Hardware for 4K movies

    Hi i would like to use this Thread for my own question.

    I still used RP4 for my Home Stuff with an Qnap TS-453 on a Onkyo 545 and they do their stuff for a couple of years in 1080p with all Sound Protocols very well.

    But i have a 4k TV since 2022 and would like to use the full resolution.

    But with RP4 i give up after an hour because this is not worth with it. :)

    Now i ordered a RP5 and installed nightly Build but the same issues like on the RP4. i have downloaded the recommended test files from here https://kodi.wiki/view/Samples and nothing is really working.

    So i tried a generic Lenovo Think centre M700 with an i3-6100T and 8GB Ram and a 500gb SSD but also on this system, more stuff dont work.

    Which Hardware have i to use that i can fully play 4k Movies ?

    THanks a lot

    • Best Answer
    Quote from R33p3r

    Now i ordered a RP5 and installed nightly Build but the same issues like on the RP4. i have downloaded the recommended test files from here https://kodi.wiki/view/Samples and nothing is really working.

    Do you want to play files from a library of test media or watch movies?

    If you want a device that plays maximum test media, including HDR10+/DolbyVision/AV1 it's probably a new-ish Android or high-end Windows device that natively supports HDCP and more codecs than an RPi5. There are few devices that can do that under Linux and none of them are supported by this distro which focusses on the upstream Linux kernel not downstream vendor/BSP kernels.

    If you want to watch movies: 99% of the 4K media files in my library are 8-bit/10-bit HEVC, and some are HDR/HDR10/HLG (or have compatible fall-back to those static HDR formats) and almost all are 23.976fps (a handful might be 30fps) and 100% of them play nicely on an RPi5.

    /shrug

    Quote from chewitt

    Do you want to play files from a library of test media or watch movies?

    If you want a device that plays maximum test media, including HDR10+/DolbyVision/AV1 it's probably a new-ish Android or high-end Windows device that natively supports HDCP and more codecs than an RPi5. There are few devices that can do that under Linux and none of them are supported by this distro which focusses on the upstream Linux kernel not downstream vendor/BSP kernels.

    If you want to watch movies: 99% of the 4K media files in my library are 8-bit/10-bit HEVC, and some are HDR/HDR10/HLG (or have compatible fall-back to those static HDR formats) and almost all are 23.976fps (a handful might be 30fps) and 100% of them play nicely on an RPi5.

    /shrug

    Hello Chewitt, very good answer.

    Would RP5 + NAS be OK?

    Hi,

    I just use test files for 4k for testing only.

    For normal use i have the same setup like you, RP 4 / 5 and a normal QNAP NAS with aggregated 1GBit Uplinks so nothing special.

    So if i use static supported 4k formats it should probably work. Ok i will test a little bit and give you feedback :)

    Thanks a lot for your good advise

    Hi,

    I tested some youtube videos with 2160p and VP9 and they work well.

    But some files like the attached ones have multiple artifacts, what i am wondering 720p as well ...., what can i do?

    I can see the first is H264/10-bit which isn't a real-world broadcast standard and thus is often under-supported in software.

    Share samples of the files and we can ask Pi devs to comment.

    If your TV supports DV then I recommend to get a DV TV box. I have Nvidia Shield tube(32bit) along with another ~15 different android TV boxes and the Shield is the only one I use because of DV.
    DV is AMAZING!

    Quote from chris2024

    If your TV supports DV then I recommend to get a DV TV box. I have Nvidia Shield tube(32bit) along with another ~15 different android TV boxes and the Shield is the only one I use because of DV.
    DV is AMAZING!

    Dolby Vision needs a device with a dedicated license. To my knowledge, only one device has such a license, and can run Kodi as an independent OS, and that's on CoreELEC (go to CoreELEC forum for details).

    Yep.

    I have a Banana Pi M5 with CE that played DV but now is only used for its capability to tonemap HDR to SDR on my LG 50" that not support HDR.

    Edited once, last by MatteN: Merged a post created by MatteN into this post. (March 21, 2024 at 6:45 PM).

    Quote from Da Flex

    Dolby Vision needs a device with a dedicated license. To my knowledge, only one device has such a license, and can run Kodi as an independent OS, and that's on CoreELEC (go to CoreELEC forum for details).


    I see no reason to consider running Kodi as a dedicated OS if you have Shield. LibreELEC or CoreELEC won't improve anything. These dedicated Kodi OSes are good for the Chinese Android boxes that have invaded the market and we've all bought them only to find that they all have software issues that make them unusable.

    An interesting box is Xiaomi TV Box S (2nd Gen). It is $60 and besides DV adds AV1, HDR10+ (Note: Shield does not have HDR10+). I think I will buy this next because it is one of the few with good reviews on Amazon.

    Quote from chris2024


    I see no reason to consider running Kodi as a dedicated OS if you have Shield. LibreELEC or CoreELEC won't improve anything.

    I agree. The Shield is the big exception on the market of Android boxes. nVidia has the money to deliver updates over a long time span. Owners of cheaper Android boxes love the option to install an OS like ours.

    Quote from chewitt

    Do you want to play files from a library of test media or watch movies?

    If you want a device that plays maximum test media, including HDR10+/DolbyVision/AV1 it's probably a new-ish Android or high-end Windows device that natively supports HDCP and more codecs than an RPi5. There are few devices that can do that under Linux and none of them are supported by this distro which focusses on the upstream Linux kernel not downstream vendor/BSP kernels.

    If you want to watch movies: 99% of the 4K media files in my library are 8-bit/10-bit HEVC, and some are HDR/HDR10/HLG (or have compatible fall-back to those static HDR formats) and almost all are 23.976fps (a handful might be 30fps) and 100% of them play nicely on an RPi5.

    /shrug

    Hello, I'm brand new here but I've been using Kodi on LibreElec for several years :thumbup:

    I have a Raspberry Pi 3b+ from 2016, and I'm limited to x264 encoded movies on my 1080p TV. I'd like to upgrade my setup at a low cost, especially to switch to x265/10bit movies, still using Kodi on LibreElec for simplicity, and it seems that the Raspberry Pi 5 is a suitable solution in my situation.

    Just one detail: could you tell me if I should go for a 4 or 8 GB RAM version?

    Another question, regarding the throughput of my NAS: it's important but I'm not knowledgeable about this subject at all, I don't know where to find the information. Could you tell me if my NAS HP Proliant microserver N54L will be sufficient in terms of data throughput, for now for 1080p, but perhaps in the future for 4K? My switch is a TP Link TL-SG105.

    Thank you for your assistance.

    RPi5 is a good choice and the 4GB board is more than enough for LE use (2GB would be fine, but doesn't exist). As long as the NAS and RPi5 are both connected to a Gigabit Ethernet switch the connection should be fast enough.

    Quote from chewitt

    RPi5 is a good choice and the 4GB board is more than enough for LE use (2GB would be fine, but doesn't exist). As long as the NAS and RPi5 are both connected to a Gigabit Ethernet switch the connection should be fast enough.

    Perfect. Thank you very much <3