Kodi Community Forum

(2016-08-23, 23:36)HereIsTom Wrote: [ -> ]The HiMedia Q5 Pro and Q10 Pro are now one of the best Kodi Mediaplayers!

For a bunch of us 1080p purists, that value smooth video playback in a Kodi mediaplayer it is absolutely essential that 23.976 / 29.97 / 59.94fps video plays back smoothly, all the time, without microstutters.

Intel Haswell micro architecture onwards has this 100% sorted in a speedy HD Audio Kodi box, it's one of the reasons the Chromebox has been so wildly popular. It took Intel many years to fix their infamous 24p bug too.
This is the benchmark.

The Q5/10 Pro has quite a way to go yet by comparison.

edit: damn spelling

(2016-08-24, 04:18)wrxtasy Wrote: [ -> ]

(2016-08-23, 23:36)HereIsTom Wrote: [ -> ]The HiMedia Q5 Pro and Q10 Pro are now one of the best Kodi Mediaplayers!

For a bunch of us 1080p purists, that value smooth video playback in a Kodi mediaplayer it is absolutely essential that 23.976 / 29.97 / 59.94fps video plays back smoothly, all the time, without micostutters.

Intel Haswell micro architecture onwards has this in 100% sorted in a speedy HD Audio Kodi box, it's one of the reasons the Chromebox has been so wildly popular. It took Intel many years to fix their infamous 24p bug too.
This is the benchmark.

The Q5/10 Pro has quite a way to go yet by comparison.

Totally agree. Life is too short to put up with microstutters. If a box doesn't support 23.976/29.97/59.94 refresh rate then I'm not interested, particularly for bitstreaming HD Audio.

(2016-08-23, 23:36)HereIsTom Wrote: [ -> ]The HiMedia Q5 Pro and Q10 Pro are now one of the best Kodi Mediaplayers!

Anything not using the native Kodi video player is garbage for Kodi usage, IMO. It might be enough for some people, but this is the Kodi forum.

Garbage is harsh IMHO. Kodi appeals to different people for different reasons. Do I (and most users I expect) want an integrated solution? Absolutely, that is if it did what I wanted for video playback (what's most important to me). Will I take a capable video player using Kodi solely as a front-end to manage my movie/TV libraries? Yes, if I can't have the former.

HiMedia, with the latest f/w does support 23.976, 24.000 and 29.970 properly (for 2D; with 3D, still minor microstutters, which has been reported by Simon to HiMedia). Support for the remaining framerates (with auto-switching) is expected in the next f/w. What I like about HiMedia Q5/Q10 Pro is versatility: 2D, 3D MVC, 4K and HD audio all there. For 4K, support for 10-bit, HDR and even DolbyVision. PQ is also excellent. It plays video types that give even the nVidia Shield trouble... 1080p yuv422, 1080p yuv444, 2160p yuv422, 2160p yuv444 (@wesk05 sent me these to test), MPEG2 29.97 4-2-2 MPEG2 1080i, etc. Also, Shield's playback of Apple iMovie 4K output isn't smooth; with HiMedia, very smooth. Edit: I was wrong about these bits; see below

I also use my Intel i3 NUC w/the MVC build, and if Intel's Kaby Lake ends up supporting HDR as rumored, along with 10-bit 4K@60, then I may just ditch HiMedia in favor of that integrated solution. My only concern is that @afedchin is the sole developer for Windows MVC, so makes sense to have at least two playback player options that play all I've noted.

(2016-08-24, 17:51)hdmkv Wrote: [ -> ]HiMedia, with the latest f/w does support 23.976, 24.000 and 29.970 properly.

(2016-08-20, 19:37)hdmkv Wrote: [ -> ]Watched 2 3D ISO's all the way yesterday and noticed microstutters about half a dozen times in each. While they seem more subtle than w/previous f/w's as some have reported, there's still noticeable even when trying to enjoy the movie & not really keeping at eye out for them.

hdmkv, can you clear up the mixed messages then please. I like everyone else am pretty confused at this point in time ?

(2016-08-24, 15:48)Ned Scott Wrote: [ -> ]

(2016-08-23, 23:36)HereIsTom Wrote: [ -> ]The HiMedia Q5 Pro and Q10 Pro are now one of the best Kodi Mediaplayers!

Anything not using the native Kodi video player is garbage for Kodi usage, IMO. It might be enough for some people, but this is the Kodi forum.

I 100% agreed, but what is Kodi doing for the demanding user request to support MVC playback natively?
This is the reason why people are looking for an alternative player that will at least still bring them close to Kodi.

If all this requested format is supported by default, most of us wouldn't be looking into all this third party applications and hardware.

(2016-08-24, 17:51)hdmkv Wrote: [ -> ]It plays video types that give even the nVidia Shield trouble... 1080p yuv422, 1080p yuv444, 2160p yuv422, 2160p yuv444 (@wesk05 sent me these to test),

Are you sure that it plays these files? I tried these clips on a nVIDIA GTX 1060 and it struggled with 2160p yuv422/yuv444.

BTW: Kodi on Linux (LibreELEC) / Windows (10 Anniversary edition) doesn't support HDR playback (At least I haven't been able to figure it out yet).

Yes, it did play the files you sent, but not smoothly. Shield wouldn't play the Golden Gate 1080p yuv444 nor Golden Gate 2160p yuv444 at all if I recall correctly.
Edit: I was wrong about this; see below

(2016-08-24, 18:12)wrxtasy Wrote: [ -> ]hdmkv, can you clear up the mixed messages then please. I like everyone else am pretty confused at this point in time ?

Minor microstutters just for 3D at the moment (as it's being output at 24.000). 2D is fine. Sorry, should've clarified this.

(2016-08-20, 19:13)signde Wrote: [ -> ]I doubt you intended this list to be exhaustive but you can add the Amazon Fire TV 2 to the list of "7.1 HD Audio decoding to lossless PCM Multichannel audio output" devices as it works for me.

It should be noted though that a lot of devices I have tried with Kodi and 7.1 PCM suffer from this unresolved bug. The surround back and side surround channels are reversed - surround back plays on surround sides and vice versa. Using the "Dolby TrueHD 7.1 Channel Check" and "DTS-HD MA 7.1 Speaker Phase sample videos, I have confirmed that bug on

Fire TV 2: Kodi 16.1, SPMC 16.3, and Kodi 17 alpha2
Nexus Player: Kodi 16.1 and Kodi 17 alpha2
Macbook Pro Retina OSX: Kodi 16.1

The channels are mapped correctly on

Windows (mac intel bootcamp): Kodi 16.1
AMD A50M Hudson M1: LibreELEC 7 and LibreELEC v7.90.002 ALPHA
Raspberry Pi 2: LibreELEC v7.90.002 ALPHA

Thanks for the info signde, added to the Audio Post #3

(2016-08-24, 17:51)hdmkv Wrote: [ -> ]It plays video types that give even the nVidia Shield trouble... 1080p yuv422, 1080p yuv444, 2160p yuv422, 2160p yuv444 (@wesk05 sent me these to test)

What codec were the 4:2:2 and 4:4:4 samples in and what bit-depth (8 or 10 bit). Did you also test any 1080i YCbCr content?

(Grrr - YUV is sloppy shorthand for YCbCr... U and V really only exist in a PAL decoder. I know it's stuck as a description in computer-land - doesn't mean it's right...)

They were torture test files from @wesk05....





Let me see if I can make a video today with some of the 4K playback differences between Shield and HiMedia.
Edit: I was wrong about above playing properly w/HiMedia; see below

(2016-08-26, 09:57)noggin Wrote: [ -> ](Grrr - YUV is sloppy shorthand for YCbCr... U and V really only exist in a PAL decoder. I know it's stuck as a description in computer-land - doesn't mean it's right...)

Y'UV/YUV and Y'CbCr/YCbCr are interchangeably used these days and I completely agree with you that the usage is confusing and not exactly right, but I think the use of YUV in digital video originates from the YUV Digital Disk format developed by Abekas in the late 80's/early 90's. Personally, I use YUV terminology for anything related to digital video storage and YCbCr for anything related to video signal.

(2016-08-26, 14:36)hdmkv Wrote: [ -> ]They were torture test files from @wesk05....

Code:

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Tagged date                              : UTC 2016-07-19 09:44:19
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Code:

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Codec ID                                 : hvc1
Codec ID/Info                            : High Efficiency Video Coding
Duration                                 : 34s 0ms
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Width                                    : 1 920 pixels
Height                                   : 1 080 pixels
Display aspect ratio                     : 16:9
Frame rate mode                          : Constant
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Color space                              : YUV
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Writing library                          : x265 2.0+4-43ca544799c2:[Windows][GCC 5.4.0][64 bit] 10bit
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Code:

General
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Code:

General
Complete name                            : Y:\AV Test Clips\Golden Gate 2160p yuv444.mp4
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Video
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Display aspect ratio                     : 16:9
Frame rate mode                          : Constant
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Bits/(Pixel*Frame)                       : 0.300
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Encoded date                             : UTC 2016-07-19 08:05:41
Tagged date                              : UTC 2016-07-19 08:05:43
Color range                              : Limited
Matrix coefficients                      : BT.709

Let me see if I can make a video today with some of the 4K playback differences between Shield and HiMedia.

Interesting - so the Shield plays 4:2;2 and 4:4:4 HEVC stuff. Wonder if it plays 4:2:2 MPEG2 and H264 too?

(2016-08-27, 17:57)noggin Wrote: [ -> ]Interesting - so the Shield plays 4:2;2 and 4:4:4 HEVC stuff. Wonder if it plays 4:2:2 MPEG2 and H264 too?

The Shield has hardware decoding only for 4:2:0. It can sort of play 1080i/p 4:2:2/4:4:4 MEPG2/H.264/H.265 with software decoding, but it will choke and die with 2160p. There seems to be conflicting reports about how HiMedia Q10 Pro handles this content. There is one user report on Futeko forum that says the Q10 Pro doesn't play these clips. I made these test clips for a user on the Shield forum who is a video editor and was trying to play digital intermediates to his clients.

I had it wrong... neither Shield nor HiMedia Q5/Q10 Pro will play 4:2:2 and 4:4:4 HEVC. Now I see why @wesk05 was asking if I was sure HiMedia actually played his 4:2:2 and 4:4:4 HEVC clips. Continuing to find that playback needs to be validated in more ways than one I tell ya...

I tried again w/HiMedia Q5 Pro, and what actually happens is that it tries (and fails) to play HEVC YCbCr (YUV) 4:2:2, then 4:4:4, and automatically goes to the next file in the directory... which happens to be 4:2:0 the way I have my filenames named:


The 4:2:0 clip does play, and it was what I was mistaking for 4:2:2 and 4:4:4 playback. Damn! Uncovered this when I remote-connected to the player via my PC and ran a diagnostic tool (available on Futeko forum) to verify while playback was happening. It was indeed playing the 4:2:0 file. I had initially thought given the difficulty in rendering 4:2:2 and 4:4:4, HiMedia was just taking longer than usual to initiate playback.

So, with Shield, HEVC 4:2:2 and 4:4:4 both result in green-pixellated mess, with only HEVC 4:2:0 playing okay. With HiMedia, it won't even play HEVC 4:2:2 and 4:4:4 at all, and like Shield, HEVC 4:2:0 is okay.

As for 4K playback differences between Shield and HiMedia Q5/Q10 Pro, the more I test, I'm not finding any significant differences, with both performing as well, very similarly.

Neither Shield nor HiMedia can play 4:2:2 MPEG2 either, not w/o serious artifacts. I've only found i3/i5 NUC and Sigma-based media players able to play this. H.264 4:2:2, I don't have samples to test with.