No access to Emby on Asustor

[MadMeddler 1]

Interestingly, I get an error with that command:

chmod: invalid mode 'emby:emby'

---

If I do a cat /etc/group

root:x:0:emby
users:x:100:admin
avahi:x:200:
netdev:x:201:
chhome:x:998:
administrators:x:999:admin,MDLAdmin
nogroup:x:65534:guest
audio:x:203:
External:x:1011:
as-webserver:x:300:
emby:x:199:

@alucrydYou must be right that this is a permission thing. But I can't see where it seems to be borked.

[TMCsw 246]

2 hours ago, alucryd said:

Please stop the server,  run `sudo chmod -R emby:emby /home/emby`

I believe he meant `sudo chown -R emby:emby /home/emby`

[MadMeddler 1]

@TMCswThanks for that. However, even after that command is run, I still get error:

sudo: unable to execute /usr/local/AppCentral/emby-server/bin/emby-server: Permission denied

[TMCsw 246]

2 hours ago, MadMeddler said:

sudo: unable to execute /usr/local/AppCentral/emby-server/bin/emby-server: Permission denied

Curious, what do you get with this command `ls -lah /usr/local/AppCentral/emby-server/bin/emby-server` and `namei -mo /usr/local/AppCentral/emby-server/bin/emby-server'

I don't have an asustor so i'm not familiar with the directory structure for emby-server on that but that error seems to indicate you may need to do the same for that directory structure `sudo chown -R emby:emby /usr/local/AppCentral/emby-server` but before doing that you may want to wait for @alucryd, @Luke...to confirm if this is safe...

It does seem that someone/something has tampered these (and maybe others) permissions on the system.

Edited July 29, 2025 by TMCsw

[MadMeddler 1]

@TMCsw

ls -lah /usr/local/AppCentral/emby-server/bin/emby-server
-rwxr-xr-x    1 root     root         952 May 21 12:51 /usr/local/AppCentral/emby-server/bin/emby-server*

namei is coming back as a bad command unfortunately.

I'll hang on for one of those guys before I pull the chown trigger

[TMCsw 246]

1 hour ago, MadMeddler said:

'll hang on for one of those guys before I pull the chown trigger

Reasonable choice... looking deeper probably will not help anyway...

1 hour ago, MadMeddler said:

namei is coming back as a bad command unfortunately.

Guess you need to install it by a quick search:

sudo opkg update
sudo opkg install coreutils

then retry. `namei -mo /usr/local/AppCentral/emby-server/bin/emby-server'

But it looks like there many more NAS problems. 

BTW What was the exact command that gave you this?:

6 hours ago, MadMeddler said:

sudo: unable to execute /usr/local/AppCentral/emby-server/bin/emby-server: Permission denied

 

[MadMeddler 1]

The command that generated that error was:

sudo -u emby /usr/local/AppCentral/emby-server/bin/emby-server

And now I'm off to bed. Emby is running (as root) and that's ok with me for now.

I'm building a Proxmox server separately to house my Emby/Media library and will be glad to use the NAS purely as a backup device.

This was the kick in the pants I needed to get it done. The NAS is now on life support from Asustor anyways, so time to move on I guess.

Regards

Michael

[alucryd 315]

@TMCswis right, I meant `chown`, apologies.

Permissions on the executable itself look right, it should belong to root:root. This error could also happen if `/bin/sh` (which is set as shebang) doesn't work but that seems highly unlikely.

Can you locate sh using `which sh`, then run `ls -lah` on the path it returns, and also try to run `sh` itself?

Finally can you run `strings /usr/local/AppCentral/emby-server/system/EmbyServer | grep ld-linux` and `ls -lah /usr/local/AppCentral/emby-server/system/EmbyServer`?

Edited July 30, 2025 by alucryd

[MadMeddler 1]

@alucryd

which sh
/bin/sh

strings /usr/local/AppCentral/emby-server/system/EmbyServer | grep ld-linux
lib/ld-linux-x86-64.so.2

ls -lah /usr/local/AppCentral/emby-server/system/EmbyServer
-rwxr-xr-x    1 root     root       74.7K May 21 12:51 /usr/local/AppCentral/emby-server/system/EmbyServer*

[alucryd 315]

Thanks! One last check please, `ls -lah /lib64/ld-*`.

[MadMeddler 1]

ls -lah /lib64/ld-*
-r-xr-xr-x    1 UNCUser  1000      157.8K Jul 17 06:56 /lib64/ld-2.27.so*
lrwxrwxrwx    1 UNCUser  1000          10 Dec 24  2020 /lib64/ld-linux-x86-64.so.2 -> ld-2.27.so*

UNCUser is an account I set up specifically for Samba shares, not sure I even use it any more, but it's been there for years.

[alucryd 315]

Don't think that's the issue either, mine is just 1000:1000 but it's just that I don't have a user with uid 1000. Everything appears fine, not sure where to go from there, apart from reinstalling from scratch. Running as root isn't going to hurt anything, and if you're fine with that solution until you've migrated to Proxmox I guess we can leave it at that.

[MadMeddler 1]

Yeah, I think that's where we're at.

As I say, I don't restart the NAS very often - and the restart function within Emby Dashboard still works for updates to Emby.

I have the three commands from the start-stop.sh, modified to use the root account in a txt file on my desktop for when I need to start it manually. Not the biggest deal in the world.

Thank you all for your efforts, at least I have working Emby instance - sub-optimal, but still working fine. Time for me to start reading up about migrating to a new Emby instance I think.

Regards and thanks again.

Michael

[Mountainmanwyo 1]

When I use the command above I get this:

sudo: unknown user emby /usr/local/AppCentral/emby-server/bin/emby-server

sudo: error initializing audit plugin sudoers_audit

 

This is the command from page 1. I had not refreshed my page when making this post.

 

Edited August 1, 2025 by Mountainmanwyo

[Luke 42077]

On 7/30/2025 at 5:21 AM, MadMeddler said:

 

Thank you all for your efforts, at least I have working Emby instance - sub-optimal, but still working fine. Time for me to start reading up about migrating to a new Emby instance I think.

Hi, did you do this?

[Mountainmanwyo 1]

No I was not sure on how it all worked and exactly where he did all of it all of it. I did try some of the code but it seemed like some of it was missing or I copied it wrong. 

[Luke 42077]

3 minutes ago, Mountainmanwyo said:

No I was not sure on how it all worked and exactly where he did all of it all of it. I did try some of the code but it seemed like some of it was missing or I copied it wrong. 

OK so you're using the workaround from alucryd?

[Mountainmanwyo 1]

No mine is still not working. 

[FailedTest 0]

Hello,

I have the same issue as MadMeddler and Mountainmanwyo.

New NAS (AS3304Tv2 with ADM 5.0.1.RKD2), so fresh install => unable to access the server on port 8096.
Looking at active processes, I can see that Emby isn't running.
Tried a few things like disabling/enabling Emby Server app, rebooting the NAS, unstalling/reinstalling the app... Nothing.

I then found a few topics here and tried a clean reinstall : uninstall Emby Server, delete user, delete /home/emby, and the reinistall => still the same issue, server isn't running.

So, even if my Linux skills are limited, I tried the manual start proprosed here : sudo -u emby /usr/local/AppCentral/emby-server/bin/emby-server
It gave me : sudo: unable to execute /usr/local/AppCentral/emby-server/bin/emby-server: Permission denied
Yet the permissions seems to be ok : -rwxr-xr-x    1 root     root           951 May 21 13:50 /usr/local/AppCentral/emby-server/bin/emby-server*

If I try to run it with my own account, then no problem, it starts and I can access the interface.
I guess I could create another account just for Emby, but I would preferer to have it running the way it's intended.
And as I'm at least the third with that kind of issue, I suppose there is a bug somewhere that could (should?) be corrected.

BTW, if its useful :
In /etc/passwd => emby:x:199:199:Emby Server:/home/emby:/bin/false
In /etc/group => emby:x:199:
(I wonder if emby should be in emby group, but adding it manually didn't change anything)

Thank you

Edited September 1, 2025 by FailedTest

[Luke 42077]

On 9/1/2025 at 12:28 PM, FailedTest said:

Hello,

I have the same issue as MadMeddler and Mountainmanwyo.

New NAS (AS3304Tv2 with ADM 5.0.1.RKD2), so fresh install => unable to access the server on port 8096.
Looking at active processes, I can see that Emby isn't running.
Tried a few things like disabling/enabling Emby Server app, rebooting the NAS, unstalling/reinstalling the app... Nothing.

I then found a few topics here and tried a clean reinstall : uninstall Emby Server, delete user, delete /home/emby, and the reinistall => still the same issue, server isn't running.

So, even if my Linux skills are limited, I tried the manual start proprosed here : sudo -u emby /usr/local/AppCentral/emby-server/bin/emby-server
It gave me : sudo: unable to execute /usr/local/AppCentral/emby-server/bin/emby-server: Permission denied
Yet the permissions seems to be ok : -rwxr-xr-x    1 root     root           951 May 21 13:50 /usr/local/AppCentral/emby-server/bin/emby-server*

If I try to run it with my own account, then no problem, it starts and I can access the interface.
I guess I could create another account just for Emby, but I would preferer to have it running the way it's intended.
And as I'm at least the third with that kind of issue, I suppose there is a bug somewhere that could (should?) be corrected.

BTW, if its useful :
In /etc/passwd => emby:x:199:199:Emby Server:/home/emby:/bin/false
In /etc/group => emby:x:199:
(I wonder if emby should be in emby group, but adding it manually didn't change anything)

Thank you

@FailedTestthis is probably the issue, but we're trying to figure out what permissions got changed following the ADM update. Asustor has told us that nothing changed.

@Mountainmanwyoare you able to try running it under your own account?

[tedfroop21 86]

On 10/10/2025 at 14:53, Luke said:

@Mountainmanwyoare you able to try running it under your own account?

I would suspect the system took ownership or the permissions were set to the root user somehow.  The emby user is suppressed by the system and not visible in the OS,  the same as other users like Docker and other app owners and only visible from the command line.

I had a similar problem with the server PID file permissions after an ADM update  but just followed a guide on the web and logged into the NAS using Putty and SSH to get to the command line, then set the permissions (or reset them as the case may be.)

If you have set permissions on a linux based system, its exactly the same process and there are plenty of web guides.  IF you followed the Asus recommendations not to use Root or admin accounts, your usual login should get you in and your usual password should be sudo.

Permissions should be emby:emby for the server directory. 

The following should do the trick.....(if your directories are as shown.)

sudo chown -R emby:emby /usr/local/AppCentral/emby-server
sudo chmod 640 -R /usr/local/AppCentral/emby-server

 

 

Edited November 1, 2025 by tedfroop21

[Mountainmanwyo 1]

Asustor finally got mine fixed. He used code to fix the problem. It had to do with force stop and reset of emby. If there is a way to get set code, please let me know I will try to get it and post it. The only problem I am now facing is getting access remotely.

[Luke 42077]

1 hour ago, Mountainmanwyo said:

Asustor finally got mine fixed. He used code to fix the problem. It had to do with force stop and reset of emby. If there is a way to get set code, please let me know I will try to get it and post it. The only problem I am now facing is getting access remotely.

What do you mean by reset?

[Mountainmanwyo 1]

That good sir was the word he used. I am not really sure.