Jellyfin Server won't start unless run by administrator

[drnickriviera]

I know I'm not the first person to have this issue, but I haven't been able to determine the solution so I'm hoping someone can help me out. I've used Jellyfin for a couple of years without issue. I had to reinstall a couple of months ago and now I have this problem (Windows 11 standard install - not a service install, latest version). The Jellyfin server will not start unless I run the trayapp executable as administrator. I can run the trayapp executable and it will show up in the tray but the server does not start. If I try to manually start the server it does not start. There are no errors in the Jellyfin log or the Windows application log. However, if I run the executable as Administrator then everything works fine. But that's a pain because I want Jellyfin to start with the PC.

It seems to me that there is an easy solution to this that I just have not discovered yet. I made sure the user running Jellyfin has FULL access to everything in the Program Data\Jellyfin\Server directory and its subdirectories. 

I tried upgrading to the latest version but that did not solve the problem.

What else can I try?

Thanks in advance!

[tmsrxzar]

start in jellyfin logs, windows logs; can be pretty confident that the user does not have access to something jellyfin needs

in a single user environment uac is useless in my opinion and usually the 2nd or 3rd thing disabled; https://www.howtogeek.com/247/disable-us...n-windows/

[drnickriviera]

I tried disabling UAC but it had no effect. The server still does not start unless I run as administrator.

[tmsrxzar]

and what about the logs?

[drnickriviera]

Right clicking on the tray icon and going to "Show Logs" gives me the Jellyfin log files but there are no entries for when I run the executable (i.e. I ran it at 1:22 PM but there are not entries for 1:22 PM or beyond).

Ditto for the Windows application log. It shows nothing at all for 1:22 PM.

The tray icon DOES open, it just doesn't (and can't) start the server.

[tmsrxzar]

ok since you're not giving me anything to work with here's my last idea (doesn't mean others don't have some)

https://www.itpro.com/software/367829/ho...on-windows

[drnickriviera]

Thank you. I was aware that I can set the program to always run as administrator but then I get the Admin popup at system startup. This can be bypassed by disabling UAC but I'd rather not turn UAC off completely just for Jellyfin if I don't have to (seems to be a security risk).

It seems to me that turning on the server must be attempting to write to a directory outside of Program Data\Jellyfin\Server because I gave everyone full access to that folder and its subs.

Any thoughts on where else Jellyfin could be trying to write to when starting up the server?

[tmsrxzar]

i don't actually know what else it might be trying to write; i was hoping the log would show that
could also be only administrator is allowed to create listening sockets; not aware of any mechanisms that prevent this but i also dont have evidence to the contrary either

[Love For Chubby Cheeks]

It appears jellyfin requires admin permissions if it is installed in the default location under C:\Program Files.

If we install it under the user folder (usually under C:\Users), jellybin no longer requires admin rights.

[TheDreadPirate]

Yes. That is expected.