Jump to content

Feature to Force DirectPlay Only Without Any Detection and Disable All Transcoding


gordan
Go to solution Solved by gordan,

Recommended Posts

Not yet. Until we do have it, I can tell you that in all likelihood the only difference you're going to see will be playback failures due to content that isn't capable of direct playing. The reason I'm saying that is because we're working really hard here, we know what the apps can play and we're not excluding anything from direct play that is capable. So it would really be a shame if that's the only thing keeping you from getting on-board because we're putting in a lot of effort to make the people that we do have as happy as they can be.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

breezytm

I am on board and a very happy camper. Kodi with Emby add-on. Yes sir

 

The only thing I would like is live tv to direct play 

  • Like 2
Link to comment
Share on other sites

PHPpro

I am not concerned about playback failures. I am currently using kodi and it does not do any transcoding. The only reason I want to switch is for the centralized organization. I am tired of having to setup each kodi individually. Because of my use of kodi I have put all the processing power in my clients, so even one video being transcoded will bring my server to its proverbial knees. So this is an important feature for me.

 

If I use the emby plugin for kodi will that prevent transcoding?

Link to comment
Share on other sites

breezytm

If you use the Kodi add-on things would play the same way they do today using Kodi directly. Totally depends on how you set it up though

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Deathsquirrel

If I use the emby plugin for kodi will that prevent transcoding?

 

Kodi and ET are the most capable clients.  They generally don't need to transcode for playback.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

PHPpro

Even if someone tried to play the movies with a mobile device, browser, or something else I would rather they get an error, than slow my server down. Something friendly like "This device is not capable of playing this video"

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Even if someone tried to play the movies with a mobile device, browser, or something else I would rather they get an error, than slow my server down. Something friendly like "This device is not capable of playing this video"

 

In the server dashboard you can disable access to transcoding on a per-user level, and then this is basically what happens.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

PHPpro

In the server dashboard you can disable access to transcoding on a per-user level, and then this is basically what happens.

 

Wait, so it is possible to disable transcoding? This is great. I wonder why no one has pointed this out before.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

mobamoba

Not yet. Until we do have it, I can tell you that in all likelihood the only difference you're going to see will be playback failures due to content that isn't capable of direct playing. The reason I'm saying that is because we're working really hard here, we know what the apps can play and we're not excluding anything from direct play that is capable. So it would really be a shame if that's the only thing keeping you from getting on-board because we're putting in a lot of effort to make the people that we do have as happy as they can be.

I don't think anyone's questioning the skill level or commitment of the Emby developers. However, in this area at least, Emby often makes mistakes. For example, not even a month ago, I was using the Emby Android app to externally play an mp4 to VLC on my mom's year-old high-end Samsung tablet and Emby insisted on transcoding even though obviously that tablet can handle an mp4. Frustrated, I copied the exact same file to her SD Card and played it locally in VLC no problem, meaning transcoding wasn't actually necessary but Emby got it wrong for some reason.

 

Nothing's perfect and certainly no one expects it to be, but, by the same token, I don't think anyone really wants to have to do battle with a piece of server software just to watch a movie. Put another way: if we're technologically savvy enough to be able to even know what transcoding is and know we've installed Emby on a server that's not powerful enough to transcode and complain about it on this board (:)), I think we're also technologically savvy enough to check a "disable transcoding" box in a difficult-to-find Advanced setting and know what the consequences will mean as well.

  • Like 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

That could have been as simple as the app bitrate setting. In most cases that's what it is. The app measures the ideal bitrate dynamically but this can be overridden in settings. Keep in mind that just because the device can play the file locally doesn't mean it can be streamed fast enough and that's why the bitrate setting is there for you.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

mobamoba

Right, but since I already know my machine is incapable of transcoding, my only hope of getting Emby to serve up my files is via direct streaming since that's the only thing my machine can handle. To me at least, this is the disconnect in this whole thread: if I already know this up front, I want to be able to tell Emby that in a setting so it doesn't even bother to try and simply pumps out a stream and we all hope for the best.

 

In a practical sense, when Emby transcodes, my entire machine freezes because the CPU is jammed at 100% and I lose access to everything on it because Emby is sucking up all the cycles and I can't break into to stop, especially if I'm accessing Emby from a remote location - I can't even break in with Teamviewer to kill the ffmpeg process because there's no CPU left.

 

One of the advantages of Emby is that it can run on an ancient machine because its system requirements are so minimal. When transcoding gets into the mix, that's no longer true, and I think it's the reason this issue keeps coming up.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Yea I understand and I'm not here to say you can't have the option. I'm just trying to point out that until we do, there are other ways to do it.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • 3 weeks later...
billbok

It would be a great features that we can disable transcoding OR download M3U file to play with external player like VLC.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Darkjeje

Does log allow to see why the movie is transcoding ?

 

This to know where is the blocking element or the limiting element.

 

Is there a list of all the stages to be respected (configuration to be made) to provide to read the live videos (without transcoding) since a NAS towards emby for android TV ?

 

All my movie are transcoding with emby, while my android box play my videos with VLC / DLNA or VLC when the movie is in my USB key.

I am in gigabit network, so I dont see why emby transcode.

 

I agree with of other one, Emby is light and does not ask for a big server what is great, but that if we can take place of transodage

 

Thank for your help.

Edited by Darkjeje
Link to comment
Share on other sites

Deathsquirrel

Does log allow to see why the movie is transcoding ?

 

This to know where is the blocking element or the limiting element.

 

Is there a list of all the stages to be respected (configuration to be made) to provide to read the live videos (without transcoding) since a NAS towards emby for android TV ?

 

All my movie are transcoding with emby, while my android box play my videos with VLC / DLNA or VLC when the movie is in my USB key.

I am in gigabit network, so I dont see why emby transcode.

 

I agree with of other one, Emby is light and does not ask for a big server what is great, but that if we can take place of transodage

 

Thank for your help.

 

If you want to track down why you're getting transcoding I suggest you post to the forum for the client you're using and include the server and transcode logs as well as the server and client versions in use.  There is usually a reason or it's quickly fixed.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • 3 months later...
jeffshead

This seems to underestimate emby users and treat them as uneducated. The option to choose directplay/directstream/transcode should be part of the client. It should be directly accessible on the same screen the play button is on. It should be clearly labeled "play method". Under this should display the play method which for most people will just say "auto detect". Clicking this should let you change the play method. Everytime the client starts up it should reset the play method back to auto detect. This way does indeed work. Emby users are smarter than you think in this area. They are quite aware and can migrate away from emby if their whims arent met. Allowing a user to choose the play method (even incorrectly) should be allowed. This issue wont go away. Others will bring up this idea, again and again. It is such a simple request to fulfill. One of the main reasons people use the embyblueneon for roku app is because it allows this feature.

 

Well said. I'm afraid this may be a deal breaker for me going for Premiere. I'm just getting acquainted with available products, their functionality and putting all the pieces together but I can clearly see the need for this. I'm also a little put off by some of the responses from the dev team. Auto-detect is nice in theory but the reality is that it will never be 100% accurate and to equate self-hosting movie watchers with the typical Netflix customer is illogical in my estimation. No disrespect intended.

 

Something like what's depicted below would be a very nice feature:

OmTRbGP.png

 

Add another option for RAW STREAM and we are good to go! Even a Netflix user could figure that out  ;)

 

I wanted to run Emby on a VM because I would rarely have need for trancoding but going by what others have said in this thread, I'm not even gonna waste my time unless someone can tell me there is a setting to keep Emby from stealing all of the CPU cycles it wants when it's transcoding.

Edited by jeffshead
Link to comment
Share on other sites

Deathsquirrel
<I demand this>

 

They've added a control to block transcoding of audio and video as a user permission.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

PHPpro

They've added a control to block transcoding of audio and video as a user permission.

 

 

We don't want media blocked, we want transcoding disabled. This means playing the media regardless of whether Emby thinks the client supports it.

Edited by PHPpro
Link to comment
Share on other sites

maximilianh75

The next server release wont do that anymore

If any posibility to add media info bitrate manually to bypass transcoding in a strm file

Edited by maximilianh75
Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • 2 months later...

Just in case you are counting users that have a demand for a simple "never transcode" server-option. Now you have one more :)

 

This problem can not be solved by having users submitting their problems and examples and mb-dev-team trying to make auto-detection perfect. Auto-detection CAN NEVER be 100% accurate. If this is your path then you are chaising windmills- you can no succeed in this by definition. The transcoding-feature is great, and can be used in many cases, but there MUST be an option to disable it totally.

 

The big question is: Why dont you (dev-team) want to enable a such an option?

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Happy2Play

Just in case you are counting users that have a demand for a simple "never transcode" server-option. Now you have one more :)

 

This problem can not be solved by having users submitting their problems and examples and mb-dev-team trying to make auto-detection perfect. Auto-detection CAN NEVER be 100% accurate. If this is your path then you are chaising windmills- you can no succeed in this by definition. The transcoding-feature is great, and can be used in many cases, but there MUST be an option to disable it totally.

 

The big question is: Why dont you (dev-team) want to enable a such an option?

Well maybe because MKV files won't play on my tv or my Roku doesn't like mpeg2 or DTS-HD MA.  It still comes down to device capabilities.  I understand you have a playback issue with native dlna and play to but you never provided any log so someone can tell you why it is happening or maybe an issue be fixed.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

There's always the way of the Plex Cloud. Upload all the media to Amazon Cloud Drive for £55/year,. and a one-off lifetime Plex Pass subscription, and you never have to worry about any kind of efficiency again. Just upload raw extracts without any transcoding, and you'll be burning somebody else's CPU forever for no cost to you.

 

It's moronic, but it does technically solve the conflict of opinion between misguided belief that capability detection can be made to be always perfect and the desire to direct-stream regardless of detection to conserve the user's own CPU.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Create an account or sign in to comment

You need to be a member in order to leave a comment

Create an account

Sign up for a new account in our community. It's easy!

Register a new account

Sign in

Already have an account? Sign in here.

Sign In Now
×
×
  • Create New...