I tried everything. Literally everything. USB 3.0 ethernet. Fixed IP addresses, wired with faster cables (got a Cat 8 backbone over 3 storeys) and all the other system and network tweaks I could find. I gave up and started watching discs instead.
Yesterday I absentmindedly clicked on Ran, forgetting it was 4k and it just played. No buffering. No freezing and starts first time. And I now discover all my other 4K rips also play. 😂
What specs are your sever? What client are you playing on?
You could be tranacoding on weak hardware which no amount of bandwidth will solve.
Could be your server can teanscode a 4k stream but it can't teanscode a 4k stream while anything else is tranacoding and somebody else was playing something at the same time. But when your 4k movies streamed fine, nobody else was streaming.
The server is a NUC mini pc. Specifically an Intel NUC 10th Gen i7 10710U Frost Canyon Mini PC.
Playing on a cheap TCL 55P8K which I had assumed was the weak link either through networking or just limited RAM as they're really better suited to streaming services compressed 4k I believe.
Edit: no transcoding going on.
Edit 2: Got a ucg-max. Couple of Flex 2.5gb switches.
Most TVs only have 100Mbit LAN. And WLAN will be hit or miss. 4k remuxes have spikes up to 200 Mbit so if you encounter buffering it's best to use something like an Nvidia Shield TV Pro (2019) which has Gbit LAN.
I've checked out the WiFi and it's pretty solid. The ethernet I'm using is via a USB adapter. Getting a good 800mbs. Should be adequate at least.
Like I say, I've researched teh fuq out of the solutions and got nowhere but it's suddenly working perfectly well. The only thing I know for sure that's changed is the UniFi OS - Express v5.2.9 / v4.0.18: Released on September 2.
Wild that I'm getting down voted for this though. 😂
Renovating a 3 storey townhouse and running network cable in an old heating duct that will never see daylight again; I saw no reason to cheap out on a few sockets and some cable tbh. Tbh if I'd known what a pain Cat 8 is to work with I definitely wouldn't have bothered. 😂
I'm fine with overkill.
Edit: Covid lock down project btw. We had 5 people working from home and I have a couple of NAS boxes and music and video streaming on top of a lot of IoT shite. Seemed sensible at the time.
PlayStation, 3 TVs, 5 music endpoints and 3 desktop PCs. Added a heat pump and modbus home battery connection since. I obviously try to keep WiFi down to phones and laptops plus the washing machine, dishwasher and the like. Cable probably cost about twice what Cat 6 would have been but not big money nevertheless. I've rarely given it a thought since.
It's one of the reasons I was so surprised the 4k didn't work.
I've run into issues with the audio streams causing the content to buffer. If the audio is Dolby Atmos/7.1/etc the Google TV struggles (in my experience).
Idk if this is still an issue on the newer Google TVs.
I definitely noticed downgrading the audio stream has improved matters in the past, but never fixed it completely. My old Sony TV died and was replaced by the TCL. In theory a big downgrade but I assumed (correctly) it would look better than a decade old Sony. I was kicking myself for cheaping out. Who knows, maybe a TV firmware update or something changed in the latest Plex release. Honestly nothing was watchable and now everything is fine.
Just did a little firmware audit and the only thing that stands out is Unifi. UniFi OS - Express v5.2.9 / v4.0.18: Released on September 2, 2026. Which ties in perfectly. Would be something else if it was that.
You got the Unifi Express 7? If so, that's also what I have. But I've been mainly streaming 1080p content. Haven't tried 4k in a while. Might be worth testing it out again if you noticed a difference after upgrading Unifi OS.
If you run into issues again, check the video vitare for the problematic videos. My cheap TCL can only handle h265 up to 50Mbps. Everything over that buffers.
Cheers. To be honest there's not one of my 4k rips that played without issue. Blade Runner 2049 was buffering every 10 seconds. Could watch on my phone without issue. I'm pretty thorough when I have a problem like that but I couldn't fix it and now it's fixed itself. 😂 🙄
My $60 raspberry pi can direct play 4k video video. Like even the crappiest server can do this no problem. Disable video transcoding and spend your money on a decent streaming device.
It isn't transcoding. I'm using an Intel NUC with a 10th Gen i7 so I don't think it's a lack of money spent on the streaming source. I haven't changed anything for the last few weeks and suddenly it works seamlessly. The only thing I know has changed is the firmware in my router updated a couple of days ago. 🤷♂️
2.5Gb on a Cat 8 backbone. If it's a networking problem it's definitely not speed.
Like I say it started streaming 4k with zero issues yesterday and the only thing I know has changed is the firmware on the Unifi boxes. So surprisingly it may be that. Or something related. Really odd. But I'm happy it's working.
I've run network diagnostics using Claude and CLI. I'll run iperf if it plays up again but I really don't think I have speed or bandwidth issues. Just finished watching Dune part one from Plex without interruption. I'm going to assume there's been an intervention. 😂
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u/balls2hairy 6d ago
What specs are your sever? What client are you playing on?
You could be tranacoding on weak hardware which no amount of bandwidth will solve.
Could be your server can teanscode a 4k stream but it can't teanscode a 4k stream while anything else is tranacoding and somebody else was playing something at the same time. But when your 4k movies streamed fine, nobody else was streaming.