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SSA subtitle handling on Emby Amdroid vs. AndroidTV clients


cubatilles
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cubatilles

Hi,

Yesterday I decided to buy an Nvidia ShieldTV 2019 to improve Emby playback on my TV. I've read the Shield is a very powerful device and it handles lots of formats natively, avoiding transcoding in a lot of scenarios.

It will arrive tomorrow, and I'm trying to document myselfg meanwhile.

One of the maisn reasons to "upgrade" is the TV performance is very low, Kodi with Embuary skin and Embycon is too slow to be an enjoyable experience. That's why I'm using the Emby AndroidTV client, which is nice and performs very well. The problem with Emby client is it does not play SSA/ASS subs well.  I've already read alot about this, according to documentation Emby client uses ExoPlayer which basically does not support subtitle formating (well on the latest client  updates it has improved support, but fonts are still generic and most of the effects are still gone).

While testing the emby client on my mobile phone I've noticed it displays the SSA subtitles perfectly without problem and without transcoding. The app looks a bit different than the AndroidTV one, which is obvious as the AbdroidTV one has been designed for being controlled via a remote on a TV, but cosmetics apart, the Android version seems to entirely support ASS subtitles while the AndroidTV version does not. I don't understand why.

When enabling Nerds'stats, it perfectly says it's DirectStream and it's using.... ExoPlayer! So, you are using the same player on both versions, but one supports SSA and the other does not....

The obvious answer was that the different results are due to different hardware. So, I tried to download  the Emby Android APK from your web, and send it to my AndroidTV and install it (using File Commander). And to my sourprise, the Emby nonTV-Android client on my TV plays SSA subtitle perfectly fine. Well, not perfectly, it has some hiccups on the playback, probably due to the low performance SOC the TV has built-in, but that's another story.

So, my questions are:

-Why the SSA subtitles are natively supported on Emby Android but not on Emby AndroidTV? Why can I play them if I use the nonTV client on the same hardware? I don't understand why can't Emby AndroidTV play them if the other version does it on same hardware. Obvious answer is that maybe the Emby for AndroidTV only uses hardware decoding while the Android version has software decoding/playback? (it's a guess).

-Will I face the exactly same behavior when my Shield arrives tomorrow? Will it just not directly play these subtitles correctly, the same as my TV, or it will play them correctly as my Android phone?  The Emby for Nvidia Shield is based on AndroidTV version or on Android? When my Nvidia Shield arrives, it would be a good idea to install the Android client via APK insted of official client from the store on it?

-Apparently the AndroidTV version of Emby seems to be more "limited" and lightweight compared to the Android one. Can you explain why and how? I am guessing maybe that the Emby Android may be using software playback while the Emby AndroidTV client only relies on hardware playback and that's why I can correctly display SSA subtitles on Android client but not on AndroidTV client. Am I correct here?

I mostly watch anime content, so correct SSA displaying is a must-have for me. Emby Theater on my PCBox works just fine, but of course, I would like to avoid using a full PC for my SmartTV needs. I thought the Shield would be a good compromise between performance / energy saving / capabilities. Any feedback of others with a similar situation would be appreciated.

Sincerely.

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  • Solution
FrostByte

Emby devs are building a modified version of the Exoplayer libraries to fix some of the shortcomings of the Google version.  ASS format rendering and dual layer PGS subtitles are a couple of the things fixed in the modified Exoplayer.

Right now it's only in testing with Emby for Android app.  You can load the apk for Emby for Android on your Shield and it should work with rendering your anime ass subtitles.

Yes, Android for Emby is limited in some TV features as it was once mainly only for mobile devices.  So it will take time to get some of the features you see in ATV added to it

ATV is supposed to get the modified version of Exoplayer eventually, but only after they deem it's ready

I have both apps so I can provide feedback to the devs.

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cubatilles

Hmm, tahnks, that's interesting information. So it's just recently that the ASS subs are displayed correcxtly on Android normal version? I guess eventually the ATV Emby will render ASS just as fine as the Android version. I'll have both apps in the meanwhile.

Indeed, in one of the latest updates (for the ATV version) the subs got improved (screen positioning is working better since latest update), so I hope it's not too long before subs are rendered perfectly. Thanks for the information.

Is there any place I can follow to keep myself informed about this specific feature progress?

Sincerely.

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FrostByte

In the testing area there should be a Android section.  Both apps have beta versions there and you can follow the discussion.  There are also links to the beta apk files for both there if you want to test

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cubatilles

Thanks @FrostByte, I've found the Testing Area googling it. Downloaded the 1.8.55 apk for AndroidTV and sent it and installed it on my TV.

I must be doing something wrong, because the SSA subs still look the same as the official build. With the Android-nonTV build the subs look perfectly, but it also solves other audio desync problems with Game of Thrones, and this desync problem still happens on the AndroidTV beta build. So to my understanding, I'm not using the updated ExoPlayer on the AndroidTV beta build, it indeed makes no difference against the official one. I've checked the Settings menu and it says on the low right corner I'm using "1.8.55g Registered" build, so I'm running the beta build, but apparently not using the new player?

I've tried uninstalling the app and installing it again, but no change. Is there some setting I need to enable to use the new player?

Thanks for your support dude.

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FrostByte

1.8.55 doesn't have the modified Exoplayer.  1.8.55 was only just updated yesterday to include the latest Exoplayer as from Google.

 

To get the correct rendering of ASS files you will need to use Emby for Android which has the modified Exoplayer.  Latest version is 3.1.65 now I think.   Until the modified Exoplayer is added to ATV

Edited by FrostByte
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cubatilles

Ah ok, so I'll stick with the Android nonTV version by now which is really a much better experience with the modified exoplayer. It does not link the watching content to the AndroidTV's main screen, but it's a good workaround until the ATV version gets the same player.

Thanks!

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+1

Same issue for me.

Subtitles render fine if I watch through the iOS client.

But the AndroidTV client forces transcoding on my DS418 (which doesn't have the horsepower to handle) and grinds everything to a halt.

Same issue on the Apple TV client. On Apple TV platform I note that Infuse plays all subtitles fine suggesting it's not an issue with the capability of the hardware.

Would be great to see the AndroidTV and AppleTV client apps support subtitles robustly without need to transcode.

Thanks for listening.

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25 minutes ago, mpcan said:

But the AndroidTV client forces transcoding on my DS418 (which doesn't have the horsepower to handle) and grinds everything to a halt

There is an option in the app to not transcode those subs.  Have you tried that?

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Hi ebr

I'm on v1.8.54g. If I go to Settings cogwheel in top right corner, then to Audio/Subtitle Settings, the only option I can see is at the bottom left...

"Burn in SSA Subs for Formatting". This box is unticked (empty). Is that the setting you are suggesting I try?

I still get transcoding on a variety of subtitle formats (but not all).

Thanks

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Quote

 

When enabling Nerds'stats, it perfectly says it's DirectStream and it's using.... ExoPlayer! So, you are using the same player on both versions, but one supports SSA and the other does not....

Emby for Android has enhancements that have not yet made it into Emby for Android TV, but it will be coming. Thanks for the feedback.

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3 hours ago, mpcan said:

Hi ebr

I'm on v1.8.54g. If I go to Settings cogwheel in top right corner, then to Audio/Subtitle Settings, the only option I can see is at the bottom left...

"Burn in SSA Subs for Formatting". This box is unticked (empty). Is that the setting you are suggesting I try?

I still get transcoding on a variety of subtitle formats (but not all).

Thanks

We'd need to look at a specific example as it sounds like the item is transcoding for another reason.

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  • 4 months later...
plaidstallion

I have been checking this topic for some time as I often have a need to display custom dual language subtitles in ASS format. I had been using the Emby for Android apk on my Nvidia Shield for some time due to the recommendation in this thread but the subtitles were very small and barely legible with the apk version I was using. I was looking for the most recent version of Emby for Android to see if it would fix the small text problem but saw that normal Emby app for Nvidia shield was super out of date on my device. I brought it from 1.8.55 to 2.0.05 using the apk found on these forums and dual language SSA are now displaying correctly in the normal Android TV app. Good stuff and not anything I saw explicitly mentioned in the release notes so figured I would write something here in case anyone else stumbles across the thread with this issue.

No idea why Emby didn't update from the app store for so long but whatever.

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Hi,

You downloaded and installed the most recent beta version of the app.  If you would like to get beta versions vs release versions you can join the beta and these versions will download/install automatically for you.

Hope this helps.

 

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