Google Drive, Plex, Windows 10

Hi ok maybe there are other posts about this but i havent seen them specific to windows

i currently use Raidrive and Expandrive but both have issues

I want to have an rclone mount that is fast to navigate, and also fast to load

buffering is an issue with raidrave, and instability is an issue with Expandrive

I aslo download stuff to pc then upload to googe drive so a write cache would be beneficial like expandrive

so pleaxe can someone give me a mount command that will achieve the following, please note everything is already scanned into plex so i just need the mount command to do the above,

Please and thank you

1 Like

hello and welcome to the forum,

to answer that question, we need more information.
what is the version of winfsp?

What is the problem you are having with rclone?

What is your rclone version (output from rclone version)

Which OS you are using and how many bits (eg Windows 7, 64 bit)

Which cloud storage system are you using? (eg Google Drive)

The command you were trying to run (eg rclone copy /tmp remote:tmp)

Paste command here

The rclone config contents with secrets removed.

Paste config here

A log from the command with the -vv flag

Paste  log here

Latest rclone
Windows 10 64 bit
Google drive
Not actually running a command I originally used standard rclone mount

As I said in my op I'm looking for the best command that people have used that fulfill my requirements

I find the basic rclone mount command slow to browse

I heard about vfs cache mode but I just want someone who is using Plex on windows with rclone who is uploading new stuff daily to give me their command which has worked the best

As it stands rclone starts a stream in 13 seconds I have 912mb down internet speed

Raidrive takes 3 seconds but has dropouts
Expandrive takes 3 seconds but can be unstable and just stop the stream half way

So I am basically looking to see what others have used and has worked well

it depends on the exact version of rclone.

there are many posts in the forum about rclone, mount and plex.

I thought I'd chime in here, since this is about Windows :wink:. Note that this is pretty much a copy/paste from a previous post of mine:

I've been using Windows to host Plex and the Gdrive mount on a dedicated server for about three years now, with almost no issues at all. The few times I had a problem watching at home was due to my ISP's peering with Google at the time. My dedicated server has gig speed up and down, but my home connection is 500/500. I can watch even the largest 4K remuxes without buffering.

Make sure you have installed WinFsp before you try to use a mount with Rclone. You can get WinFsp here: https://github.com/billziss-gh/winfsp/releases

I suggest you try my mount settings. Note that this is a read-only mount. Create a .bat file with the following (replace my path and drive name with your own, of course):

@echo off
title Rclone Mount READ ONLY
D:\Programs\Rclone\rclone mount --attr-timeout 1000h --dir-cache-time 1000h --poll-interval 0 --rc --read-only -v Google_Drive_Crypt: G:
pause

Then create another batch file with this (replacing my path again):

@echo off
title Rclone Prime
D:\Programs\Rclone\rclone rc vfs/refresh recursive=true --timeout 10m
pause

Run this after you mount the drive to "prime" it. This will basically cache the file and folder structure for much, much faster reading afterwards, and it does so very quickly. You'll want to re-run this whenever you make changes to your mount.

To give you an idea of how I use all this: I download stuff overnight, organize everything and then use RcloneBrowser by @kapitainsky to upload everything to Gdrive. I do not upload via mount, ever, hence the read-only. Once uploaded, I use a separate read/write mount to move things around in Gdrive. For this, I use this very simple command via batch file (notice the different drive letter):

@echo off
title Rclone Mount READ/WRITE
D:\Programs\Rclone\rclone mount -v Google_Drive_Crypt: F:
pause

When I'm done putting things into their final locations, I stop the read/write mount via CTRL+C. Then I run the "prime" batch to update the read-only mount. Once that's done, I run the Plex scan.

As you can see, I like doing things manually and being in full control at all times :wink:

EDIT: Note that my solution does not use any cache. My Internet speeds on both the server side and at home do not require things to be cached. Media starts playing after about 3-5 seconds.

3 Likes

hi @VBB,

when the OP posted, my first thought was you and your post but i like to give the OP a chance to search around the forum first.

Wait, you mean people actually use SEARCH???? :rofl:

3 Likes

Thank you this is perfect, exactly what I've been looking for, love the priming bit too

the prime part of it doesnt seem to be working just hangs on the cmd screen

heres what i have

mount.bat

@echo off
title Rclone Mount READ ONLY
C:\rclone\rclone mount --attr-timeout 1000h --dir-cache-time 1000h --poll-interval 0 --rc --read-only -v Gdrive: V:
pause

Prime.bat

@echo off
title Rclone Prime
C:\rclone\rclone rc vfs/refresh recursive=true --timeout 10m
pause

you can run the same command with debug output by adding flag -vv
C:\rclone\rclone rc vfs/refresh recursive=true --timeout 10m -vv

thats with your command

the prime command can take time to complete, as it has to scan all the files in all the folders and subfolders.

here is the output of my prime command

2020/09/16 18:49:24 DEBUG : rclone: Version "v1.53.0" starting with parameters ["C:\\data\\rclone\\scripts\\rclone.exe" "rc" "vfs/refresh" "recursive=true" "-vv"]
{
	"result": {
		"": "OK"
	}
}
2020/09/16 18:49:27 DEBUG : 4 go routines active

my output

VBB command uses flag --timeout 10m

if you look at your command's timestamps, the command timed-out after 10 minutes - 23:58 to 00:08

change the flag to --timeout=0 to disable a timeout period.
run the command again.

Hmm, that is odd, unless he has even more data than I have. I recently started using the timeout flag, because my priming started taking longer than the default would allow. You could remove the flag entirely and see if it makes a difference. Just to be sure, your mount is up while you're running the prime.bat?

yes, i noticed that you added that flag, as i do not remember it from your posts.

i would not remove the flag, as The default is 5m. Set to 0 to disable.

I started having an issue after updating to the latest beta one day, and Nick recommended using the timeout flag. That fixed my problem. You could set it to an hour even, and it wouldn't make a difference, if your prime command connected properly. But in OP's case it's not connecting, so it simply times out after 10 minutes.

good point but based on docs, not sure that is correct.
If a transfer has started but then becomes idle for this long it is considered broken and disconnected

so the transfer/process can start, but if the command does not finish in x minutes, then it is considered a failed command.

to know, the OP should make sure the mount command is working.
then run the command with --timeout=0, wait and see what happens.

if the mount is not running or the refresh command cannot connect, it fails immediately .
Failed to rc: connection failed: Post "http://localhost:5572/vfs/refresh": dial tcp 127.0.0.1:5572: connectex: No connection could be made because the target machine actively refused it

Right, that's why I was wondering if he had even more data, so the command would take even longer to finish. Disabling the timeout or setting it to a really high number should take care of it, but of course only if RC is working properly. We'll have to wait for OP to respond :slight_smile: