M3u8 master playlist and video quality

[gartiol]

I'm relatively new to Jellyfin, but have been using Plex for years.

I've added Live TV with the use of m3u8 playlists, and that works just fine.

Now I'm trying to add movies and series the same way and simply just stream them with the use of a master m3u8 playlist. 

An example is the movie Mile 22, it's master playlist can be found here: https://drod22p.akamaized.net/dk/clear/n...ifest.m3u8

When I play that link in Jellyfin the best quality is 480p - 3 mbps. To me that seems like a low quality when the playlist contains different quality versions. Including this one:
#EXT-X-I-FRAME-STREAM-INF:AVERAGE-BANDWIDTH=83792,BANDWIDTH=215056,VIDEO-RANGE=SDR,CODECS="avc1.640029",RESOLUTION=1280x720,URI="Mile-22-Mile-22_DRTV2022Jan_HD_16x9_VideoMain_video_5500_iframe.m3u8"

#EXT-X-STREAM-INF:BANDWIDTH=6539321,AVERAGE-BANDWIDTH=5663898,FRAME-RATE=25.000,CODECS="avc1.640029,mp4a.40.2",RESOLUTION=1280x720,VIDEO-RANGE="SDR",AUDIO="audio_medium",SUBTITLES="subs"
Mile-22-Mile-22_DRTV2022Jan_HD_16x9_VideoMain_video_5500.m3u8

Am I getting is all wrong?

I tested with the HD 5500 m3u8 file: https://drod22p.akamaized.net/dk/clear/n..._5500.m3u8

When I play that file i Jellyfin the quality is much better. With a quality of 720p - 8 mbps. The problem with that file is, that it has no audio attached.

Any pointers on what to do about it?

[TheDreadPirate]

No audio attached or no COMPATIBLE audio. Can you share your jellyfin and ffmpeg logs with us?

[gartiol]

There is no auto attacked in the last playlist. Audio is in a separate playlist.

Would there - as an alternative - be a way to combine the two playlists?

I have attached logs. One set of logs when playing the low res and one set with the best res.

[TheDreadPirate]

AFAIK, Jellyfin cannot combine tracks from two separate streams on the fly. If you can write the streams to disk you can use ffmpeg to combine them locally.

[gartiol]

As a buffer of a sort? If I need to store the data on a drive from the start, then I might as well just download them from the start.

But I would like to stream it.

Did the logs point out anything interesting, as to why the quality is so low?

[TheDreadPirate]

For the 480P streams, the original bit rate is just really low. 309Kbps and 638Kbps H264. Even for that lower resolution, that's a pretty low bit rate.

Jellyfin and, AFAIK, most other players that can do m3u8 IPTV can only "tune" into one stream per client. So muxing audio and video from separate streams just isn't possible at the moment.

[gartiol]

hmm.. ok.

Would there be any way to merge or combine the two m3u8 files to one new m3u8 playlist?

[TheDreadPirate]

m3u8 files are just text files with links. You can copy and paste the contents of multiple files into one.
But it doesn't matter if they are in the same playlist file. The video and audio are in separate streams for your streams and you can only "tune" into one at a time per client.

[tmsrxzar]

what TDP is trying to explain is

an m3u8 can have multiple tracks but in jellyfin there is no way to have it pick 2 tracks at the same time
so the streams have to serve BOTH audio and video in the same track, not separate

with ffmpeg it would require 2 input file (-i) flags, jellyfin simply is not setup to do that

if you merge the m3u8 it's going to play each stream in sequence at best like a playlist, so you'll get video first then next track is audio, never at the same time

[gartiol]

Ok. Thank you.

And there would be no way to to create a new master playlist, where I use the two links with audio and video as sources in a new playlist?