4k video on Minix Neo U9-H using Kodi

you could try with a kodi 17.6 fork on your U9 ( recommend WBMC) and just transfer a single video file to the minix internal memory ( if enough space) or usb stick and try playing that.
I now use Kodi 18 and use the Aura Skin ( very nice and easy to use) which is 18 compatible
download skin from github.... https://github.com/jurialmunkey/skin.aura/tree/Leia

worth a whirl :)
 
@CybeRider
Don't misinform: "The white list has nothing to do with the playback. It only concerns the interface" - on the contrary, see for example https://forum.kodi.tv/showthread.php?tid=339119&pid=2806338#pid2806338 and many other posts on Kodi forum.
Also original Kodi discussion: https://github.com/xbmc/xbmc/pull/13274

Misinform?...
My Minix Xbmc 16.3, as my Kodi 17.6, as my Kodi 18.0 never showed anything different than 1920x1080 in that setting, not when I connected it to a HD Ready TV or to a 4K TV. Besides, the separator is clearly System settings display, different from the player settings, where logically that setting would be in case it had anything to do with it. I read a lot to be able to go from where you are to the point where I am, meaning I am not the one having any issues to play my files. I am not misinforming, I am translating what I learned from many years of video processing and some reading as well, so people know how I dealt with those very same doubts in the past. But people can always follow your knowledge instead of mine, I am actually grateful that you now joined to help, had you done so from the beginning and I wouldn't even probably tried to. If kodi ppl wanted that setting to do anything for the video playing in a Minix box, well I have news for you: as far as I can tell, or trust, they didn't succeed.

Can you honestly confirm that setting changed anything for you in the video playing? That is the only thing that could ever convince me. But I give it to you that maybe it changes something to whomever wanted (as per one of your examples) to downsample the video playing, which I doubt it will do, but that never crossed my mind to try, even if I wanted to I couldn't, as I never saw anything else displayed there.

And of course I will then apologize for having misinformed you.
 
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Misinform?...

https://forum.kodi.tv/showthread.php?tid=339119

"
If you open the whitelist menu, you will see some resolutions and Hz numbers mentioned. Hz can also be understood as "fps" (Frames per second). The list shows, what your TV/Monitor is capable of. Let's assume, we have a FullHD TV connected which is also capable to do different fps on its respective resolutions. So 24, 23.98, 30, 59.97, 60 for 1920*1080 for example and also 24, 23.98, 50, 60 for 1280*720 and 50, 60 for 720*576 (the list is somewhat huge Wink ).

If you don't enable any of those settings, Kodi will pass everything it plays directly to the TV. That will mean if you play some SD Live-TV channel (which sometimes has 720*570 at 50fps) your TV will probably show 1080p instead (which will mean 1920*1080/50fps). So your TV does the upscaling then. If you enable 720*576/50fps at the whitelist, your TV will show 576p and there's absolutely no upscaling and the TV shows the native resolution the Live-TV channel has. That willl also result in a 576p Kodi GUI if you hit ESC during a live-tv playback.
"

And yes, it's not enabled and my TV is not switching to 24fps when playing 23.976 content, which results in nasty tearing. With WD TV Live SMP I am not having such issues - it switches modes as needed.

BTW, from another post (re S912): "There are only three Android Kodi devices currently on sale that have auto Kodi refresh switching working. They are the FireTV Stick 4K, NVIDIA Shield and the MINIX U9." - that's why I've chosen Minix over 3 times (sale prices) cheaper S905/other chipset boxes.
 
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I had read it at first, still doesn't make me believe kodi to be able to upscale or downscale video files. But that is probably just my poor english.

It is a pitty that all the theory, and I got a lot since the old forum about this same subject, doesn't reflect afterwards in the reality. How does that explain all the members achieving good results with their devices, if that was true U9 would be very unpopular.

Maybe they meant the U1 which is flawless (even with that menu greyed out) but since you found in writting that it is the U9 so it must be true.

In what matters, is there something you suggest to make it work, or since the written science is unmoveable should all U9s be dumped? I hope not.
 
Because I have no intention of misinforming or misguiding anybody, here are my new conclusions:

I just installed Kodi in my Windows 7 laptop (something I never thought I would ever do) because the vast list of "White listed" and video resolutions that were pointed out somewhere above looked too familiar with the lists we normally see at the available resolutions in a computer. And yes, there they were, just as they appear when we choose them in the several computer graphics options available.

And then I put a nice 1080p file to run, and as expected it didn't, because my working laptop is only HD capable. I tried to no avail to downsample in the white list menu, and as I expected it didn't work.

Then I got a 720p file, and it went nice and smoothly with the white list cleared (none of the options marked).

Then I went to the System Setting Display resolution in Kodi and pulled it down from 1024x600 (the pc native res) to 640 x 480 and the Kodi interface got immediately blurred, as I mentioned it would in my previous messages. As expected, that didn't interfere with the file playing which was exactly the same as before.

Then I picked a White List option to force the file to play at a lower resolution, and guess what, it didn't play at all!

So now I am going to remove this thing straight away from my computer as I have better things to do in life then spending time confirming things I already know.

And by the way, I would appreciate if someone could please explain the following:

If Hz are the same as fps, how come all the 16 resolution options available at White List are all between 60Hz and 59.94Hz. Should this mean no one should ever be able to watch a 23fps video? Because mine played really well at the native 60Hz rate of the monitor!
 
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you could try with a kodi 17.6 fork on your U9 ( recommend WBMC) and just transfer a single video file to the minix internal memory ( if enough space) or usb stick and try playing that.
I now use Kodi 18 and use the Aura Skin ( very nice and easy to use) which is 18 compatible
download skin from github.... https://github.com/jurialmunkey/skin.aura/tree/Leia

worth a whirl :)

Just because it's not a official Kodi release, i suppose it's possible to have them both installed? The WBMC doesn't replace the original Kodi 17.6? Am i right?
 
you could try with a kodi 17.6 fork on your U9 ( recommend WBMC) and just transfer a single video file to the minix internal memory ( if enough space) or usb stick and try playing that.
I now use Kodi 18 and use the Aura Skin ( very nice and easy to use) which is 18 compatible
download skin from github.... https://github.com/jurialmunkey/skin.aura/tree/Leia

worth a whirl :)

Now it's getting realy complicated ...
I installed WBMC, tried both 17.6 and 18 and both is working with my U9. I getting 4k output to my TV, but I have to choose 4k-smpte. It doesn't work with the automatic settings wich give me 4k 60Hz. But, when I choose 4k smpte, I get 4096x2160, and not 3840x2160 and i wonder why?

If I look here https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/4K_resolution it says that 4k SMPTE is explained as "A resolution of 3840 × 2160 (UHDTV1) ". Why do i get 4096? And what result is it giving me? My TV has a UHD resolution (3840x2160) but when i choose 4k SMPTE i get 4096x2160?? Do i get wrong perspective, or what is happening? My TV has a specified resolution of 3840x2160 and I'm using media with resolution of 3840x2160??

The upside of using my U9 is that i get HDR working. I don't get HDR on my U1, but i suppose that is correct, and by design. In a normal viewing distans, i think HDR is giving more benefits for the picture than UHD vs HD.

So, as a summing-up, do I get any disadvantages of using 4k-smpte, and what I can see, 4k but "wrong resolution"? Is it "wrong" to run 4096x2160 on a TV that have a specified resolution of 3840x2160?

My conclusion is that i stick to my U9 with 4096x2160 and HDR, instead of my U1 with 3840x2160 and without HDR! What do you think guys?
 
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What means are you using to determine the file is played at a lower resolution in Kodi?

I wish there was a simple way to lower the resolution of a 4k video with a player, but I could never do it. A 4k video file will require a graphics processor and a player capable of playing it, and either you have it and it plays, or you don't have it and it doesn't play at all. Such thing of a 4k file being played at 1080p without going through a recompress procedure to reduce it into something else makes no sense to me. Not even a powerful player as Kodi can do that kind of magic.
I have a splitter on my system that routinely lowers 4k to 1080 - this spliitter gets the capabilities of what is connected to the output ports and adjusts itself for each accordingly.
 
I have a splitter on my system that routinely lowers 4k to 1080 - this spliitter gets the capabilities of what is connected to the output ports and adjusts itself for each accordingly.

After the machine reads the file the splitter processes the signal. A splitter is not a player. It is a very cool device actually.
 
Both boxes have a clean installation of Kodi 17.6. No special settings on any of them. I use advancedsettings-file and MySQL for my library so the media is also the same.

As you see in my post, i have also tried Kodi 18, with the same outcome! Not working on my U9, but i haven't tried on the U1. Because i use the advancedsettings-file and MySQL, i have to upgrade all my three installations of Kodi at the same time, and i think i wait with that. I use Aeon Nox skin, and unfortunately it's not compatible with Kodi 18 ...

Did you try it with LG TV :unsure: ? LG rolls out many updates compared to Samsung.
 
Did you try it with LG TV :unsure: ? LG rolls out many updates compared to Samsung.
I can certainly confirm that, especially with my Samsung "Smart" Home Theater 5.1 receiver. The Samsung is maybe 6 years old and had a total of TWO updates in that time while my LG TV I just bought this year has already had about 4 updates.
 
I need to read every post in this thread but do find the OP problem interesting, as I have exactly the OPPOSITE problem when I installed the forum provided Ubuntu image on my Z-84.

Like the OP, I don't even have 4k listed as a resolution in the control-> system section for display and the user interface is always in 1080. Yet I can play 4k movies and they play in 4k as evidenced by the Kodi 18.x "Codec" display function (pressing "o" during the movie).

My advice is to use the later Kodi 18 with the codec display option so you know what the resolution is while playing and also to be sure you are using the correct input on the TV - it may need to be HDCP 2.x specific input.
 
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