Back up and restore Emby / new installation emby Server on QNAP NAS

[kellerduell 8]

I had to reinstall Emby on my QNAP NAS due to an error and now have Emby Premiere.
I had created a backup beforehand. However, I can't find an option under Backup & Restore to restore the backup. In this description under the link: https://emby.media/support/articles/Backup.html

shows the option to perform a restore, but I can't see it. I also tried to create a new backup, but again, no restore option is displayed afterwards.

Why is the option not displayed?
Or, are there any other ways to restore the backup files?

[Happy2Play 9780]

Probably need to see the server log for when you performed the backup to look for errors but will guess possibly permission.

As for not seeing previous backup, did you configure the plugin to the same folder as previous backup?

May need a screen shot of the Backup and Restore settings.

[kellerduell 8]

Yes, the plugin is configured for the same folder.

I'll attached the screenshot of Backup and Restore and the log-file.
Did this help for further steps?

Or is there another way to restore the backup?

embyserver.txt

Edited November 3, 2025 by kellerduell

[Happy2Play 9780]

55 minutes ago, kellerduell said:

Yes, the plugin is configured for the same folder.

I'll attached the screenshot of Backup and Restore and the log-file.
Did this help for further steps?

Or is there another way to restore the backup?

embyserver.txt 1.95 MB · 0 downloads

Sorry but you don't point to the full backup folder as that is the backup, you point to your Transfer folder that contains the actual backup.

May need to see the content of the folder but correcting the level should show the backup assuming the backupinfo.json file is in /embyserver-backup-full.

Edited November 3, 2025 by Happy2Play

[kellerduell 8]

I created the storage path there so that the backup would be stored there. How can I restore the backup?

[Happy2Play 9780]

3 minutes ago, kellerduell said:

I created the storage path there so that the backup would be stored there. How can I restore the backup?

Point the backup path to the /Transfer folder in the plugin setup assuming all permissions are correct, the backup should show up.

[kellerduell 8]

Thank you for your help. That worked for me! 

[Bartype 3]

Hi,

 

i am running Emby on one Qnap NAS, running QTS and configuring Emby on a new Qnap nas running QuTS hero. I try to restore only the user data and stats, leaving the rest of the new server as clean as possible. I have configured on both old and new nas the backup plugin to the same configured share path on both Nasses. Then made a backup on the old nas, copied that backup to the correct folder on the new nas, but there it doesn't show up, no "Restore from backup" and "Extract user data from backup" options. Only when i make a backup on the new nas these options appear AND can i also select the copied backup at "Restore from backup". But at "Extract user data from backup" only the users from the local new backup are shown, while it seems that option is the one to use for what i want...

What can i do to show the right options and users for the correct backup?

 

[Luke 42077]

On 11/17/2025 at 10:47 AM, Bartype said:

Hi,

 

i am running Emby on one Qnap NAS, running QTS and configuring Emby on a new Qnap nas running QuTS hero. I try to restore only the user data and stats, leaving the rest of the new server as clean as possible. I have configured on both old and new nas the backup plugin to the same configured share path on both Nasses. Then made a backup on the old nas, copied that backup to the correct folder on the new nas, but there it doesn't show up, no "Restore from backup" and "Extract user data from backup" options. Only when i make a backup on the new nas these options appear AND can i also select the copied backup at "Restore from backup". But at "Extract user data from backup" only the users from the local new backup are shown, while it seems that option is the one to use for what i want...

What can i do to show the right options and users for the correct backup?

 

@Bartypewe'd have to look at exactly what you did, but it sounds like either you didn't put the backup in the correct place, or the server on the new NAS doesn't have permission to access it.

Can you please show us exactly what you did? Thanks.

[Bartype 3]

Thanks for the reply!

Well i configured the new server backup plugin to a local folder on the new nas to store the backup (i have configured it such that the path is the same for new and old servers) and copied the latest backup from the old server to that path on the new server. This way, the new server doesn't see the backup. But when i make a new backup on the new server, i get the "Restore from backup" and "Extract user data from backup" options. With "Restore from backup" i DO get the option to select the copied backup from the old server. I didn't do an actual restore, so not sure if that works but i don't want to break the new server...

But when i want to use the option "Extract user data from backup" it only shows these from the 'new server backup'...

Edited November 19, 2025 by Bartype

[sa2000 673]

There should only be the set of backups from the old server under the backup and restore base path

The user data is extracted from the full backup 

So remove all the new server backups and only keep the old server backups

If these are not seen by the backup and restore plugin, then please provide screenshots of the top folder and folders below it and also the backup/restore configuration page and get the emby server log for when trying to do the restore and the backup is not found

 

[Bartype 3]

I fixed it by mounting the old server backup path to the new one and restored the users states from there. That worked for me! I only had to set all the user passwords again, and profile pictures are not there either, but that's not a big deal...

Thank you all for your help!

 

[kellerduell 8]

Unfortunately, after installing the update, some media, whether movies or series, cannot be played.

I already deleted the movie folder from the library and re-added it. Unfortunately, the error persists. It's strange because some can be played and some cannot. Is the path to the media correct?

When I try to play media that won't play, a background image from another movie or TV show appears between the playback attempt and the error message.

embyserver.txt

What could be causing this error and how can I fix it?

ffmpeg-transcode-c76be7c4-686b-49b3-8d46-7a4f2818482c_1.txt

[Luke 42077]

Are you able to update to 4.9.1.90? Does that help?

[kellerduell 8]

I updated it to 4.1.90 but it doesn't help. Nothing changed. Still the same problem.
How can this problem solved?

[sa2000 673]

On 30/11/2025 at 20:26, kellerduell said:

I updated it to 4.1.90 but it doesn't help. Nothing changed. Still the same problem

Lets get a fresh and complete set of logs and details of what is not working.

In the initial logs provided for the 28th November, there were a number of playbacks and it is not clear to me which ones and which streaming you are actually referring to as the problem

The logs show DLNA Server served media from Emby to LG Smart TV. Is the issue relating to DLNA Server or was this unrelated?

There was only 1 ffmpeg log supplied but there were a number of playbacks that required transcoding.

The ffmpeg log shows playback of "The Accountant" at 11:47 and hardware transcoding failed to initialize and the server switched to software transcoding. This was related to the Emby DLNA server with the movie played back on the LG Smart TV - reason for transcode was due to subtitles. We appeared to transcode for about 20 minutes - so probably this was not a problem.

The embyserver log shows failures relating to subtitle fonts for playback of Shogun S01E01. The error relates to this font "metadata/SubtitleFonts/Gandhi_Sans_Makron_Edit_Bold.53600.ttf"

The process that was running was "SubtitleFontsManager" - i am not sure if there would be any logs relating to that in the logs folder. 

Was this "Gandhi_Sans_Makron_Edit_Bold.53600.ttf" font one that was available before the backup restore? Is there a "EmbyServer/programdata/metadata/SubtitleFonts" directory?

For the fresh set of diagnostics, suggest enabling debug logging on the server (settings / logs / settings), restart the server to get fresh logs and then do the tests to reproduce the problems - noting down times and what was being streams and what the issue was

Also establish if the problem relates to subtitles or specific types of subtitles and if playback is ok without subtitles - again please note down the time and what was being played so this can be checked in the logs

Then please download and attach all the log files that relate to the time of the test covering period from launch of the server and give details of the tests and outcomes with times and what was being played and how eg if dlna or not.

thanks

 

 

[Luke 42077]

Right, please provide a log example from 4.9.1.90. Thanks.

[kellerduell 8]

Please excuse the delayed response.

 

I noticed that the ‘Trailer’ plugin was causing the problems, so I uninstalled it.

Now the films and series are running again without any error messages being displayed.

[sa2000 673]

20 hours ago, kellerduell said:

I noticed that the ‘Trailer’ plugin was causing the problems, so I uninstalled it.

Thanks for the feedback

Was it the Trailers plugin available in the Emby Plugins Catalogue?

 

If it was this plugin, do you recall which of the settings you had enabled ?

• Movie Trailer Archive
• New and upcoming in Theaters

 

[kellerduell 8]

Yes, that was the plugin, named "Trailers".

If I remember it correctly, only the setting "Movie Trailer Archive" was enabled.

[sa2000 673]

55 minutes ago, kellerduell said:

Yes, that was the plugin, named "Trailers".

If I remember it correctly, only the setting "Movie Trailer Archive" was enabled.

And to clarify what was going wrong - see my questions in my earlier post here

Was it Emby DLNA Server playback to an LG TV ?

Was it relating to use of subtitles?

Are errors mentioning this still appearing in the embyserver log file?

Gandhi_Sans_Makron_Edit_Bold.53600.ttf

and is there a directory in this path named SubtitleFonts? "EmbyServer/programdata/metadata/SubtitleFonts" 

[kellerduell 8]

embyserver (2).txtffmpeg-remux-78ee5b8b-72af-4100-afdf-68749e22f5cf_1.txt

You will find the log files in the attachment.

I accessed the films or series via the LG TV. However, the error also occurred when I tried to access them via the browser or the Android app.

The error had nothing to do with subtitles.

 

Yes, there is a folder in the following path:

/share/CE_CACHEDEV1_DATA/.qpkg/EmbyServer/programdata/metadata/SubtitleFonts

 

Since the ‘Trailers’ plugin was removed, there have been no more errors.

[sa2000 673]

23 minutes ago, kellerduell said:

I accessed the films or series via the LG TV. However, the error also occurred when I tried to access them via the browser or the Android app.

The embyserver log was for the 9th December - Dec 9 23:59 to Dec 10 13:27

I believe you had already removed the trailers plugin. 

The transcoder log is for the 2025-12-07 22:02 but does not show any errors. 

The embyserver log has loads of errors relating to uPnP automatic port mapping - they make the log very noise and difficult to look at. Do you have remote access setup ? Do you have manual port forward in the router ? You could disable the emby server network setting for automatic port mapping and that would stop these errors occurring periodically in the log.

Anyway, if you have some time to reproduce the issue again, I can have a look at fresh logs - preferably without the DLNA playback and giving details of what was being streamed and what the erorr was and what time - and you could also have debug logging enabled on the server beforehand.

 

 

[Luke 42077]

@kellerduell?

[kellerduell 8]

Hello and Happy New Year! :-D

 

Please excuse the delayed response. I had already removed the trailer plug-in, which resolved the issue.

I will see if I can reproduce the error and then provide the logs.

 

I can access the NAS where Emby is hosted directly via the console. Or I can access it in the local network via browser or app. To my knowledge, uPnP is active in the router.