Yea I realized that after I spoke, thanks again.

Not sure if it is worth mentioning but I've updated my post about mounting the app drive to include aligning the partition, format as Ext4, and exporting as a samba share.  I also added a link in the wiki here http://lime-technology.com/wiki/index.php/How-To%27s

Very cool guide! Thank you very much. 

 

For everyone who uses S3 sleep, you could add a hint, that adding a SSD might stop the automatic sleep from working. This happens if the ssd reports its status as active/idle instead of standby (spundown mechanical hdd) and a script is used, that checks all system drives for their spindown state (normal SimpleFeatures S3Sleep script does).

 

The script needs to be modified to exclude the ssd drive from its checks or to recognize the active/idle state as "spundown".

Can someone help me diagnose an issue? I'm having a @#$@# of a problem.

 

I have been using PMS for a while now without much issue. I use the PMS updater plugin regularly to update my PMS.

https://github.com/Benni-chan/unraid_plugins/blob/master/plexupdater.plg

 

I have my plex files stored on a cache drive

 

Today I awoke to find my channels were missing and much of my media artwork and info was missing. I went onto myplex and noticed my unraid server was published twice to the service.

 

I had an issue yesterday where I was trying to install the unsupported app store channel. noticed there was a appdata share listed so I just clicked into that and put the plugin in the respective folder using the shortcut. It didn't seem to install. I couldn't figure out why it wasn't showing up in my channel directory and but after digging found out that there was an app data folder on my disk5 which I have no recollection of installing plex to this location.

 

So now I figure there's been some corruption or mismanagement. So I go to delete the appdata folder on my disk5... takes FOREVER. finally it seems to delete. so I try to then delete the appdata share but it won't delete.

 

I figure I have a big issue so I go and COMPLETELY delete all the plex files from my unraid flash drive including the PMS updater plugin.

 

 

I restart my unraid unit and the appdata folder on disk 5 has now returned... I can't delete it now because there's permission issues. Is unraid rebuilding the folder from parity? There's no Plex running anymore to be creating this file. I really just want to delete this folder, delete the plex folder on my cache drive as well and restart from scratch.

Can someone also help me? I've been looking up this issue for a while, I did everything the tutorials said to do. I dropped the Plex txz file into the "extra" folder, rebooted the server. I went to the settings for plex on my server and changed the directory paths, tried to enable Plex and the status is STOPPED.

 

 

I've uninstalled and reinstalled over and over and over and it wont work..

 

 

Please help me!

 

 

syslog?

Nov 14 23:25:45 Tower su[17518]: Successful su for unraid-plex by root
Nov 14 23:25:45 Tower su[17518]: +  root:unraid-plex
Nov 14 23:25:56 Tower pms: /mnt/cache/appdata/plex/lib/Application Support doesn't exist creating it
Nov 14 23:25:56 Tower pms: Plex Media Server: changing owner of /mnt/cache/appdata/plex/lib/Application Support from root to unraid-plex
Nov 14 23:25:56 Tower pms: /mnt/cache/appdata/plex/tmp doesn't exist creating it
Nov 14 23:25:56 Tower pms: Plex Media Server: changing owner of /mnt/cache/appdata/plex/tmp from root to unraid-plex
Nov 14 23:25:56 Tower pms: Starting Plex...
Nov 14 23:25:56 Tower su[17637]: Successful su for unraid-plex by root
Nov 14 23:25:56 Tower su[17637]: +  root:unraid-plex
Nov 14 23:25:58 Tower pms: Check 1: Plex has NOT started yet, something is maybe wrong!
Nov 14 23:26:01 Tower pms: Check 2: Plex has NOT started yet, something is maybe wrong!
Nov 14 23:26:04 Tower pms: Check 3: Plex has NOT started yet, something is maybe wrong!
Nov 14 23:26:07 Tower pms: Check 4: Plex has NOT started yet, something is maybe wrong!
Nov 14 23:26:10 Tower pms: Check 5: Plex has NOT started yet, something is maybe wrong!

I'm not an expert on this stuff, but I have my temp dir set to    /tmp 

I have my pms  .txz file in  boot/extra/ 

What version of PMS are you running?  The current (beta I think) is 0.9.8.13.235-a263b7e

 

Are you using the Plex Update utiity / plugin?  If not, search for that and install it.  It will install PMS and help you keep it updated.

 

unraid version?

@Switch: if by /tmp you mean the ramdisk, I'd be very careful with that.  That is a recipe for running out of ram and crashing your server.  I'd suggest changing the tmp location to something on /mnt/cache/[share]

 

@Dazed: based on your log it looks like it is having trouble creating the /plex library directory where it will store all the metadata, clipart, etc.  Do you actually have a cache disk?  If you do, did you create a cache only share on it called "appdata".  If you THINK you did, are you SURE you made it cache only and it is still on the cache and it has not been moved by the mover into your array?

 

Check that and get back to us.  Because if you did all the steps correctly and pms still can't create its directory you have other problems.

Hi Jumper,

 

 

I think I am sure that my appdata directory is set to cache only. I also have CP, SB, and SAB running out of the same directory with no problems.

 

 

When I set the filepaths in the settings. It DOES actually create the folders that I told it to, but nothing more. There is an Application folder inside of the library that is just an empty file.

 

 

 

This is why I don't understand whats going on! Its driving me up the wall lol

hmmm ok fair enough.  those were just my first thoughts.

 

I suppose my next step would be trying to install on a base system just to confirm it is even possible.  That is, disable all other plugins and customizations.  If it works, start loading up plug-ins until it fails to start.  If it fails even then, you might want to prove you can get it to run using a full and fresh install of unmolested unraid.  Probably easiest on another flash drive on your PC with a spare drive used as cache.

 

And for grins, redownload the PMS package just in case it somehow was borked (unlikely but who knows)

I fixed the problems.

 

 

I had to remove the two export language  (UTF- lines from the "exportsettings.ini" and it booted up like a charm.

In my best Senator Clay Davis voice ...

 

Shiiiiiiiiit who would have guessed?

Another question. Using the Plex App on my phone, everything stutters. Its definitely a transcoding issue....but I thought this build would be strong enough to transcode things.

 

 

If anyone can give me advice on settings or something, please do!

 

 

My specs on my NAS are in my signature.

 

 

 

 

Another question. Using the Plex App on my phone, everything stutters. Its definitely a transcoding issue....but I thought this build would be strong enough to transcode things.

There are at least three parts involved in the playback chain from PMS to your phone which can all cause stuttering:

1. PMS CPU power -> this should be fine with your i5

2. Your internet connection's uplink speed. If you have a standard ADSL (asymmetric digital subscriber line) connection then the uplink speed is usually very limited (<1Mbps). Test it here: http://www.speedtest.net/

3. Your phone's 3/4G data connection.

 

You can easily rule out any server side problems by using Plex Web player and forcing transcoding with the settings and observing CPU usage with telnet/top (and of course observing the playback quality).

Here is my Speedtest:

 

 

 

How do I make sure my phone's data connection is being used properly? I have 4G

 

 

 

More specifics on what its doing.....sometimes, I will play for a minute or so with no problem, and then it will freeze for a while and come back. Its like its writing files or something....

 

 

It says the video is "direct stream" but the audio is being transcoded.

 

 

 

Well it's definetely your internet connection 

 

But you have now set the options on your Plex client (phone) so that it is not transcoding the video. What is your setting for Settings / Video / Quality Over Cellular?

quality over cellular is 1mbps.

 

quality over local network is 3mbps.

 

 

Not sure what to set those at.

Plexupdater NOT updating to Version 0.9.8.7.186

 

I put an issue on Benni Chan's github

it is only the url which changed again ...

but above my paygrade as it changes the way the plugin knows there is an update ....

 

so regex people will have to have a look to update it or Benni chan of course ... hope he has normal internet again ....

 

Benni-Chan

 

they change url again

 

http://downloads.plexapp.com/plex-media-server/0.9.8.13.235-a263b7e/PlexMediaServer-0.9.8.13.235-a263b7e-unRAID.txz

 

can you please update the updater ?

 

Thanks

@JumperAlex & Forum

 

Before I give you my issues, I want to let you know that your GO script is working very well to keep my SDD mounted upon reboots.  BUT, for some reason when I have increased activities using PMS the SSD holding the PMS directory files just unmounts itself and I have to reboot to get the drive mounted again.  I was wondering if you or anyone else have experienced this issue or is this problem just isolated to my set-up. So far I'm thinking it may be harware related either my SSD or my SAS card based upon the log errors.  BUT, no other drives in my array are having unmout issues due to increased activity, and this issue only seems to happen when I'm using Plex.  I also have SAB, and Sickbeard directory files on the same SSD.  I did have my MySql databases on the same drive but I put those on my cache when this problem started to occur so I wouldnt have to keep rebuilding the corrupted database everytime the SSD dropped off.

 

I have attached my log to this post hoping you or someone could take a look and offer some suggestions.  The problem starts around 10:41:40 in the log.  I will start troubleshooting by uninstalling and reinstalling Plex, then I will look into hardware issues either SAS card or SSD, hopefully I will not have to spend money to replace hardware. 

 

Thanks in advance for any assistance you can offer!

 

syslog-20131125-105508.zip

Wow i will take a look but I'm not a log reading expert.  I somehow doubt it is the plex install causing the issue itself beyond the fact that plex might be generating a lot of activity.  But give it a try.  It can't hurt I guess.  At some point this might be better posted outside the plex thread and into general hardware as a dismounting problem.  But give it a little time as many of the real gurus troll this thread too

Hey thanks...  BUT, look here...  I may have been wrong when stating that the SSD is unmouted.  After more research, it seems that after running the df -h command, my SSD(named AppShare) is stiil listed under mounted drives.  Also, the share is still accessable through SMB??? BUT...  it is no longer listed under the Disk Management tab as mounted(like it normaly is "mounted as writable") and SAB,SB, and PMS no longer work and are not rechable through the web browser.  This is really strange!!

 

I will post to the General Hardware post and try to get help/or even a response.  But honestly, I came to you first because you seem to always respond and offer assistance.  Thanks for your time!!

I try where I can.

 

so it is listed under df -h.  That is promising.  And accessible via SMB.  OK.  As for the Disk Management Tab ... mine has never shown up but I am on the stock GUI.  I take it you are using the upgraded GUI on github?  Or Unmenu?

 

I have no reason to say this is related, or not, similar or not, but I had a lot of problems with the upgraded gui and plex.  But it was usually limited to cases where I was stopping and starting plex either during some testing or when they were pushing beta PMS builds fast and furious last month.  the gui would stall yet oddly emhttp was still shown in TOP.  Only a dirty reboot would fix it as even my CLI powerdown script would fail to complete.

 

That said, that SAS error in your log still doesn't look pretty.  I would at least engage in the hardware thread with some other SAS owners to find out if that is bad or not.  Also if you have old logs from before this problem, take a look for a similar error.  Might at least let you know if it is new or not.

 

Ok so wait you're saying your web gui is otherwise reachable but SAB, SB, and Plex no longer work?  What about other plug-ins?  I don't think I've ever heard of a split failure like that where plugins stop but the rest of the server keep chugging along. [weird]

 

So not much help I guess other than try going with the stock gui and maybe stop all plugins except PLEX and see if you can still replicate the problem.

Well...  Thank you for looking into it anyway!  Yes, those SAS errors are scaring me as well, but why would the disk still be accessible and listed has me so puzzled??  I did post to the General Support thread, but so far no one has replied with anything, just a few people have viewed my syslog.  Currently I'm using simple features to view unRAID and it is a bit buggy.  Not sure if this is related but I will try stock GUI and see if this helps.  One thing I can say is that the problem only occurs when I'm browsing through PMS using my iPAD, PC or Android phone.  I browse through the menus for a bit then BAM, AppShare just drops off and I get these SAS errors in my log.  This is the only time I can replicate the problem.  All other plugins(SAB/SB) run perfectly

That is jacked indeed. 

 

any way to move your ssd off the SAS card even if only to test?