TV Seems to Lose Input Source for a Couple of Seconds Before Playing

[Guest CodeCat5]

This seems like a bit of a weird issue that just started popping up a couple of weeks ago or so. Now when I select a show and press the "play" button, my TV behaves as if the HDMI was unplugged for a couple of seconds and shows it looking for input from the source, and then starts playing a couple of seconds later. This doesn't seem to happen with all TV shows, but it is now occurring with most things that I watch. I checked a variety of shows to see if maybe it was a certain file format or etc, but couldn't see any correlation. I tested this with 2 different Nvidia Shields (2017 & 2019 pro model) and can reproduce it on both of them, though it's much more obvious on my Roku TV since it displays Roku's loading screen for a few seconds whereas my older Vizio TV just shows a less obvious overlay indicating that something changed with the source input. Just to be clear, I don't see this happening with Emby's Roku app, but I have a Shield connected to a TV with Roku for the OS and it's method of displaying a lost connection to the input source is much more obvious. I also tested on a Google Chromecast (new model with installed apps, not casting), but it doesn't seem to affect the Chromecast as far as I can tell.

I've attached logs from today, and at the end you should be able to see where I tested with 3 different TV shows. I saw the issue happen with the first 2 shows ("The Geology Elevation" and "Talking Shop"), but it did not happen with the last show ("Jolly Roger Telephone Co., Toybox Labs, Goalsetter, Moink.").

Hopefully my description here is clear enough, but I can take a video of it happening with each TV as well if it would be helpful.

embyserver(8).txt

Edited September 20, 2022 by CodeCat5

[speechles 2055]

By chance, have you unknowingly enabled this?

[Guest CodeCat5]

Yup, it looks like the "Enable Refresh Rate Switching" setting was the culprit. I definitely don't remember changing it, but I guess I must have if nothing related to it changed within the app recently. Thanks for the help!

[ebr 16184]

Hi.  When most displays change video modes, they behave this way.

[Guest CodeCat5]

10 hours ago, ebr said:

Hi.  When most displays change video modes, they behave this way.

Yea, it makes sense now that I know what's causing it. For some reason though the Emby app doesn't seem to handle the switch very gracefully on my 6-series TCL TV. I saw that Plex has a similar setting for variable refresh rates so I did some comparing. In Plex I notice a black screen for a second or two when starting or stopping a show which doesn't happen with the setting disabled, so I can kinda tell when it's doing the switch. Emby just seems much slower about the switch though so I see a black screen for a second or two, then it goes back to the Roku OS for a couple of seconds showing there's no input, then it goes back into Emby and loads the show. Granted it's a minor annoyance, but it still throws me off every time I see it.

[ebr 16184]

3 hours ago, CodeCat5 said:

goes back to the Roku OS

I thought we were talking about Android TV...

[Guest CodeCat5]

We are. I mentioned this in my original post, but I have a Shield connected to a TV with Roku OS, so it's showing part of the Roku OS for a couple of seconds as if the Shield is disconnected.

[ebr 16184]

3 hours ago, CodeCat5 said:

We are. I mentioned this in my original post, but I have a Shield connected to a TV with Roku OS, so it's showing part of the Roku OS for a couple of seconds as if the Shield is disconnected.

Ah, okay.  Thanks.