[drew_willy]

I apologize if this has been explained previously in the thread. I attempted to search for it, but that wasn't very helpful. Plus, I am not well-versed in video and audio containers and codecs, generally. I did find this: https://developer.amazon.com/appsandserv...#Supported Media Formats

What kinds of file formats (codecs, containers, etc.) can I expect to be able to play on the Amazon Fire TV through XBMC? A lot of my media is h.264 in .mkv container (according to the info shown in XBMC and the file extension shown in windows; I know nothing about codecs and containers).

At first, I would have assumed that any file that plays fine in XBMC on my i3 HTPC would play fine on the Fire TV, but then I recall seeing several posts about a lack of MKV support, so that left me unsure, as I believe XBMC on my HTPC plays MKV files just fine. Of course, I have to admit that over the years I have not been the best at keeping track of which codecs / containers, etc. I use for my media. So far, in my experience, running XBMC on two Intel machines I have never had a problem playing back any files whatsoever, no matter the video or audio formats, so I never paid too close attention to them.

I am really interested in getting a Fire TV, but I would hate to have to re-encode or remux a couple hundred files. Any info / summary you could give to fill me in? Thanks.

FTV works with H.264 via hardware decoding. Some full bit rate MKV files have shown problems but if the file is compressed or a different container is used they play fine. . DTS-MA and True-HD don't work but with DTS-MA it will extract core DTS track, with True-HD you will get stereo.

VC-1 is not supported in hardware and about 25% of Blu-Rays are in VC1 format. FTV does not have enough horsepower to decode VC1 or high resolution MPEG-2 via the CPU.

FTV is a very good box if you have a library consisting primarily of compressed H264 content without HD audio. Also, FTV will not do 23.976 video so not really suitable for a home theater setup...

Thank you very much. This helps greatly.

I guess that leaves me with another question regarding audio specifically. You have said that HD audio does not work "but with DTS-MA it will extract core DTS track, with True-HD you will get stereo." I am not at all well-versed with HD audio formats or serious receiver/speaker setups (I still think 5.1 surround sound in itself is amazing). Suppose I have a 2.1 soundbar to which I connect the Fire TV via HDMI. I have previously had no trouble getting the soundbar to play audio from files containing DTS and Dolby Digital audio. Will I be able to get 2.1 audio when XBMC on the Fire TV attempts to play a video with DTS-MA or True-HD audio? From what you've written above, I think the answer is yes, but I am not sure. Also, seeing that my HTPC plays the same file in XBMC just fine, producing audio via 3.5mm aux line to 2.1 computer speakers*, I strongly suspect the audio will play fine on the soundbar via HDMI, but just checking with somebody who obviously knows a lot more about all the audio stuff than I do.


*I know, my audio setup is super lame, but it is all I can afford now; it works at present. Later in the year, when my budget allows, I would like to step up my 2.1 computer speaker setup to a true 5.1 setup. But getting info on that would probably require a whole other thread...