Help with Emby server build

[enforcersu 1]

Hey Guys -

 

I've been running Emby on my HTPC that I have nPVR, Comskip and MCE Buddy running on.  I've been having some real bad issues when trying to add a stream to this mix from this system with Emby (using 100% CPU even if I have Nvidia Hardware Acceleration enabled).  Lots of skipping.

 

System specs:

i5 6600K, 16GB ram, NVIDIA gtx 1060

 

Since I've been having issues transcoding on this system, I was thinking about building a dedicated Emby server so that I'm able to have multiple streams running (some remote).

 

I was wondering what you guys have setup for this, and any tips you might have?

 

Thanks!

 

(Apologies if this isn't the right place to ask!)

[legallink 187]

What is causing the 100% CPU usage? Is it all the time or some of the time? If you are transcoding/stripping commercials, I would just do that when you are sleeping and not in prime viewing time.

[Jdiesel 1114]

With Emby that CPU should be able to handle at least 8 simultaneous 1080p transcodes. If using hardware acceleration, I think VA API would be best, you could do even more I suspect.

Edited December 11, 2016 by Jdiesel

[enforcersu 1]

With Emby that CPU should be able to handle at least 8 simultaneous 1080p transcodes. If using hardware acceleration, I think VA API would be best, you could do even more I suspect.

Really?  I'm on Windows 10 if that matters...hadn't heard of VA API so wasn't sure what it was (and wasn't sure if it would have been best to use quicksync or NVIDIA's transcoding).

 

Emby Server and ffmpeg account for ~80% of my CPU usage any time I'm trying to stream anything.  The other 20% comes from nPVR recording service and comskip (running while recording in nPVR).

 

I could change the nPVR settings to post process the commercials, or just rely on MCE Buddy to run this overnight...but I've still not been able to get Emby to reliably stream without eating all of my resources.  Perhaps I have hardware acceleration set up incorrectly?

[Jdiesel 1114]

Unless things have changed Nvidia hardware acceleration NVENC was limited to 2 or 3 simultaneous threads. VA API is a manufacturer independent library that has lots of potential. I have noticed that FFmpeg will eat up all my CPU cycles when transcoding by converting the video as fast as it can even if it doesn't need to, thankfully there is the option in Emby to throttle the transcoding to reduce CPU load. Maybe that is why you are seeing the high CPU load now.

[Guest plexman]

Check my post here, my setup is similar to yours and I can tanscode a lot of simultaneous streams with the IGPU and VA-API.

https://emby.media/community/index.php?/topic/31174-hardware-encoding-on-ubuntu-server/page-5

[enforcersu 1]

Check my post here, my setup is similar to yours and I can tanscode a lot of simultaneous streams with the IGPU and VA-API.

https://emby.media/community/index.php?/topic/31174-hardware-encoding-on-ubuntu-server/page-5

Thanks!  I did see your post when searching the forums before, but it seems you're on ubuntu, whereas i'm on Windows 10.  Can I do something similar on Windows 10?  (sorry for the newbie question)

[Guest plexman]

Thanks!  I did see your post when searching the forums before, but it seems you're on ubuntu, whereas i'm on Windows 10.  Can I do something similar on Windows 10?  (sorry for the newbie question)

 

Well I don't really know about Windows, but I imagine that you should find a ffmpeg.exe compiled with the libVA (VA-API) library. Because I suppose that drivers of the IGPU come by default with the OS. Anyways, google and investigate because I can't tell you anything more.

[legallink 187]

If your usage is really ffmpeg and emby, then there are a lot of steps you can do to minimize that usage.  I have a 2500k cpu and no graphics card in my system (other than the gpu on the cpu), and I can transcode up to 3 streams at any given time.  You should be able to do more.

 

From  a practical standpoint, I have pre-transcoded almost all of my media, and the user experience is just sooo much better.  It isn't even close.  Everything from searching in a file, to ff and rw, to time to play, if you can avoid transcoding, I can't recommend it enough.

[Guest asrequested]

Something to remember is that CPUs like Intel Core, cann have dynamic frequencies. So if you see that it's running at 100% doesn't necessarily mean that it's maxed. Often I look at mine and it'll say 90% or something like that, but when I look at the frequency, it'll keep changing and not getting anywhere near it's max (i7 6700k). Each CPU will behave a little differently. I have a new i5 6500 in one machine and a year old i7 6700k in the server. They behave differently. The i7 will drop the clock to almost zero, but with the i5 the clock always runs high, but always seems to handle whatever I throw at it.