Regular Kodi crashes on popcorn Transformer.

Sm3ghead · January 15, 2019 at 11:43 PM

Hi,

Ive been using Librelec since I got the transformer a few ,months ago and generally have found it vastly better than the default android.

However I do get fairly regular crashes. Sometimes just a total freeze which requires pulling the power and sometimes it resets itself.

Normally this happens within the first 30 minutes of powering on. I usually happens twice and then from then on I can watch all night without an issue.

Im using LibreELEC-RK3328.arm-8.90.011-rock64.img but have had crashing issues with all builds, seems to be slightly more regular recently though.

Yesterday however it reset itself a few times within minutes and put kodi into safe mode.

I've attached the crash logs I was directed to and also the system? logs from the same time.

I have seen posts talking about the RK 4.4 kernel being outdated and to be replaced.

So my issues could be related to that and nothing can be done at present, but if not any help would be appreciated.

Thanks

**Kwiboo** · January 16, 2019 at 12:43 AM

From what I can read in log files it looks like the same file (Star trek the Next Generation S01E07.mkv) is playing when crash occurs, is crashes also happening with other files?

It also looks like you are using EGL rendering when playing the video file, please change to use Direct-To-Plane rendering for best support and performance. Direct-To-Plane rendering should be the default.

My Transformer has been running pretty much non-stop without crashes since it was released, but then I only play occasional sample video when testing new code.

Sm3ghead · January 16, 2019 at 1:01 AM

Ok, thanks for the reply

it can happen on any file, none in particular.

After the crashes I watched that episode start to finish without issue.

I did have it set on direct to plane but for some unknown reason on some videos the image comes out wrong.

ie there are "ghost" images offset from each other and each in a different colour. (this doesn't happen on all videos but seems to be random)

I've tried setting the output to RGB, YCbR 444 or 442 but it has no effect.

Thanks

Edit:

Just investigated some media info's of two episodes of farscape, 1 plays fine the other is wonky. Both ripped by same person, program, libs, etc

the only difference I found was:

Bits/(Pixel*Frame) . the one that played wrong was 0.098 the other which all played fine was 0.099, this led me to try different zoom settings.

I normally had been playing 4/3 in zoomed mode, when i set to default or wide or 120 % all was good but image gets corrupted when I set to zoom.

So I will now leave on direct to plane, turn off zoom see if that helps with my crashes

Thanks

noggin · January 16, 2019 at 11:21 AM

Quote from Sm3ghead

the only difference I found was:

Bits/(Pixel*Frame) . the one that played wrong was 0.098 the other which all played fine was 0.099, this led me to try different zoom settings.

That figure is just a measure of how much the source has been compressed.

It's literally the number of bits used to encode each pixel - on average - across the file, which for a given encoder implementation can give you an idea of the relative quality. (For reference - an uncompressed studio master at 8-bit 4:2:2 will have a figure of 16, and 8-bit 4:2:0 of 12. A high quality compressed broadcast master will have a figure of around 4 or 5. DVDs and HD Blu-rays are around 0.5)

It shouldn't have any major impact on the replay of content, particularly when they are so close, if everything else is equal.

**Kwiboo** · January 16, 2019 at 12:58 PM

Using different zoom/aspect ratio options in Kodi is only something I have done minimal testing with and I know there are limitations that are not fully enforced by software that can cause issues with hw.

Interesting to know if anything improves with direct-to-plane and zoom/aspectratio/mode setting using default/normal options, and/or a clean install/user data using default options.

Sm3ghead · January 16, 2019 at 10:59 PM

Thanks noggin and Kwiboo.

I realised the Bits/(Pixel*Frame) was probably pretty meaningless but it lead me to alter the zoom settings which turned out to be the culprit of the corrupted image.

I played videos for about 4 hours last night without a crash so the EGL could well have been the cause of the crashes, fingers crossed.

Thanks for you help, much appreciated.

Just for extra info, I played around with some zoom settings on different 4/3 videos and they all give corrupted images at different zoom level.

For instance the star trek I was watching was perfect at normal and 101% zoom but corrupted at 102%, good at 103% etc

seemingly alternating as I went up the zoom levels, In the end I think I set manually to 130% which was fine but 129 and 131 were not.

Not sure if this is relevant or some sort of bug, but I could take a picture to show what I mean by image being corrupted.

Thanks again for all the help and to the developers

AintMyProb · February 7, 2019 at 11:26 PM

I too am playing around with the Transformer, and have had "random" crashes that took powering down, I hadn't worked out the zoom issue, so I thank the noggin and Kwiboo for their comments here... I know the thread is "older," but this input was helpful.

I will also say one of my Freezes is when the device tries to turn off video to the TV with the screensaver, so I have it dim to 100% and change sources when walking away is needed... I am able to reboot the device without pulling power by holding the power button something like 8-10 seconds then a 3 second press... Not sure if any of this would be helpful to anyone.