How do I force transcode on the Emby App like in the Kodi addon?

[hedgehog90 19]

In the Emby Kodi addon app, if I long-press an item, among the options is 'Force Transcode', which then brings up a slider to target a specific bitrate.

99% of the time I want to watch my media via Direct Play, but sometimes due to compatibility issues that might affect the playback (as was the case earlier), it's useful to have the option to force it to transcode on the rare occasion that it's necessary.

I use the Emby android app to control another media device with Kodi installed. I cannot find any option in the official app to force transcode a particular item.

The functionality is there, but how do I access it besides using the Kodi addon?

[Luke 42080]

Hi, android doesn't have it, but it will automatically fallback to transcoding when there is a direct play error. What kind of problems lead you to wanting to do this?

[hedgehog90 19]

I use an android box with CoreELEC, it has an issue with some media files with MPEG2 video streams. For whatever reason it makes the audio jump about every 30 seconds or so.

I double checked by manually re-encoding the audio but it didn't help, but when I re-encode the video to h264 it works.
Force transcoding it in the kodi addon also fixed the issue.

It would be cool then if you could make this option available for the Android app, it's very useful in the kodi addon.

Edited October 17, 2021 by hedgehog90

[GrimReaper 4742]

15 hours ago, hedgehog90 said:

'Force Transcode', which then brings up a slider to target a specific bitrate.

Changing in-app quality settings during playback should give you similar result, just select first lower value than item bitrate, it'll trigger transcoding while giving results similar to direct played. 

Downside of this, though, is that it gets remembered for future sessions (as app playback setting), there was recently a similar thread when that issue popped up, gimme a minute to find it. 

Edit:

 

Edited October 17, 2021 by GrimReaper
Link

[hedgehog90 19]

5 minutes ago, GrimReaper said:

Changing in-app quality settings during playback should give you similar result, just select first lower value than item bitrate, it'll trigger transcoding while giving results similar to direct played. 

Downside of this, though, is that it gets remembered for future sessions (as app playback setting), there was recently a similar thread when that issue popped up, gimme a minute to find it. 

Additionally, I would need to know the bitrate to trigger the transcode at the highest bitrate, which isn't ideal.

Also, the resulting transcode would then have a lower bitrate than my original media, and a noticeably lower quality stream as a result. When I want to force transcode something I'm not doing it for bandwidth limitation reasons, so I always pick the highest bitrate so the difference in quality is imperceptible.

Edited October 17, 2021 by hedgehog90

[GrimReaper 4742]

2 minutes ago, hedgehog90 said:

Additionally, I would need to know the bitrate to trigger the transcode, which isn't ideal.

That is a click away as SFN will show you that. 

2 minutes ago, hedgehog90 said:

Also the resulting transcode would have a lower bitrate than my original media, and a noticeably lower quality stream as a result.

As stated:

8 minutes ago, GrimReaper said:

Changing in-app quality settings during playback should give you similar result,

not same, although slightly lower bitrate shouldn't impact that much. Anyway, I understand your desired use-case, was just offering a method that might currently suffice until (if?) other solution becomes available, of course it is up to you whether to make use of it or not. 

[hedgehog90 19]

^ Much appreciated, clarified a few things for me on the conditions for enabling transcoding.