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Shield TV 2019 playback issues with 4K HDR


kaledi

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kaledi

It is correct that the tube shield TV is the cheaper of the current Shield TV models, but I wouldn't call it cheap.  It is as expensive as the previous generation shield TV, and considerably more expensive than other media products such as Fire TV stick.

I have no issue with nVidia producing different product levels, but it is disingenuous at best that they failed to fully highlight the technical difference (e.g. that the tube only runs in 32bit mode) between the two models.

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lightsout
95% of people using these devices are streaming media that is designed for streaming (i.e. much lower bitrates).  That's what they are designed for.  Our users, on the contrary, are trying to force media designed for hardware optical disc players through an internet streaming device.  With the really high-end hardware, you can almost get away with that - but not with the budget version.  Again, not terribly surprising in my view.

Yes it is "cheaper" but as the post above states, it's still more expensive than basically every other device, and with Nvidia advertising the same SOC one would assume they had the same playback ability.

As far as the second statement I get what your saying. But AVS is also an enthusiast where most folks use their devices like the posters here do.

I'm still very curious if Kodi has the same problem.
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FrostByte

I was oh so close to getting the tube version myself until I started reading the reviews on Amazon complaining about it being 32-bit.  I then jumped on the nVidia forums to verify and quickly changed my mind and got the Pro.  So glad I read Amazon first

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lightsout
54 minutes ago, FrostByte said:

I was oh so close to getting the tube version myself until I started reading the reviews on Amazon complaining about it being 32-bit.  I then jumped on the nVidia forums to verify and quickly changed my mind and got the Pro.  So glad I read Amazon first

That's what sucks, because I had read that that only mattered for for 64 bit apps like Dolphin and Plex Server. Oh well.

 

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lightsout

According to the folks that have replied they are not having issues with UHD high bit rate remuxes using Kodi with the tube.

One person mentioned Plex had similar issues but with a recent beta they are resolving things. I believe Emby and Plex both 

use exo player. Assuming that may be where the problem lies. 

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Lawrage

I have not tested Kodi but from reading the Nvidia forums they had this issue as well, a recent post seems to indicate this may be working now but cant confirm.

I run both and Plex had the same stuttering issue for me as well.

If you still have the Tube, I changed it to use VLC as an external player and that seems to work fine for playback, there was the odd time where on stopping a movie the tube crashes and you have to close the apps down so not really a long term fix. This was with 60Mb/s files, what happens if I throw a 100Mb/s file at it, I wouldnt be confident that long term this would keep up if its having issues now.

Attempting to get a refund now on the Tube as its advertised as a 4K HDR player where clearly its not.

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lightsout
1 hour ago, Lawrage said:

I have not tested Kodi but from reading the Nvidia forums they had this issue as well, a recent post seems to indicate this may be working now but cant confirm.

I run both and Plex had the same stuttering issue for me as well.

If you still have the Tube, I changed it to use VLC as an external player and that seems to work fine for playback, there was the odd time where on stopping a movie the tube crashes and you have to close the apps down so not really a long term fix. This was with 60Mb/s files, what happens if I throw a 100Mb/s file at it, I wouldnt be confident that long term this would keep up if its having issues now.

Attempting to get a refund now on the Tube as its advertised as a 4K HDR player where clearly its not.

I just sent it back, bought from amazon and still in return period so no big deal. waiting on the refund and will snag a pro. I would rather be confident

going forward that I won't have to worry about it, the Pro has been solid in my living room, as was the previous model before that.

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rbjtech

From reading the various threads on this, I believe it is basically the lack of memory in the Tube - the width of the bus has little to do with it.  The Pro has an extra 1 Gig, which makes all the difference.  I also deleted the Plex Media Server and some of the other factory installed apps that I have no use for to save as much memory as possible.

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lightsout
10 hours ago, rbjtech said:

From reading the various threads on this, I believe it is basically the lack of memory in the Tube - the width of the bus has little to do with it.  The Pro has an extra 1 Gig, which makes all the difference.  I also deleted the Plex Media Server and some of the other factory installed apps that I have no use for to save as much memory as possible.

You could very well be right, although the tube shouldn't have had Plex Media Server since it can't run it?

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queenbuzzo

Damn, I made the same mistake and didn't check reviews before buying. But even worse is that I couldn't test it properly before going on a business trip and now I'm out of the return period. I'm really not impressed by Nvidia, but I have already ordered the Pro as the Shield is the only device atm that can fulfil all my needs. 

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  • 1 month later...
Cydios

I'm having issues.  Not sure what's changed. I've been using shield and emby for a long time now. It'll glitch out about 5 mins or so into a 4k movie. Plex seems to be ok, making a temp change till resolved. 

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On 7/21/2020 at 1:30 AM, Cydios said:

I'm having issues.  Not sure what's changed. I've been using shield and emby for a long time now. It'll glitch out about 5 mins or so into a 4k movie. Plex seems to be ok, making a temp change till resolved. 

Hi there @Cydios can we please look at an example?

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  • 1 month later...
puithove

I have just started collecting 4k content, and I'm running into the same performance issues on my Shield tube.  I don't have a 4k TV yet, so my players have to down-res, but that doesn't seem to be an issue here.

I have some 4k HDR 23 Mbps HEVC content which should be well within spec, but it is having the issue in Emby Android.  Interestingly I have Kodi installed on the same device with the Emby for Kodi sync - Kodi plays this just fine.  Kodi also plays my highest bitrate content fine - 4K HDR 45 Mbps (4k HEVC BluRay -> remux MKV).  So that leads to the question of what's different between the players.

The interesting thing is that upon first starting playback, the UI is still responsive and stopping playback is no issue.  After a period of playback though, the UI boggs down and stopping playback becomes an issue as already described above - this happens much quicker in the higher bitrate content.

I saw mention above about a theory of it being a memory issue.  I changed the playback buffer size setting in the Emby app from the default Medium to Small.  Now the lower bitrate content plays back fine, and the higher bitrate takes longer before it encounters the issue.  Conversely, if I set the buffer size to Large, it makes this happen quicker.

Do we maybe have an issue with the buffer size calculation where it is overrunning the available memory on the device?  I assume it's setting buffer size based on time at the bitrate of the file.  It needs to account for the max available ram in the device though so that it doesn't eat too much.

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1 minute ago, puithove said:

I saw mention above about a theory of it being a memory issue.

The information we have is that it is a memory leak in the firmware on the device.

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  • 1 month later...
treefiddy

 

On 9/3/2020 at 2:11 PM, ebr said:

The information we have is that it is a memory leak in the firmware on the device.

Any Update on this? Do i need to RMA my tube?

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  • 7 months later...
bruceleeon

I have this same issue… the only way I have been able to watch these on the non pro shield is to install Vlc and tell Emby to use external player. VLC plays it all no issue

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vdatanet

Barney Stinson's solution worked for me (Replace the Tube TV with a Tube Shield):

 

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3 hours ago, bruceleeon said:

I have this same issue… the only way I have been able to watch these on the non pro shield is to install Vlc and tell Emby to use external player. VLC plays it all no issue

Hi there, can we please look at an example of what you're playing? Thanks.

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bruceleeon

  <fileinfo>
    <streamdetails>
      <video>
        <aspect>1.77777779</aspect>
        <bitrate>21688406</bitrate>
        <codec>x265</codec>
        <framerate>24.000</framerate>
        <height>2160</height>
        <scantype></scantype>
        <width>3840</width>
        <duration>57.390983333333331</duration>
        <durationinseconds>3443.459</durationinseconds>
      </video>
      <audio>
        <bitrate>768000</bitrate>
        <channels>0</channels>
        <codec>EAC3</codec>
        <language>English</language>
      </audio>
      <subtitle>
        <language>Danish / German / English / Spanish / Spanish / French / French / Italian / Dutch / Norwegian / Portuguese / Portuguese / Finnish / Swedish</language>
      </subtitle>
    </streamdetails>
  </fileinfo>

 

Only way to get it to play with Emby is to use the external player option... using VLC

Edited by bruceleeon
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vdatanet

A high bitrate is not necessary, this media is also problematic:

169958545_Capturadepantalla2021-05-21185019.jpg.3eb4219f2e482a374536510e4e586bed.jpg

High bitrate bluray rips (H264) play fine. Regarding H265 content, there is everything, 15 Mbps movies lead the Nvidia Shield Tube inresponsive and 30 Mbps movies that play fine. By reducing the playback buffer, the stability improves slightly. More than 30 Mbps usually leads to shield instability.

Edited by vdatanet
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bruceleeon

Based on the fact that VLC can play, I am going to assume this is an emby problem and not a shield problem.

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vdatanet
3 hours ago, bruceleeon said:

Based on the fact that VLC can play, I am going to assume this is an emby problem and not a shield problem.

Now I don't have the Tube Shield, I've gotten rid of it. When I did the tests, I only got satisfactory results with applications that did not use Exoplayer. One of the applications, allowed to select libmpv or exoplayer. With libmpv playback was satisfactory, with exoplayer not. In my opinion the memory leak problem is some interaction between exoplayer and the Shield firmware. I don't think Emby is culprit.

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  • 2 months later...
NedXX7
On 4/23/2020 at 9:03 PM, ebr said:

There are no errors in either log which again suggests something at a system level.  If the remote isn't responding on the device home screen, that cannot be something within our app.

With all due respect, but I strongly disagree! I believe the built in player in Emby (the android TV version!) is garbage. And here is why: 
 

1. I have the same issue as the author so I tried to fiddle with the playback settings but with little to no effect. My last hope was actually the last setting in the menu - use an external player. I was skeptical but I installed randomly 4 different players, one of which - VLC. It turns out that on all of the 4 player the movies that I have issues with are running PERFECTLY. All the movies are running super super smooth with VLC, MX player and the other 2(I forgot the names). I specifically downloaded a huge version of Tenet that has 73Mbps bitrate just to test - works like a charm (on the Shield with VLC and all the rest of the players). VLC of Shield is able to fast forward and rewind instantly! that huge and heavy file (72.8Mbps). It runs significantly better that a simple SDR 1080p file runs on the internal player of Emby... So I really can't see how is this the Shield fault! 
Some movies with bitrate around 22-25mbps on the internal player of Emby have huge issue and are practically unwatchable, some movies with 35mbps are running better, not great but better.  First I thought it was because of the DTS metadata or the Atmos TrueHD, but there were no difference with or without DTS/Atmos... I really can't see any pattern with the internal player. But the bottom line is that everything I throw at the Shield with VLC, it smashes it like an absolute boss! Very high bitrate, Atmos or no Atmos, DTS or not, it doesn't matter - the movies are running perfectly! 

2. Additionally I tested it on my smart TV. I have Emby installed on my LG running WebOS and guess what - all movies are running great as well on the TV. I admit, it's a very decent TV :D but a seriously doubt that it has more raw horsepower that the Shield! 

Unfortunately there are downsides of using external player:
 - when you close the movie the emby UI is reloading and it opens the main screen, not the page of the movie 
 - Emby will not know what movie you've watched, to what minute and even worst - when you watch TV show, Emby will not which episode you watched last and which one is next... And really really like that functionality. "What's next" will become unusable :(

So I will be very happy if the internal player get fixed. Other than the playback issue (which is huge!) I absolutely love the internal player and all the rest of Emby! 

*****As a side note I want to share what my setup is, just in case:
- Emby server (v.4.6.0.50) running on Docker Container along side 3 other containers for Sonarr, Radarr and qBittorrent. Host OS is Linux Mint 20
- Nvidia Shield 2019 (tube) with Emby 2.0.09g Registered 
- TV LG B9 55" OLED 
- Sony HT-XF9000 soundbar with Dolby Atmos and DTS support

 

Edited by NedXX7
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vdatanet
7 minutes ago, NedXX7 said:

With all due respect, but I strongly disagree! I believe the built in player in Emby (the android TV version!) is garbage. And here is why: 
 

1. I have the same issue as the author so I tried to fiddle with the playback settings but with little to no effect. My last hope was actually the last setting in the menu - use an external player. I was skeptical but I installed randomly 4 different players, one of which - VLC. It turns out that on all of the 4 player the movies that I have issues with are running PERFECTLY. All the movies are running super super smooth with VLC, MX player and the other 2(I forgot the names). I specifically downloaded a huge version of Tenet that has 73Mbps!!! bitrate just to test - works like a charm ot the (Shield with VLC and all the rest of the players). VLC of Shield is able to fast forward and rewind instantly! that huge and heavy file (72.8Mbps). It runs significantly better that a simple SDR 1080p file runs on the internal player of Emby... So I really can't see how is this the Shield fault! 
Some movies with bitrate around 22-25mbps on the internal player of Emby have huge issue and are practically unwatchable, some movies with 35mbps are running better, not great but better.  First I thought it was because of the DTS metadata or the Atmos TrueHD, but there were no difference with or without DTS/Atmos... I really can't see any pattern with the internal player. But the bottom line is that everything I throw at the Shield with VLC, it smashes it like an absolute boss! Very high bitrate, Atmos or no Atmos, DTS or not, it doesn't matter - the movies are running perfect! 

2. Additionally I tested it on my smart TV. I have Emby installed on my LG running WebOS and guess what - all movies are running great as well on the TV. I admit, it's a very decent TV :D but a seriously doubt that it has more raw horsepower that the Shield! 

Unfortunately there are downsides of using external player:
 - when you close the movie the emby UI is reloading and it opens the main screen, not the page of the movie 
 - Emby will not know what movie you've watched, to what minute and even worst - when you watch TV show, Emby will not which episode you watched last and which one is next... And really really like that functionality. "What's next" will become unusable :(

So I will be very happy if the internal player get fixed. Other than the playback issue (which is huge!) I absolutely love the internal player and all the rest of Emby! 

*****As a side note I want to share what my setup is, just in case:
- Emby server (v.4.6.0.50) running on Docker Container along side 3 other containers for Sonarr, Radarr and qBittorrent. Host OS is Linux Mint 20
- Nvidia Shield 2019 (tube) with Emby 2.0.09g Registered 
- TV LG B9 55" OLED 
- Sony HT-XF9000 soundbar with Dolby Atmos and DTS support

 

Did you try setting the playback buffer to small?

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