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Is Plex throttled on wholesaleinternet network?
slavetothesound
Member
in Help
Has anyone here used a wholesaleinternet server as a plex media server before? What was your experience like?
I just set up a dual xeon dedi with them this week hoping to use it as a plex streaming box. I can get great speeds using FTP right now -5 MB/s (~40 megabit) to my home connection, but I can't stream a 10 megabit movie over plex even though the server is doing nothing else. Even when I transcode down to 4 megabit, the stream spends more time buffering than playing. I've ruled out CPU since that never spikes over 40%. What am I missing? Should I try a different provider?
Comments
Hm, whats the passmark on the cpu? What is plex buffer settings set to?
The CPU is a dual L5420, passmark should be around 6500. But even without transcoding, I can't play back the file with a ~10mb bitrate.
I don't know about buffer settings, I'll have to go look that up, but this is a fresh install on Ubuntu 16.04 and I haven't tinkered with anything, yet.
Hmm yeah, cpu should 101% be able to handle it. I'll have a think
Wonder if the ISP is throttling the connection? PM me for access to an emby box for comparison.
Usually, issues like that are caused in client's side, not server. For example, if you have chromecast device there are some issues over 2,4Ghz wifi, or if you have installed bitdefender on your pc this can cause buffering.
From what you describe, this cannot be a server issue, cpu is powerful enough to handle it (except if this server is doing already a lot of other works and is loaded or if it is poorly configured and has other issues) and the bandwidth you need is enough.
Just a notice: a cheap server with shared network resources has not a great stability as on constant speed. This can cause some issues on streaming from time to time, but not constant buffering. But, to be sure, do another test: open a vlc instance and stream directly a movie to your desired speed, receiving it also with vls. Then, you can see if there are real network issues, because ftp is not the same protocol to actually measure streaming speed.
Also, I read in another thread that you were looking for a box to combine a plex server and a torrent server. Do not use those the same time, this maybe is causing streaming issues if you use them both.
I don't know about WSI, but I use Plex on a cheap server elsewhere with a similar or worse CPU and transcoding definitely isn't an issue, even though I rarely do it. I've had occasional issues buffering with certain file formats, not sure if it's a problem though.
the cpu is too weak. and old.
I have rtorrent installed, but it's paused so that it won't interfere right now. I just tested with Filezilla and it looks like I'm getting 67 KBps download. VERY slow! The 5 MB/s download I experienced earlier was not actually FTP, but HTTPS (the download page looks like an old FTP directory - I'm using QuickBox).
From what you describe, this cannot be a server issue, cpu is powerful enough to handle it (except if this server is doing already a lot of other works and is loaded or if it is poorly configured and has other issues) and the bandwidth you need is enough.
I've tested on a wired connection and gotten the same results, also with my firewall disabled. Can't stream on Mac, PC, or smart TV.
The CPU is old, but not too weak. And there are two of them. And I'm not transcoding, so the CPU isn't really a factor
Have you done a download test from your server to maybe sure you can even download a file via ftp or http at the speed(s) you are expecting? I have a feeling you won't be getting the speed you are expecting to get which is the issue you are coming across.
How many clients have you tried? Do all perform the same way?
Disk IO perhaps?
If he's just using it (Plex) to stream a movie/show/music wouldn't disk IO be irrelevant?
I downloaded a 20GB file to the server last night using bittorrent and got 80+ MB/s. That's plenty fast for me. Traffic the other direction is the problem. A gigabit port should be faster than a 128k modem.
And the video file is on an SSD. Definitely not a disk issue since the server is doing absolutely nothing else.
I've used 3 clients in my home, all perform the same, but I will be trying from another location soon. I can't stream video and FTPS is super slow, but if I attempt to download the file in my browser over HTTPS the speed quickly rises to 4 MB/s which is plenty fast.
I've streamed from other Plex servers outside my network so I'm assuming that there is some throttling going on at the datacenter. I was hoping someone else would chime in and say that they've got it working to give me hope that I hadn't just wasted a server rental fee.
Plex needs to read the file then save the transcode to disk cache and then read it again to send. It can have an issue if you're on a single 5400Rpm disk. Which I've seen before on the older servers. But OP says SSD so Disk IO is not likely an issue.
Try another port? I know the internal port is 32400, but what if you use another port for external access? Does it still limit itself?
User said he wasn't transcoding, if he was then definitely on a 5400RPM.
Ahh yes, I see. I have sent them a link to test from my Emby server to see if its a possible ISP throttle on the stream. (Some Providers throttle media streams)
First of all, try to download a file from your server to your home pc. Upload a big file (1GB) , give access thru a web server (install nginx to test it) and download it, to see the speeds.
Install ffmpeg or vlc, and stream a video directly to your home pc vlc. Use transcoding to stretch the cpu and a bitrate of 10Mbps if this is what you are going to use in Plex.
Do a traceroute from server to your home pc, and see what's going on there.
Check your home router to see if it is configured well. QoS etc.
Port has nothing to do with OP's issue.
If OP's server has enough memory, this won't happen. Plex will transcode video to memory first and, if this is not enough, will use disk as cache. For a single stream, even a 5400 disk could do the job (for simultaneously streams, he will face issues for full HD streams of 10Mbps).
Downloading to server is something you will not use, in a plex server. Uploading from this server to yours, is the speed you want to be good. Where do you live? Try to do a speedtest to a close to you location.
Use this script:
Instead of 1727, use a server near your location (it's easy to find it using google, or tell me where you live to give you your closest server's id).
I did a speed test from WHS to my location (Greece), far far away from Kansas, to see what speeds do I get.
Pretty good results for a 10$ server in a distance of 10K Km!
in my testing it relies heavily on single threaded core. the CPU you have (single threaded) is about the same as a bail trail atom.
Thanks for the helpful suggestions jvnadr.
Here are speedtests to all the closest servers. They seem good enough for my purposes.
http://pastebin.com/TCUR1mXC
I am downloading a 10GB file right now through Apache with speeds floating betweek 500KB and 1.5 MB/s Not exactly great, but it is nearing peak internet traffic time between the server and myself right now. Still, if I got that much bandwidth while streaming I would at least get stuttering playback at full bitrate instead of an endless spinning yellow circle. And I would be able to stream at 720p.
This morning when the during internet slow hours I downloaded through apache at a full 5MB/s.
I'll try VLC streaming next.
Do a Speedtest from the server to your home network. Who cares what other speeds to other locations are.
Also do a test uploading FROM your server to your home network. The uploading speed is all that matters. That's pretty much common sense!
I can upload a 10 gigabyte file from my server to home connection at the full 30 mb/s that my home connection can handle. I cannot stream an 8 mb/s video from plex even in an ssh tunnel, which should avoid throttling, right? my router is only showing kilobits to 3 megabits coming through from WAN). I don't even know where to look anymore. Maybe I've made bad assumptions about how ssh tunnels work.
Upload and download are getting confused a lot in this thread. I've tested both ways. I have good enough throughput between myself and my server (can usually max out my home connection) EXCEPT with streaming in Plex.
Can't tell if it's working better with OpenVPN or just late at night...
What CPU you have locally?
i7-4578u in my mac (passmark > 4500). My Desktop has an E5-2670 (passmark > 12000).
Right now even a download from Apache is jumping between 0 and 98.3 KB/s. I'm going to write this off as an unreliable connection issue and see if I can find a reasonable priced west coast USA server or colocation.
What isp do you use? IIRC Frontier/ex-Verizon (US West - Verizon sold off all non wireless in the west coast) throttle encrypted traffic?
A VPN in a nearby location with portforwarding works? Set custom port on remote access
Did you open a ticket with them? Their support is really helpful, at least regarding my experience with them. THey might check the connection for you.
Also, do a traceroute from your home connection. Send it to WSI among with your speed results. Maybe they can move you to another rack. They claim they have as upstream providers HE, Cogent and they are also connected to Kansas City Internet Exchange.