Some AVI video codecs won't play on Sony Bravia TV

If I correctly understand Serviio (I have free version on Windows 10) is supposed to transcode on the fly any incompatible video before sending to my Sony Bravia 55W808A TV. By incompatible I mean non supported by my TV. Also, Serviio recognizes my TV profile (as listed in status console) as "Sony Bravia TV (2013/14)".

So in theory, since Serviio knows what codecs my TV supports, it knows when to transcode and in which format. That is theoretically all media files should be playable. Am I right in theory ? (just to understand)

Yet, some AVI files (depending on codecs inside) can't play on my TV. So, either the transcoding machine doesn't work and/or Serviio just misunderstood my TV profile.

How can I check the transcoding machine is working at all ? The transcoding folder (C:\Users\xxx\AppData\Local\Temp\) doesn't seem to contain any trace of transcoding!

If the issue is the wrong profile, how can I find the right one and how to tell Serviio to take that one ?

Thanks

[atc98092]

Yes, you understand the basics of transcoding correctly. The wild card is of course the codecs within a specific container. You correctly note that there's likely a difference of codecs within your different files. Whomever created that Bravia profile either didn't account for a specific codec combination, or perhaps the profile hasn't been updated to cover newer codecs. I don't have any Sony devices, so can't offer any suggestions about changes.

If you could post the media information from a video that plays, and one that doesn't play, we can compare them to see what the difference is, and suggest some ways to make it work.

Here are 3 files' info, OK.All where everything is OK, NOK.video where video can't play but the audio is OK and NOK.All where none of video nor audio is OK.

It is pretty obvious my Sony TV can't read Divx codecs but can read Xvids.

The real question is where could I find the right profile ?

I understood those profiles are done by users (?) and not Serviio staffs. How to create a profile and where to find existing ones ?

If creating profiles mean listing all unsupported codecs, is that mean that by adding somehow the unsupported codecs in NOK.All for example would tell Serviio to re-encode it ?

Thanks

[atc98092]

OK, there's a difference in video codecs. The video that plays is XVid, while the two that won't are DivX. Even though they both show as MPEG-4 video, there's still that core difference between the two. For that one that doesn't play video or audio, they both show MP3 as the audio codec, but they do have a different setting for "Alignment". I don't know what that means myself, but I have a hunch the non-play is because of the video, not the audio.

I thought that divx was available as a Matches element, but looking at the support page I don't see it. Wait, just found another example within a different Sony profile. You would do this by adding a Matches statement to the profile like this:

<Matches container="avi" vCodec="mpeg4" vFourCC="div3,div4,div5,divx,dm4v,dx50" />

In fact, just as a test, change the profile assigned to your TV to "Sony BDP-Sx80/SMP-N200 (2011)". Yes, it's a Blu Ray player profile. But it has that Matches line in the profile, and you can test the videos that won't play to see if they now do. If they do, then we've identified the fix and we can build you a user-profiles.xml file specifically for your TV.

Thanks very much I'll test and let you know the result.

I think I begin to understand. Do you mean that if the test (including the codec line) is OK, then I switch back to my TV profile but before, I add that line just after others beginning with <Matches container>... ?

Now that I'm looking at profiles.xml I see <Matches container>="*" vCodec="h264" and looking at the comment above it'll transcode ALL h264 codecs! I have little knowledge on videos but I though h264 includes Xvids; that is Serviio would transcode even Xvids ? that would be wired because my Sony TV natively support Xvids so no need for transcoding!

How can I check any transcoding is taking place or not ?

[atc98092]

You can see if it's transcoding in two ways. The easiest is to look at the Serviio console during playback. On the status tab, there will be a colored dot to the right of the status icon in the very left column. You can click that dot to see what's playing. If that dot is green, it is not being transcoded. If it's more of an orange-yellow color, it's being transcoded. The other way is to look at the CPU utilization on your Serviio computer. Video transcoding pushes the utilization near 100% (regardless of how many cores or how powerful the CPU is). If it's down around 10-15% it's not transcoding, or perhaps just audio transcoding.

Before you paste anything into the Profiles file, do the test with the other profile first. If you paste something wrong into the profile, Serviio will no longer run, and you'd have to take it back out. It's easy to mess things up. That's why it's better to build a personal profiles and store it in the user-profiles.xml file (which doesn't exist until you create one). But run the test first so we can see if we're moving in the right direction.

OK I did the test you rightly suggested. Actually a very good idea

First of all, none of the videos is transcoded with my current profile ( that is "Sony Bravia TV (2013/14)"). The play current light is always green (not red). What is strange is that while the NOK.All can't play on TV, Serviio status is showing that it is !!! Serviio thinks it is streaming the content (without transcoding) but my TV lost the connection altogether. I had to stop and restart Serviio in order for my TV to connect again.

Here is the result after changing the profile to "Sony BDP-Sx80/SMP-N200 (2011)":

The OK.All file is not even listed on the TV so I can't even try to play it.

But, now NOK.All is played by my TV without problem and I can see that Serviio is transcoding it (red light).

So what all these mean ? I guess what it lacks in my TV profile is a statement saying "I can't play Divx and all those codecs should be transcoded" in xml language (that I don't know).

What is exactly the missing line I should add into my TV profile and what is the best way (more safe) to add it ? You talked about user profile in order to not touch the original profile (?). How to do it ?

Please keep in mind that I hugely prefer not to transcode when it is not needed. Please tell me selectively the codec lines I should add to transcode just what is needed.

Thank you very much for your support.

[atc98092]

OK, let's try this test profile. Copy the attached file into your Serviio/config folder (under Windows, the default location is c:\program files\Serviio). Then either reboot your computer, or go into the Serviio console and on the Status tab at the bottom click Stop Server then Start Server. This will load this new profile file. Then change the assigned profile for your TV to one that says "Bravia TV Test". You might need to refresh your browser page to find it. Now test your videos to see if the working ones still work and the non-working will now play.

What this profile does is extend the profile you're using now and adding two Matches lines to catch the DivX video that your TV doesn't appear to play. So in theory it does everything the "Sony Bravia TV (2013/14)" profile does, and added the DivX capture.

Thank you very much. It works now !!! Serviio transcode only when needed (i.e. Divx codecs).

But now there are two new points I like to mention:

1/ When playing a Divx file, Serviio begins transcoding, but when I stop playing (that is, on the TV I push the back button so I get again the list of files), Serviio still continues to transcode as I see in CPU utilization and also I see the transcoded file in Windows\TEMP\Serviio growing as the transcode continues.

The only way I found to stop the transcoding process was to stop the server, which is not cool because I have to do it on the PC (far away from TV). Is there any way to configure Serviio so it stops transcoding as soon as I stop playing ?

2/ When playing, I can see no more green or red light where I could click on and see the name of the file playing. Also, when Serviio starts playing a file (no matter transcoding or not) it keeps showing and removing the icon of the played file continually on the status page.
Before adding user-profiles.xml, I had the red/green light when playing and Serviio showed just once the icon when playing started (right behavior).
Is there something on the new profile file causing this ?

Many thanks for your support

[atc98092]

1/ When playing a Divx file, Serviio begins transcoding, but when I stop playing (that is, on the TV I push the back button so I get again the list of files), Serviio still continues to transcode as I see in CPU utilization and also I see the transcoded file in Windows\TEMP\Serviio growing as the transcode continues.

The only way I found to stop the transcoding process was to stop the server, which is not cool because I have to do it on the PC (far away from TV). Is there any way to configure Serviio so it stops transcoding as soon as I stop playing ?

2/ When playing, I can see no more green or red light where I could click on and see the name of the file playing. Also, when Serviio starts playing a file (no matter transcoding or not) it keeps showing and removing the icon of the played file continually on the status page.
Before adding user-profiles.xml, I had the red/green light when playing and Serviio showed just once the icon when playing started (right behavior).
Is there something on the new profile file causing this ?

Many thanks for your support

1. That's the way it works. Transcoding will continue until the file has been completed, unless the same player begins watching another video. That will stop the original transcoding and begin streaming the new video, transcoding if needed.

2. I can't explain that. I see the red/green indicator any time a video is playing. Of course, I have to refresh the page (or leave the page and come back) to see any changes. Those are static icons and don't change without a page refresh. There's a refresh button at the top of the page, right above the column with the Edit buttons for each connected device.