Streaming video to multiple devices. NAS

[jxsilicon9]

I'm looking at QNAP or Synology to setup a NAS/home server. What I want do is be able to stream 1080/4k video to multiple sources at the same time. I have Vizio and Samsung TV's some of them are 4k. I also have cell phones,tablets. I want to be able to watch these videos from this NAS anywhere. With the ability to stream 2-4 videos to different devices at the same time.

My TV's have DLNA and I have a couple roku's. I know the formats are limited on TV's, So I want hardware transcoding on the NAS. And then just have any mk4/mp4 format streamed to the TV.Would I need to get new adapters for the TV's or is there a way to turn off TV's transcoding? Also,I have an Almond+ wifi router.

 

[drtweak]

They have Plex for both of those and if you have smart TVs (I know Plex is on Samsung and Roku for sure) just use that. Great thing is it is easy to do, if all your stuff is converted to MP4 with AAC audio like my stuff is, there is little to do on the hardware side as there is no transcoding needed. been using it for a year and a half now and i love it. I play for the plex pass which is only needed if you want to stream to Mobile/Tables. Otherwise TVs, Browsers, PC Plex App, Consoles is all free at no cost and easy to setup.

 

[old_rager]

Hey jxsilicon9, your desire to stream video to multiple devices is definitely achievable if you only want to do 1080p. When you bring 4K into the mix, this opens up a whole world of hurt. Simply put, as long as your target devices can natively handle both the audio and video codecs of the source file, then you should be good. As soon as you bring transcoding into the picture, this is where things go haywire.

Something not many people seem to be aware of is that when you serve up source to a target and not want any transcoding, it has to be compatible BOTH from a video and audio codec perspective. If it is compatible from a video perspective, but not from an audio perspective, then both video and audio codec will be transcoded - at least I believe this is the case from a Plex perspective.

Although I'm not using a dedicated NAS, I was sort of hoping to do what you want to do via a dedicated NAS and fell into a whole world of hurt when I tried to move from 1080p to 4K. I've been using Plex perfectly for years now and it has been fantastic, but when I tried to make the move to 4K after getting a Samsung Q7F, it's been horrendous... My PC's just reached 5 years of age but is still in the top 76% of PCs running today when looking at it's overall performance. It's running an I7 Gen 3 @ 3.5GHz, 32GB DDR3 1600MHz RAM, 24TB of storage in raid 6 off an Adaptec ASAR7805 raid card that runs at 6Gbs. So to make things simple, it is one thing to transcode (what a Plex server has to do when the source file is not entirely compatible with the target device) in 1080p, and a separate thing altogether to transcode at 4K. Hell, I can't even play all 4K files in VLC or via the Windows 10 'Film & TV' app. Severe jutter and lag are what I generally get. To try and assist me here, I purchased a GTX 1080 Ti 11GB Xtreme GPU this weekend, and although it has helped quite a bit playing files directly from PC, it's still nowhere near perfect. With Plex Server, you can tell the server to offload as much processing as it can to your GPU's hardware - which also helped a bit with the new GTX 1080 Ti, but again, still not good. To give you an idea how much grunt you need to transcode on the fly, have a look at this post - https/forums.overclockers.co.uk/threads/cpu-for-plex-media-server-4k-transcoding.18789345/.

So with respect to a NAS serving up 4K media (H264 - or even H265 where you need double the requirements for H264), I don't believe any exist today. If you open the NAS Compatibility Guide link from this page, you will find that 1080p is the best you will get - https/support.plex.tv/articles/201373803-nas-compatibility-list/

If you need to know anything else, drop me a line...

 

[jxsilicon9]

Hey jxsilicon9, your desire to stream video to multiple devices is definitely achievable if you only want to do 1080p. When you bring 4K into the mix, this opens up a whole world of hurt. Simply put, as long as your target devices can natively handle both the audio and video codecs of the source file, then you should be good. As soon as you bring transcoding into the picture, this is where things go haywire.

Something not many people seem to be aware of is that when you serve up source to a target and not want any transcoding, it has to be compatible BOTH from a video and audio codec perspective. If it is compatible from a video perspective, but not from an audio perspective, then both video and audio codec will be transcoded - at least I believe this is the case from a Plex perspective.

Although I'm not using a dedicated NAS, I was sort of hoping to do what you want to do via a dedicated NAS and fell into a whole world of hurt when I tried to move from 1080p to 4K. I've been using Plex perfectly for years now and it has been fantastic, but when I tried to make the move to 4K after getting a Samsung Q7F, it's been horrendous... My PC's just reached 5 years of age but is still in the top 76% of PCs running today when looking at it's overall performance. It's running an I7 Gen 3 @ 3.5GHz, 32GB DDR3 1600MHz RAM, 24TB of storage in raid 6 off an Adaptec ASAR7805 raid card that runs at 6Gbs. So to make things simple, it is one thing to transcode (what a Plex server has to do when the source file is not entirely compatible with the target device) in 1080p, and a separate thing altogether to transcode at 4K. Hell, I can't even play all 4K files in VLC or via the Windows 10 'Film & TV' app. Severe jutter and lag are what I generally get. To try and assist me here, I purchased a GTX 1080 Ti 11GB Xtreme GPU this weekend, and although it has helped quite a bit playing files directly from PC, it's still nowhere near perfect. With Plex Server, you can tell the server to offload as much processing as it can to your GPU's hardware - which also helped a bit with the new GTX 1080 Ti, but again, still not good. To give you an idea how much grunt you need to transcode on the fly, have a look at this post - https/forums.overclockers.co.uk/threads/cpu-for-plex-media-server-4k-transcoding.18789345/.

So with respect to a NAS serving up 4K media (H264 - or even H265 where you need double the requirements for H264), I don't believe any exist today. If you open the NAS Compatibility Guide link from this page, you will find that 1080p is the best you will get - https/support.plex.tv/articles/201373803-nas-compatibility-list/

If you need to know anything else, drop me a line...

Thats not a problem. I only have a few H.265 videos. But I have a lot of mkv-h.264 with 5.1 AC3. Does plex play that?And what is a good add-on to play that format on my TV's? Roku,chromecast,etc?

 

[old_rager]

Not sure RE: Roku, Chromecast, etc, but as DrTweak states above, they will need to be in MP4/AAC to ensure straight pass through. I barely see any MP4s around when it comes to downloading 4K content - and the more that 4K HDR target devices hit homes, the less you're going to see H264 (H265 is far more efficient). Not sure what to advise except to get good video editing software to cut all of your MKVs over to MP4's, etc - that's what I'm about to do (I currently have near 11TB of 4K content so am not looking forward to it). :-(

 

[drtweak]

Wonder Share Video Converter is what I use. Works great. There is also a hack out there to use a 600+ Series NVidia to enable GPU acceleration (Its some DLL patch. Found it on youtube. My videos convert twice as fast now if not faster! (most of the time)).

Its pretty nice. Just load everything up. Select MP4 from the profile (I usually let everything be same and source in the settings except for Audio. If you go from anything that is more than Stereo then you have issues hearing say a 5.1 channel as it only plays the front two and doesn't automatically convert to stereo on the TV Side so I have it set to stereo only which actually saves space in some cases, but then I don't have a sound system so it doesn't mother me that i lose surround sound.

But yea anything that is going to be 4K is going to be a pain. You might as well plug a high end PC straight into the TV and just use that VS the smart TV/Plex/Firestick/Roku/Boxee/etc. Also with 4K you will have your TV to be hardwired as well or have it be the only device on say that WiFi (if you have like a Tri Band router (2G + 2 5G networks) have one be just for the TV) this way you won't run into any bandwidth issues.

but either way it may take a while (Its been like 4 years for me) of converting ALL my stuff to MP4/AAC. Once i found out Chrome played it, i converted everything over, made a simple to use HTML site to browse my movies, setup a HTTP server, and then password protected everything I was using that. Then found plex a year later and moved to that and have never looked back! I was going though downloading album art ect and what not and it was such a pain.

The only thing about Plex is I will say this. When you first set it up and it ask what databases to pull the movie/TV info from SELECT EVERY SITE FOR ALL CATAGORIES! I had a lot of stuff the default one could find (IMDB) that others did so I had just started over on my database and it found EVERYTHING which was nice. Even all my anime lol.

 

[old_rager]

Wonder Share Video Converter is what I use. Works great. There is also a hack out there to use a 600+ Series NVidia to enable GPU acceleration (Its some DLL patch. Found it on youtube. My videos convert twice as fast now if not faster! (most of the time)).

Its pretty nice. Just load everything up. Select MP4 from the profile (I usually let everything be same and source in the settings except for Audio. If you go from anything that is more than Stereo then you have issues hearing say a 5.1 channel as it only plays the front two and doesn't automatically convert to stereo on the TV Side so I have it set to stereo only which actually saves space in some cases, but then I don't have a sound system so it doesn't mother me that i lose surround sound.

But yea anything that is going to be 4K is going to be a pain. You might as well plug a high end PC straight into the TV and just use that VS the smart TV/Plex/Firestick/Roku/Boxee/etc. Also with 4K you will have your TV to be hardwired as well or have it be the only device on say that WiFi (if you have like a Tri Band router (2G + 2 5G networks) have one be just for the TV) this way you won't run into any bandwidth issues.

but either way it may take a while (Its been like 4 years for me) of converting ALL my stuff to MP4/AAC. Once i found out Chrome played it, i converted everything over, made a simple to use HTML site to browse my movies, setup a HTTP server, and then password protected everything I was using that. Then found plex a year later and moved to that and have never looked back! I was going though downloading album art ect and what not and it was such a pain.

The only thing about Plex is I will say this. When you first set it up and it ask what databases to pull the movie/TV info from SELECT EVERY SITE FOR ALL CATAGORIES! I had a lot of stuff the default one could find (IMDB) that others did so I had just started over on my database and it found EVERYTHING which was nice. Even all my anime lol.

 

[old_rager]

Man, had to laugh when I read your response - it is exactly what I'm going through now. Downloaded Adobe Premiere last night and it wouldn't even import MKV files. Then downloaded Wondershare Video Converter and through a simple 28GB file at it, and it shat itself after 5 mins. Have sent a job to Wondershare to work out what I'm doing wrong.

Bit of a bummer loosing surround - but I did see an option in Wonder share to output in either 2 or 6 speaker format (unless I've got that all wrong) as I'm about to cut over to a Dolby Atmos 3.1.2... With respect to just hooking up a kick ass PC straight to my TV, that won't cut it as I can't get HDR to work at all directly from my PC (see https/forums.geforce.com/default/topic/1023484/hdr-not-working-in-windows-10/?offset=9#5274517 - my post is near the bottom).

With respect to network setup, have already done as suggested. Am running Nighthawk D7000 in conjunction with 2 x EX7000 range extenders which uses 802.11ac. Whatever can be hard wired is (PC, TV, XBox 1X, HDHomerun), and everything else (mobile phones, laptop, etc) only connect via 2.4GHz with the router and range extenders passing all ethernet connections via 5GHz. Distance between router and range extenders is only 20 feet, so the home network runs really well.

All the work that is required just to watch 4K HDR at home is a joke. Currently, I just copy the files to an ext HDD and direct connect it to the TV. Am planning on getting an AMD Threadripper 1950X with some pretty mean M2 NVMe's in a raid 0 config (which should be blindingly fast), but still unable to play 4K HDR direct from PC (which is absolutely stupid). The good thing though is that Plex will be able to transcode everything on the fly and stream 4K HDR to the TV.

Thanks for the advice though - just need to hear back from Wondershare to see why my conversions are failing...

 

[drtweak]

Wow yea not biggest i have thrown at it was about 5Gb or so. What kind of file was it for it to be 28GB? I'm assuming 4K. what settings did you use?

 

[old_rager]

It was the Wonder Woman movie. I've got some 4K content that goes up to 80GB+ - although had a breakthrough on getting HDR in Win10 going. I found if I dropped my refresh rate down to 25Hz and selected HDR, I could get the Win 10 'Films & TV' app to play the movie with HDR working (still couldn't play it in VLC and Plex played it unfortunately without the HDR working). For me, this is the best news I've had in the past couple of months in trying to get this working. Also found that the Wondershare Video Converter also works with the refresh rate set at 25Hz - the unfortunate thing, that 28GB movie will take approx. 9hrs to convert to MP4 (which is near unworkable). But, gonna eat this elephant 1 bite at a time... ;-)

 

[drtweak]

XD yea before the GPU hack some movies took real time to convert from MKV to MP4. Nows its WAY Faster! also depends on the MKV. Some take a few minutes some still take an hour for a 2 hour movie but I'll take it!

and yea I don't have anything that is 4k so no need to have 4k lol 1080 is just fine for me.

 

[old_rager]

XD yea before the GPU hack some movies took real time to convert from MKV to MP4. Nows its WAY Faster! also depends on the MKV. Some take a few minutes some still take an hour for a 2 hour movie but I'll take it!

and yea I don't have anything that is 4k so no need to have 4k lol 1080 is just fine for me.

Hey DrTweak, I found the place in the Wondershare to use GPU hardware acceleration, but it doesn't appear to be helping much. Do you know where I can find this DLL where it would work. Wondershare is not currently working for me as my CPU is overheating trying to convert the files to MP4/AAC. It worked for one and streamed perfectly from my PMS - but as it takes 13 hours to do one movie, my PC can't be used for anything else as it will definitely crash. So if you could send me a link to the DLL, that would really be appreciated. Then my new GTX 1080 Ti can then start carrying the weight, as it's barely doing anything at all even with telling it to help out via the Wondershare options...

Tx...

 

[drtweak]

This is the video i found it form

https/www.youtube.com/watch?v=g5UaOIqqFX0

the link is in the description. This does work on Windows 10. I wasn't able to use Cuda acceleration before and now I can. Most MKV's took real time if there had to be any kind of coding done (Audio, subtitles, etc) and now it takes anywhere from 10-20% of the time of the video. Last night i converted a TV Show so 43 minutes in 6 minutes. This is also with me doing 4 video at once on my FX-8320 @4.4Ghz. Even only doing 1 video before this still took a long time but then all MKV's took forever either. AVI's convert pretty quick as well. did a few movies, and tv shows (like 8 or 9 total of the the mixed bunch) in about 30 minutes.

 

[old_rager]

This is the video i found it form

https/www.youtube.com/watch?v=g5UaOIqqFX0

the link is in the description. This does work on Windows 10. I wasn't able to use Cuda acceleration before and now I can. Most MKV's took real time if there had to be any kind of coding done (Audio, subtitles, etc) and now it takes anywhere from 10-20% of the time of the video. Last night i converted a TV Show so 43 minutes in 6 minutes. This is also with me doing 4 video at once on my FX-8320 @4.4Ghz. Even only doing 1 video before this still took a long time but then all MKV's took forever either. AVI's convert pretty quick as well. did a few movies, and tv shows (like 8 or 9 total of the the mixed bunch) in about 30 minutes.

Are you using Wondershare (which is what I thought you originally said) or Xilisoft's Video Converter - which is what the post was using? Does the same hack work for Wondershare for you?

 

[old_rager]

What a heated discussion.
Actually, you don't need to worry about 1080P&4K output together.
I looking for my splitter for my 1080P and 4K TV, just to see a matrix. that maybe help you.
Said it can be down scaler from 4k to1080P output.
https/www.amazon.com/EZCOO-HDMI-Matrix-Switcher-embed/dp/B078YS79HZ/ref=sr_1_30?ie=UTF8&qid=1517369143&sr=8-30&keywords=hdmi+matrix+4x2

Hopefully it can help you a little bit.

Hey Leon, product only supports 8bit HDR from what I can see - am after 10bit, but tx...

 

[drtweak]

This is the video i found it form

https/www.youtube.com/watch?v=g5UaOIqqFX0

the link is in the description. This does work on Windows 10. I wasn't able to use Cuda acceleration before and now I can. Most MKV's took real time if there had to be any kind of coding done (Audio, subtitles, etc) and now it takes anywhere from 10-20% of the time of the video. Last night i converted a TV Show so 43 minutes in 6 minutes. This is also with me doing 4 video at once on my FX-8320 @4.4Ghz. Even only doing 1 video before this still took a long time but then all MKV's took forever either. AVI's convert pretty quick as well. did a few movies, and tv shows (like 8 or 9 total of the the mixed bunch) in about 30 minutes.

Are you using Wondershare (which is what I thought you originally said) or Xilisoft's Video Converter - which is what the post was using? Does the same hack work for Wondershare for you?

Wondershare 10.0.7

 

[old_rager]

Wondershare 10.0.7[/quotemsg]

Will give it a shot then and will let you know...

 

[jkhowtoam]

I'm looking at QNAP or Synology to setup a NAS/home server. What I want do is be able to stream 1080/4k video to multiple sources at the same time. I have Vizio and Samsung TV's some of them are 4k. I also have cell phones,tablets. I want to be able to watch these videos from this NAS anywhere. With the ability to stream 2-4 videos to different devices at the same time.

My TV's have DLNA and I have a couple roku's. I know the formats are limited on TV's, So I want hardware transcoding on the NAS. And then just have any mk4/mp4 format streamed to the TV.Would I need to get new adapters for the TV's or is there a way to turn off TV's transcoding? Also,I have an Almond+ wifi router.

Hi jxsilixon9, It is possible to stream a video to multiple streaming devices/Smart TVs simultaneously using VLC from a PC. Each video stream would need to come from different ports. There may be a lag as far as the video playing on the different devices due to app/channel overhead meaning when the same scene plays on a Roku vs. when it played on the PC. You may run into buffering with 4k/1080. There is a YT Roku vid describing its setup "roku win7 dvd" and a SmartTV setup using an IPTV App "smartv win7 dvd". FYI. You will need to change the transcoding Profile to a HD video/audio Profile vs a SD video/audio profile. There is a part in the video explaining how to change it. The default during setup is 800KBPS and you would need at least 8000kbps for 1080 w resolution AUTO or the video stream will be very blurry.