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"Auto" for Android Mobile over Mobile data or external Wi-Fi issues


Richard Branches

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Richard Branches

The current web app is transcoding all 24 bit FLACs while the current Android app doesn't transcode anything when using mobile data along with "auto", what gives? as far as I can remember it wasn't like this 🤔

Edited by Richard Branches
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Richard Branches

Looks like video playback is also affected, it stutter a lot with the Android app, it's not even taking into account the upload limit set in the server.

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Richard Branches

I noticed something: My internet upload speed is limited to 10Mbps and Emby server upload speed limit is set to 8Mbps, however, the average upload speed I see when I play something doesn't pass beyond 2Mbps, and some videos that are suitable for playing directly within the 8Mbps speed limit stutter because of the average upload speed I'm getting, I don't have any internet issues as of right now so my question is if this is an Emby problem perhaps?

Edited by Richard Branches
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Richard Branches

I can confirm that Auto is failing completely in the Android app, the same video that stutters on the Android app gets transcoded on the web app because it properly detects the bandwidth limitation of the mobile network and the bitrate limitation of the video itself.

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Richard Branches

Turns out the 2Mbps speed is actually the download speed I'm getting from the mobile network, so it's OK in that regard, it's the Android app the one failing with Auto.

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Oh, lots of questions at one time. :)  Next time just edit your last message and add to it if you want.  I'll take a shot and give some very general answers.

3 hours ago, Richard Branches said:

The current web app is transcoding all 24 bit FLACs while the current Android app doesn't transcode anything when using mobile data along with "auto", what gives? as far as I can remember it wasn't like this 🤔

The web app probably can't play back FLAC while android can so that would explain why one transcodes and the other doesn't.

3 hours ago, Richard Branches said:

Looks like video playback is also affected, it stutter a lot with the Android app, it's not even taking into account the upload limit set in the server.

Not enough to go on and I don't want to guess.  Can you give more information on an example?  IE What is the bitrate of the file? Is it direct playing, direct streaming or transcoding? Were you on WIFI on the android app or using the cell network?

3 hours ago, Richard Branches said:

I noticed something: My internet upload speed is limited to 10Mbps and Emby server upload speed limit is set to 8Mbps, however, the average upload speed I see when I play something doesn't pass beyond 2Mbps, and some videos that are suitable for playing directly within the 8Mbps speed limit stutter because of the average upload speed I'm getting, I don't have any internet issues as of right now so my question is if this is an Emby problem perhaps?

This one is tough.  "Average" isn't so meaningful unless you know the encoding of the file.  Was it CBR or ABR encoded?  Basically an average for example of 5Mbps could have lows of 1.5Mbps to highs of 15Mbs (for example) but still "average" a low number.  This can be common in action movies. I don't like to assume or guess so we'll take an actual example and break it down in a bit.

2 hours ago, Richard Branches said:

I can confirm that Auto is failing completely in the Android app, the same video that stutters on the Android app gets transcoded on the web app because it properly detects the bandwidth limitation of the mobile network and the bitrate limitation of the video itself.

OK let's take AUTO out of the equation.  What happens if you set the client to specific bitrate limits?  I say this because "Emby Auto" may not be what you think it is.  If you are thinking adaptive auto, this is not what it is.  I hope that doesn't add more confusion but for those that know what adaptive bitrate adjustment is, it will make sense.

2 hours ago, Richard Branches said:

Turns out the 2Mbps speed is actually the download speed I'm getting from the mobile network, so it's OK in that regard, it's the Android app the one failing with Auto.

This is one of the things we need to check.

So let me ask you to step back to help in diagnostics.  What happens if your Android client is connected to your WIFI network (assuming you have one) and play back these files?  In other words is the problems only on cell network or also on WIFI?  Not a trick question or putting blame on a cell network or upload internet bandwidth. We just want to try and understand YOUR environment so we can help you make adjustments/config changes to help you get the most out of Emby or learn from you to make changes to the code to help others as well.

Carlo

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Right now, the Android mobile app only looks at the device's connection speed in general instead of your server speed to determine it's "auto" setting.  If your bottleneck is at your server or its network, then you will want to manually set the proper bitrate in the app.

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Any way we can get this to take into consideration both the server and user limit set on the server as well ebr?

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3 hours ago, cayars said:

and user limit set on the server

The app does respect any of the settings as far as limit goes. 

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I know it respects the server limits but it doesn't take them into consideration in determining the best client setting does it?

By this I mean if the client has 20Mb connection but the server upload is set at 8Mb will the client take this 8Mb into consideration since it's the maximum the path can handle?

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6 minutes ago, cayars said:

but the server upload is set at 8Mb

If by that you mean the setting in the server for Internet Streaming Bitrate limit then, yes, that will be accounted for and, no matter what the client requests, it will not deliver over this limit.

If, instead, you mean the bandwidth is simply limited to that due to current conditions or the pipe size, then that will not be accounted for.

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Richard Branches

 

Quote

Oh, lots of questions at one time. :)  Next time just edit your last message and add to it if you want.  I'll take a shot and give some very general answers.

OK 👍🏼

Quote

The web app probably can't play back FLAC while android can so that would explain why one transcodes and the other doesn't.

It does, when I play 16bit FLACs they play directly, sometimes they get transcoded depending on how bandwidth is performing at that moment, but 24bit FLACs usually get transcoded because in my current environment bandwidth is not good enough to play them directly, I believe "Auto" is doing great in that regard.

Quote

Not enough to go on and I don't want to guess.  Can you give more information on an example?  IE What is the bitrate of the file? Is it direct playing, direct streaming or transcoding? Were you on WIFI on the android app or using the cell network?

I tested a TV show episode, the bitrate is higher than the upload limitation, on the web app the video gets transcoded because the "media bitrate exceeds limit" as you can see in these screenshots:

server1.png.43dcb16f7b0fdd301bfd818fecfd7b40.png

server2.png.284762fe0bd8ad3b52e7a872e273bf93.png

But the Android app is just playing the video directly, as you can see in this screenshot:

server3.png.8e584d40628027076b687584ad38bf17.png

And this also applies to music, I've been unable to test this with an external Wi-Fi connection but I assume it's the same problem with the Android app.

I think this problem is not new, it has several months actually.

Edited by Richard Branches
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What is the media bitrate you have set for browser use?

What is the media bitrate you have set for Android client use?

Every device can have it's own limits.

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Richard Branches

Really?, where should I check for that? as far as I know everything is set to Auto.

Edited by Richard Branches
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Richard Branches

I just checked, everything is set to Auto as usual.

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You checked that on the Android browser correct?

Can you copy/paste the media info for the show you streamed?

What is the limit you have setup on the server?

I'm a bit puzzled why the server would send a file to direct play if the bitrate exceeds a limit set on the server.

Edited by cayars
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Richard Branches
37 minutes ago, cayars said:

You checked that on the Android browser correct?

Yes.

37 minutes ago, cayars said:

Can you copy/paste the media info for the show you streamed?

Container: mkv
Size: 795MB

Video Audio Subtitle
Title
h.264
Codec
H264
AVC
Yes
Profile
High
Level
40
Resolution
1920x1080
Aspect Ratio
16:9
Anamorphic
No
Interlaced
No
Framerate
23.976
Bitrate
5,113 kbps
Color Primaries
bt709
Color Space
bt709
Color Transfer
bt709
Bit Depth
8 bit
Pixel Format
yuv420p
Reference Frames
1
NAL
4
Title
English AAC 2.0
Language
English
Codec
AAC
Profile
LC
Layout
stereo
Channels
2 ch
Bitrate
192 kbps
Sample Rate
48,000 Hz
Default
Yes
Subtitle
Title
Spanish Subtítulo SubRip
Language
Spanish
Codec
SUBRIP
Default
Yes
Forced
No
External
No

 

59 minutes ago, cayars said:

What is the limit you have setup on the server?

8 Mbps.

1 hour ago, cayars said:

I'm a bit puzzled why the server would send a file to direct play if the bitrate exceeds a limit set on the server.

I guess the Android app is ignoring the upload limit altogether.

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5,113 kbps for the file or 5.1 Mbs. The server is set to 8 Mbps.

Something not asked before.  Was this played over the local LAN or through the Internet or a mix of this?

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Richard Branches
1 minute ago, cayars said:

Was this played over the local LAN or through the Internet or a mix of this?

I don't have any problems playing anything on my library on my LAN, the problem is when using mobile data and probably an external WiFi (I can't test the latter), maybe the file needs to be transcoded not because of that bitrate but because of the network condition which is what I believe Auto is doing correctly using the web app.

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@ebr @Happy2Play

Do either of you guys see why he is getting different results between the Android app and Web Browser on the phone used through the Internet?

He posted some pictures a few posts up (google links).

It might be obvious, but I'm not seeing a reason why the results are different.

 

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Happy2Play
13 minutes ago, cayars said:

@ebr @Happy2Play

Do either of you guys see why he is getting different results between the Android app and Web Browser on the phone used through the Internet?

He posted some pictures a few posts up (google links).

It might be obvious, but I'm not seeing a reason why the results are different.

 

I would guess the Auto algorithm on the client itself (the client connection probing).  Just like I have remote Rokus that do this.  No streaming limit set.

returned limitations snippet
&VideoBitrate=1193282&AudioBitrate=192000
&TranscodeReasons=ContainerBitrateExceedsLimit

item "Bitrate":2631094

-c:v:0 h264_qsv -b:v:0 1193282 -g:v:0 90 -maxrate:v:0 1193282 -bufsize:v:0 2386564

 

As I mention in other Auto topics, I have the user change Auto to client Max quality and throttle them via Streaming limit.

But the devs will have to explain why the client itself Auto is falling to a low bitrate.  

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Well my question was with the server set to 8 Mbps and the file only being 5.1Mbps why is it transcoding VS direct playing?

The transcode reason was that "Media bitrate exceeds limit".

 

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Richard Branches
2 minutes ago, cayars said:

the server set to 8 Mbps and the file only being 5.1Mbps why is it transcoding VS direct playing?

Remember the 2Mbps I mention earlier?, well, I guess that's the reason why it's getting transcoded, I guess Auto knows that's the download speed I'm getting at that very moment so it transcodes the file to a better bitrate to avoid stutter which is what I get with the Android app, it doesn't play smooth.

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