Playback fails when client has iGPU

[yikesezxd 2]

I have Emby premiere, using the Emby App. Playback is perfect on smart tvs, computers, and mobile devices. But for some reason it seems if I have a windows device with an iGPU, playback is impossible. It just fails.

At first, I thought it was an H.265 issue, but after downloading the extension from microsoft stored and verifying the hardware of the devices supported H.265 (they indeed did), I was still having the same problem.

I tried to playback H.264 and no, I found out that NO playback works. So I'm a bit lost for words. I downloaded Emby diagnostics so I could test/temporarily force transcoding, and still no luck.

I have no idea what the issue could be. The devices I'm testing them on are not old at all. They're pretty high end even (one of them I built). There's a laptop and a mini desktop, the only correlation I can draw is that they both have iGPU and are Windows devices. My Windows gaming PC with a dedicated GPU can use Emby flawlessly.

 

 

[Abobader 3464]

Hello yikesezxd,

** This is an auto reply **

Please wait for someone from staff support or our members to reply to you.

It's recommended to provide more info, as it explain in this thread:

Thank you.

Emby Team

[Luke 42077]

 

Hi there, let's look at an example. Please attach the information requested in how to report a media playback issue. Thanks!

 

[yikesezxd 2]

embyserver (6).txtffmpeg-transcode-78d97ec1-2800-4c62-9716-0cb74b476f29_1.txt

Here is the ffmpeg transcode log for the instance the client device in question attempted playback and the server log that proceeded it. I have also attached the error popup that the client gets.

[yikesezxd 2]

I know this isn't definitive, I always question AI as it tends to hallucinate more often than not, but while I was waiting for a response, I had AI take a look at the logs. It was able to identify a subtitle transcode issue of some kind, and so I came up with the idea of forcing subtitle burning in on the server side (via Emby Dianostics plugin) and that seemed to have fixed the issue for me. Take it with a grain of salt though, the reasoning it gave made me question the true cause of the problem, but regardless this will do for now. I would still like a more straightforward fix though, since Emby diagnostics settings do not persist beyond server Restarts.

[Lessaj 467]

The reason it's transcoding is due to a bitrate limit, is this a local device? It seems to think it's remote, so just checking. The file's bitrate is pretty high at 18.2 Mbit but it's being transcoded all the way down to I think a little over 700 Kbps at 640x362. Does this even need to be transcoded? The windows app should be able to direct play this.

[yikesezxd 2]

When I made the change of forcing subtitle burn in on the server side, things started working but I saw it was low res (720p) at a very low mbps. I then realized this setting specification was from a previous troubleshooting session, that I simply had forgotten to revert. Changing it to 1080p 60mbps, and even testing 4k 200mbps worked fine. I believe this only indicates that the resolution and what you described is unrelated to the playback issue. Simply I had the resolution/quality setting set that way client side and forgot to revert.

Transcoding shouldn't be necessary from my understanding. The files I have contain a lot of complex ASS subtitle files, it seems that may be causing an issue in someway---- which is odd since other windows devices can process them fine. To be noted that the only windows devices ive tested with success have a dedicated GPU.

Also yes, this is a local device.

Edited January 29 by yikesezxd

[RanmaCanada 494]

I've run into this issue on my 6500T test system (iGPU only as it's a micro), and the only way I could fix it was to use the web browser, or the old git hub build of Emby Theatre as the Emby Theatre from the MS store refused to play anything at all. I do not have the issue on my main desktop that has a 3080.

[yikesezxd 2]

Web browser isn't an option to me, since it's so much slower than the app. I highly recommend downloading diagnostic options plugin. It exposes a lot of settings that, really, should be exposed by default. While a lot of the settings are not persistent on server restart, the one that solved my issue actually was persistent and saved beyond restarts.

Subtitle Options --> Delivery Preference --> Force subtitle burn in on the server-side. If that doesn't solve it for your case, there's other things you could mess with in there that might help.

[yikesezxd 2]

@Lukethe plugin aside, is there anything within base Emby to address the issue of iGPU setups not being able to do playback properly?