Emby app on Samsung TV crashes when opening Guide via VirtualTV plugin

[s1mwest 6]

Hi, Emby app crashes on all my Samsung TV's when opening the VirtualTV 'Guide'.  A "v" or similar character shows in centre of screen - I have to exit the app.

Perhaps this is a known issue?

My setup is:

 - Emby beta 4.9.1.3 on Synology NAS DSM 7.2.2-72806 Update 3
  - All VirtualTV channels are Playlist (Live) and using rules
 - Emby for Samsung 2.1.2
 - Samsung QLED's (QE55Q9FNA & UE50DU8000KXXU)

Thank you

[Luke 43532]

Hi there, please attach the Emby server log from when the problem occurred:

How to Report a Problem

Thanks!

 

[s1mwest 6]

Apologies for not supplying any logs and appearing to abandon this question.

Just noting here that this turned out to be caused by an overkill of multiple DNS blocklists used in my internal network.  I'm not certain which entry caused the symptoms, but now I only use Steven Blacks blocklist and the TV Guide functionality works as intended, as do other Samsung features now (iPhone screen mirroring wouldn't work either), whilst avoiding the majority of chatty/unwanted Samsung telemetry.

Once again, thanks for an awesome product and keeping up the awesome work!

[Luke 43532]

Thanks for following up!

[s1mwest 6]

Hi there

It seems that this issue also occurs if my Samsung TV's are not connected to the Internet (firewalled).

Can this be fixed or improved?

All my Virtual TV channels are indexing locally stored content, and I'm trying to keep chatty Samsung TV's away from Internet connectivity.

Some updates to my setup since my original post:

- Emby 4.11.0.7 beta
- Synology DSM 7.4-90075
- Emby for Samsung 2.5.0

Thank you

PS: I also notice that the release notes are not current: Emby for Samsung SmartTV Release Notes (Tizen & Orsay)

[FrostByte 5670]

29 minutes ago, s1mwest said:

 

PS: I also notice that the release notes are not current: Emby for Samsung SmartTV Release Notes (Tizen & Orsay)

That is the old post.  They have automated things a bit.  Look for the pinned post starting with Changelog

 

[s1mwest 6]

3 minutes ago, FrostByte said:

That is the old post.  They have automated things a bit.  Look for the pinned post starting with Changelog

 

Hey, thank you for that @FrostByte

[s1mwest 6]

Just giving this thread a little nudge, as the underlying issue remains unresolved.

Although I resolved the original problem by adjusting my DNS blocklists, I've since confirmed that the Virtual TV guide crashes in the Samsung Emby app when the TV is blocked from accessing the internet.

My Emby server and media library are available locally and they can access the Internet, so I'm curious to understand why opening the guide appears to depend on the TV having internet access.

Could the development team clarify whether this is expected behaviour or a bug that could be addressed?

Thank you

- 4.11.0.13 beta
- DSM 7.4.1-90080 Update 1
- Emby for Samsung 2.5.1

[Luke 43532]

It’s not expected behavior. The TV app does need occasional internet access to verify premiere status but even when that’s not available it shouldn’t crash the app.

@SamES can do some testing on that.

[s1mwest 6]

Thank you.

Some behaviour that might help testing;
If I allow Internet access then restart the tv, let it settle for a minute, then block Internet access the virtual tv guide works for about 48hrs (or close to that).
Then it crashes again until I repeat those steps.

I have noticed the premiere verification when tv has been blocked for some time, so that makes sense. And Samsung seem to block the beta emby app after about 30 days, which I understand is expected (although blocking Internet overcomes that, allowing Emby to continue to function). However, I am reloading the app regularly with latest versions.

[Luke 43532]

What’s the last thing you see on screen?

[s1mwest 6]

[Luke 43532]

Do you also have regular live TV? Are you able to get to the programs tab using the button on the Home Screen?

[s1mwest 6]

Yes, I can get to the programs tab successfully - and I recall I had to change the default screen for live tv from "Guide" to something else to workaround the app crashing

[Luke 43532]

OK so we know it’s not the screen premiere check. 

[Luke 43532]

please attach the Emby server log from when the problem occurred:

How to Report a Problem

Thanks!

 

[s1mwest 6]

Log attached.

FYI, I started the emby service on the NAS at 19:44 and waited around 20 seconds, then opened Virtual TV and navigated to the guide, thus the log contains that complete window.

Thanks for investigating this.

embyserver.txt

[s1mwest 6]

@Lukeas you mentioned the Premiere check earlier, this may or may not be relevant, but I've carried out some further testing.

Windows laptop (Emby web client):
With Internet access blocked, I can open Emby and navigate to the Virtual TV Guide without a crash. However, attempting to play anything from the guide grid prompts me to subscribe to Emby Premiere, and playback does not start. When Internet access is allowed, everything works as expected.

iPhone (Emby for iOS 2.2.59):
With Internet access blocked, both the guide and video playback continue to work as expected.

The behaviour therefore appears to differ between clients when Internet access is restricted, although I appreciate these may not be directly comparable.

My objective is to keep my Samsung TVs completely blocked from Internet access while continuing to use Emby locally, with the server hosted on my NAS (which does have Internet access).

I'm happy to carry out any further tests that might help identify why opening the Virtual TV Guide crashes the Samsung TV app under these conditions.

[SamES 1143]

On 03/07/2025 at 06:17, s1mwest said:

Emby for Samsung 2.1.2

This is a very old version. Can you update to the latest version? I think a fix for this issue has already been added

Edit: just read your later post and saw you are now on 2.5.1

I believe this is related to this setting in the guide. From a web browser on a PC, login with the same user, access the guide and change this setting to either Image or Title - not both, then try connecting again from the TV

 

Edited Thursday at 12:01 PM by SamES

[s1mwest 6]

Thanks.

This was already set to "Image". I changed it to "Title" but there's no change in behaviour. Also restarted Emby server and TV and retried but still the same.

[Luke 43532]

And if you remove virtual tv, then it works with the other live tv ?

[s1mwest 6]

No idea - I never used the other live tv as I believed it only supports sources such as IPTV, tuners etc. All my content is stored locally so I went with Virtual TV from the outset

[SamES 1143]

Maybe this will be easier to diagnose if you can set me up with a minimal account on your server if it is enabled for remote access as I suspect it is something unique with your guide providers. Please just send me details via PM if that will be possible. 

[s1mwest 6]

I appreciate the offer to help @SamESbut unfortunately I'm unable provide remote access.

However, I can share what I can see:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

In the Guide Data Source drop-down below, the options are 'Virtual TV' and 'None'. However, after selecting either then clicking Save, the value is not stored - I don't know if that is expected

[SamES 1143]

Do all your channels say 'Not mapped to guide data'? If so, that is probably the issue.

Does the guide display if you use a browser on a PC instead of the Samsung client? Can you add a screenshot of what that looks like?

After you select 'Guide Data Source', you should then see another dropdown with all the channels available from that Guide, and you need to select the actual guide channel to complete the mapping before selecting save.

 

It should be fine if there are some channels that are not mapped, but I suspect that if none of them are mapped, that may be causing the guide display issue that your are experiencing.