New fw for X9S v2.1.36

Thnx Team for another update.

 

thanks Guys !
Read file 7.1 resolve for me
Édit : in fact not for all movies. i don’t understand what’s wrong.

 

So, nothing really fixed from the previous broken list and therefore nothing to see? I read horror stories about 2.1.30 so I've not upgraded. I don't want to make things worse for no obvious benefits ("optimize this and optimize that" means nothing to me. It was working fine here except for the occasional audio stutter with 3D playback for unknown reasons (seems random and happens maybe once every three films and I run them off a local NTFS hard drive). Well that and ZDMC doesn't run as smooth as the native player. I've read KODI "Leia" versions will now run, but how well? Krypton works fine here on my current firmware (heck I forget which version it's even using offhand, but it's about a year old) and given I have problems with my Nvidia Shield randomly "stopping playback" for no apparent reason with Leia and its firmware, I need at least one of my boxes to run KODI halfway well and right now that's the Zidoo X9S since it at least doesn't randomly stop (I have seen it freeze for a second a couple of times, though but Krypton did that on the Shield too sometimes).

It's odd since Leia is more stable on my FireTV, but the Shield randomly stops and my current Zidoo firmware crashes if I try to install it so I was hoping to try with a newer firmware, but not if it's going to make 3D playback or some other thing behave worse.

 

No extra problems so far. (same as 2.1.30)
(I only use the mediaplayer with an external hdd)

Must say that I never use the X9S anymore. I Use the tv build in player through USB. Picture is better (sharpening and colors) than the X9S. Also no manual changing the color depth.
It comes with less options and I mostly have to demux and decode an audio stream, but the picture quality is the most important for me.
No stutter and also no weird symbols after a subtitle line with srt subtitles.
How can this be in 2020? A mp with subtitle problems.

Question for the owners of a new 2019 Zidoo model.
Is the picture quality better then the X9S?

 

Yeah, I guess you would have no problems with the build if you never use the X9S anymore....

 

Hdr to srd is still broken?

 

That's correct. With every update I hope there is something fixed, like the symbols after a subtitle line. Maybe next one

 

Unfortunately I have updated my X9S with last version 2.1.30 where a major regression appeared with lost of HDR with half of my 150 HDR 4k movies And since there is no way to downgrade a buggy firmware ( I mean return to the previous 2.1.28 without losing anything ), I had to flash to 2.1.1 , upgrade 2.1.28 ( those took 5 mn ) , and then re-scrap my 1000 movies/series ( 2 hours lost because of bad recognition errors in scraper ~ 10% of movies ).
So please zidoo team, each time you propose a new firmware, such as 2.1.36 , propose also a way to be able to "save old firmware on USB key " in order to be able to restore it if things goes wrong, such as new regressions in behaviour of HDR.

 

The current version I'm using is 2.1.22. So the best version to update to is 2.1.28? Are there any real advantages to 2.1.36? I don't use 4K streaming files currently as my projector is still 2K.

 

2.1.28 is flawless for me, you can’t go wrong with this one (some people seem to prefer 2.1.25 but I could not see and feel any difference)

With 2.1.30 I had audio drop outs (video runs but audio gone for one second once or twice a movie) so I rolled back. Still testing 2.1.36, worked fine the last days but I had a audio dropout today so I will have a close eye on this.

I mean rolling back is fast and easy, at least when using ZDMC because you can back it up with Backup addon.

 

I had audio dropouts once in awhile for a second with 2.1.22. I'll try 2.1.28. Hopefully that will fix it.

What about ZDMC? What's the best version to use now that there's a "Leia" build? Was the Krypton one more stable? Did either work better with 23.976 fps sync?

Currently, I tend not to use ZDMC except as an alternative database (easier to look up information, count totals, etc. I normally actually play off the built-in player. Can the HT 2.x version work with 2.1.28 or does that require newer? Is there a link for the latest version or does that update with the firmware? I don't really get why there's a software update button in the preference pane when it never finds anything....

Also will KODI 18.x Leia work at all with 2.1.28 firmware or does that require one of the newer (buggier) firmwares? I still use Krypton on the Zidoo because with Leia on my Shield it randomly "stops" 40+ minutes in like I actually hit the stop button. I can resume, but it's a PITA with that happening. Zidoo has frozen temporarily (I had that problem with all versions of Krypton once in awhile), but it continues so it's still the better choice. Leia runs flawlessly on my FireTV 4K (2nd gen) upstairs on my 48" set, but it doesn't do TrueHD, Atmos, etc. which I need in my home theater. I don't want to make KODI worse.

Thanks.

 

Well, I'm still using ZDMC 17.6.1 (so Krypton), because it works perfectly for me, and I see no point in upgrading to ZDMC 18.4, The huge benefit of ZDMC in general is, that the native external Zidoo player is used when playing video, so it's the same "base" like the Media Center or HT (I would not use the standard Kodi player for anything because not optimized for the Zidoo hardware and no HD audio), but with a nice customizable look. So yes, no framerate issues at all.

Some people like HT, I don't and I will explain why. Except from customizing, you can't backup your database, it the player dies or you roll back the firmware you have to start from the beginning, this is often the case with proprietary apps. With ZDMC (or Kodi) you can export/import everything on every device you want and restore your database/configuration. Furthermore all my files are perfectly organized with Ember Media Manager (or you could use Tiny Media Manager) that works hand in hand with Kodi. So when importing my media files, I don't need to scrape anything and I don't need to worry about specific proprietary stuff.

HT 2.x should be already included with FW 2.1.28. Andy you can update HT 2.x without updating the firmware. There are two ways: You download any latest Zidoo firmware (model does not matter) and just grab the HT apk from the zip, or you look in the other threads here and some people upload it, like here is one but I don't know if its the very latest: http://forum.zidoo.tv/index.php?threads/zidoo-x20-pro-my-humble-opinion-fw2-2-85.8944/

Sidenote: If you don't want to use ZDMC (because it's not updated yet to 18.5 because Zidoo focuses more on HT now) you simply can use the standard Kodi apk for Android. But since it's not optimized, you can't use the external Zidoo player with it. To solve this problem, you need a Wrapper: https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=hu.xmister.xbmcwrapper
Once set up, it makes Kodi playback the files with your desired player app. You can see ZDMC as a modified Kodi with an included wrapper.

I know several people you have no problems with ZDMC/Kodi 18.x. It's the same like with HT, it has nothing to do with the Zidoo firmware, it's just another user interface. It's a little different than 17.x and you may need new addons, skins etc. but the base it the same. Like said above, the FW updates the device and modifies the native Zidoo player that everyone should use (and what you are already using when playing files with Explorer/Media Center, HT or ZDMC).

But long story short: If I would recommend a flawless setup it would be FW 2.1.28 + ZDMC 17.6.1. If you want special skins or Kodi addons that require Leia, you could go directly to ZDMC 18.4 (or Kodi 18.5 + buying the Wrapper app).

 

Yes, nothing is fixed. At now the 2.1.28 like others recommended is the best one for me.

 

I think this is the last zidoo device I buy..

 

Well, other manufactures have other (basic) problems. Zidoo is still making very good devices. HDR to SDR conversion is not that easy. I'd rather upgrade my TV/projector or avoid HDR material and stick to SDR instead of using such a conversion.

 

Well, I loaded everything I might conceivably want to update onto a USB stick.

Unfortunately, I screwed up with the update and clicked the "update" button with everything "checked" on the right (weird interface, IMO). This updated ZDMC to 18.4 and Kodi to 18.5. This is after updating the firmware to 2.1.28.

Short story there. ZDMC 18.4 works fine (apart from the fact using the internal player won't change the frame rate, etc. and that you still cannot play movies with the external player from NFS sources. You have to use the HT2.0 interface to do it. In other words, SMB and NFS support on the Zidoo pretty much sucks. NFS works, but only for HT2.0. ZDMC will recognize the drives, etc. because it's using KODI's NFS. But when you go to play the movie, it passes it to the external player and it doesn't know what to do for some reason. SMB never did work since it's not updated to SMB2 or SMB3 and those are REQUIRED for security reasons on present day computer (you're risking your computer using SMB1 on a Windows machine if it's on the Net). SMB3 has been out since 2012! (SMB2 even longer) I have no idea why everyone is so slow to adopt it.

Anyway, KODI 18.4 still doesn't work (crashes instantly) with the 2.1.28 firmware. I went back to 17.6. It runs, but no support for frame rate changes as before.

On the PLUS side, the HT 2.0 update (whatever minor version it's on in 2.1.28) is vastly improved with matching movies. I was able to add my entire movie library via NFS this time and only had to correct a couple dozen entries out of around 1000 movies or so. It does work with frame rate changes and is probably the smoothest player out there (even on systems where KODI does change frame rates, it usually loses sync or starts dropping frames at some point during the movie on every single hardware I've EVER run it on). I'm not crazy about the "Wall" interface for so many movies, but if the movies play silky smooth, it's probably worth it.

I watched 2 3D films so far with the 2.1.28 firmware and so far no audio dropouts whatsoever (keeping fingers crossed as that was one of the annoying "bugs" I had to put up with before with the audio cutting out for a second for no apparent reason). If they could just get the external player to work properly with NFS in conjunction with the ZDMC player (so frame rate changes work), that would be great as it's easier to navigate the Kodi interface. But it seems like even when I ran local 3D movies from ZDMC the frame rates weren't as silky smooth as the HT 2.0 interface engaging the player for some unknown reason (didn't check yet with this one).

One other weird problem I have is that my Seagate external USB drive won't wake up from sleep on the Zidoo. I have to reboot. My Western Digital drive (the other one I have connected) does wake up fine. That kind of sucks to have to shut down and reboot each time, but at least it boots quickly.


One other major oddity/bug I have encountered is that when I try to copy my database files for backup to either a USB drive or network drive from KODI, it won't copy and gives an error (see log for more details it says; yeah, good old KODI "logs"; WTF are they!?!? Why after over a decade is there no option to read them from within KODI? Bloody awful.... In any case, I cannot make a network connection to the Zidoo that lets me read the KODI profile directory and since it won't copy outside the Zidoo device, the only place I can back them up to is perhaps on another folder on the Zidoo itself. The question is WHY won't it copy files to other devices??? It's bizarre. I never had that problem on KODI on FireTV or the Shield.

 

Something seems to be odd on your side.

1) SMB works perfectly fine. I watched hundreds/thousends of hours from my NAS over SMB (NTS works too). You don't browse the SMB source, you enter the direct IP, Login, Password and you are good to go. Works with every software on the Zidoo. I'm using a Synology NAS, should work right out of the box. Minimum SMB1 should be activated of course like this:



2) I have no framerate issues what so ever, and this is like the most important point when I choose my media devices and goes over anything else: You need to set up one thing and this is the important one: Quick Settings > Playback > Automatic Framerate > Framerate Mode > Switch Framerate and Resolution. Then the Zidoo player plays the media in its native nature and the upscaling (if given) is done only by your display. The resolution you can set in the Quick Settings don't matter for this, they are mainly for the GUI when setting Auto Framerate/Resolution.

3) ZDMC 18.4 crashes because you installed it over the old 17.6. You must not do this. You need a clean install of ZDMC when moving from 17 to 18, there should be a thread in the developement forum about this. Give it a try, remove it completely and install it again.

 

I notice some micro lags when the the scene is in movement.

 

Describe "micro lags".

Is the sound lagging behind video or you see some slow motion stutter effect when the scen is in movement?

 

The second one.