Sonarr: Prefer Content - x265,HEVC,Ecnoder,Rips

[adz7]

Issue #385 was opened in 2014 and has been locked by @Taloth since Jan 2016. Is there any update on this?
I prefer 1080p content but x264 WEB-DL takes up a lot of disk space whereas x265 1080p content is 50% smaller and is very easily available now with the rise of 4K and 4KHDR content, just one example: https://extratorrent.cc/profile/UTR/torrents/

My current quality profile is:
WEBDL-1080p (Finish)
WEBDL-720p
HDTV-1080p
HDTV-720p (Start)

I know that I can put restriction in for 'Must Contain' or 'Must Not' but I'd like to be able to prioritise search for x265 and not limit it because an episode may not be released in x265 but if it is I want to make sure that is what it gets upgraded to. Part of the issue is current search profiles do not take into account codecs which can provide a massive boost in quality and efficiency. For instance the other day Sonarr downloaded an x265 HDTV-1080p rip which was amazing quality and only 400MB. 2 days later it found a x264 WEBDL-720p rip which was 1.1GB and it upgraded the file, turned out it was worse quality - so I got a lower quality rip and almost triple of my disk space consumed. This is a very frequent occurrence, also the fact that it relies on the the user putting the correct rip type into the filename doesn't always help. I find a lot of HDTV-1080p content is actually WEB-DL 720p just incorrectly named. Maybe ignoring the source quality (which can be very inaccurate) and allowing the user to filter based on codec would be a more reliable alternative?

I guess the wish would be to get more control of what Sonarr selects and downloads. Ideally I would like my quality profile to be:
WEBDL-1080p [x265,h.265,HEVC] (Finish)
WEBDL-720p [x265,h.265,HEVC]
HDTV-1080p [x265,h.265,HEVC]
HDTV-720p [x265,h.265,HEVC]
WEBDL-1080p [x264,h.264]
WEBDL-720p [x264,h.264]
HDTV-1080p [x264,h.264]
HDTV-720p [x264,h.264] (Start)

Or alternatively:
[x265,h.265,HEVC]-1080p (Finish)
[x265,h.265,HEVC]-720p
[x265,h.265,HEVC]-1080p
[x265,h.265,HEVC]-720p
[x264,h.264]-1080p
[x264,h.264]-720p
[x264,h.264]-1080p
[x264,h.264]-720p (Start)

A lot of users have a preferred encoder/rips they may wish to prioritise, a few examples: PSA,Shannig,tigole,UTR,RMteam
A feature like this would allow them to prefer those if found over others and if not then download a quality it does find even if that is an x264 or different encoder and should it become available later on can upgrade the file.

I was hoping there is something in the pipeline to help accommodate this? Hopefully in the near future otherwise we're going to need petabyte drives as 4K content increases and Sonarr keeps on grabbing x264 quality.

Provide a description of the feature request or bug, the more details the better.
Please use https://forums.sonarr.tv/ for support or other questions. (When in doubt, use the forums)

[markus101]

Issue #385 was opened in 2014 and has been locked by @Taloth since Jan 2016. Is there any update on this?

No update, any updates will be posted to the GHI in question. It was locked because of repeated comments that added no substance to the conversation.

I was hoping there is something in the pipeline to help accommodate this?

385 would be it, it's not actively being worked on at this time by any one of the core members and I'm not aware of anyone else working on it.

[Sparticuz]

This feature already exists in Radarr. Would probably not take much effort to pull this into Sonarr, but idk.
https://github.com/Radarr/Radarr/pull/462 and https://github.com/Radarr/Radarr/pull/484
I tried to post this in #385, but it's locked. Maybe with most of the work done, a core dev could merge it.

[markus101]

Depends if we go about it the same way Radarr did. We still haven't decided if that's the way we want to do it.

[ujellyx]

Any update on this?
I'd like to redownload my collection in x265 to save disk space and up the quality.

[Fish2]

would really love to see this in Sonarr

[keystorm]

This would be really great.

I'm currently using a tag to force HEVC releases, but that usually breaks how the Profiles work. For example, I would prefer h.264 over nothing at all. But then again, I would prefer a 10bit over a regular HEVC release. Same with 1080p over 720p.

I think this could be "easily" achieved if the Quality Definitions could be extended with Custom Qualities, allowing for new definitions based on certain filename contents and filesize conditions. This way they can be also used within profiles while abiding to the known and loved Sonarr criteria.

[juress]

Please get on this, it's too important to be "undecided" for so long.

[redxon]

I don't think that would be very hard to implement really. Sonarr already looks for keywords in the filename like hdtv, web-dl etc. so I can't imagine this would be too much of a stretch.

[Fish2]

I did get it working with https://github.com/Sonarr/Sonarr/pull/2232

[Sparticuz]

If you use a torznab client like jackett and your tracker supports categories, you can specify in Sonarr only that category that is for HEVC. Of course, then you are locked into HEVC, but I seem to still get everything I need in HEVC.

[keystorm]

You can do this by using tags. Of course you need to manually assign that tag to every new show you add, but that's basically set and forget. Additionally, not all trackers have a separate HEVC/x265 category.

Again, what would be perfect is being able to download h264, but prefer h265 when/if available. Just like you do with HDTV and WEBDL.

As of today, many shows are released in HEVC hours or days after initial release. And sometimes you might have to wait up to one week. I would rather Sonarr downloaded the regular h264 first and then eventually replaced it with h265 so we don't have to wait for the show (or manually download, which is what I usually end up doing).

It seems like everything is being rewritten for v3, but there's no ETA and we've been in v2 since forever, so who knows. IIRC it seems there will be "prefer"-like tags, which might be an ok solution.

[vinchi007]

I agree this feature is a must have. currently I have to manually download each episode because Sonarr wont fetch it timely, it removes the fun of automation and requires manual intervention every time.

[browned]

I now this is a very old thread but wouldn't an "Preferred Encoder Profile" be a better option. The current settings for "Profiles" and "Quality Definitions" are very good.

All users need now are an "Preferred Encoder Profiles" that can be selected and ordered and associated with the "Profiles"
AV1 - AV1
h265 - h.265, h265, hevc, x265, x.265, possibly ?10bit?
h264 - h.264, h264, x264

99% of my content is h264, I do not want to leave h264 on the system if I can get and play h265, av1 with no issues. It is a complete waste of space especially when every thing is so automated.

[redxon]

That's actually a good idea.

This way it still can do the fallback to h264 if needed, but also with quality there should be a cutoff. So for example say let's grab the h264 release when available but upgrade to the h265 one when possible.

Like I mentioned above, often the quality is in the filename with hvec, h265 or whatever. There could also be the agressive option (if Sonarr can do this) that it looks at the file in detail (mkvinfo or whatever) after downloading if the file is actually h265 or just named wrong.

[browned]

Not sure Sonarr needs to get too involved in checking quality, by way of setting "cutoff" limits and "quality definitions" Sonar knows what it has downloaded and the quality of it. If files are uploaded with incorrect names then that can cause issues but it is not something Sonarr should worry about unless it is super easy to scan the file codec details before it copies/moves it to the right location.

We could say that h265/AV1 can be downloaded if the size of the file is xx% of the size in the "quality deinitions".

"Preferred Encoder Profiles"

1. AV1 - Percent of Quality Definition = 50
2. h265 - Percent of Quality Definition = 65
3. h264 - Percent of Quality Definition = 100
4. Other - Percent of Quality Definition = 100
5. No Preference.

This gives Sonarr a consistant interface as it shouldn't change the "Profiles" and "Quality" tabs, right now I assume Sonarr searches for a file, it checks the name for say WEBDL, 1080P, and Size is between 2GB and 6GB. With additions above the search would be:
WEBDL, 1080P, H264, and Size 2GB to 6GB or
WEBDL, 1080P, H265, and Size 1.3GB to 3.9GB at 65% or
WEBDL, 1080P, AV1, and Size 1GB to 3GB at 50%

You could also add "Preferred audio Profiles" as well. DTS-HD HR, Dolby True HD and DTS-HD MA, DTS, DD5.1, AC3 etc etc

[donileo]

Really need this feature. Just putting my vote in as well. Is there a reason for the holdup? Not trying to be pushy but I figure this isn’t something too hard to implement.

[voltagex]

Can this be reopened?

[markus101]

No... It's a dupe of another issue.

[voltagex]

Ah right, GitHub really needs a way to merge/redirect issues.