Docker Jellyfin on UGreen NAS not using Direct Play

[mjennings77095]

I am fairly new to the Jellyfin ecosystem and recently acquired a Ugreen NAS (DXP4800 Pro).  Since I was just starting to learn about Jellyfin, I used the Ugreen Jellyfin app (recommended for beginners) to install my first media server.

The process was easy (installs 10.10.3) and the end result was successful.  My intent was to have all content played as Direct Play and I confirmed that both Dolby Atmos and Dolby Vision were playing successfully and without any transcoding (Hardware Acceleration is set to None).

The issue I have with the Ugreen Jellyfin app implementation is that it is rigid and very limited in what can be edited.  My greatest problem was I defined the home for movies to be directly at my movie folder (the app defines it as /data).  I later decided I wanted to keep movies under a different folder (media/movies), which completely breaks my Ugreen Jellyfin server.  So leaving my movies in place (under /data), I decided to try my hand an installing Jellyfin in Docker.  This was a great opportunity to learn, but the end results were very different.

Under the Docker install, the only way to play without transcoding is using VLC as an external player.  I prefer not to fall back to VLC as I prefer the integrated player.

I have tried all different things, different builds, different settings, etc. trying to get the Docker implementation to work as well as the Ugreen Jellyfin app version.  I just can't find what I'm missing.

For the record, all content is identical between the Ugreen app and the Docker install.  I've gone through the 10.10.3 configuration (virtually all transcoding is turned off) and insured the 12.0.0 configuration is the same.  Still I get a starkly different outcome.

I need advice on what may be causing the Docker install to not be able to play DV (where the Ugreen app is able to play DV).  Interestingly enough, a DV/DA movie will come into my AVR (Denon X8500) as 2 channel.  If I select a 5.1 channel, I get 5 channels coming in from the AVR.  If I play a movie with only DA, but no DV, the movie seemingly streams without any issue.

Again, to re-emphasize, none of these issues occur with the Ugreen Jellyfin app implementation, but many issues seem to happen under the Docker implementation.

Please let me know questions or suggestions.
Thx!

[TheDreadPirate]

What you're describing may be some server side changes regarding when to transcode and when not to between 10.11.3 and 10.11.11. I see several changes in the change log that may be related.

Depending on what kind of Dolby Vision, the client may not support playing it directly via hardware accelerated decoding. The fact that it played well before via (I'm assuming) software decoding may have been a fluke since Jellyfin will opt to transcode if hardware accelerated decoding is not supported on the client.

Regarding the issue with movie folder location, when you made the move from /data to /data/movies, did you have both /data and /data/movies in the library config at the same time?

[mjennings77095]

What I did shortly after posting was attempt to emulate the Ugreen install. While it's likely that Ugreen has its own image, app installed container identified it as 10.10.3 with GPU performance turned on and bridge network mode. So, I created a new container from the 10.10.3 image and this seemed to resolve my playback problem (I basically emulated the Ugreen app version container). All is working using the internal player with zero transcoding going on anywhere (my goal).

I also installed Plex and had success.

I've seen this issue mentioned in one similar form or another during my previous searches, but rarely exactly the same identical issue. All were related to loss of direct play when transcoding was not needed or experienced with an external player. I finally found a reddit that mentioned earlier versions of Jellyfin, which led me down the path to try and reproduce the Ugreen app implementation.

One further note, I have mostly UHD movies. Any movie that had both Dolby Vision and Dolby Atmos were forced into being transcoded. If the UHD had HDR+ and Dolby Atmos (or any other lower combination) transcoding did not seem to happen. For me, the issue was exclusively for movies with both Dolby Atmos + Dolby Vision.