Hello
I got the Kodi 14 RC1 install on my Fire Stick. It works really well despite one problem, blurriness despite at high resolution like 1080p. For example, if I watch a twitch stream through XBMC or Twitch app itself, the picture looks like it runs on 360/480 despite I select 1080p. I read in some of posts that this seems to be some software codec issues since for certain video files it runs fine without the blurriness issue. Also, Netflix is not working, it will starts to play then stop. I wonder if Amazon is aware of this and they are going to fix it soon.
On another note, my FireStick is running the original firmware (54.1.0.0_user_100211520). They have and updated version of the software, version 54.1.0.1_user_101016220. I want to know if anybody is running this newer version. Is the newer version fix the blurriness issue and Netflix? If yes, then I will upgrade it to the newer version since it is annoying since I can't read any small text at higher resolution because it is too blurry.
Thanks for your help.
Just got my stick yesterday and I allowed the system update. I can confirm Netflix works without issue. I'm also running TVMC which is based on XBMC Gotham 13.2, this also runs great, crisp picture on 1080p movies. Maybe the newer codecs in Kodi 14 not optimized for FireTV stick?
Sent from my Nexus 5 using XDA Free mobile app
RickG13 said:
Just got my stick yesterday and I allowed the system update. I can confirm Netflix works without issue. I'm also running TVMC which is based on XBMC Gotham 13.2, this also runs great, crisp picture on 1080p movies. Maybe the newer codecs in Kodi 14 not optimized for FireTV stick?
Sent from my Nexus 5 using XDA Free mobile app
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Click to collapse
Hello,
Thanks for the info. I just did an upgrade to the newer version and you are right. Netflix runs great on it. However, Kodi 14.0 RC1 still has the same blurrines. I guess I will just wait till the official 14.0 is released. Thanks for replying.
Yup, same here, Kodi UI is crisp but videos are blurry. . I hope this gets ironed out.
Sent from my S5 using XDA Free mobile app
I concur. I'm having the same issue on my FireTV Stick. I'm running it on a 720p display. I will also try it on a 1080p display and see if it's any better.
I have tried both XBMC 13.2 and SPMC (13.3 I think) and they are both not as sharp as the native FireTV Stick apps even though I'm playing Blu-Ray rips through XBMC.
Was having the same issue with my stick and gave up and sold it, hopefully someone can find a fix and I'd buy it again, great value
Blurry Firestick with Green line aross the bottom and doubled focus
I just joined to say thank you for helping me figire it out.....i turned on game mode in the device manager on my samsung 65 inch tv and it FIXED it completley....i have been workinf trying to figur it out for months...SOOOOOOOOOOO .thank you THANK YOU THANK YOU
After two days with an Nvidia Shield Android TV , there are many pluses and minuses, but over all, it has BY FAR the best hardware of any android based box on the market... no question at all about that, and here are what I think are the biggest pluses and minuses.
PLUSES
- amazing smoothness in interface - no jerky, delays etc at all
- superb playback of all media, smoother than any box I have seen
- 192khz 24 bit audio output (kodi and mxplayer but I am not sure if they are able to output at that HD rate)
- very well built, sexy touch activated standby button
- very easy to get up and running with controller etc
- shield game streaming service is flawless, fast, smooth, HD
- gaming controller is high quality, has a microphone for voice input and a headphone socket, which work well.
- Voice search within Play Music for artist or track works very well, extremely fast.
- playing Flash-based websites like TennisTV.com etc on Dolphin in Desktop mode is way better than any other box I have tried (and I have tried MANY)
MINUSES
- have to sideload many apps you may want, like TED, BBC iPlayer, IMDB, Spotify, Movie Mate etc.. even Chrome Browser - but relatively easy to work around using APK Extractor to get APK's from your phone, and Chainfire's sideload launcher.
- no up front display of non-Android TV specific apps
- no recent apps
- no way to get to "now playing" with some apps like Spotify if you had returned home, unless its a leanback app
- no notifications
- no mouse on desktop, backpace key on keyboard not working as backspace but as left mouse click
- Keyboard is USA only, so UK users have to know, for example, that " and @ have swopped places
- voice search from the home screen does not find music artists on google play music or spotify, but only youtube... so "play van morrison" will play a track from youtube, and not from the 25 van morrison albums I have already uploaded to Play Music.
- my tv keeps on cropping a lot off the screen, there is no way to adjust the screen crop size, to reduce size so it fits better on my screen... I can adjust my screen but that is a hassle.
- very little customisation, settings limited too.
There is at least one NON-Android TV ROM for this device, so you can fix almost all of those Minuses, and you can run it using Squarehome or NovaLauncher or whatever you like, but I am not sure I actually NEED to customise the box. Personally I use it for Kodi, Spotify, Play Music, TuneIn Radio, Youtube, Movie Mate, all of which works fine... so for the moment, I am not rooting the box, and am adjusting my expectations and enjoying what works fantastically well, pretty much everything.
This is FAR and away the best box I have ever had, goodbye Tronsmart Drako, Minix Neo X8H+ etc, this is WAY beyond. At some point I may change to plain android, but so far I am fine with a couple of extra steps to be able to enjoy the voice input and superb power and playback capabilities.
Mark.
Hi. I'm located in Ireland and looking for android TV box for my FHD projector. I'm considering MINIX Neo X8H+ or Nvidia Shield TV box (not yet available). What advantages of one over the other would you point? Thanks!
The Answer to The Ultimate Question of Life, the Universe, and Everything is: CLEAN FLASH.
Natakranta said:
Hi. I'm located in Ireland and looking for android TV box for my FHD projector. I'm considering MINIX Neo X8H+ or Nvidia Shield TV box (not yet available). What advantages of one over the other would you point? Thanks!
The Answer to The Ultimate Question of Life, the Universe, and Everything is: CLEAN FLASH.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Minix Neo offers access to almost all the play store apps without needing to sideload, with the Shield you need to sideload some apps, which isnt hard. The Shield has far better hardware, so you will get smoother HD playback, no question. If playing video is your main think, then the Shield's faster graphics, faster processor is the way to go. They are both good boxes, but my Minix Neo x8hplus is currently UNPLUGGED!
fredphoesh said:
Minix Neo offers access to almost all the play store apps without needing to sideload, with the Shield you need to sideload some apps, which isnt hard. The Shield has far better hardware, so you will get smoother HD playback, no question. If playing video is your main think, then the Shield's faster graphics, faster processor is the way to go. They are both good boxes, but my Minix Neo x8hplus is currently UNPLUGGED!
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I'd like to connect external 2GB HDD USB 3 to the box. Make it media storage to play on the connected to the box projector and available for all devices in home through my local WiFi.
How could I remotely control the box to manage utorrent on it from my phone, at home thorough local WiFi or externally when I'm away. Possible?
The Answer to The Ultimate Question of Life, the Universe, and Everything is: CLEAN FLASH.
Natakranta said:
I'd like to connect external 2GB HDD USB 3 to the box. Make it media storage to play on the connected to the box projector and available for all devices in home through my local WiFi.
How could I remotely control the box to manage utorrent on it from my phone, at home thorough local WiFi or externally when I'm away. Possible?
The Answer to The Ultimate Question of Life, the Universe, and Everything is: CLEAN FLASH.
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Click to collapse
Hi, sorry, no idea, I use it for streaming...
Sent from my SM-N910F using Tapatalk
fredphoesh said:
MINUSES
- no up front display of non-Android TV specific apps
- no recent apps
- no way to get to "now playing" with some apps like Spotify if you had returned home, unless its a leanback app
- very little customisation, settings limited too.
Mark.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Hi Mark! For your minuses mentioned above, you might want to consider HALauncher found in the Play Store. I'm using this on my Nvidia Shield Console/TV and it looks and works better than the default Android TV "Home" launcher. This apps allows you to create your own Home screen with rows of your customized apps. For example, I have a row for my Emulators, Racing Games, Space Shooters, Sports Games, TV apps, etc. You can arrange these rows and apps anyway you want. You can also use your own background image. You can also rename the apps to your liking and edit the icons for higher quality 320x180 images. Everything looks great now. This is what Android TV home launcher should be like. The only thing that is missing now is a button for rebooting the system, and another one for shutting it down!
Check out the images below to see what HALauncher can do:
http://postimg.org/image/kuncrk5tf/
http://postimg.org/image/57w3e6s1f/
http://postimg.org/image/fkie09lkj
http://postimg.org/image/mjwfzmlir/
-- Manny
funtasticguy said:
Hi Mark! For your minuses mentioned above, you might want to consider HALauncher found in the Play Store. I'm using this on my Nvidia Shield Console/TV and it looks and works better than the default Android TV "Home" launcher. This apps allows you to create your own Home screen with rows of your customized apps. For example, I have a row for my Emulators, Racing Games, Space Shooters, Sports Games, TV apps, etc. You can arrange these rows and apps anyway you want. You can also use your own background image. You can also rename the apps to your liking and edit the icons for higher quality 320x180 images. Everything looks great now. This is what Android TV home launcher should be like. The only thing that is missing now is a button for rebooting the system, and another one for shutting it down!
Check out the images below to see what HALauncher can do:
http://postimg.org/image/kuncrk5tf/
http://postimg.org/image/57w3e6s1f/
http://postimg.org/image/fkie09lkj
http://postimg.org/image/mjwfzmlir/
-- Manny
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Hi Manny,
Yep, I've been using it for a few days and like it a lot.
My gripes are that the voice search doesn't work properly and always shows empty results, and there is no "now playing" function... and the lack of a power button. For some reason ALT-Tab doesn't show recent apps. Oh, there is no ALL APPS function either, so new apps are invisible till you edit the home screen. But yeah, the best home screen for the SATV for sure.
Cheers,
Mark
Sent from my SM-N910F using Tapatalk
I agree with pretty much everything you said, I've had mine for two weeks and I love it. I have Kodi running to play local media, plex to stream stuff from friends servers, Netflix (which really upped their game since the last time I subscribed a year or two ago), along with tons of games. This will only get better over time, its still a relatively new product. I'm still debating on whether or not to root it, I think I'm going to but will be keeping the stock launcher because I like it, despite the lack of "recent apps" which I still don't understand why they didn't include it. The only reason I want to root it is so that I can install the Xinstaller module from Xposed so all my apps will install to my sdcard and not the internal memory.
Sent from my Nexus 6 using Tapatalk
I have had mine a few weeks and it is definitely a really nice device and it is crazy fast!
Really the only gripe I have is 4K support but that isn't Nvidia's fault. Basically because I am running through a processor (more or less an AVR without an amp) and HDMI 2.0 standard is not used on them, Netflix won't show 4K content on the device unless I am directly connected to the TV.
Fortunately Ultraflix works at 4K and everything else does as well.
brando56894 said:
I agree with pretty much everything you said, I've had mine for two weeks and I love it. I have Kodi running to play local media, plex to stream stuff from friends servers, Netflix (which really upped their game since the last time I subscribed a year or two ago), along with tons of games. This will only get better over time, its still a relatively new product. I'm still debating on whether or not to root it, I think I'm going to but will be keeping the stock launcher because I like it, despite the lack of "recent apps" which I still don't understand why they didn't include it. The only reason I want to root it is so that I can install the Xinstaller module from Xposed so all my apps will install to my sdcard and not the internal memory.
Sent from my Nexus 6 using Tapatalk
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Try HALauncher, it is good enough for me to not install a custom rom and root... So far! Also once you root you'll have to manually install rom updates and reinstall apps etc... Also you can move most apps to sd card. DON'T set to Automatically Move apps to SD card, that doesn't work. Install to system then move them to SD card in app settings after player no the game once.
Sent from my SM-N910F using Tapatalk
Had mine for about a week and like it an awful lot.
As someone who bought an Ouya, I must say focusing on the media services first THEN worrying about gaming made this a MUCH BETTER product.
I am a bit disappointed I can't have my HBO Go on it, there's currently no Amazon Video and the Netflix app needs better voice options, but I'm really digging the Gamestream from my PC upstairs to the downstairs TV, It works most of the time without a hitch. The only time it doesn't is when I'm playing my Steam games and the Ubisoft games try to go through Uplay and Uplay crashes or its a game I've never ran before and Steam itself crashes because it doesn't seem to like running a game in Big Picture mode if it has never been opened and ran at least once on my PC in normal Steam mode first, and those are client problems, not Nvidia issues so can't fault them there.
Yes, having to install some of my apps from the PC through the Play Store is a bit of a pain, but it also keeps the kids from loading it up with a bunch of useless crap, so I'd say its a fair trade.
tobalaz said:
Had mine for about a week and like it an awful lot.
As someone who bought an Ouya, I must say focusing on the media services first THEN worrying about gaming made this a MUCH BETTER product.
I am a bit disappointed I can't have my HBO Go on it, there's currently no Amazon Video and the Netflix app needs better voice options, but I'm really digging the Gamestream from my PC upstairs to the downstairs TV, It works most of the time without a hitch. The only time it doesn't is when I'm playing my Steam games and the Ubisoft games try to go through Uplay and Uplay crashes or its a game I've never ran before and Steam itself crashes because it doesn't seem to like running a game in Big Picture mode if it has never been opened and ran at least once on my PC in normal Steam mode first, and those are client problems, not Nvidia issues so can't fault them there.
Yes, having to install some of my apps from the PC through the Play Store is a bit of a pain, but it also keeps the kids from loading it up with a bunch of useless crap, so I'd say its a fair trade.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Oh yes, speaking of Gamestream, what does everyone think of the quality?
I tried it both before and after the update that was supposed to improve the quality and have not been that impressed. The bitrate seems somewhat low and I get random stutter and both the PC and Shield are wired gigabit.
Well as far as Gamestream goes for me, I've got my win7 gaming rig w/ an i5, 12gb ram and gtx 750ti hardwired to my Buffalo AC1750 and the Shield on 5g to a 42" 1080p TV and I've no problems with it, everything runs smoothly, well, smoothly when Uplay isn't f*cking everything up...
I had issues initially so I had to go into my router and change the settings for my 5ghz channel.
OK interesting, maybe it is is an issue with SLI since I am running 3 Titan Xs, i7, 32GB RAM, etc through an Asus RT-AC3200. I will try disabling SLI and see if that helps.
mutelight said:
OK interesting, maybe it is is an issue with SLI since I am running 3 Titan Xs, i7, 32GB RAM, etc through an Asus RT-AC3200. I will try disabling SLI and see if that helps.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
You've really peaked my interest here, was the SLI making it not work correctly? Like maybe the video encoding being slit amongst the cards wasn't working too well?
I'm about to upgrade my 750ti so it'd be nice to know if it was SLI or just isn't playing nice with your Titan.
tobalaz said:
You've really peaked my interest here, was the SLI making it not work correctly? Like maybe the video encoding being slit amongst the cards wasn't working too well?
I'm about to upgrade my 750ti so it'd be nice to know if it was SLI or just isn't playing nice with your Titan.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
It is honestly hard to say, I still need to try disabling SLI to see if it helps. Also I should mention I have been running Windows 10 for a couple months now there have been a few driver updates for it since I tried it last.
Video calling only available for the Shield ATV
One unique feature on the Shield ATV is the camera support.
Just plug a camera and it works! I've been checking out other Android SmartTV's and set-top-boxes, but yet couldn't find any other device having this support.
And, there is already a video calling android tv app on google play called "Tellybean - Easy video calling". It works perfectly on the Shield ATV.
furkna said:
One unique feature on the Shield ATV is the camera support.
Just plug a camera and it works! I've been checking out other Android SmartTV's and set-top-boxes, but yet couldn't find any other device having this support.
And, there is already a video calling android tv app on google play called "Tellybean - Easy video calling". It works perfectly on the Shield ATV.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Nice, but surely Hangouts works just fine, and even Skype?
fredphoesh said:
Nice, but surely Hangouts works just fine, and even Skype?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Your right. Since shield has camera support basically any video calling app might work. But I don't believe they work as smooth as Tellybean. Skype and hangout does not have Android TV apps (not gonna have one any time soon). They don't exist on google play for Android TV. You need to sideload their default android app.
Also, their UX is fine for a mobile app but not so much for a TV app. They don't really fit into the leanback UI. Not so usable if you are sitting on the couch and just want to have a video call. I use hangouts and skype on my smartphone and laptop but Tellybean on my TV
Tellybean is an Android TV app, shows up on Leanback launcher and it works smoothly on the shield ATV.
tobalaz said:
Well as far as Gamestream goes for me, I've got my win7 gaming rig w/ an i5, 12gb ram and gtx 750ti hardwired to my Buffalo AC1750 and the Shield on 5g to a 42" 1080p TV and I've no problems with it, everything runs smoothly, well, smoothly when Uplay isn't f*cking everything up...
I had issues initially so I had to go into my router and change the settings for my 5ghz channel.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Hello! From Italy here! 10 days I have a 16Gb unit I struggle with Ethernet AND wifi 5Gb connection! Wifi N working about fine. Netgear R7000 and Fastweb FTTS connection 85MBps! I only get 10 MBps at most, and this is the only device that gets this low! Need to solve this or ask for replacement the soonest! Any help much appreciated.
Regards
Alessandro
Hey all have a og pixel XL it's unlocked and rooted either stock kernel December update (8.1) I use vlc at work to watch and listen to downloaded videos I've been using it for months now with no issues. Now I recently noticed that all my videos stutter and hitch . I though it was because I went for 8.0 to 8.1 so I went back and it was still happening (even though in the past I had no issues)
Only way I can fix this is to disable hardware acceleration in vlc settings. But doing thumis makes my device warm and sucks battery (being that it's decoding HD video via software) this is driving me nuts. How can I fix this?
I downloaded the device driver binaries from Google but no idea how to install it. I though I could make sure they are all up to date but not sure how to go about that.
Valkyrie743 said:
Hey all have a og pixel XL it's unlocked and rooted either stock kernel December update (8.1) I use vlc at work to watch and listen to downloaded videos I've been using it for months now with no issues. Now I recently noticed that all my videos stutter and hitch . I though it was because I went for 8.0 to 8.1 so I went back and it was still happening (even though in the past I had no issues)
Only way I can fix this is to disable hardware acceleration in vlc settings. But doing thumis makes my device warm and sucks battery (being that it's decoding HD video via software) this is driving me nuts. How can I fix this?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Has VLC been updated recently? it sounds like if it's happening on 8.0 and 8.1 and wasn't happening before ... it's likely an issue with the app itself and not the OS.
Valkyrie743 said:
I downloaded the device driver binaries from Google but no idea how to install it. I though I could make sure they are all up to date but not sure how to go about that.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
No, do NOT do that. that's not what those drivers are for - they are for developers, not end-users.
your firmware contains the drivers that you should be using / built for your firmware.
nine7nine said:
Has VLC been updated recently? it sounds like if it's happening on 8.0 and 8.1 and wasn't happening before ... it's likely an issue with the app itself and not the OS.
No, do NOT do that. that's not what those drivers are for - they are for developers, not end-users.
your firmware contains the drivers that you should be using / built for your firmware.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
i could not find a past version of the app. well i did on apkmirror but the only non beta past app was from nov 28th i was looking for one from like october but only found beta versions. tried one of them. still doing it. i think it has something to do with 8.1. i would do a back up with twrp and just do a fresh install of 8.0 and see if it happens again but last time i tried making a twrp back up restoring from it failed.
You can download the older builds from the vlc website:
https://get.videolan.org/vlc-android/
Valkyrie743 said:
i could not find a past version of the app. well i did on apkmirror but the only non beta past app was from nov 28th i was looking for one from like october but only found beta versions. tried one of them. still doing it. i think it has something to do with 8.1. i would do a back up with twrp and just do a fresh install of 8.0 and see if it happens again but last time i tried making a twrp back up restoring from it failed.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
well, I did just try vlc. not sure what u are watching, but I used a couple 4k videos on my phone and 4k YouTube videos.... no issues. - but that may not be an best test; I'm not using the stock kernel...
I'd see if u can get someone who isn't running a non-stock setup to reproduce it....? maybe someone will read this and give it a test too...
nine7nine said:
well, I did just try vlc. not sure what u are watching, but I used a couple 4k videos on my phone and 4k YouTube videos.... no issues. - but that may not be an best test; I'm not using the stock kernel...
I'd see if u can get someone who isn't running a non-stock setup to reproduce it....? maybe someone will read this and give it a test too...
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
i think i found the issue. i use the app arktube to download youtube videos the night before i go into work so i can listen and watch while on shift. in the app there is a setting to allow to download VP9 version of videos and i had it selected for some reason. those videos are the ones that are stuttering unless i disable hardware acceleration.
would you be able to test to see if VP9 content stutters on your pixel? the video i had was 2560x1440P VP9 youtube video here is the video i downloaded https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=33OZFYN_cQw&index=22&list=PL8mG-RkN2uTyuEutQa79RZ0Q5u5gteUci
i just got done flashing 7.1.2 and 8.0 with different versions of VLC each and still had the issues so i guess its because of VP9. which makes no sense being that i can view it fine from the youtube app at that setting but cant if i download it and play it via vlc?
Valkyrie743 said:
would you be able to test to see if VP9 content stutters on your pixel? the video i had was 2560x1440P VP9 youtube video here is the video i downloaded https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=33OZFYN_cQw&index=22&list=PL8mG-RkN2uTyuEutQa79RZ0Q5u5gteUci
i just got done flashing 7.1.2 and 8.0 with different versions of VLC each and still had the issues so i guess its because of VP9. which makes no sense being that i can view it fine from the youtube app at that setting but cant if i download it and play it via vlc?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
well, I'm not going to be installing arktube or downloading the video. but the link itself plays fine in vlc...
Well, having come from a long line of Nexus phones I really like the 5T and OOS except...
I can't get many simple videos to play back - either getting a 'MIME/Not Supported' or 'EXCEPTION' in the logs.
An example is the video at the top of this article: https://www.stuff.co.nz/business/pr...n-my-quiet-cul-de-sac-say-Auckland-neighbours
Can others play that video?
Now, installing VLC or otherwise is NOT a solution because many videos I'm struggling with are embedded so use the built in Chromium player.
Everything works fine on my 6.0.1 Nexus 5x but many (most?) don't work on my 8.0.0 (OOS 5.0.4) OP 5T.
If I can't play most of the media I find on the web the phone is practically useless and will be going back. This is a 1990's problem, not one we should be facing in 2018.
Thoughts? Insights? Comments?
As it happens https://oneplus.net/support/ticket/submit is broken too at the moment, nice one OP.
42 views and nobody has tested the link for me...
Open beta 4. Play just fine. No problem here.
djmcnz said:
Well, having come from a long line of Nexus phones I really like the 5T and OOS except...
I can't get many simple videos to play back - either getting a 'MIME/Not Supported' or 'EXCEPTION' in the logs.
An example is the video at the top of this article: https://www.stuff.co.nz/business/pr...n-my-quiet-cul-de-sac-say-Auckland-neighbours
Can others play that video?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I am interested in buying the 5T, among other phones... so I was intrigued by your post.
I tried this link on my home computer - and do you realize the video in question is a APPLE "mpeg.url" link? It could simply be the app your phone is dedicated to use is not equipped to understand URL's as links. Try installing a different browsers, and try to play it with each....and see what your results are.
I suspect the problem is the default app isn't equipped to understand those links. My Asus tablet TF700 had a similar issue until I realized it was the old version of "Chrome" that was installed on it that was having the problem... FireFox on the same Tablet didn't exhibit the same problem.
Thanks for the suggestions @Animal2017, I have tried a few browsers with the same result I'm afraid.
Since @tanpro260196 can play the videos with the stock (albeit beta) ROM and browser I think I'll flash back to fresh and new first and build from there. OnePlus tech support also advise they can play the video on a 5T (not sure of ROM version though) so there's hope.
Tried with mozilla Firefox and Chrome, video plays just fine. OB4
Okay, well I dirty-flashed OB4 and the problem is fixed.
I then decided to go back to 8.0 using a nandroid backup to see if I could diagnose further (an unnecessary step but for my interest). TWRP proceeded to bork my storage so I lost everything on /data and /sdcard including all my backups. Great.
Anyway, thanks for the help and replies.