Recommended Settings and other useful stuff for RTD 1619DR Players

Er - no - I need the file to load into an editor..

 

Ah, thanks, please find it attached.

 

Cool - I'll look at that today...

 

Hi all.
I bought z9x but the first contact today was not very pleasant.
I conected the zidoo to a Formovie T1 projector which is DV and Lldv ready.
I have selected in Zidoo menu, HDR in auto and Dolby Visión TV LED because I want the projector to manage DV. I get in zidoo Info out “ RGB 8bits DV (TV LED) but mapping is not so good compare with the one I get with Oppo Clone. In Oppo clone when I use Tv Led I can see in info “Dolby vision 12 bits”, mapping in oppo is good, I can check it in the famous scene with the rosette in the back (Aquaman)
My feeling is that zidoo is sending lldv instead of Normal DV, in a couple of times I got the same picture than Oppo but the rest of times I get with zidoo bad mapping in TV LED, so I don’t know what is happening, I tried everything but no succes.
In my understanding, mapping should be the same in both players since I have selected TV LED.
By the way, I installed last beta.
Waiting for your help, thanks.

 

Ok - I loaded your EDID. This makes my player react in the same way yours does when connected to your TV.

I had Resolution set to "Auto(3840x2160P 60Hz)"

This means that the GUI is set to 4K60 (I'll use that abbreviation - easier to type).

First I set Frame Rate Mode to "Off"

This resulted in all content playing back at 4K60 (I tested 4K23, 4K24, 2K23 content).

Next I set Frame Rate Mode to "Match Frame Rate Only"

This resulted in all content playing at 4K but at the correct frame rate - so 4K23 > 4K23 and 2K23>4K23 etc

Next I set "Match Frame Rate and Resolution" and as expected, 4K23 > 4K23 and 2K23 > 2K23 etc.



I could have easily predicted these results but I wanted to do a belt and braces job using your EDID and of course the Zidoo behaved as expected.

However, I think what may be confusing you here is that you mention 29.97 content which is a broadcast refresh rate and therefore I would assume that the content is interlaced - probably 1080i, maybe 480i or 576i ?

In that case, since each frame consists of two fields, the Zidoo will report and play back at 59.94Hz (59.94 is 2 x 29.97) and there's absolutely nothing wrong with that - you won't skip or repeat frames etc. Similarly if you use 1080i25 or 576i25 etc these will play back at 50Hz.

Bottom line is that Frame Rate Mode works as expected.

 

And this is my EDID....



Any help will be wellcome

 

Thank you very much for your testing of and attention to my confusion, Mark!

It's extremely rare that I ever have an Interlaced file. 99.99% of the files I download are Progressive. 98% are, specifically, 1080p or 2160p as in my previous post with my testing.

** Resolution **
I was expecting there would be a setting which would pass through the resolution to the TV. In other words, a way to get the UHD3000 to output content at the resolution of the content, 720p or 1080p or 2160p (or rarely 240p or 360p or 540p) to leave all the upscaling to the TV.

But in my testing, the UHD3000 output both 1080p and 2160p content at 1080p when I set Display Resolution to 1080p regardless of whether I "Match Framerate Only", or "Match Framerate and Resolution".

I guess I can compare scaling by taking some 1080p content, and viewing it with Display resolution set to 1080p then switching it to 2160p. But if it looked better set to 1080p (which meant that the TV was scaling better), that would be useless information for me, because if I left Display/Resolution set to 1080p then the UHD3000 would be downscaling 2160p content to 1080p (leaving the TV to do a 2nd lossy upscale); and for contents with resolution less than 1080p both the UHD and the TV would be upscaling (the UHD3000 to 1080p, and the TV from 1080p to 2160p).

My new guess about what I'm hearing is that there's no way to get the UHD3000 to pass through resolution. In that case, it seems to me that it would be a poor choice to ask the TV to do the upscaling unless one wanted to switch the Display/Resolution setting every time one played content with a different resolution (which I can't imagine having patience for). And I can't imagine accepting two scaling operations, since each one is lossy and in my heart I'm a purist.

** Framerate **

First, I admit that I've been assuming that as regards playback of a file, "refresh rate" and "frame rate" were the same thing (or at least numerically identical), and were being reported by the Info button as "fps" (for content) and "Hz" (for output). Perhaps that assumption is causing me to not understand something?

I see that you tested content of both 23 and 24 framerate, and (unless you made a typo) both got output at 23 regardless of whether you "Match Framerate Only" or "Match Framerate and Resolution". This is exactly what happened for me. How is it desirable for framerate 24 to get output at 23 instead of getting passed through at 24?

**Conclusion**
At this point, whatever the answers are to my questions, I'm ready to accept setting Display/Resolution to Auto and leaving it set that way. It looks good. If the functionality of the UHD3000 isn't what I might have imagined (namely, the ability to pass through resolution and framerate) I accept that. I'm a purist, but I just want us all to be happy and unburdened. (Maybe there's a box that could've done what I imagined, but if so I probably couldn't've afforded it lol.)

And you have my sincere thanks for putting up with me, sir.

 

No typos - you've misinterpreted what I said:

"This resulted in all content playing at 4K but at the correct frame rate - so 4K23 > 4K23 and 2K23>4K23 etc

Next I set "Match Frame Rate and Resolution" and as expected, 4K23 > 4K23 and 2K23 > 2K23 etc."

The "etc" was used to indicate the omission of other results that were also correct.

I have to admit I'm utterly at a loss on what it is you're doing to get these results - it's just not how these boxes (they all have exactly the same video behaviour) - the UHD3000 absolutely does pass resolution and framerates and the frame rate settings do exactly what they say.

The only caveat is it that the output must fit within the confines of legal HDMI modes - for example you can't have 720p23~30 since that would be an illegal mode so in that case the Zidoo would upscale to 1080p in order to preserve frame rate and keep it legal.

Same with SD resolutions - only 50/60Hz are allowed.

My advice is set Resolution to Auto and Frame Rate Mode to Frame Rate and Resolution and everything will be output natively as long as it's a legal HDMI mode (see below).

 

Ah, yes my mistake, I didn't figure out as I should have easily that the > symbols had the file numbers on one side and the output numbers on the other side.
(And on top of that I didn't even notice that [unlike for me] the framerate numbers didn't match the ones you set in Display/Resolution.)

So yes, now I see clearly that with your Auto framerate at 60 and "Match Framerate Only", it passed through the framerate. Do you know this from the Info button's Output number? Because that how I'm getting that my UHD3000 is not passing through the framerate, but outputting it fixed whatever the framerate is in Display/Resolution (namely Auto = 60).

It makes me feel better somehow that the thing that confused me also confused the Zidoo forum's expert on such things. And as I'm wholly unqualified to do anything else, I accept where I am. Thank you very very much for your generous help. I'm happy for both of us that neither of us need to take another moment on this.

I guess given that the Input button reports the exact same Output (both resolution and framerate) regardless of whether I set "Frame Rate Mode" to "Frame Rate only" or to "Frame Rate and Resolution" it really doesn't matter which I choose.* But given the issues inherent in the behavior I'm getting, I like your plan for me to match both ("Frame Rate and Resolution") to at least try in vain to get the Zidoo not have the problematic resolution behavior I'm getting.

Edit: Oh, and I just tried setting "Frame Rate Mode" to Off and testing 3 different resolutions (72p, 1080p, 2160p) and many framerates (23.976, 25, 29.970, 30). That had the exact same behavior as the "Frame Rate only" and "Frame Rate and Resolution" options (in other words, no matter what "Frame Rate Mode" is set to, the Input button's Output reading has nothing to do with the video file, it's always whatever Display/Resolution is set to, or now Auto = 2160p/60Hz).

Edit Two: Maybe my Input button's Output reading is just broken; maybe that gets resolved with the next firmware update; I just noticed that while testing for the first time with "Frame Rate Mode" = Off, for the first time I had zero resyncs! That suggests to me that even though what the Input button says is being Output to the TV is the same no matter what I set "Framerate Mode" to, what's actually being received by the TV must have changed to result in resyncs by the TV stopping in Off mode (I guess that means that only when it's Off is the TV actually receiving the Display/Resolution fixed values).
Would this be a good time to reflash the firmware? If so, should I reflash with the same v6.0.90_G or first try something else/earlier?

 

So yes, I use the <info> button to see the file frame rate and the output frame rate:



In this case, Resolution was set to 1080p60 with Match Frame Rate and Resolution.

I also have an HDFury Vertex2 connected which gives me a sanity check on everything.

And yes, it may be that the firmware has got itself confused and the info screen is reporting incorrectly - as you say the resyncs you see seem to bear this out.

Definitely worth a factory reset (settings/other/recovery and reset/restore factory settings) - whatever's happening, it's not normal so it seems the processor has got its knickers in a twist.

Make sure you do a backup of your databases (music and HT4 depending what you use) so you can easily get back to where you are now.

You can also reflash the same firmware (don't need to use the G version) over the top, but I'd try a factory reset first.

 

Thank you very much, Mark, I'm excited to follow this advice. I love getting to the bottom of things. (And testing things.)

Wow, that would've helped me in this situation!

It also reminds me that I need to get a an HDMI 2.0a or above-compliant switch to move the UHD3000 to. My five-port Kinivo K501 isn't. I wish more switches supported 120Hz like my HDMI 2.1 TV does.

 

I know the UHD3000 can't do 4K@120p, but would anyone have a suggestion for an HDMI auto-switch (preferably 4 or 5 ports, and under US$200) that does? (Edit: I found one to try.)

 

Is there a way to backup Settings (UHD3000 and/or Posterwall)?

 

If you backup your HT4 database that includes HT4 settings as well.

Unfortunately there's no way to backup the main settings - you need to take note of those - maybe use screenshots (but save the screenshots externally - USB or network location!)

 

Ooops I forgot about screenshots (what an amazing capability for a media box to have!), I spent time writing down all the settings...

...including the HT4 settings, lol.

Questions about Factory Resets:
Does one remove internal HDDs, or leave them in?
Does storage:// get reset, in other words should I manually back up the folders (for example "wallpaper") I created in storage:// ?

Question about restores:
In addition to the Restore button, does one do something with the NFO one exported? (What is that for, BTW?)

I'm thorough. Incidentally, I've noticed that about 1% of the time I press the <Info> button it actually shows the correct Output Hz (only sometimes right at start of playback right around the resync); I think I should still go ahead with the Factory Reset.

 

There's no need to remove internal hard discs (at least as far as I know! I never use them...)

Yes, all internal storage is wiped, so if you put stuff there, copy it out...

NFOs are used if you want to, for example for rescan the database using local NFO to provide metadata rather than online resources - they are not related to, nor affect, backup/restore.

 

Thanks a million, Mark!

I figured I might need to leave the HDDs in, in case the Reset might want to access the folders (Android, LOST.DIR) the UHD3000 created on my internal HDD.

 

The Factory Reset worked. By "worked", I mean that now the <Input> button's reported Video file resolution and fps equals the button's Output Mode resolution and Hz (with Settings=Match Framerate & Match Resolution). Or at least it did in the vast majority of the three-figure number of files I tested. But there were some exceptions (which I imagine is no longer the button's display's problem, but some other explanation):

On some of the 720p files, a 30 fps was output at 60 Hz, and a 29.970 fps was output at 59 Hz. A couple other 720p files were output at 1080p.
On the one 480p file I tried, it was output at 2160p.
On one of the 1080p files, a 29.970 fps was output at 30 Hz.

Now that the Info button works correctly, I tried comparing upscaling between my UHD3000 and my LG C1 OLED. I have no idea which is better. Can anyone please offer me an educated guess? (I examined numerous frames of fine detail both ways, and they both looked the same to me. Maybe if I had two players and two TVs and could look at them both at the same time I could do better, but I don't know.)

Miscellaneous restore notes: Just reconfiguring everything took most of two hours. I'm not sure I value the Play Store apps to ever take the time to Recertify the player and login to my very long random google password again (I guess I could try loading the later into a macro on my keyboard and connecting the keyboard to the player).

 

@Markswift2003 Hey Mark, sorry to tag you directly but I've been reading through this thread and it seems you are the go to guy around these parts!

I just got myself a Z9X and I have a JVC NX-7 projector.

I was wondering what would be the best way to set up the Z9X to maximize PQ.

Most of my rips are 4K HDR and DV .mkv files.

Thanks for any help!

I currently set it up as per the OP settings in this thread, but I'm intrigued with the LLDV feature, which I currently am not using.

 

It seems Mark is away on holiday