Many videos are not working on my LG C1 - transcoding is on

Hello,

I have just found serviio as a potential replacement for plex, but I'm having some issues with video playback on my LG C1 tv.

In serviio settings I have enabled transcoding and profile is set to LG TV / player.
Are there any logs to see what kind of encoding is used in case of non working video and if there is a way to force transcoding for that encoding types ?

BR

[atc98092]

The standard Serviio log does not go into that level of detail. You can enable detailed logging and the specifics of the transcoding command will be logged, as well as being able to see if it's not being transcoded at all. But you do need the detailed logging enabled to get that level of detail.

Thank you. I'll look into that.

[Meelis]

Hello,

I have just found serviio as a potential replacement for plex, but I'm having some issues with video playback on my LG C1 tv.

In serviio settings I have enabled transcoding and profile is set to LG TV / player.
Are there any logs to see what kind of encoding is used in case of non working video and if there is a way to force transcoding for that encoding types ?

BR

I have same TV (LG C1). LG is not supporting DTS. It is a TV issue. Maybe you have same problem.

Yes, DTS is not supported. But there are also some video formats that are not supported by TV.

The standard Serviio log does not go into that level of detail. You can enable detailed logging and the specifics of the transcoding command will be logged, as well as being able to see if it's not being transcoded at all. But you do need the detailed logging enabled to get that level of detail.

What should I look for in the logs when the video in played on TV ?

[atc98092]

The standard Serviio log does not go into that level of detail. You can enable detailed logging and the specifics of the transcoding command will be logged, as well as being able to see if it's not being transcoded at all. But you do need the detailed logging enabled to get that level of detail.

What should I look for in the logs when the video in played on TV ?

The detailed log will show what profile is being applied and if transcoding is being performed.

I have attached the log file from serviio running debug mode.
This is simplified setup with just 3 video files for which I know that they do not work on my TV with profile set LG TV / player. But they do work when I have profile set to DirectTV.

I kindlly ask for help on how to read this file, how to extract info what is the reason for video not playing. And how to create profile to fix this.

[atc98092]

OK, I see an attempt to play a video called CCF.avi, and Serviio is not attempting to transcode the video, so according to the LG TV profile it should be a playable file. Since it's not playing, that means the contents of the AVI file is not a compatible codec your TV can play. So to understand better we need to know what's inside your file. See the link in my sig line to help you find out the contents of your file.

I can see what the format is by using VLC. I just tough that it will be visible in the log.

But in case of Direct TV profile it shud be visible what the source format was ?

[atc98092]

The DirecTV profile transcodes everything, even if the player supports the file being played. So that's why it will usually play what doesn't otherwise work. In that log I see an FFMPEG error while it's trying to play but I have no idea the meaning of the errors.

I noticed this time that you're running Serviio on a Linux machine. It's possible there's something "wrong" with the version of FFMPEG you're using, so you might check for an updated version. Serviio installs a known version of FFMPEG under Windows, but on Linux the user is responsible for installing and maintaining FFMPEG.

I have some initial profile configured to handle DTS sound.

  Code:

    <Transcoding>
      <Video targetContainer="mpegts" targetACodec="ac3">
        <Matches container="*" aCodec="dts-hd" />
        <Matches container="*" aCodec="dca" />
      </Video>
    </Transcoding>

The small issue is that if you try to seek forward then the video freezes and the next time you try to play it it wants to continue from the last location, but it doesn't work. By the CPU usage on the server it seems like it's doing something. The only way to fix this is to switch profile and then switch back to my profile. Even stopping server or stooping service altogether doesn't clear the last position.

Is there a setting to always start from beginning when video must be transcoded in any way ?

[atc98092]

The small issue is that if you try to seek forward then the video freezes and the next time you try to play it it wants to continue from the last location, but it doesn't work. By the CPU usage on the server it seems like it's doing something. The only way to fix this is to switch profile and then switch back to my profile. Even stopping server or stooping service altogether doesn't clear the last position.

Is there a setting to always start from beginning when video must be transcoded in any way ?

No, there's no setting in Serviio to alter the way a player works. On my Roku players and Shield players (using Kodi) when I select a title that the player had previously started, it gives me the option of resuming playback or starting from the beginning. But that's something that has to be offered by the player.

You might experiment with a different target container. For the Roku profiles, I had to use AppleHTTP (HLS) as the target container (<Video targetContainer="applehttp" targetACodec="ac3">) for resume to work correctly on those devices. I don't know for certain if LG supports that container, but it doesn't hurt to try different things.

Thank you.

I have some videos with the following codec
VLC: Xvid MPEG-4 Video (XVID)
ffmpeg: Video: mpeg4 (Advanced Simple Profile) (XVID / 0x44495658), yuv420p, 720x304 [SAR 1:1 DAR 45:19], 2499 kb/s, 23.98 fps, 23.98 tbr, 23.98 tbn

Is there a way to mach this codec to transcode the videos?
Judging by this (https://www.serviio.org/index.php?optio ... icle&id=24) it doesn't seem possible.

A good option would be to invert transcoding matches. So transcode anything that is not matched. This way you could specify known working formats and anything else will be transcoded.

[atc98092]

Yeah, I'm not certain if there's a match for XVid. And that is likely what is causing your issue. Depending on the number of files you have with it, I suggest using something like Handbrake and convert them all to H.264 with AC3 audio. Or use an external player that has better codec support, such as the Nvidia Shield or other Android based player.

Thank you.

I'll see what I'll do.
But the inverted match option would be really nice feature in the future.