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Guide PSA Tivimate x Firestick 4k - AFR

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Hitchhiker42

Newbie
Just a PSA for those using Tivimate on a Firestick 4k (unfortunately I have no other devices to test this with).

It's generally recommended here and across the internet that auto frame rate (AFR) be switched on where available. This is solid advice, with a caveat when using Tivimate on a Firestick 4k.

If you have AFR turned on in both Tivimate's settings and under settings on the Firestick then you will experience a playback issue that some people may interpret as buffering. If you have both turned on streams will play fine for a variable amount if time, freeze, jump back ~10 seconds and then continue to play fine until the next freeze and so on...

I spent a good hour or so debugging this issue ensuring it wasn't the stream itself and I found that disabling AFR completely resolved the issue. I then enabled AFR under Firestick settings, but this didn't result in the display switching refresh rates when playing a stream in Tivimate - but the freeze and jump back issue was gone. So I re-enabled AFR within Tivimate, display switched refresh rates as expected but would now streams would freeze and jump back intermittently.

Finally, I disabled AFR under Firestick settings, kept it enabled in Tivimate and the display switched as expected and the streams no longer jumped back.

I also tested this in IMPlayer briefly which didn't have the same issue. I think it may be the interaction between the Firestick's hardware decoder and Tivimate - since switching to software decoding in Tivimate resolved the issue above but created many more of it's own.

I honestly wouldn't be surprised if this is on Amazon, rather than Tivimate, and it's and issue with their decoder... Given the issues their decoder has re. Mixed files that include both DV profile 7 and HDR10 and it's inability to fallback correctly to HDR10.

TL;DR
If using Tivimate on a Firestick 4k (and potentially others) and wanting to use AFR, ensure that it is only enabled within the app settings and not the Firestick's display settings.
 
Odd, I tried this on two separate providers in two different households and had the same behavior.

Only common denominator was that I was using the same TV in both cases (an LG OLED C5).
 
Hitchhiker42 said:
Just a PSA for those using Tivimate on a Firestick 4k (unfortunately I have no other devices to test this with).

It's generally recommended here and across the internet that auto frame rate (AFR) be switched on where available. This is solid advice, with a caveat when using Tivimate on a Firestick 4k.

If you have AFR turned on in both Tivimate's settings and under settings on the Firestick then you will experience a playback issue that some people may interpret as buffering. If you have both turned on streams will play fine for a variable amount if time, freeze, jump back ~10 seconds and then continue to play fine until the next freeze and so on...

I spent a good hour or so debugging this issue ensuring it wasn't the stream itself and I found that disabling AFR completely resolved the issue. I then enabled AFR under Firestick settings, but this didn't result in the display switching refresh rates when playing a stream in Tivimate - but the freeze and jump back issue was gone. So I re-enabled AFR within Tivimate, display switched refresh rates as expected but would now streams would freeze and jump back intermittently.

Finally, I disabled AFR under Firestick settings, kept it enabled in Tivimate and the display switched as expected and the streams no longer jumped back.

I also tested this in IMPlayer briefly which didn't have the same issue. I think it may be the interaction between the Firestick's hardware decoder and Tivimate - since switching to software decoding in Tivimate resolved the issue above but created many more of it's own.

I honestly wouldn't be surprised if this is on Amazon, rather than Tivimate, and it's and issue with their decoder... Given the issues their decoder has re. Mixed files that include both DV profile 7 and HDR10 and it's inability to fallback correctly to HDR10.

TL;DR
If using Tivimate on a Firestick 4k (and potentially others) and wanting to use AFR, ensure that it is only enabled within the app settings and not the Firestick's display settings.
Click to expand...

I had AFR issues on TiviMate with the new firestick 4k plus and had to return it. It was only on the 25FPS channels though where it would stutter.

So when you turn off the AFR setting on the firestick does AFR still work correctly on VOD though? AFAIR it didn't activate AFR on VOD even though on live channels it did.
 
What exactly happens or doesnt happen if you have AFR disabled in both tivimate and firestick/cube ? I have neither enabled ( using a 3rd gen cube ) , what improvements if any will I see if I enable it ?
 
soltia said:
What exactly happens or doesnt happen if you have AFR disabled in both tivimate and firestick/cube ? I have neither enabled ( using a 3rd gen cube ) , what improvements if any will I see if I enable it ?
Click to expand...

Usually if your tv is set to 50hz and you try to watch something that was recorded in 60hz then you will notice judders as frames have to be dropped as there are too many. It is most noticeable in motion such as panning scenes. By enabling AFR, your tv switches to 60hz to match the frame rates and so the motion is very smooth.
 
mike123 said:
You are more likely to get buffering if you don't turn it on
Click to expand...
Completely agree with you there, although its not buffering in the sense that the network can't keep up. However, in this specific case (with AFR turned on in two different places) it was causing more issues than it resolved.
 
lemta said:
I had AFR issues on TiviMate with the new firestick 4k plus and had to return it. It was only on the 25FPS channels though where it would stutter.

So when you turn off the AFR setting on the firestick does AFR still work correctly on VOD though? AFAIR it didn't activate AFR on VOD even though on live channels it did.
Click to expand...
When you say stutter, what exactly did that look like?

Yeah, for live channels at least. I wasn't testing VOD at the time but I'll give it a go
 
Did I read somewhere that turning AFR on causes the momentary black screen when switching between channels ? or am I misremembering ?
 
soltia said:
Did I read somewhere that turning AFR on causes the momentary black screen when switching between channels ? or am I misremembering ?
Click to expand...

Yes, it does that but only once. So if you were to switch to another channel from the same country/refresh rate it would not do it again. If you switched between live tv and VOD it would switch refresh rate as movies are almost always 24FPS.
 
Done a little more testing with more devices now. This only became an issue with the new UI update for the firesticks.

It does seem to be resolved now though after an update during the week. AFR on in FTV settings and within the app settings results in correct behavior.

@lemta It does also work correctly for me on VOD. You sure you had it enabled for VOD as well as live TV?
 
Hitchhiker42 said:
Done a little more testing with more devices now. This only became an issue with the new UI update for the firesticks.

It does seem to be resolved now though after an update during the week. AFR on in FTV settings and within the app settings results in correct behavior.

@lemta It does also work correctly for me on VOD. You sure you had it enabled for VOD as well as live TV?
Click to expand...

I never had your issue with it jumping back 10 seconds. So it could be a different issue. AFR doesn't usually cause stream to jump back as if it was buffering. My issue was that there were jerky motion even though TV looked like it was matching refresh rate ( only with 25FPS programmes).

If I disabled AFR in firestick settings and enabled in Tivimate (for both Live & VOD) it would only switch refresh rate for live TV, not VOD. This is strange as you seem to suggest that it works for you for VOD too. I was testing it on a Firestick 4k Plus (which is the same as 2nd gen 4k - it was just renamed).

On my 4k 1st gen everything works perfectly so weird that on the new version it has issues.
 
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