Live TV Transcoding Crushing CPU

[econ 74]

It seems as though the handling of transcoding within emby has changed somewhat recently.  In my case I am having an issue transcoding Live TV via chrome but see the issue on other devices as well.  In the past I was able to utilize all 3 tuners I have available all at once.  Now I can only watch one at a time.  As soon as I start the 2nd tuner stream I see the CPU max out and both streams start to skip.  Looking at the running processes on the server you see the ffmpeg processes taking about the same about of processing power as they have in the past.  However, now you see embyserver.exe taking up way more processing power that in past builds. What is the reasoning for this additional usage in CPU and can it be better utilized?  On my server nothing has changed hardware wise and it is solely dedicated for emby.  I don't have a monster of a server as others do but am running a decent machine hardware wise -- i5 with 32gb RAM.  This should be able to handle 2+ transcoding streams at a time.

 

One Steam at a time Processes:

 

Two Streams at a time:

Log.txt

ffmpeg2.txt

ffmpeg1.txt

[Luke 42077]

As far as the server process goes, try removing all plugins and seeing if that has an effect. thanks.

[econ 74]

I removed the 2 plugings i have -- roku thumbnails and statistics and see the same high processing from embyserver.exe

[Luke 42077]

Here's what i see for comparison with two simultaneous transcoded live tv streams. 

 

 

FYI - it says dotnet because i'm running in debug mode.

[econ 74]

Yes, that is around what I remember the processing power being around in the past.  As soon as I stop the live tv streams embyserver.exe drops to 0% along with the ffmpeg processes being killed as they should.  It is almost as if the streams are being double transcoded.  

[Luke 42077]

I bet it's because you're using SSL over your local lan.

[econ 74]

Nope, I just switched to the http port and see the same exact cpu usage. 

[Tur0k 148]

Is the setting "Enable throttling" in "server dashboard- transcoding" enabled? Also are you running a third party FFMPEG?

 

 

Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

[econ 74]

Throttling is enabled. However I don’t think it factors in here. Not running a 3rd party ffmpeg.

[econ 74]

Any additional ideas as to why embyserver.exe would be consuming so much cpu? I am running now with no plugins and still see the issue consistently.

[econ 74]

So I finally got around to doing a clean install of windows and emby in an effort to resolve this issue.  I ran a backup/restore of my old server using the plugin and still see the issue.  Then I ran the portable install of emby with ONLY live TV configured and still see emby consuming a ton of CPU.  What could be causing emby to utilize so much CPU?  This was not an issue previously.

[Luke 42077]

does this happen with video files that need transcoding?

[econ 74]

No, when transcoding video files within a library, ffmpeg processes at a high percentage (as it should) and embyserver.exe is at a low percentage (less than 5%, as it should).  This issue is only with live tv.

 

The tuner is a HDHomeRun using a cable card using their latest firmware if it matters. HDHR3-CC  Firmware: 20170930

[econ 74]

In continuing to troubleshoot this issue I have found that it happens in all apps.  It even happens when I am direct playing live tv via emby theater.  Let me know if additional logs as needed as I would like to solve this issue. 

[Luke 42077]

What kind of storage is your transcode temp folder on?

[econ 74]

It is a solid state drive.

[econ 74]

Any additional troubleshooting suggestions? At this point Emby is unusable for live tv unless this is resolved.

[arrbee99 1815]

I realize its probably a dumb idea seeing as you have a Homerun, but would it be worth trying out a TV plug-in like NextPVR or something ?

[econ 74]

Yes, I thought about that. I’ve used serverwmc in the past but was hoping for a fix since I have a paid subscription to schedules direct. I’ll give it a try but am losing hope on a fix.

[Luke 42077]

i have been testing for this but haven't been able to reproduce.

[econ 74]

So I setup NextPVR and I don't see the issue with high CPU usage.  The issue is isolated to Emby's built in support for the HDHomeRun.  @@Luke would it help if I provided logs of NextPVR vs the built in EmbyTV?

 

[econ 74]

Server and ffmpeg logs attached with NextPVR in use.

Log.txt

ffmpeg.txt

[econ 74]

@@Luke is there any rhyme or reason why nextpvr doesn’t increase the CPU usage but the built in EmbyTV does? I know you have been unable to reproduce but I can on multiple machines and am willing to provide additional logs and testing in an effort to resolve.

[Luke 42077]

I'm still unable to reproduce but am continuing to test for this, thanks.

[rfeng33 0]

Have there been any updates on this?  I have a similar setup. My CPU isn't quite as bad but a single stream is causing about 30%CPU utilization off my HDHR tuner.  As soon as I stop the stream I get back to around 5% with a single IPTV stream going.