Media playback error/Most media files are unplayable

[MathBell 0]

Hi,

I am quite new to the digital movie libraries and started using Plex about a month ago. I discovered Emby last week and I am really impressed with the interface. It feels a lot superior to Plex in my opinion.

There is one problem though. Most of the movies in my library are unplayable. I will add a video link below to show the actual problem and the logs. The thing is that the exact same video from the same source plays well on Plex. I really want to make the switch to Emby, but I cannot until I fix this issue.

I am running the Emby server from my personal rig which is equipped with the following components:

-          Cpu: Intel i9-9900k

-          Gpu: Nvidia 2080 Super

-          Main storage: M.2 Nvme SSD WD SN750 1 TB

-          Video storage (emby): WD RED 5400rpm 6GB/s 8 TB

-          Ram: G.Skills Trident Z 64 GB

-          Router: ASUS RT-AC86U

I really doubt the horsepower on my side is the issue. Also, I am paying a premiere membership for both Plex and Emby at the moment. I wish I could pay for a single one and for that one to be Emby but if the problem persist it simply wouldn’t make sense

The weird thing is that I have some movies that work perfectly. But I ripped all of my movies in X265 and the movies that work and don’t work on Emby all work on Plex.

I really am that hoping I am simply doing something wrong and there is an easy fix to this. If you need more information I'll be happy to provided it. This is my first post and I do apologies if I didn't provide all of the information upfront.

Thank you,

Video: https://youtu.be/fOgUPvduF9w

 

 

ffmpeg-transcode-a2fba149-1bd8-406a-8fb1-a2a5f9b6483e_1.txt

[Abobader 3464]

Hello MathBell,

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 42079]

Hi, it looks like your server just can't transcode this one quickly enough. Can you please try lowering the in app quality setting and see if that helps?

[MathBell 0]

2 hours ago, Luke said:

Hi, it looks like your server just can't transcode this one quickly enough. Can you please try lowering the in app quality setting and see if that helps?

I am guessing that the in app quality settings is the speed at which the video is being transcoded since it's the only settings I can find that kind of makes sense. It was at auto and I tried lowering the quality from 160 mbits/s all the way down to 21 mbits/s without success.

I was seeing the same issue without any kind of improvements in any of the settings I've tried. 

I've added two screenshots of the media being played and the info bubble from the server settings page. Thought it might be helpful.

Edited December 31, 2020 by MathBell

[Carlo 4561]

I'm going to take a guess and say you don't have Emby Premiere which means all transcoding is done on the CPU and your nice new GPU is not doing anything for Emby. In Plex the GPU is being used so all your movies playback as the CPU work is offloaded.

Is the server and client on the same network?
I'm wondering why your movie isn't able to direct play on the Shield?

 

[MathBell 0]

8 minutes ago, cayars said:

I'm going to take a guess and say you don't have Emby Premiere which means all transcoding is done on the CPU and your nice new GPU is not doing anything for Emby. In Plex the GPU is being used so all your movies playback as the CPU work is offloaded.

Is the server and client on the same network?
I'm wondering why your movie isn't able to direct play on the Shield?

 

No, as I stated in my original post, I do have an Emby Premiere subscription. The transcoding is being done by the GPU.

Yes, the server and the client are on the same network.

As I understand, and it is important to know that my knowledge in the matter is quite limited, my Shield TV is direct streaming from the LAN.

Edited December 31, 2020 by MathBell

[Carlo 4561]

Sorry went back and re-read things.  Nice machine BTW.

Your screenshot doesn't show the file transcoding but direct streaming.

Are you playing back with subtitles?
Is your shield using WIFI or Ethernet?

On the shield playback the file again and bring up the OSD and click the cog icon then select Stats for Nerds (SFN).  Can you take a screen shot of SFN?

Can you also give us a screenshot of the bottom of the detail screen for the movie that has all the meta-data info shown?

If you playback the exact same file inside of Google Chrome it should be forced to transcode assuming the file is h.265/mkv.  If you do this does it play without pausing/stuttering?

 

[MathBell 0]

On 31/12/2020 at 17:33, cayars said:

Nice machine BTW.

Thanks!

Sorry I am not familiar with any of this and I have to admit that I didn't know what the difference between direct streaming and transcoding was.

No, I disabled all subtitles since I thought that it could be causing the issue.

My shield TV is connected to WIFI, but I can't see why it would be an issue since the same movie works perfectly on Plex.

I attached the picture of the SFN information. Sorry for the picture, my shield tv does not take screenshots apparently. I also attached the metadata for the one movie in particular, but as I stated before, the problem isn't specific to a single movie but to the vast majority of my library if not all of it.

It does the exact same thing within Chrome. The video in my initial post was taken on my computer using chrome, but the picture was taken on my shield TV. I also tried it on my Macbook pro using the application and I am having the same issues.

Edited January 1, 2021 by MathBell

[MathBell 0]

Hi,

New update that might help isolate the problem. I watch two movies yesterday on Emby and they worked perfectly. So I am starting to get quite confused. I believe they are all in the same format but I attached pictures of the properties, the SFN and the metadata for each movies besides the one already uploaded below.

Movie that do not work properly:

The Grinch & Lara Croft : Tomb Raider

Movies that did work without any issues:

Mike and Dave need a wedding date & Underworld 

I tried to find similarities or differences to the movies that do work vs. the ones that don't but I could not. Hopefully you guys can.

If you need more information I'll upload as soon as I get a chance.

I really appreciate anyone who is trying to help me. I really like the software and I'd like to be able to use it to it's full potential!

Thank you,

Mike and Dave's SFN:

Tomb Raider's SFN:

Underworld's SFN:

Edited January 2, 2021 by MathBell

[ebr 16184]

Hi. When you tried setting a lower bitrate maximum you said you only went down to 21Mb.  All the media you are playing are under that rate so the settings changes would have made no difference.

Can you try setting it all the way down to something like 1 or 2 just to see if it plays smoothly?  Then, start raising it slowly until you find the point where it doesn't.

The server is transcoding fast enough (as it should since these are just audio) so there may be a network bottleneck.

[MathBell 0]

Hey ebr,

I lowered it all the way to 1 mbits/s and tried all the settings above it without success. Even at the lowest bitrate the problem stays exactly the same.

I really doubt that it's a network problem since some of the movies in my library work fine and the same movies that do not work on emby work on plex.

[ebr 16184]

It seems there is a discrepancy between the screen shots you are providing and the log you originally provided.  In your screen shots, the server is transcoding plenty fast enough but, in your log, it is not.

Can we look at logs from a new example and also get a description of exactly what happened in the session?

Thanks.

[MathBell 0]

Okay, so I've decided to play a different movie that has issues besides the Grinch and Lara Croft : Tomb Raider that I already showed in a previous video. 

So here is a recording of what the video looks like when being played on my android shield TV or my PC since they pretty much look the same on either but I can't record my tv the same way I do my computer.

I will also provide the log for both the TV playback, the computer playback and the embyserver general log file.

As stated previously, when using Plex, the movie plays without any problems on any system that I own. If it would help for me to record it or if you guys require any additional info just tell me and I'll be happy to provide it. I would really like to get to the bottom of this problem!

P.S. The first and third movie of the resident evil sequel play work like a charm. Didn't try the rest of the series yet.

ffmpeg-remux-8d893d1d-2b17-4781-8bd4-5218d11e3265_1.txt ffmpeg-transcode-0601bda5-caba-4854-b3a1-b557903d4491_1.txt embyserver.txt

Edited January 8, 2021 by MathBell

[Carlo 4561]

What do your settings look like under transcode?

[ebr 16184]

My guess is going to be that the issue in the web app is going to come down to something with hardware transcoding so playing with those options may correct that.   Once you fix that, you will also be able to fix the issue with the remux by either not requiring an audio conversion with settings in the app or by using the Playback Correction option to cause it to transcode like the web app is.

[MathBell 0]

46 minutes ago, ebr said:

My guess is going to be that the issue in the web app is going to come down to something with hardware transcoding so playing with those options may correct that. 

Well you were right!! 

When disabling hardware acceleration, the film plays without any issues which is great but I was wondering if I could isolate it to a particular transcoding process and the problems seems to be with the NVIDIA NVDEC decoders. So I left the setting on advanced and used DX11VA as my preferred decoder. Why?... I'm not sure. Seems to me that it is better to have a decoder than to completely disable the feature but I have no clue. So if you could enlighten me on the subject that would be much appreciated.

Otherwise, everything is working A1 at the moment and I owe it to you guys. Thank you very much to everyone that helped!

Here are my current decoder settings if anyone cares:

[MathBell 0]

 

9 minutes ago, MathBell said:

Well you were right!! 

I spoke too soon. 

Everything works on the computer now which is a step in the right direction. But I am having the exact same issues on my android Shield TV even if I disable transcoding completely.

Any clues?

Edited January 8, 2021 by MathBell

[MathBell 0]

2 hours ago, cayars said:

What do your settings look like under transcode?

Here are my settings prior to trying anything and next is the settings that make it work on the computer but not on the TV.

[Carlo 4561]

What version of nVidia drivers do you have installed?

On my system I have NVDEC in the top spot enabled, and I never have this issue. This is with a 1650 Turing GPU.

How I would test is to renable everything (for the codec being used) then deactive one by one with a test between each.  With a few tests you should find the combination that works for you.

Remember you have both DEcoders and ENcoders sections but from what I usually see it's the Decoders that usually cause green artifact issues.

Edited January 9, 2021 by cayars

[ebr 16184]

13 hours ago, MathBell said:

But I am having the exact same issues on my android Shield TV even if I disable transcoding completely.

Right because it is the stream copy that is the problem there.

14 hours ago, ebr said:

Once you fix that, you will also be able to fix the issue with the remux by either not requiring an audio conversion with settings in the app or by using the Playback Correction option to cause it to transcode like the web app is.

 

[MathBell 0]

I am not sure what you mean by the stream copy is the problem. But as you said, I am able to prevent any artifacts on all of my movies by changing the audio track. Using the playback correction had not effect.

For some reason some movies with 7.1 audio tracks play fine and others don't. Regardless of the transcode options I have set, if I change the audio track to ac3 5.1 it works on the Shield TV. Still doesn't on the PC but if I change the transcode options then it works with any audio tracks on the PC.

Being perfectly honest, I don't quite understand why that is and if anyone is willing to take the time to explain I would be grateful. But, at the moment, I am able to play every movie with a little tweaking which is what I was hoping for.

Thanks to everyone that helped!

[Carlo 4561]

hi, the nutshell view is with using the alternate sound tracks you are likely able to direct play the videos and therefor bypass what causes the problem. As soon as it has to do any transcoding (video or audio) you have the problem with these Hi resolution files likely 10 bit using the encoders/decoders you had setup.

The next version of the server beta will have more ffmpeg changes (ie support HDR to SDR tone mapping for 4K) and it would be appreciated if you could try that version when released in the next week or two to see if it helps with this specific problem as well.

You should in the mean time experiment with the different decoders/encoder settings in the advanced transcoding menu.

[ebr 16184]

You were seeing two separate problems that looked the same.  One was related to deficiencies in the hardware decoders and the other is related to trying to deliver HEVC streams in a certain way.  The first was solved by you disabling the bad decoder and the second is solved by you avoiding delivering that stream in that way (by either transcoding or selecting an audio track or audio settings that will allow direct play).

[MathBell 0]

On 09/01/2021 at 09:44, cayars said:

The next version of the server beta will have more ffmpeg changes (ie support HDR to SDR tone mapping for 4K) and it would be appreciated if you could try that version when released in the next week or two to see if it helps with this specific problem as well.

You should in the mean time experiment with the different decoders/encoder settings in the advanced transcoding menu.

I will. I have the automatic updates enabled but I'll be on the lookout for the update and will try my previous settings that didn't work for me back then.

I'll keep you update with the results in this thread.

[Luke 42079]

Yes regarding hardware transcoding, I would ensure your graphics drivers are up to date.