Exiting because another instance is already running.

[solidsnakex37 54]

I am trying to spin up another Emby Server container in Unraid, but it keep stopping with the error 

Exiting because another instance is already running.

I want to have a second instance to test out the 4.8 beta, am I allowed to run two Emby servers on the same machine in Unraid or will this not work?

1. Yes I've changed the ports (WebUI, container port, along with the ports in the config file)

2. The appdata is pointing to a new, separate folder

What might I be missing, if this is indeed possible?

[Luke 40065]

Hi, where do you see that message?

[solidsnakex37 54]

I see this when I click on Logs after trying to start the container 

[Luke 40065]

Can you please supply a complete log file? thanks.

[solidsnakex37 54]

Here is what I found in the logs folder in appdata, it has a date modified of last night when I was initially attempting to do this, but if I try and start the container now it doesn't seem to be updating this log file anymore 

embyserver (10).txt

[Q-Droid 880]

Does the second container get a different name or is it the same as the existing one?

[Luke 40065]

The server holds a mutex on the system using this as the key:

/system/EmbyServer.dll

If those two values are the same for both servers, then that explains it. So if you can find a way to make them different. Like for instance make one of them /system-beta

[solidsnakex37 54]

6 minutes ago, Luke said:

The server holds a mutex on the system using this as the key:

/system/EmbyServer.dll

If those two values are the same for both servers, then that explains it. So if you can find a way to make them different. Like for instance make one of them /system-beta

Where is this file placed? I can look to rename the second one, but I can't seem to locate this 

[Neminem 886]

7 hours ago, Q-Droid said:

Does the second container get a different name or is it the same as the existing one?

I think this is your issue.

If both enby dockers have the same name, you will have issues.

Stable :

Beta :

[solidsnakex37 54]

56 minutes ago, jaycedk said:

I think this is your issue.

If both enby dockers have the same name, you will have issues.

Stable :

Beta :

So both of them have different names, I am really confused on what's happening. I just started the beta container and it's working now? 

But, I just made a change and restarted it, now it's back to saying there is another instance running and won't start again. lol

I should mention that the change I made was just adding a library mapping, so nothing that would break it 

Edited January 11, 2024 by solidsnakex37
add reason

[Neminem 886]

Hmm it look like you have changed the port in emby and your docker.

In emby try with default port : 8096, its under Network

But keep the port you have now, in your docker config.

[Neminem 886]

And you say, you have edited some config files in your appdata folder.

You would probably need to change them back.

[solidsnakex37 54]

2 minutes ago, jaycedk said:

And you say, you have edited some config files in your appdata folder.

You would probably need to change them back.

The only way for me to change that port would be the config file unless I can get to the UI again, but I'll change the emby config ports back to default and leave the container port and see if that helps

[Neminem 886]

Super

Let us know what happens.

[Junglejim 383]

Yeah docker ports can get confusing..

e.g. "8097:8096", the last port 8096 is the default port emby uses, 8097 is the port I'm using for a second test server so it doesn't conflict with my original server.

I hope that makes sense, just don't change the second port and you should be ok.

No need to change the ports within emby! Just change the port to access emby in the url etc.

[Q-Droid 880]

Double check host side IP:port bindings and make sure there are no conflicts with another instance of Emby or other apps. Container IP:port bindings shouldn't affect others.

What is "foxdie"? I understand "bridge".

[Neminem 886]

That looks like a custom network in unraid.

[solidsnakex37 54]

6 hours ago, Q-Droid said:

Double check host side IP:port bindings and make sure there are no conflicts with another instance of Emby or other apps. Container IP:port bindings shouldn't affect others.

What is "foxdie"? I understand "bridge".

Yeah foxdie is a custom docker network that I use for a few things, it just allows the containers to communicate using the container name I believe. The ports are definitely different

 

11 hours ago, Junglejim said:

Yeah docker ports can get confusing..

e.g. "8097:8096", the last port 8096 is the default port emby uses, 8097 is the port I'm using for a second test server so it doesn't conflict with my original server.

I hope that makes sense, just don't change the second port and you should be ok.

No need to change the ports within emby! Just change the port to access emby in the url etc.

The ports I changed in Emby were in the system.xml file, since these matched what my first Emby instance uses. I thought this may have been causing conflict so I just changed those by one value, but I set them back to default for now


My current docker mappings are the following, I am using 8097 for my main Emby instance and chose to use 8099 for the beta one, but it still keeps telling me that another instance is already running and I don't get how it even knows this? I wonder if it is what luke mentioned, where it's something to do with the EmbyServer.dll file, but I can't find this anywhere. 



I've also tried setting the network type to different options just to see, but nothing helped there (None, Bridge, Host, or my custom docker network). 

Edited January 11, 2024 by solidsnakex37
forgot to add screenshot

[Q-Droid 880]

So back to the beginning. Are you trying to run a container for stable release and another for beta or adding a second beta for a total of three instances?

There are examples in here already of a stable and beta running on Unraid and one of your images appears to show a similar working example. So this is most likely a configuration issue.

Regarding that file (EmbyServer.dll), each container should have an instance layer of that file and each image will have a completely different and separate copy of that file. So no chance of a conflict.

Both Docker and Emby allow what you're trying to do so the remaining piece of the puzzle is Unraid.

 

[solidsnakex37 54]

28 minutes ago, Q-Droid said:

So back to the beginning. Are you trying to run a container for stable release and another for beta or adding a second beta for a total of three instances?

There are examples in here already of a stable and beta running on Unraid and one of your images appears to show a similar working example. So this is most likely a configuration issue.

Regarding that file (EmbyServer.dll), each container should have an instance layer of that file and each image will have a completely different and separate copy of that file. So no chance of a conflict.

Both Docker and Emby allow what you're trying to do so the remaining piece of the puzzle is Unraid.

 

Well to start at the beginning, I have a functional Emby container running on the stable release. The 4.8 beta has recently peaked my interest and all I am looking to do here is setup a second instance of Emby, running the 4.8 beta release. 

I have other containers running as duplicate instances and they work fine, I've never had this issue before where it's detecting an instance is already running. I will post to the Unraid forums then and see what suggestions I get. 

[solidsnakex37 54]

I posted the issue in the Unraid discord and figured out the issue, which was the following

In my main emby container, I used /mnt/user/transcodes for my transcoding directory 

I set this same path in the beta container, which is where emby was somehow detecting another instance was running (no idea how that works)

So I created a new transcode folder specifically for 4.8 under /mnt/user/transcodes/embybeta and this got my second instance to run 

I never had thought this would have caused issues, but it does sorta make sense. Thanks all for the help on this!

[Q-Droid 880]

That's a strange one. I wonder where that check is happening because I can't reproduce it in Docker on Linux.