nmkaufman 49 Posted September 10, 2018 Share Posted September 10, 2018 I've been on the fence for over a year about purchasing an Nvidia Shield TV. I'm certain the day I finally purchase one, it will be supplanted by a more powerful version, which has actually been my concern this whole year. Anyways, I'm tired of using my laptop as the media streamer in my bedroom, and am considering making the plunge. Can anyone vouch for the video scaling quality of the Nvidia shield device when used with Emby Theater? Are there scaling options, like the PC app? Much of the content I've collected is still in SD, and the scaling of the Samsung TV app and default (bilinear) scaling used by the PC app are very poor. Does the option exist to use at least Lanczos scaling? Chroma scaling I don't care so much about. Also, does anyone know whether the android TV app scales to 4k directly, or to 1080p and then use the Shield TV's hardware to scale to 4k? Thanks very much for any help in advance. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ebr 14923 Posted September 10, 2018 Share Posted September 10, 2018 Hi. Emby Theater doesn't currently run on the Shield but we have a dedicated Android TV app for the device. Video scaling is best left up to the video display as they are usually very good at it. The app does not perform any scaling at this time (other than what the device itself does). Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
nmkaufman 49 Posted September 10, 2018 Author Share Posted September 10, 2018 (edited) So the video / Emby theater UI is output to the display at the video's native resolution? Can anyone vouch for the Shield TV's scaling ability then? I use a large computer monitor as a television in my bedroom, and the scaling is absolutely Vaseline-smear awful. Edited September 10, 2018 by nmkaufman Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ebr 14923 Posted September 10, 2018 Share Posted September 10, 2018 Can anyone vouch for the Shield TV's scaling ability then? I use a large computer monitor as a television in my bedroom, and the scaling is absolutely Vaseline-smear awful. Ah... I think the Shield does a good job (it is build by NVidia and designed for gaming) but a modern TV probably does a slightly better one (when going to 4K). Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
nmkaufman 49 Posted September 10, 2018 Author Share Posted September 10, 2018 Unfortunately TV's make worse monitors than vice-versa, and it's used primarily as a monitor. I just found a bunch of threads on Nvidia's forum complaining about poor scaling too, so it looks like this plan is a non-starter. I'll just keep using Kodi on my laptop, until ET-PC works correctly at 4k or a better option presents itself. Thanks for the help, anyways. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jdiesel 1114 Posted September 10, 2018 Share Posted September 10, 2018 (edited) The Shield TV's internal scaler isn't the greatest, the Apple TV 4K does a much better job for comparison sake, but the Android TV has the ability to output at the videos native resolution which allows the TV to do the scaling. Most 4K TV's do a rather good job at this as this is what they are designed for. I personally use MPC-HC with madVR as an external player with Emby Theater on my projector where any minor improvement makes a huge difference when magnified to the size. For my daily watching I am more than happy with the Shield TV and my 65" 4k TV. Edit: Just reread your post on noticed your are using a monitor and not a TV so your displays scaler might not be as good. Edited September 10, 2018 by Jdiesel Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
nmkaufman 49 Posted September 10, 2018 Author Share Posted September 10, 2018 (edited) No worries, I appreciate the insight. I'm using a Mini-PC as both living-room HTPC & Emby Server right now, but I've been toying with the idea of building a gaming tower for my office. At that time, I'll migrate Emby Server to the new tower, move the Mini-PC to my bedroom, and revisit the Shield / Apple TV idea for my living-room. Edited September 10, 2018 by nmkaufman Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Carlo 4330 Posted September 12, 2018 Share Posted September 12, 2018 It's hard to tell exactly what you are trying to accomplish because your quest was vague. What type of scaling are your talking about? up or down scaling? As an example even if you have the Shield TV connected to a 1080p device you can still play back non UHD 4K source material. If you have the Shield TV connected to a 720p monitor you can playback 1080p content. In both cases the Shield TV will downscale the video and does a great job. On the other hand if you are looking to take 1080p video and want it upscaled to 4K on the TV then it can do this also but you may/may not appreciate the result. This has more to do with the TV then the Shield TV itself. Often times you are better off feeding the TV with the 1080p and allowing the TV itself to upsize to 4K. In cases like this the TV has the smarts to match it's own electronics and "knows" best how to upsize then using something "generic" to do the same. So in a nut shell it will perform these functions if your TV can't but if you TV can then let it. In either case you shouldn't worry about this on the Shield TV. If you're on the fence about the purchase, see if you can find one used online for $99 or so. If not you can often find the non-pro version online for $129 which is a good deal. You don't need the pro version unless you plan to run a server on it. If a new model that is significantly better comes out you can turn around and sell your used ShieldTV online if you must and get good money for it or you can purchase the latest/greatest new box and retire the Shield TV to the bedroom or something. It's currently the all around best box to have and it's functionality won't change if something new comes along! It will continue to perform great for years to come. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
nmkaufman 49 Posted September 12, 2018 Author Share Posted September 12, 2018 It's hard to tell exactly what you are trying to accomplish because your quest was vague. I need to upscale to my monitor's native 4k, because the monitor does a poor job. The consensus is that the shield does a poor job, as well, so it's no longer of interest. Thank you. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Carlo 4330 Posted September 12, 2018 Share Posted September 12, 2018 If truth be told if you play 1080p video on any 4K monitor with or without up-scaling there is not much difference if any at all. Surely nothing to write home about if sitting more than 3 feet from the TV. You can't "magically" add what isn't there to begin with. You can "guess" at things. For example a white dot and a black dot next to each other at 1080 can be displayed with a gray dot in the middle on 4K. To be honest if sitting at 7 feet from the TV you can't really tell the difference in 1080p and non UHD 4K either. Given a stream of X bandwidth the 1080p video can actually look better than 4K as long as the stream isn't bit starved. Personally, I'd cross of up-scalling as a need as it's normally of no significant use. Let the TV playback 1080 content at 1080 (as was designed). This is exactly what most people do with 1080 content when they have a 4K TV. Carlo Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
nmkaufman 49 Posted September 12, 2018 Author Share Posted September 12, 2018 I realize in theory 1080, 720, 480, 360 and even 240p all scale perfectly to 4k, but most 'hardware' based scalers apply bilinear scaling which interpolates between pixels to 'smooth' them out. Nvidia and Intel are both guilty of this, as well as most entry level televisions, A/V receivers, and nearly all computer monitors. I think AMD graphics cards use bicubic scaling, which is a bit nicer. I own a relatively nice (for it's time) Plasma television, as well as a Receiver with Marvell Qdeo scaling, and the difference when using lanczos or jinc on my PC is still a significant one. Emby Theater has a terrific set of video and chroma scaling options on PC, and I only came here to ask whether or not they were available on the Shield as well. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Carlo 4330 Posted September 12, 2018 Share Posted September 12, 2018 Got ya, I know you got the info you were looking for. I just wanted to make sure there was more info written in the thread in case someone else was reading this and thinks they must have up-scaling ability. Search engine and all... Carlo Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
gtmnyc 12 Posted April 23, 2019 Share Posted April 23, 2019 Is there any plans for a shield release Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Luke 37095 Posted April 24, 2019 Share Posted April 24, 2019 Is there any plans for a shield release Hi, yes, we already have an app for the Shield: https://emby.media/emby-for-nvidiashield.html Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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