automatic quality detection for playback not working

[runtimesandbox 171]

I know this has been raised in the past but for quite a long time it has been working fine. I am now having trouble with devices on my local emby network not defaulting to the highest quality copy of a movie or tv show.

I have multiple versions of a film with the quality appended to the end of the file name ie

- Movie Name (2021) [1080p]
- Movie Name (2021) [4k]

On my network local to emby, I have a number of nvidia shield devices. These used to all default to the 4k version of films when available. Ever since the upgrade to the latest stable emby server 4.6.4.0 this has not worked and they all default to 1080p. I do still get the drop down option in the app to select 4k.

I have checked all my settings and nothing seems to have changed. the device is correctly identified as on the local network

[Carlo 4561]

Hi, Check out this KB article for the proper naming of multi-versions.

https://support.emby.media/support/solutions/articles/44001159102-movie-naming

[MBSki 1114]

49 minutes ago, cayars said:

Hi, Check out this KB article for the proper naming of multi-versions.

https://support.emby.media/support/solutions/articles/44001159102-movie-naming

What does naming have to do with selection of the best quality for the client device? I think that was covered in a different thread recently and it was noted that Emby doesn't really pick the best quality for the client device. Not at the moment at least. 

[Carlo 4561]

If you don't setup the multiple version of the movie so that they are recognized as the same movie and show up in a drop down selection then Emby won't try to select between the two to find the best version.

[runtimesandbox 171]

I was previously told that the [4k] format was accepted for this. I have also tested and renaming to the convention listed on the wiki still has the same issue

 

9 minutes ago, mbarylski said:

What does naming have to do with selection of the best quality for the client device? I think that was covered in a different thread recently and it was noted that Emby doesn't really pick the best quality for the client device. Not at the moment at least. 

it's a real shame as it used to work really well. do you have a link to the thread?

[Luke 42080]

It's possible that the 1080p version can direct play, and the 4k version can't. Or that the 1080p version can play more efficiently. That will affect the version selection.

We've never said it would pick the highest quality version on the local network. We've only said that automatic on the local network will not restrict the quality based on bitrate. The version selection is not just about bitrate, it's about which version can play the most efficiently.

But we'd have to look at a specific example, otherwise we're just generalizing:

 

[MBSki 1114]

2 minutes ago, runtimesandbox said:

I was previously told that the [4k] format was accepted for this. I have also tested and renaming to the convention listed on the wiki still has the same issue

 

it's a real shame as it used to work really well. do you have a link to the thread?

Here's the thread. Multiple Versions of a Movie - Emby Server - Emby Community. ebr says the same thing Luke just said. It picks the first version that can direct play, which isn't my preference, but that's the way it works. 

[runtimesandbox 171]

Hi Luke,

Both files direct play on the nvidia shield (whole reason for getting a shield was the ability to direct play everything) - bit rate shouldn't be an issue either as everything is hard wired 1gb/s.

If they are both direct play, surely one is not going to be more efficient than the other from an emby perspective?

[Carlo 4561]

50 minutes ago, runtimesandbox said:

Hi Luke,

Both files direct play on the nvidia shield (whole reason for getting a shield was the ability to direct play everything) - bit rate shouldn't be an issue either as everything is hard wired 1gb/s.

If they are both direct play, surely one is not going to be more efficient than the other from an emby perspective?

Try this for one movie as a test.  Remove both versions and rescan your library.

Then add only the 4K version so it's the first movie.  Rescan library.
Now add the 2nd movie and rescan again.

Now check and see if it will choose the 4K version automatically for you.

[runtimesandbox 171]

40 minutes ago, cayars said:

Try this for one movie as a test.  Remove both versions and rescan your library.

Then add only the 4K version so it's the first movie.  Rescan library.
Now add the 2nd movie and rescan again.

Now check and see if it will choose the 4K version automatically for you.

This still shows the 1080p version first.

@Luke any plans to improve playback detection / file selection?

Any reason this would have changed between server versions as this did use to work on the nvidia shields very well

[Happy2Play 9781]

I don't know the difference but I see different results in this area on my test system from 4.6.4.0 to 4.7.0.x for selected version.  But this is only looking from the web client perspective.

4.7 is not defaulting to 1080p versions like 4.6.4.0.

[Carlo 4561]

19 minutes ago, Happy2Play said:

4.7 is not defaulting to 1080p versions like 4.6.4.0.

That's good isn't it?

[Happy2Play 9781]

1 minute ago, cayars said:

That's good isn't it?

I could careless but just pointing out there is different behavior in the next release.  So to the question "any plans to improve playback detection / file selection", I would say it is already there.  But have only looked at this from a browser perspective.

[runtimesandbox 171]

18 hours ago, Happy2Play said:

I could careless but just pointing out there is different behavior in the next release.  So to the question "any plans to improve playback detection / file selection", I would say it is already there.  But have only looked at this from a browser perspective.

Not sure that is actually any different to now, just tried emby web on my laptop and that does default to 4k (on the current stable server)

[Happy2Play 9781]

20 minutes ago, runtimesandbox said:

Not sure that is actually any different to now, just tried emby web on my laptop and that does default to 4k (on the current stable server)

But the online line web client is not using the same stable code, so Emby Web 4.6.4.0 is not the same as Emby Web 4.6.4.23.

[Guest]

On 8/9/2021 at 10:50 AM, runtimesandbox said:

- Movie Name (2021) [1080p]

- Movie Name (2021) [4k]

 

Don't you need the hyphen "-" between the year and the version?

[runtimesandbox 171]

6 minutes ago, generiq said:

Don't you need the hyphen "-" between the year and the version?

Even deleting from the library and readding in that format does not fix this issue. But it does work without the dash

[Guest]

Just now, runtimesandbox said:

Even deleting from the library and readding in that format does not fix this issue. But it does work without the dash

But for versioning to work as it's designed to, you need the hyphen. What was the result with the hyphen in place?

[Happy2Play 9781]

6 minutes ago, generiq said:

But for versioning to work as it's designed to, you need the hyphen. What was the result with the hyphen in place?

The bracket option use to be in the KB but believe Luke has move away from it.  Haven't tested recently but believe it still works.

[Guest]

8 minutes ago, Happy2Play said:

The bracket option use to be in the KB but believe Luke has move away from it.  Haven't tested recently but believe it still works.

But I am interested to see what happens when using the format shown in the wiki.

[runtimesandbox 171]

The result using the format in the wiki has the same result. 

I tested by removing the movie from emby, rebooting the server, renaming the media and then rescanning the media library

[Luke 42080]

@runtimesandbox have your questions been answered?