Plex change transcoder tmp folder not working

[dirkme]

Dear FreeNas Friends,

I have plex running in a jail, can access the storage with all movies etc. but when I change the transcoder tmp folder, it doesn't transcode in it.

I tried on FreeNas 11:

1.) added storage to: /media/tmp doesn't show transcoding

2.) went for the real path: /mnt/trust3/dataok/tmp doesn't show transcoding

Anyone knows what is wrong or why Plex doesn't take over the tmp path, or any error of thinking of my part?

I also stopped and restarted the plex plugin, no changes.

 

[SweetAndLow]

Freenas version? What do you expect to happen? Why do you want to change the tmp folder. I assumed that the tmp folder was just something Plex used under the covers.

Sent from my Nexus 5X using Tapatalk

 

[dirkme]

I don't want to run temp transcoding on my good hdds with proper data. I have a good fast drive, where I don't store important data and transcoding destroying it wouldn't be a loss compared destroying a drive with important data (and more capacity/expensive)

On my old Centos 7 server, i got a tmp ram disk and all the encoding happens in ram, no stress on any hdd.

 

[dirkme]

Freenas version? What do you expect to happen? Why do you want to change the tmp folder. I assumed that the tmp folder was just something Plex used under the covers.

Sent from my Nexus 5X using Tapatalk

FreeNas 11, updated my question and included FreeNas version.

 

[danb35]

I don't want to run temp transcoding on my good hdds with proper data.

Why not? What are you afraid will happen?

 

[SweetAndLow]

I don't want to run temp transcoding on my good hdds with proper data. I have a good fast drive, where I don't store important data and transcoding destroying it wouldn't be a loss compared destroying a drive with important data (and more capacity/expensive)

On my old Centos 7 server, i got a tmp ram disk and all the encoding happens in ram, no stress on any hdd.

It will not destroy your hdd's.... I don't think you will ever notice. Do you have any evidence that shows you should move it off your hdd's? I ask not because I'm trying to be mean but because I'm curious. People are always making these claims to run Plex off a SSD or move the transcoding to a ssd. Not a single person can show proof that it makes a difference and I don't think it does.

My Plex is running in a jail and can do 7+ 1080p streams concurrently. It finally hits a network bottleneck and starts getting choppy but the CPU and disk are definitely not the problem. Been using it this way for 4 years now I think.

Sent from my Nexus 5X using Tapatalk

 

[pschatz100]

I am curious too. Any issues I've seen with Plex performance have been related to network performance or cpu limits when transcoding.

 

[dirkme]

Why not? What are you afraid will happen?

tear and wear on my hdds.

 

[dirkme]

I am curious too. Any issues I've seen with Plex performance have been related to network performance or cpu limits when transcoding.

I stream only a max of 3 streams, it is more to not wear out my hdds,

 

[SweetAndLow]

I stream only a max of 3 streams, it is more to not wear out my hdds,

There is no wear and tear on your hdd's. You are making this up. Hdd are meant to read and write data that will not affect their lifespan very much. Heat and other factors are more impactfull.

what kind of plex usage are we talking here? I guess if you have 20+ steams happening at the same time you might run into iops limits on the pool.

 

[dirkme]

There is no wear and tear on your hdd's. You are making this up. Hdd are meant to read and write data that will not affect their lifespan very much. Heat and other factors are more impactfull.

what kind of plex usage are we talking here? I guess if you have 20+ steams happening at the same time you might run into iops limits on the pool.

spinning hard drives are mechanical and have physical parts rotating, and nope, I am not making that up my friend ;-)

But it might be minor thou, just at my Centos 7 server (also running ona USB stick) would try to transcode on the usb stick tmp folder and for that reason I moved it into ram.

 

[SweetAndLow]

spinning hard drives are mechanical and have physical parts rotating, and nope, I am not making that up my friend ;-)

But it might be minor thou, just at my Centos 7 server (also running ona USB stick) would try to transcode on the usb stick tmp folder and for that reason I moved it into ram.

HDD will last longer if they are spinning and working.

Sent from my Nexus 5X using Tapatalk

 

[danb35]

Of course mechanical hard drives can wear out. But what evidence do you have that r/w activity increases the wear measurably compared to simply spinning idle?

And do we know that Plex transcodes to disk anyway? I'd have expected it to be done in RAM.

 

[dirkme]

HDD will last longer if they are spinning and working.

Sent from my Nexus 5X using Tapatalk

That's true, that is why you usual don't spin them down.

 

[dirkme]

And do we know that Plex transcodes to disk anyway? I'd have expected it to be done in RAM.

You can check that at Plex website and ask those questions ;-) plex usual uses the system temp folder.

 

[SweetAndLow]

You can check that at Plex website and ask those questions ;-) plex usual uses the system temp folder.

Ahhh see you can ask your question there also since it's specific to Plex.

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[dirkme]

Ahhh see you can ask your question there also since it's specific to Plex.

Sent from my Nexus 5X using Tapatalk

Don't be offended though, but how old are you?

This questions i specific for FreeNas as at all other systems Linux like, it just works.

 

[danb35]

...and we have yet another user who thinks FreeBSD is Linux. It isn't.

 

[pschatz100]

There does seem to be a fair amount of discussion on the Plex forums. Some guy decided to point his temporary directory to a ram disk in order to save wear and improve performance on a flash drive (he was running Linux from a USB flash drive on a system with 32Gb ram.). Then another guy decided to save wear and tear on an SSD. Somebody else pointed out that, based on the usage that was presented in the original post, it would take 22 years to reach the end of life for a 128Gb SSD. After that, I lost interest in the thread.

There are folks who have given instructions for a few different Linuxes and a Docker installation. Nobody has said anything about doing this on FreeBSD. Generally speaking, it looks like one must 1) mount a volume to be accessed from the jail, 2) make certain you have read and write access to the volume, 3) go into the Plex server advanced properties interface and define the desired volume as your temporary directory. I don't think it is rocket science, but one must 1) know how mount a volume to be accessed from the jail, and 2) know how to give the volume rw access.

 

[dirkme]

Generally speaking, it looks like one must 1) mount a volume to be accessed from the jail, 2) make certain you have read and write access to the volume, 3) go into the Plex server advanced properties interface and define the desired volume as your temporary directory. I don't think it is rocket science, but one must 1) know how mount a volume to be accessed from the jail, and 2) know how to give the volume rw access.

These ar the steps I did, just got puzzled when plex didn't write into the new folder.