[alekseyzimin]

For the past several months I have been on a quest to find Android hardware to run Kodi and HDHomerun app.  My requirements:

1. Run Kodi Leia 18 with proper automatic framerate switching, proper colorspace switching and HDR and HD audio bitstreaming (at least Dolby TrueHD and DTS-HD MA)
2. Be Google certified, to watch DRM channels from HDHomerun via HDHomerun app
3. Have working high quality deinterlacing for Live TV
4. Have working HDMI-CEC control
5. Run Amazon Prime Video app with AFR, 4k, HDR

So far the three near-winners are
1. Amazon Fire TV 3 -- pendant, but Kodi HD audio does not work, not Google certified, so no DRM channels
2. Nvidia Shield TV, but Live TV deinterlacing is worse than Fire TV 3, picture is fuzzy even if the box set to output 1080p resolution, compared to Fire TV 3, stuttering visible on CNN
3. Xiaomi Mi box (2016), but Live TV deinterlacing is worse than Fire TV 3, Amazon prime app is questionable, has to be sideloaded and may stop working any minute

As far as i can see there is no single box that does it all.  My current setup is cheap chinese S905X bot with Libreelec that does Kodi perfectly, and Fire TV 3 for everything else but (2).  

Does anyone know of a single box solution for this?

[feathers]

Have you investigated AppleTV 4K + MrMC?

Also I was under the impression the de-interlacing situation was improved/solved on the shield. Do you own it ?

[alekseyzimin]

Have you investigated AppleTV 4K + MrMC?

Also I was under the impression the de-interlacing situation was improved/solved on the shield. Do you own it ?

Yep, I own the shield and I compared them side by side. Visually the live TV picture (CNN, Discovery, NBC) is much sharper on my Amazon Fire TV 3 (Amlogic-based) with The Channels app from HDHomerun tuner, and without artefacts.  On CNN the newsline on the bottom is quite blurry on the shield and it is fine on Fire TV 3. I set the Shield to output 1080p, no help. Shield also stutters and the HDHomerun app. Apple TV runs MrMC only, and I would like full Kodi. 

Fire Stick 4k also has problem with deinterlacing -- it produces jagged text on CNN and CNBC.

[feathers]

I’ve done a little more reading. Seems the only solution to fix 1080i h264(?) on the shield is to disable hardware decoding in Kodi. I’m guessing the premium channels don’t work in Kodi and also there’s no way to use software decoding on the Channels app ? What a pain.

[wrxtasy]

I’ve done a little more reading. Seems the only solution to fix 1080i h264(?) on the shield is to disable hardware decoding in Kodi. I’m guessing the premium channels don’t work in Kodi and also there’s no way to use software decoding on the Channels app ? What a pain.

The Shield does Not have the CPU ponies to Software decode 1080i h264 - AND - do high quality, full motion, YADIF2X type software deinterlacing.
The Apple TV 4K definitely can do that with it's more modern, more powerful SoC package running MrMC.

The NVIDIA Shield would be your best hope, especially for DRM protected TV channels & Kodi.
But as you have said, you have blurry deinterlacing and/or picture output problems.

Have you tried the MrMC App on the Shield to see if deinterlacing is a Kodi Leia / Shield issue ?

[alekseyzimin]

I’ve done a little more reading. Seems the only solution to fix 1080i h264(?) on the shield is to disable hardware decoding in Kodi. I’m guessing the premium channels don’t work in Kodi and also there’s no way to use software decoding on the Channels app ? What a pain.

The Shield does Not have the CPU ponies to Software decode 1080i h264 - AND - do high quality, full motion, YADIF2X type software deinterlacing.
The Apple TV 4K definitely can do that with it's more modern, more powerful SoC package running MrMC.

The NVIDIA Shield would be your best hope, especially for DRM protected TV channels & Kodi.
But as you have said, you have blurry deinterlacing and/or picture output problems.

Have you tried the MrMC App on the Shield to see if deinterlacing is a Kodi Leia / Shield issue ? 

I have blurry deinterlacing of 1080i MPEG2 channels in native HDHomerun app -- this is the only one that plays DRM channels.  The picture in Kodi "seems" slightly better (maybe it is the same), but still by far not as good as Amlogic picture. MrMC is the same.

You are right, the Shield is the best candidate.  If the Shield software developers could only fix the blurry deinterlacing of MPEG2, it would be perfect.

[Luke M]

Which devices can output 1080i?

[noggin]

Which devices can output 1080i?

The Raspberry Pi can, as can many Intel platforms, I've not checked others.  However these are not usually 1080i 1:1 field mapped output of 1080i sources, and are instead a 1080i re-interlace of a 1080p deinterlace from a 1080i source.  

i.e. 1080i25 source->codec decode->1080p50 deinterlace->1080i25 reinterlaced output 

There have been some Kodi builds (on Intel ISTR) that do attempt to output 1080i content as 1080i natively using field-for-field matching, however there are some limitations to this approach and incorrect field dominance/phase can be the result ISTR.

i.e. 1080i25 source->codec decode->1080i25 output (field matched)

Given that there are very few displays now that support only 1080i25 and don't support 1080p50, for most use cases 1080p50 output is OK.  However if you need to integrated into a 1080i25-only system (like an HD-SDI broadcast studio) then 1080i25 output is pretty vital.  (I've used a Raspberry Pi 3 in that use case with a cheap HDMI->HD-SDI converter)

[alturismo]

the shield tv meanwhile does a nice 1080i job here, specially compared to a fire tv ... also on zapping,
was a time where only every 2nd zap deinterlacing was working, but thats fixed some time ago already ...

i short had a fire tv 3 wich was really crap on deinterlacing, and fire tv 4k ... almost no 1080i deinterlacing possible here,
only in use when outdoor, then i use emby or plex and let the stream transcode.

im mainly on german HDTV content here, DVB-C and DVB-S, just as note.

4k 50p broadcasts works nice on all devices, shield and fire tv 4k.

[alekseyzimin]

the shield tv meanwhile does a nice 1080i job here, specially compared to a fire tv ... also on zapping,
was a time where only every 2nd zap deinterlacing was working, but thats fixed some time ago already ...

i short had a fire tv 3 wich was really crap on deinterlacing, and fire tv 4k ... almost no 1080i deinterlacing possible here,
only in use when outdoor, then i use emby or plex and let the stream transcode.

im mainly on german HDTV content here, DVB-C and DVB-S, just as note.

4k 50p broadcasts works nice on all devices, shield and fire tv 4k.

I should have clarified. I am in the United States and the tv here is mpeg2 720p or 1080i, rarely 1080p. I am concerned with deinterlacing mpeg2 1080i streams from hdhomerun. Fire tv 3 does it well. The difference is clearly visible on CNN, because it has both moving and static letters and numbers. Deinterlacing is not a new problem and it is solved well in many devices. My Samsung tv does it perfectly allowing me to watch hdhomerun streams through dlna, but the interface is very cumbersome, without tv guide. Same goes for my sony bluray player. Amlogic deinterlacing is nearly as good. But shield tv is very noticeably worse which is not expected of $180 device.

As far as Kodi goes, Shield tv does everything well enough. But libreelec on cheap chinese s905x box works as well or better for everything except for drm encoded tv channels. 

So the best solution at this time IMO in USA is s905x box with libreelec for kodi use and fire tv for android apps and amazon/netflix use. Total cost under $100 and everything but drm encoded channels from hdhomerun will work fine.

[alturismo]

true, here its 1080i H264 interlaced streams ...

fire tv 4k should do hw 1080i mpeg2 deinterlacing afaik.

[wrxtasy]

So the best solution at this time IMO in USA is s905x box with libreelec for kodi use ...

CoreELEC Kodi Leia is even better on a S9xx, faster as well with even more AMLogic specific optimizations for TV viewing

[alekseyzimin]

So the best solution at this time IMO in USA is s905x box with libreelec for kodi use ...

CoreELEC Kodi Leia is even better on a S9xx, faster as well with even more AMLogic specific optimizations for TV viewing  

Yep, correct, i actually meant CoreELEC, this is what I am using -- just got used to the old name :-)