[ozkhan1]

I am going to go with just the Helix 14.2 for now. TVHZ reads like an anti biotic with strong side effects.

[david.kennedy]

I'm jealous here in Europe, won't be with us for a few months. Please add some reviews here when you guys get them delivered. Enjoy :-)

[hifiaudio2]

Really sucks about not having ANY lossless audio capabilities.

[Tinwarble]

Has some one said anything about not having HD audio pass-through? Last I saw the only thing that was said is:

Not trying to make any one anxious but I'm now watching a 4K movie on the SHIELD
Sadly my AVR can't do 4K@60Hz pass-through as it's only HDMI1.4a so cannot confirm HD audio (yet)

Maybe I missed something.

[Ganesh_AT]

No HD Audio passthrough due to licensing restrictions.

http://www.anandtech.com/show/9289/the-n...v-review/6

[essential]

Still coming soon on Best Buy. I have a $100 bb gift card ready or else I'd have ordered from Amazon already. Curious about the 500GB. If it's mechanical HD or SSD/mSATA, and if whatever port that drive is plugged in to will be accessible to those of us who buy the 16GB if we wanted to add our own drive.

[hifiaudio2]

Without the licensing, can it even downmix / decode audio at all if all I rip is the lossless track on my BD rips?

[Ganesh_AT]

Without the licensing, can it even downmix / decode audio at all if all I rip is the lossless track on my BD rips?

I believe software players can do whatever they want - no licensing restrictions.

[hifiaudio2]

Ahh...according to Anandtech this is already in the works. I suggest all of you hit up the Twitter and Facebook pages with requests for this codec pack to be released...

"NVIDIA has skimped on licensing for various audio and video codecs keeping the target market in mind. Only H.264, H.265 and VP9 decode have been licensed on the video side. On the audio side, we only have Dolby Digital and Dolby Digital Plus. The absence of HD audio bitstreaming is particularly disappointing, given the capabilities of the core platform. NVIDIA talked about making available a 'codec pack' in the Play Store for users needing hardware acceleration for certain codecs. We will have to see how that plays out."

[ozkhan1]

I personally dont care, I dont have a surround sound system. But I am sure given the extreme nature of audiophiles, Nvidia will add this in a future update.

[Tinwarble]

Audio pass-through does not require a license since the device itself is not doing the decoding, which is the only case where a license is needed.

[iatacs19]

Wait, so if I am using a receiver and I bitstream the HD audio codec to my receiver, it will decode and play the sound or not?

[Tinwarble]

That's a different question, but it has nothing to do with licensing. Because the specs are:

High-resolution audio up-sample to 24-bit/192 kHz over USB
High-resolution audio playback up to 24-bit/192 kHz over HDMI and USB

it's technically possible, but it being possible and having it work are 2 different things.

Keep in mind that there's a lot of devices that run Kodi and can at the least pass-through DTS/DD, but aren't licensed for DTS/DD.

[hdmkv]

Great review Ganesh! Read the portion on local media playback with special interest. When you mention VC-1, did you get a chance to try both 1080p/23.976 (like 'Constantine' BD) and 1080i/29.970 (like the Eagles' Farewell I concert BD) via Kodi?

Besides HD audio, I'm wondering if there's a possibility if this box can ever support full 3D/MVC playback?

[drhill]

The anandtech article isn't very encouraging. Deinterlacing only working for h264 is good for the few blu ray documentaries I have in 1080i, but if it doesn't work for 1080i mpeg 2 in live tv it is just as crappy as the Forge TV. One of the developers for Silicondust mentioned the hardware mpeg2 deinterlacing not working but he didn't respond to additional questions about what kind of deinterlacing and if it was only for the HDHomerun View app (ugly interface just like the Kodi app) or if it would help the Google Live Channels app (nice interface).

I'm not too concerned about HD audio as long as it can be properly software decoded to PCM audio and it doesn't affect software decoding of VC-1 and MPEG2. Refresh rate switching we all are concerned about.