viera (2013)

 

	<Profile id="viera2013" name="Panasonic Viera (2013)" extendsProfileId="1">
		<!-- Panasonic Viera 2013 Models: 
			Plasma's: ZT60, VT60, ST60, GT60, S60
			LED/LCD's: WT60, DT60, ET60, FT60, E6 
		Supports native streaming of mainstream MP4, MKV and XVid files
		All 60 series models also known as 64 or 65 series in some countries -->
		<Detection>
			<UPnPSearch>
				<FriendlyName>(VIERA [DFGVWZ]T6[0-5].*)|(VIERA [ES]T?6[0-5]?.*)</FriendlyName>
				<Manufacturer>Panasonic</Manufacturer>
			</UPnPSearch>
		</Detection>
		<ContentDirectoryMessageBuilder>org.serviio.upnp.service.contentdirectory.PacketVideoDLNAMessageBuilder</ContentDirectoryMessageBuilder>
		<MediaFormatProfiles>
			<MediaFormatProfile mime-type="video/divx">AVI</MediaFormatProfile>
		</MediaFormatProfiles>
		<Transcoding>
			<!-- Transcode h264 videos with profile level > 4.1 to mpegts with ac3 audio -->
			<Video targetContainer="mpegts" targetVCodec="mpeg2video" targetACodec="ac3" aBitrate="384" DAR="16:9" forceInheritance="true" maxWidth="1920" maxHeight="1080">
				<Matches container="*" vCodec="h264" profile="high_10" />
				<Matches container="*" vCodec="h264" profile="high" levelGreaterThan="4.1" />
				<Matches container="*" vCodec="h264" profile="main" levelGreaterThan="4.1" />
				<Matches container="*" vCodec="h265" />
				<Matches container="*" vCodec="h263" />
				<Matches container="*" widthGreaterThan="1920" />
			</Video>
			<!-- remux FLAC/TrueHD in MKV/MP4 to AC3, DTS (MP4) to AC3 -->
			<Video targetContainer="mpegts" targetACodec="ac3" aBitrate="384" forceInheritance="true">
				<!-- Matches container="matroska" vCodec="h264" aCodec="dca" / --> <!-- Uncomment this line if DTS is not supported natively -->
				<Matches container="matroska" vCodec="h264" aCodec="dts-hd" />
				<Matches container="matroska" vCodec="h264" aCodec="flac" />
				<Matches container="matroska" vCodec="h264" aCodec="truehd" />
				<Matches container="mp4" vCodec="h264" aCodec="dca" /> <!-- E6 support??, remove this line -->
			</Video>
			<!-- Remux MPEG-PS with no transcoding -->
			<Video targetContainer="mpegts" forceInheritance="true">
				<Matches container="wtv" />
			</Video>
			<!-- unsupported codecs will be transcoded into mpeg-ts, mpeg2 video and ac3 audio -->
			<Video targetContainer="mpegts" targetVCodec="mpeg2video" targetACodec="ac3" aBitrate="384" forceInheritance="true">
				<Matches container="mp4" vCodec="mjpeg" />
				<Matches container="mp4" vCodec="dvvideo" />
				<Matches container="mp4" vCodec="mpeg4" />
				<Matches container="mpeg" vCodec="mpeg1video" />
				<Matches container="matroska" vCodec="mpeg4" />
				<Matches container="matroska" vCodec="vp8" />
				<Matches container="matroska" vCodec="vp9" />
				<Matches container="asf" />
				<Matches container="ogg" />
				<Matches container="rm" />
			</Video>
			<!-- AVI files will be transcoded into mpeg-ts, mpeg2 video and ac3 audio.  
			This section is NOT inherited by other Panasonic profiles  -->
			<Video targetContainer="mpegts" targetVCodec="mpeg2video" targetACodec="ac3" aBitrate="384">
				<Matches container="avi" />		<!-- Remove this line for models that natively support AVI's with Xvid video (some ST60's) -->
				<Matches container="avi" vCodec="mpeg4" vFourCC="div3,div4,div5,divx,dm4v,dx50" />
				<Matches container="avi" vCodec="msmpeg4" vFourCC="div3,div4,div5,divx,dm4v,dx50" />
				<Matches container="avi" vCodec="dvvideo" />
			</Video>
			<!-- unsupported audio will be transcoded into lpcm audio -->
			<Audio targetContainer="lpcm" forceInheritance="true">
				<Matches container="ogg" />
				<Matches container="asf" />
				<Matches container="adts" />
				<Matches container="wv" />
				<Matches container="mpc" />
				<Matches container="ape" />
				<Matches container="dsf" />
				<Matches container="wav" />
				<Matches container="mp4" codec="alac" />
			</Audio>
		</Transcoding>
		<AudioTrackRemux>
			<Video targetContainer="mpegts" targetACodec="ac3" aBitrate="384">
				<Matches container="*" vCodec="h264" />
				<Matches container="*" vCodec="mpeg2video" />
				<Matches container="*" vCodec="mpeg1video" />
				<Matches container="*" vCodec="mpeg4" />
				<Matches container="*" vCodec="msmpeg4" />
			</Video>
		</AudioTrackRemux>
		<GenericTranscoding>
			<Video targetContainer="mpeg" targetVCodec="mpeg2video" DAR="16:9" targetACodec="ac3" aBitrate="384" />
		</GenericTranscoding>
		<Subtitles>
			<SoftSubs mime-type="text/srt" type="srt" character-encoding="utf-8" />
			<HardSubs>
				<TextBased supported="true">
					<RequiredFor container="mp4"/>
				</TextBased>
			</HardSubs>
		</Subtitles>
		<ThumbnailsResolution>HD</ThumbnailsResolution>
	</Profile>

If that somehow helps emby to play my media files, would be nice. Thank you and sorry for bringing this up again. 

profiles.xml

[Luke 37060]

Yea I've been wondering if we should just stop shipping a panasonic profile altogether and let it use the default which will direct play just about everything.

[accelleratii 2]

Can I custom switch to default one? 

[Luke 37060]

17 hours ago, accelleratii said:

Can I custom switch to default one? 

You'd just remove any profiles you've created, but the Panasonic profile included with the server will transcode a fair amount. I've loosened this up for the next release.