[TUTORIAL] 13th Gen Intel Proxmox/TrueNAS/Plex hardware transcoding guide

[sterzy]

efibootmgr -v this should say grub mine does. But I still get systemd under pstree.

Just chiming in here to say this: That's normal. You are using GRUB as your bootloader then (that should be the default unless you are booting a UEFI system with a ZFS root partition). systemd, among other things, acts as the init system in Proxmox, i.e., the process that is the ancestor of all other processes. So it will always show up as PID 1 and, thus, on top of pstree.

Under the systemd umbrella of software projects there is also systemd-boot (formerly, gummiboot) which we use as a bootloader if you are using ZFS on your root partition. Please note though that systemd ≠ systemd-boot and that having systemd showing up as PID 1 does not imply that systemd-boot is being used.

 

[xokia]

Just chiming in here to say this: That's normal. You are using GRUB as your bootloader then (that should be the default unless you are booting a UEFI system with a ZFS root partition). systemd, among other things, acts as the init system in Proxmox, i.e., the process that is the ancestor of all other processes. So it will always show up as PID 1 and, thus, on top of pstree.

Under the systemd umbrella of software projects there is also systemd-boot (formerly, gummiboot) which we use as a bootloader if you are using ZFS on your root partition. Please note though that systemd ≠ systemd-boot and that having systemd showing up as PID 1 does not imply that systemd-boot is being used.

Thanks for clarifying that.

 

[xokia]

I didn't have to switch back, I was using Grub all along, this is the explanation

"It appears to boot with GRUB in UEFI mode, which is normal if your root filesystem (Proxmox installation) is not on ZFS. Following the Proxmox manual, it also matches GRUB booting in UFEI mode. Even if the \EFI\proxmox\grubx64.efi is not identical to your \EFI\BOOT\BOOTX64.EFI, it's definately not \EFI\systemd\systemd-bootx64.efi that would indicate systemd-boot. In short: you are using GRUB and not systemd-boot, so you have exactly what you wanted."

Turns out my real issue was updating to 6.2.9-1
So now I have to find a way to default boot into 6.2.6-1

Have to edit the grub file, trying to get the right edit now. Luckily I didn't break it all down and rebuild!

So is your system stable now? The drivers for 13th gen dont appear to work under windows either. HW transcode is a bust under windows. It will say HW trancoding although on my phone I get audio no video. If you manually change the encode to something else it will play correctly but HW transcode shuts off. It was working better under linux but would always crash after about 3-4 hours. Seems Plex isn't ready for 13th gen.

 

[lampshade29]

Is anyone else having issues after they migrate their Plex Library? I followed this guide, everything and then all the sudden Plex won't use hw to Transcode. The only thing that changed is I migrated my Plex Library, I even uninstalled and reinstalled Plex and it sees my igpu but it will not transcode with the igpu.

I went back to a snapshot before I migrated and it works like perfectly!... So its something in the migration from my old plex server?

 

[adresner]

So is your system stable now? The drivers for 13th gen dont appear to work under windows either. HW transcode is a bust under windows. It will say HW trancoding although on my phone I get audio no video. If you manually change the encode to something else it will play correctly but HW transcode shuts off. It was working better under linux but would always crash after about 3-4 hours. Seems Plex isn't ready for 13th gen.

My system is stable.. we have been using Plex on various TV’s and devices for the last week and it’s all working. I’m really happy as it is now. I’m able to update my Plex LXC and nothing breaks. Still pinned to the same kernel I mention in the OP.

With that said, I did not migrate a library, i setup everything from scratch. My old Plex Media server was a mess, I’m breaking free of it and QNAP

 

[adresner]

Is anyone else having issues after they migrate their Plex Library? I followed this guide, everything and then all the sudden Plex won't use hw to Transcode. The only thing that changed is I migrated my Plex Library, I even uninstalled and reinstalled Plex and it sees my igpu but it will not transcode with the igpu.

I went back to a snapshot before I migrated and it works like perfectly!... So its something in the migration from my old plex server?

So if you follow the guide, it works, but then you migrate your library and it stopped working? I have never migrated a Plex library so I cannot comment.

Did you check with kernel you are using in Proxmox?

 

[lampshade29]

So if you follow the guide, it works, but then you migrate your library and it stopped working? I have never migrated a Plex library so I cannot comment.

Did you check with kernel you are using in Proxmox?

With this guide the trick seems to start fresh with a new library, so if you share your plex with others you need to kick out new invites.

I am on the kernel in this guide, I thought that was the issue but no luck. I went back and redid a whole new LXC to replicate it, with the exact same results. The only thing I didn't do is dig into the logs, but it was all about time mgmt lol, faster to rebuild from scratch. Proably a better start anyways, my library was migrated from a synology 918-->into Truenas Scale-->Then into a LXC soo who knows what other issues it had.

All I care is Transcoding hw is working now, and so far with a i5 13gen I was able to get ten 4k streams all transcoding with no issues. Next its time to add Plex Meta Manager back to put back those cool overlays!

 

[pchang388]

I stumbled upon this guide after already getting things working with the same mobo and motherboard. Just a FYI - I see that it says use 6.2.1 kernel version and it broke with 6.2.9-1 but I am running 6.2.9-1 without issue. Am not using the iGPU yet though, using a A2000 that I already had before setting up this new proxmox host. Plex is running in a Ubuntu 22 server VM in my case though which may be the factor.

# pveversion
pve-manager/7.4-3/9002ab8a (running kernel: 6.2.9-1-pve)

# lscpu
Model name:                      13th Gen Intel(R) Core(TM) i9-13900K

# lspci
06:00.0 VGA compatible controller: NVIDIA Corporation Device 2571 (rev a1)
06:00.1 Audio device: NVIDIA Corporation Device 228e (rev a1)

 

[adresner]

I stumbled upon this guide after already getting things working with the same mobo and motherboard. Just a FYI - I see that it says use 6.2.1 kernel version and it broke with 6.2.9-1 but I am running 6.2.9-1 without issue. Am not using the iGPU yet though, using a A2000 that I already had before setting up this new proxmox host. Plex is running in a Ubuntu 22 server VM in my case though which may be the factor.

# pveversion
pve-manager/7.4-3/9002ab8a (running kernel: 6.2.9-1-pve)

# lscpu
Model name:                      13th Gen Intel(R) Core(TM) i9-13900K

# lspci
06:00.0 VGA compatible controller: NVIDIA Corporation Device 2571 (rev a1)
06:00.1 Audio device: NVIDIA Corporation Device 228e (rev a1)

We are using an LXC to run Plex, with the iGPU mapped into the LXC, very different than a VM with a GPU passed through

 

[pchang388]

We are using an LXC to run Plex, with the iGPU mapped into the LXC, very different than a VM with a GPU passed through

Ah my bad! I think I was looking at a different post/thread and ended up posting here instead, definitely off topic. Sorry about that, but I am interested in using the iGPU eventually for another purpose, maybe tdarr, so I'll follow along. Thanks!

 

[TrustyHippo]

This blog post worked for me: Proxmox: Plex LXC with Alder Lake Transcoding

 

[xokia]

My system is stable.. we have been using Plex on various TV’s and devices for the last week and it’s all working. I’m really happy as it is now. I’m able to update my Plex LXC and nothing breaks. Still pinned to the same kernel I mention in the OP.

Mine is still not stable crashes after a few hours. Are you using 6.2.9-1?

 

[adresner]

I'm sorry to hear that, I know it can be quite frustrating. I'm using Kernel 6.2.6-1-pve

So far, very stable here. if you reboot, don't turn on any VM or CT, still unstable?

 

[xokia]

I'm sorry to hear that, I know it can be quite frustrating. I'm using Kernel 6.2.6-1-pve

So far, very stable here. if you reboot, don't turn on any VM or CT, still unstable?

how did you switch the kernel?

 

[TrustyHippo]

I'm using 6.2.9-1, 12th gen CPU, and I was using Plexamp for a few hours today (yes I know no GPU usage) and no issues. Just watched 5-10 min of video but was fine. I use Plex more for music than video.

 

[xokia]

I'm using 6.2.9-1, 12th gen CPU, and I was using Plexamp for a few hours today (yes I know no GPU usage) and no issues. Just watched 5-10 min of video but was fine. I use Plex more for music than video.

Yea I looked at your link and compared with what was posted here. Looks like the difference was the following

I removed
vfio_virqfd

from /etc/modules

then

update-initramfs -u -k all
Reboot

Dont want to get ahead of myself but its been up all day without crashing. Been streaming a bunch of 4k video and transcoding to 1080 just to test.
If it stays up multiple days I'll report back

 

[adresner]

You should be able to choose which kernel at boot, you can also pin that kernel with a command.. check out my other post about that.
https://forum.proxmox.com/threads/set-default-kernel-with-grub.125672/post-548716

 

[adresner]

Yea I looked at your link and compared with what was posted here. Looks like the difference was the following

I removed
vfio_virqfd

from /etc/modules

then

update-initramfs -u -k all
Reboot

Dont want to get ahead of myself but its been up all day without crashing. Been streaming a bunch of 4k video and transcoding to 1080 just to test.
If it stays up multiple days I'll report back

how is it going?

 

[xokia]

how is it going?

Fails I even tried switching to the kernel you are using same issue. I think its a Cstate issue as I mentioned before. Cores go idle and then they start going to sleep and then things freeze up. I will disable the c-states in BIOS see if it stays up. This only happens after the system has been sitting idle multiple hours. But could be issue for both versions of kernel.

 

[xokia]

My system is stable.. we have been using Plex on various TV’s and devices for the last week and it’s all working. I’m really happy as it is now. I’m able to update my Plex LXC and nothing breaks. Still pinned to the same kernel I mention in the OP.

How are you transferring files to the new system? I have windows 11 in a VM so I can convert my 4K disks to h.265 mkv . My drives are also setup as ntfs so they can be removed and attached to a different windows machine via a USB connection if needed. I still have to transfer the raw mkv from local machine to server as the server has no disk drive.

I normally use SMB server and transfer files via the network. If I read files from the new server I get over 100MB/s. If I have to write files to the server I am getting 30MB/s I am running samba server in the same container as plex. Write speeds are terrible.

I was using a Nvidia shield pro with a similar setup before. NTFS drive attached to shield via USB. Samba server enabled on shield. I was getting 130MB/s read and writes. Crazy that the little shield outperforms on write speeds via SMB.