playback will result in a black screen with audio until device restart

[katbyte 40]

Every so often playback with the emby app will result in a black screen with audio coming through. this will happen randomly on videos that previously played fine or ones that never played before. Once it happens no video will play properly all resulting in the black screen.

closing and reopening the app does not fix this. picking a different video does not change it.

other devices (web, ios, andriod tv) play fine

the only thing that fixes it is restarting the apple tv

Edited September 14, 2024 by katbyte

[Luke 42077]

@katbyte

 

Hi there, let's look at an example. Please attach the information requested in how to report a media playback issue. Thanks!

 

[katbyte 40]

luckily it just happened again. restarted the server. tried again. tried 2nd show.

logs attachedembyserver.txt

[DarkStar1977 119]

On 9/18/2024 at 12:15 AM, katbyte said:

luckily it just happened again. restarted the server. tried again. tried 2nd show.

logs attachedembyserver.txt

@Luke

This is been happening since 1.8.8 (2) version and before TVOS 18 upgrade.

I've reported this to you here:

In fact, in my case does not need a device restart, just kill the emby app in apple tv and open it again.

Edited September 30, 2024 by DarkStar1977

[Jcheinaman 19]

Just adding my issue as well. Apple TV with a random black screen.

[StrageEnemy 2]

This happens to me as well, once I’ve played several tv episodes, the screen goes black and only audio comes through, the temporary solution is to close and reopen the app.

[Luke 42077]

Hi, we are looking into this. Thanks.

[RichardGrimmer 3]

Just to add - I've just experienced the same issue (Apple TV also). Perhaps significant (perhaps not) - prior to the problem, playback seemed to be slightly stuttery - movements weren't smooth - that was fixed by exiting and restarting the video - next episode after the restart exhibited the problem, as others different videos had same issue as did live TV (Homerun HD)  - restart of Apple TV fixed it. 

Again, perhaps significant - I'd been playing a combination of videos and live TV on the app (without problem) from about 0700 - 1500 - perhaps a resource freeing issue?

[Luke 42077]

On 2/7/2025 at 10:10 AM, RichardGrimmer said:

Just to add - I've just experienced the same issue (Apple TV also). Perhaps significant (perhaps not) - prior to the problem, playback seemed to be slightly stuttery - movements weren't smooth - that was fixed by exiting and restarting the video - next episode after the restart exhibited the problem, as others different videos had same issue as did live TV (Homerun HD)  - restart of Apple TV fixed it. 

Again, perhaps significant - I'd been playing a combination of videos and live TV on the app (without problem) from about 0700 - 1500 - perhaps a resource freeing issue?

Ok that is helpful, thanks. We are looking into it.

[RichardGrimmer 3]

Interestingly I had another possible manifestation of the issue last night - same as before, I'd been using all day with a combination of live TV and videos....got to c1800 and the picture on the programme I was watching stopped updating - so it looked as though it had frozen, but the audio continued.....came out and back in and I got the black screen with sound.

Again, possible linked (but I doubt it) - I'd used my mobile (IOS) as a remote to select the TV channel and had been for a couple of hours (It's really cool having a TV guide on my phone and using that to "tune" the TV!!). Something else I do which may be significant is that when I'm watching videos I tend to put a series on for a couple of hours and just let it roll over to the next episode rather than picking each episode - I don' normally click "next episode" , then I'll switch to live TV for a bit then back to episodes....

On 14/02/2025 at 18:45, Luke said:

Ok that is helpful, thanks. We are looking into it.

I seem to be getting the issue pretty much daily at the moment - is there anything you guys (the dev team) would like to help diagnose - logs / document more specifically what I was doing prior to the issue etc - I'm a dev myself, so I could potentially do some digging on my side or supply some additional info if needed.

I have noticed that the navigation on TVOS seems to use a stack of some kind - in one of my own work projects (Xamarin & C#) I had significant issues with this sort of navigation (old views still being held in memory consuming resources ) and needed to implement navigation stack clearing (popping to root etc) - could this be a similar issue?

[Luke 42077]

On 2/17/2025 at 2:57 PM, RichardGrimmer said:

Interestingly I had another possible manifestation of the issue last night - same as before, I'd been using all day with a combination of live TV and videos....got to c1800 and the picture on the programme I was watching stopped updating - so it looked as though it had frozen, but the audio continued.....came out and back in and I got the black screen with sound.

Again, possible linked (but I doubt it) - I'd used my mobile (IOS) as a remote to select the TV channel and had been for a couple of hours (It's really cool having a TV guide on my phone and using that to "tune" the TV!!). Something else I do which may be significant is that when I'm watching videos I tend to put a series on for a couple of hours and just let it roll over to the next episode rather than picking each episode - I don' normally click "next episode" , then I'll switch to live TV for a bit then back to episodes....

I seem to be getting the issue pretty much daily at the moment - is there anything you guys (the dev team) would like to help diagnose - logs / document more specifically what I was doing prior to the issue etc - I'm a dev myself, so I could potentially do some digging on my side or supply some additional info if needed.

I have noticed that the navigation on TVOS seems to use a stack of some kind - in one of my own work projects (Xamarin & C#) I had significant issues with this sort of navigation (old views still being held in memory consuming resources ) and needed to implement navigation stack clearing (popping to root etc) - could this be a similar issue?

How much Xamarin do you do?

[RichardGrimmer 3]

@Luke - sorry for the delay in replying - Xamarin is / was my bread and butter for a while!

Mainly on mobile apps, but several different projects (edit: Pro developer >25 years, C / C++ (MFC / ATL) => .Net Framework => >NETCORE, MS specialist)

Edited March 5, 2025 by RichardGrimmer

[Luke 42077]

Do you do much with Maui?

[RichardGrimmer 3]

Nothing professionally (not had a suitable project for it recently) but it's in my toolbox! 

[Luke 42077]

By the way can you still reproduce the original issue?

[RichardGrimmer 3]

Yes - still seeing the issue, also seeing a fair few still image but sound manifestations of the problem.

"Anecdotally", it seems more likely when another Video app (iPlayer / Netflix) has been playing, then Emby used...no hard data to back that up, but seems that way to me

[RichardGrimmer 3]

Quick update on this one just in case.

I've added a "new" Apple TV 4K to my lounge and moved the original one to my bedroom...

The lounge (new) one hasn't exhibited the problem above - at all......

The bedroom (old) one also hasn't - however..... when it was in the lounge, it was on Emby from C0700-2200 every day being used constantly (mix of live TV and personal media)......in the bedroom it's used for an hour or so in the morning and again in the evening - so light use

I HAVE been seeing an awful lot of hard crashes back to the Apple TV main menu on the "new" one - I can't be certain, but it appears that it's on a similar "schedule" to the original problem - i.e. happens after a long period of use - (potentially a resource freeing issue?) - could it be that the original blank screen issue is now manifesting as a crash?

I'm happy to submit crash reports if there's a mechanism for doing so and it would help?

[jasonmcroy 316]

Just wanted to add that I am seeing the same issue no matter if I tell Siri to "pause playback" then come in later and tell Siri to "resume playback" or using the remote. 

If it matters, I am using 2 Home Pods on the device so I also get that audio delay on restart if I use the MPV player. I don't get that audio delay if I use the Native player setting.

I also don't need to fully restart the device, just the app. 

Edited November 13, 2025 by jasonmcroy

[Luke 42077]

On 11/10/2025 at 11:59 AM, RichardGrimmer said:

Quick update on this one just in case.

I've added a "new" Apple TV 4K to my lounge and moved the original one to my bedroom...

The lounge (new) one hasn't exhibited the problem above - at all......

The bedroom (old) one also hasn't - however..... when it was in the lounge, it was on Emby from C0700-2200 every day being used constantly (mix of live TV and personal media)......in the bedroom it's used for an hour or so in the morning and again in the evening - so light use

I HAVE been seeing an awful lot of hard crashes back to the Apple TV main menu on the "new" one - I can't be certain, but it appears that it's on a similar "schedule" to the original problem - i.e. happens after a long period of use - (potentially a resource freeing issue?) - could it be that the original blank screen issue is now manifesting as a crash?

I'm happy to submit crash reports if there's a mechanism for doing so and it would help?

Hi, we’ll take a look at it. Thanks.

[HouseOfCards 95]

Could this be an HDMI issue?  It happens to me as well...  Having worked for a big cable company for two decades, we would occasionally find that certain model cable boxes would have black screen/flickering issues which were often fixed with a newer version HDMI cable.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/HDMI#Versions

Negotiations happen between devices over the HDMI interface, and a cable that doesn't support the bandwidth necessary can cause all sorts of issues like this.  I'm going to upgrade my HDMI cable and see if this stops for me.  I'll report back in a few weeks.  I will say that it only happens with Emby though.  I've never had it happen with any other app on the device, but it's still worth a shot.  I'll give it a try.  It seems relevant because after the device shuffle from the post above the problem went away for them.  That tells me some cables were swapped around, which screams HDMI version mismatch between devices and cables.

I'll update what I find...