Anyone Else Having HDMI Display Handshake Issues?

1st Official Post

    Hi all,

    I don't know if this is hardware realted, software related, a common problem or if there are any suggestions on what to do about it.

    On every Kodi box I've had, be it my own builds on top of Ubuntu minimal as suggested by Fritsch over at the Kodi forums years ago, OpenElec or now LibreElec I've always had difficulty with TV's detecting the HDMI signal from the boxes.

    It seem hardware independent. It happened with AMD based systems, Nvidia based systems and with Intel based systems (though I have never tried an ARM based system, across probabyl 8 different x86 builds I've used over the years and four different TV's

    Usually this happens up resume from sleep but sometimes on initial boot too.

    I power on the TV, then power on the LE box. Sometimes (rarely) I get display output right away. Most of the time - however - it is a matter of pressing the power button on the LE box to put it back to sleep again and wake it again, or try turning the TV on and off again.. Sometimes this takes SEVERAL tries before it finally works, or I give up and hold down the power button on the box to force power it down and power it up again.

    It's usually a running joke with my Fiance, her mother and I. Neither of them can usually get the things to display on several tries, so I get called, and try a couple of times powering things on and off again until I have display output.

    When this happens, it never seems like the box is frozen. it responds to remote input to hibernate and wake up, is pingable and can be SSH:ed to. It just seems like the HDMI handshake process is having difficulties.

    So I guess my question is, is this just life wit these systems, or is there something I have done wrong for several years now? Any suggestions?

    I have had these hdmi issues on and off for the last 5 years with my 2 Intel NUC's (3rd gen). Most of the time it affected the video (black screen) but a new Yamaha AVR had no audio unless the Kodi video resolution was toggled up/dn or the NUC rebooted. I use the NUC's suspend feature instead of pressing the pwr button to turn them on. I gave up trying to find a permanent fix and just live with it.

    I Had the same issues on some systems. Only with hibernate/suspend and mostly, If HPET (High Precision Timers) were active in BIOS. I Set HPET to Off by default since years on Linux based HTPC's. HPET was/is also the Problem for a System Not waking Up using RTC Alarm (eg for a Timer recording).

    On some Mainboards I had also to try different states (eg s1 to s5).

    Or the wife didn't wait for the TV to be ready when Starting the HTPC.

    I prefer using power Off since years. LE Starts Up fast (faster than some receivers and stb's) and I never Had such Problems again. On NUC's I use CEC to Power on the TV works fine.

    Regards

    Nicolas

    Edited 2 times, last by Nicolas (July 26, 2020 at 3:19 AM).

    i do not know it is the same. But I had 1k tv running fine. now I bought a 4k tv with atmos. I have audio hiccups at all content. And I also have issue detecting sometime the hardware that supports E-AC3. I still se no pattern , but I could be a handshake or DHCP issue

    • Official Post
    Quote from Nicolas

    If HPET (High Precision Timers) were active in BIOS. I Set HPET to Off by default since years on Linux based HTPC's.

    that is news to me, something I need to try

    I have handshake issues since day one.

    Quote from Nicolas

    HPET was/is also the Problem for a System Not waking Up using RTC Alarm (eg for a Timer recording).

    I forgot to mention to Type in the path to setwakeup.sh in PVR>Powermanagement as wake up command. For a RTC Alarm from the pvr to Work for a Timer recording. Sometimes was needed to.

    CvH

    Just checked it again on an ASRock n3700 If HPET is on the system does Not wake up for a PVR Timer.

    Regards

    Nicolas

    Quote from Nicolas

    I prefer using power Off since years. LE Starts Up fast (faster than some receivers and stb's) and I never Had such Problems again.

    I don't mind booting and shutting down the box every time. After all with modern SSD's boot time is so fast.

    ONly problem is I don't think my remotes support powering on the system, which would annoy the significant other if she has to press the button on the box every time.