Tone mapping query - disable VAAPI or QuickSync?

[fireplex 12]

Hi,

I run emby in a docker under unRAID and have an Intel i7 7700 with QuickSync support passing through /dev/dri successfully.

Do I need to disable VAAPI or QuickSync in one of these options below? and presumably I leave software tone mapping off as hardware is enabled?

Thanks!

[sross44 431]

I'm running on unRAID as well. I have my settings exactly the same. However on the first transcoding tab, I have all of the VAAPI options unchecked like below. Let me know if you have any issues with transcoding and tonemapping and I'll be more than happy to help. 

 

[fireplex 12]

Hi,

Thanks for replying.

I must be blind but cannot spot the "first transcoding tab" or the options you posted

I just see two tabs under Server-> Transcoding, Transcoding or Tone Mapping:

[Lessaj 467]

Transcoding is the first tab being referred to here. Have to set "Enable hardware acceleration when available" to Advanced to get the checkbox options.

[fireplex 12]

2 minutes ago, Lessaj said:

Transcoding is the first tab being referred to here. Have to set "Enable hardware acceleration when available" to Advanced to get the checkbox options.

Ah, I had set HW acceleration to yes rather than advanced, thanks

[sross44 431]

55 minutes ago, fireplex said:

Ah, I had set HW acceleration to yes rather than advanced, thanks

Yes sorry, I should have mentioned to have it set on advanced like @Lessajmentioned. 

[RanmaCanada 496]

I think you might have to disable quicksync as hardware tonemapping wasn't added until Tiger Lake.  I could be wrong though as softworkz is a wizard when it comes to coding dependencies that aren't officially supported.

[fireplex 12]

Hmm, Plex can do it on Kaby lake (my CPU) so I guess emby would also?

[VDB01 0]

Jumping on this post. What are your thoughts about the performance of QuickSync vs VAAPI?

[RanmaCanada 496]

On 16/02/2024 at 04:39, fireplex said:

Hmm, Plex can do it on Kaby lake (my CPU) so I guess emby would also?

No as both programs use different custom builds of ffmpeg.  

[sross44 431]

2 hours ago, VDB01 said:

Jumping on this post. What are your thoughts about the performance of QuickSync vs VAAPI?

QuickSync has much better performance over VAAPI. At least in my experience that's the case. Usually quicksync is the way to go. 

[softworkz 5068]

On 2/16/2024 at 4:23 AM, RanmaCanada said:

I think you might have to disable quicksync as hardware tonemapping wasn't added until Tiger Lake.  I could be wrong though as softworkz is a wizard when it comes to coding dependencies that aren't officially supported.

It is correct that the fixed-function tone mapping was only added in more recent iGPU models, but we support hardware tone mapping via OpenCL, which works with both, QuickSync and VAAPI. QuickSync is generally preferable (faster + better encoding).

[softworkz 5068]

On 2/15/2024 at 5:32 PM, fireplex said:

I run emby in a docker under unRAID and have an Intel i7 7700 with QuickSync support passing through /dev/dri successfully.

Do I need to disable VAAPI or QuickSync in one of these options below? and presumably I leave software tone mapping off as hardware is enabled?

No, you don't need to disable anything here. Which one is used depends on the hw encoder (that's why others have mentioned the other tab for choosing encoders/decoders).

There are cases where hardware tone mapping would be inefficient, like in case of transcoding operations which can only be done in software and the data would need to be copied back and forth between CPU and GPU mem. In that case, no tone mapping would happen when you disable software tone mapping. 
Also, hw tanscoding can always fail for many reasons, where Emby falls back to sw transcoding and then it's relevant which choice you made for sw tone mapping. You should try it out and see how it works out on your system. If it's too slow, you should better disable it, as without sw tone mapping you get better sw transcoding performance. If your system is capable, you can leave it enabled to be sure to have tone mapping even in cases with sw fallback.

What this setting doesn't do, is having Emby perform sw tone mapping instead of hw tone mapping when hw tone mapping would be possible (and is enabled), so no need to worriy about that.

[Luke 42080]

Has everyone's questions been answered?