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ISOHaven · 2019-10-20, 02:35

Since the hardware is brand new do we simply have to wait for proper support? I figured out of the box it would have at least worked better than my old Fire TV 2nd Gen (18.3). That's certainly not the case. The new cube (18.4) is experiencing audio sync issues. Just about every video is a different delay. Sure I can tweak each one but that certainly leaves out a global fix. Then there's video stuttering. Anywhere from livable to completely unwatchable.

My old Fire TV has none of these issues with all the same video files. Would installing 18.3 on the newer unit help?

As it is I've gone back to the old Fire TV for now.

Many thanks for any help!

**fritsch** · 2019-10-20, 10:06

Kodi does not support devices, it supports platforms, in this example: Android with Mediacodec and Audiotrack for Audio. If they fucked it up again with non Android standard implementations, that they workaround in their fire-os for their application only ... then mainly nothing we will do about it.

ISOHaven · (This post was last modified: 2019-10-21, 01:06 by ISOHaven.)

Well then I guess if KODI devs are tired of supporting KODI then I guess I need to find a new box that supports HDR, HDR10 and Dolby Vision at full 60fps.

People are saying Shield does HDR but their own specs on their own page mention nothing about it. Yet alone Dolby Vision. I still have to read up on the Vero 4K+. Any other viable media players out there?

EDIT:
Looks like I need to add MINIX U9-H and Zidoo to my research as well.

EDIT2:
Looks like I've got it narrowed down to either a Zidoo or the new Nvidia TV Pro coming out later this month. The Zidoo's are lacking Dolby Vision but I love the idea of off loading my NAS storage and just playing movies locally on that and ditching Kodi in general.

wrxtasy · (This post was last modified: 2019-10-21, 06:26 by wrxtasy.)

(2019-10-20, 19:26)ISOHaven Wrote: Well then I guess if KODI devs are tired of supporting KODI then I guess I need to find a new box that supports HDR, HDR10 and Dolby Vision at full 60fps.

People are saying Shield does HDR but their own specs on their own page mention nothing about it. Yet alone Dolby Vision. I still have to read up on the Vero 4K+. Any other viable media players out there?

EDIT:
Looks like I need to add MINIX U9-H and Zidoo to my research as well.

EDIT2:
Looks like I've got it narrowed down to either a Zidoo or the new Nvidia TV Pro coming out later this month. The Zidoo's are lacking Dolby Vision but I love the idea of off loading my NAS storage and just playing movies locally on that and ditching Kodi in general.

Just be aware there is NO support for DolbyVision with any version of Kodi - does not matter if the hardware supports DV or not.

DolbyVision is only for copy protected video streaming Apps like Netflix, iTunes, Prime Video etc. not for playing back home network 4K HDR DolbyVision Bluray Rips.

There is a LOT of info about 4K HDR Kodi over in this https://forum.kodi.tv/showthread.php?tid=332180

If you are a demanding 4K HDR HD audio Kodi user - the Linux based CoreELEC Kodi is where you should be looking. Avoid Android.

PS I've read with the FireTV Stick 4K when used with the MrMC App there are No audio delay problems- try that.

ISOHaven · (This post was last modified: 2019-10-21, 07:42 by ISOHaven.)

(2019-10-21, 06:17)wrxtasy Wrote: Just be aware there is NO support for DolbyVision with any version of Kodi - does not matter if the hardware supports DV or not.

DolbyVision is only for copy protected video streaming Apps like Netflix, iTunes, Prime Video etc. not for playing back home network 4K HDR DolbyVision Bluray Rips.

There is a LOT of info about 4K HDR Kodi over in this https://forum.kodi.tv/showthread.php?tid=332180

If you are a demanding 4K HDR HD audio Kodi user - the Linux based CoreELEC Kodi is where you should be looking. Avoid Android.

PS I've read with the FireTV Stick 4K when used with the MrMC App there are No audio delay problems- try that.

Which is why I'm leaning towards the Zidoo. For all my Dolby Vision apps I can use them on my LG C9 itself. Not the greatest of UI experiences but it gets the job done. Prime is no where the same experience as on Amazon hardware.

There's certainly a very weird issue at hand here. I just played a 4K HDR 68Mbps stream and it played flawlessly. Every now and then something works fine. I played around with it again with Kodi19. I can't find any rhyme or reason to things that work and things that don't. For example, I have a certain TV series recorded. Every single episode is exactly the same spec. Some work fine, some don't.

One example that's constant are those jellyfish videos. It starts to stutter at 60mbps. Above that and it fails miserably.

Edit:
Actually you forgot one. The built in LG media player plays Dolby Vision via USB. I tested a 58GB rip on it and it activated Dolby Vison just fine. Maybe I should just quit putzing around, quit trying to do what I've always done and just embrace the set and everything it can do. If I could find a NAS solution that acts like a USB drive via USB (of course) that might solve all my issues. Just dump everything to that and play via the internal player.

So...USB storage device with network access...

wrxtasy · 2019-10-21, 08:55

I will repeat this again - Use the MrMC App

The S922Z chipset in the 2019 Cube easily has the CPU capacity to Software decode everything but 4K HEVC if you have problems.

The MrMC App has a whole bunch of Video HW / SW decode Settings and options so you can configure and playback all sort of video content.

We tried to get this sort of user friendly Kodi settings functionality into Kodi itself - but the Kodi codebase gatekeepers said NO - they wanted to make it hard for Android users unfortunately. Sad

Such settings could have all been hidden behind Advanced or Expert settings. LibreELEC, OSMC and CoreELEC Kodi have such easy to use settings.

ISOHaven · 2019-10-21, 17:59

(2019-10-21, 08:55)wrxtasy Wrote: I will repeat this again - Use the MrMC App

The S922Z chipset in the 2019 Cube easily has the CPU capacity to Software decode everything but 4K HEVC if you have problems.

The MrMC App has a whole bunch of Video HW / SW decode Settings and options so you can configure and playback all sort of video content.

We tried to get this sort of user friendly Kodi settings functionality into Kodi itself - but the Kodi codebase gatekeepers said NO - they wanted to make it hard for Android users unfortunately.

Such settings could have all been hidden behind Advanced or Expert settings. LibreELEC, OSMC and CoreELEC Kodi have such easy to use settings.

Yeah, I'm getting there. Only so many hours in the day ;p

Working out all my options. Trying not to be a creature of habit and checking out everything that's out there now.

When I get time to play with that I'll report back.

ISOHaven · 2019-10-22, 04:21

MrMC was a huge fail. Stutters at 40mbps. I didn't have anything slower to test. Wouldn't play anything I had.

wrxtasy · (This post was last modified: 2019-10-23, 02:44 by wrxtasy.)

After seeing really high bitrate, successful video playback with Kodi on the new 2019 Cube here:

https://youtu.be/SaEDtjgpon8?t=476

I suspect there is something wrong with your Networking and feeding of data into the FireTV, or Kodi audio is configured wrongly and causing issues.

Suggestions:

- Reset to Default all Kodi audio and only select AC3, EAC3, DTS to start with, do not mess with Audio channels.
- Make sure "Sync Playback to Display" is NOT selected in Video Settings
- Use Ethernet or like in the above video, USB connected storage.

ISOHaven · 2019-10-23, 07:35

(2019-10-23, 02:41)wrxtasy Wrote: After seeing really high bitrate, successful video playback with Kodi on the new 2019 Cube here:

https://youtu.be/SaEDtjgpon8?t=476

I suspect there is something wrong with your Networking and feeding of data into the FireTV, or Kodi audio is configured wrongly and causing issues.

Suggestions:

- Reset to Default all Kodi audio and only select AC3, EAC3, DTS to start with, do not mess with Audio channels.
- Make sure "Sync Playback to Display" is NOT selected in Video Settings
- Use Ethernet or like in the above video, USB connected storage.

The test files I mentioned were also ran locally from the Cube. I went through many variations of those settings. Nothing wrong with my network. 10Gb backbone. All lines running to the TV are 10Gb Fluke certified. Overkill for now but in my last house 10/100 was overkill. I don't plan to rerun lines any time soon. Getting too old for that crap. Also, don't forget about my Fire TV Gen2. With identical settings the new cube runs twice as slow.

Every option for a WiFi connect USB drive turned up crap. So much for that. USB connected turns off WiFi. Can't do both at the same time. Makes sense for a tiny little unit though.

I went ahead and put DLNA on my NAS and turned off every single bit of transcoding. Even then DLNA still has overhead but at least it works better than both the cubes and with my new TV being able to decode just about everything that should be a viable solution. Provided I scale back on my surveillance throughput. That's the only crummy part. Would hate to buy another NAS just for that. Noisy damn things. It ran every heavy hitting movie I threw at it. Via the USB port the TV chokes around 200Mbps. Via my NAS it chokes around 140. A lot of that is DLNA being dumb and again the network is fine, iperf from NAS to many different devices averaged 980 while pounding it.

Could I have a bad cube? Possible. All the more reason to start slimming down on this crap. I'm going to continue to try to use the TV as much as possible now that they don't have dogcrap for CPUs. That way I can get away from garbage like "nothing we will do about it".

wrxtasy · (This post was last modified: 2019-10-25, 03:22 by wrxtasy.)

Well there is definitely something going wrong with video playback with your new Cube and compatibility with your particular connected equipment after looking at various Cube YouTube reviews where users have no where near the same number of issues.

A factory reset might be an option....

Android Pie on any new S922x or S922Z chipset device should be nice and speedy. Maybe you have a dud Cube.