Apple TV 4K... quirks

[MagicWok]

Hey guys

So to go along with this thread, I have a Samsung UE55JS8500 on the latest firmware (1501 for me).Might be useful to see trends across Apple TV's by themselves or with combinations of specific sets/manufacturers and hopefully help each other out.

Here's a list of quirks I've noticed with my Apple TV 4K, will be great to know who has similar or the opposite. Will try to get some pictures of a few that I can below, if anyone's interested.

• When setting 4:2:2 in 4K HDR 60Hz I get really bad banding on the UI, especially noticeable on the grey gradient for the settings and whilst watching some content - noticeable on trailers for Ghost in the Shell in Movies and Planet Earth in iPlayer.
• Setting it to 4:2:0 4K HDR 60Hz eliminates the banding issue.
• I get a lot of skips in motion watching content at 4k HDR 60Hz Apple TV setting on apps such as BBC iPlayer. This goes away when setting 50hz or lower.
• Watching the Apple keynote, the processing is so over the top everything overly sharpened to the point where things look rendered.
• Real Racing 3, with the Apple TV at 4k HDR 60Hz, experienced many lags and jitters when I played the opening 'tutorial' lap.

(all references are to HDR are HDR10 for me with my particular TV, which doesn't support Dolby Vision)

 

[Poontaco]

Samsung TV's generally add a lot of processing features.
Turning them off (especially the smooth motion one) might help with the choppiness.
Also; on that TV with good HD or 4K material, sharpness should be at 0.
[doublepost=1506600647][/doublepost]Ultimately; if you can't get the TV to play nice at 60hz, then run it at 50hz.
[doublepost=1506600764][/doublepost]It's also worth trying another HDMI cable.
It could clear up all of your issues.

 

[MagicWok]

Cheers @Poontaco! I've already turned off as much as the unnecessary post processing 'features' as I can. I've mostly followed the advice on hdtvtest.co.uk

I've thought about an alternate HDMI cable. I'm extremely wary of negligible to no difference at all in over-priced over-marketed cables, especially as I'm using a great one from Amazon. But I'll put more thought in it. And no, I'm not touching ridiculous Monster Cables Although, I'm tempted at a solid platinum HDMI cable I saw in the shops

I used to use a WDTV Live, and me noticing frame-rate difference I switched between 24/30/50 fairly often depending on the content. I had to switch from 50hz to 24hz whilst watching a Netflix film today, as the motion seemed all wrong. Was much better after I did.

Fingers crossed Apple introduce auto frame-rate and colour switching that respects the source, soon.

 

[Mabus51]

Return the ATV 4K while you still can. It's junk, the ATV4 is a better unit. Back to the drawing board Apple

 

[err404]

The banding issue is almost certainly your cable. You don’t need to speed a lot on one. Just get a cheap Amazon Basics HDMI 2 compliant cable for a less than $10.

 

[MagicWok]

The banding issue is almost certainly your cable. You don’t need to speed a lot on one. Just get a cheap Amazon Basics HDMI 2 compliant cable for a less than $10.

Think again? That's exactly the cable I have. See post #3...

 

[kheard73]

Samsung 4k TV with ATV4K and everything runs smooth, I just have issues when watching shows and or movies the screen just blacks out and I have to hit play pause on the remote to get it to play again. Im connected straight into my HDMI port on the TV and sound/picture is coming through AV receiver

 

[MagicWok]

I've tried all the ports, tried the second (identical) HDMI cable from Amazon I ordered at the time and I'm still getting colour banding for 4:2:2 @ 4K 60hz.

Played around with a multitude of settings on my TV as well.

This is frustrating.

 

[Poontaco]

I've tried all the ports, tried the second (identical) HDMI cable from Amazon I ordered at the time and I'm still getting colour banding for 4:2:2 @ 4K 60hz.

Played around with a multitude of settings on my TV as well.

This is frustrating.

Why not just use 4:2:0 then?

 

[xsmett]

• I get a lot of skips in motion watching content at 4k HDR 60Hz Apple TV setting on apps such as BBC iPlayer. This goes away when setting 50hz or lower.

Those issues are just there because the Apple TV does no automatic framerate switching and no automatic switching between sdr and hdr.

But hey, I bet the interface looks amazing in 60hz HDR.

 

[MagicWok]

Why not just use 4:2:0 then?

Because colour is better with 4:2:2 than 4:2:0, and since the Apple TV offers it of course I want to go for it if I can.

Anyway... I tested with a different brand of HDMI cable, this time a Premium Certified cable just to go for it. I tried all different HDMI ports too, and I get the same issue of banding in 4:2:2 Chroma.

So it's either a combination of the Apple TV & my UE55JS8500, or just the Apple TV itself. Urgh... Though my set is able to do full 4:4:4 at 3840×2160/60fps

 

[brentsg]

Because colour is better with 4:2:2 than 4:2:0, and since the Apple TV offers it of course I want to go for it if I can.

Anyway... I tested with a different brand of HDMI cable, this time a Premium Certified cable just to go for it. I tried all different HDMI ports too, and I get the same issue of banding in 4:2:2 Chroma.

So it's either a combination of the Apple TV & my UE55JS8500, or just the Apple TV itself. Urgh... Though my set is able to do full 4:4:4 at 3840×2160/60fps

4K UHD disks are encoded at 4:2:0, so I doubt that streamed content is going to be any better. The whole point is to reduce the cost of transmission.

It really all just comes down to where the conversions are best handled, and you have been saying that using 4:2:0 output works without banding in your case.. so there you go.

 

[Snoopy4]

If you select an incompatible format by accident as I did, it will reset if you connect the HDMI directly to the TV.

If you get a black screen after selecting an incompatible format, sit and wait. It will revert back to the previous.

They need a hard reset button on these things.

Otherwise it’s beautiful. The extra bandwidth afforded with the Ethernet input makes a difference. I watched an SD version of “The Time Machine” and you couldn’t tell it was 480p.

 

[Poontaco]

4K UHD disks are encoded at 4:2:0, so I doubt that streamed content is going to be any better. The whole point is to reduce the cost of transmission.

It really all just comes down to where the conversions are best handled, and you have been saying that using 4:2:0 output works without banding in your case.. so there you go.

Exactly this^
Just set it to 4:2:0 and be happy.
Or set it to 4:2:2 with banding if that's what you prefer.

 

[clcnyc]

I have the same TV (although mine is UN55JS8500), and setting up my Apple TV 4K yesterday was an all day ordeal. I run everything through my Marantz NR 1506, but it’s not going to 4K HDR, only 4K SDR. When plugged directly into the tv through the one connect hub, it switched over to HDR (no audio though since that goes through Marantz), but honestly colors looked muted and bland. I’m on the fence and mya just return the ATV4k and just keep my 4th gen ATV. What receiver do you use?

 

[MagicWok]

I have the same TV (although mine is UN55JS8500), and setting up my Apple TV 4K yesterday was an all day ordeal. I run everything through my Marantz NR 1506, but it’s not going to 4K HDR, only 4K SDR. When plugged directly into the tv through the one connect hub, it switched over to HDR (no audio though since that goes through Marantz), but honestly colors looked muted and bland. I’m on the fence and mya just return the ATV4k and just keep my 4th gen ATV. What receiver do you use?

I'm currently going straight to the TV from the Apple TV.

Did you enable 'HMDI UHD Color' in your TV settings?

 

[clcnyc]

I'm currently going straight to the TV from the Apple TV.

Did you enable 'HMDI UHD Color' in your TV settings?

Yes

 

[Macalicious2011]

• I get a lot of skips in motion watching content at 4k HDR 60Hz Apple TV setting on apps such as BBC iPlayer. This goes away when setting 50hz or lower.

Interestingly I am experiencing some slight motion judder when watching iPlayer and even YouTube. I didn’t have this on the chromecast. I have a non HDR 4K TV. Did permanently switching to 50hz solve the problem for you?

 

[BODYBUILDERPAUL]

Interestingly I am experiencing some slight motion judder when watching iPlayer and even YouTube. I didn’t have this on the chromecast. I have a non HDR 4K TV. Did permanently switching to 50hz solve the problem for you?

It's because they are UK apps (doing 25/50fps instead of 60fps?) AVS review states "The automatic selection of 60Hz will also cause problems with certain apps in the UK and, although Netflix looked great, NOW TV and the BBC iPlayer exhibited noticeable judder and dropped frames unless 50Hz was manually selected. The Apple TV does have a large selection for different formats from 4K Dolby Vision 60Hz down to 4K SDR 24Hz, so thankfully there's room to manually change the format to suit your needs."
Their review is excellent: https://www.avforums.com/review/apple-tv-4k-hdr-media-player-streamer-review.13954

It would be AMAZING if Apple would introduce an auto frame rate switching auto detector.

 

[Cvohara]

Exactly this^
Just set it to 4:2:0 and be happy.
Or set it to 4:2:2 with banding if that's what you prefer.

I was searching around this morning to see if anyone has had this issue and if they found a fix. After leaving it at 4:2:2 for a couple weeks I just decided to switch it to 4:2:0 and move on. The banding is a major image quality issue that is noticeable in the menus and visible and distracting when watching content. The banding goes away or is not noticeable at 4:2:0. I have the un75ju7100 Samsung 2015 TV and am set to HDMI UHD Color. This set received HDR compatibility sometime after I bought it via a firmware update. I’ve looked around the picture settings on the tv and there don’t seem to be any settings to eliminate the banding. I am running through a denon x3300w receiver witch received HDR compatibility within he last couple months.

The major wow factor with HDR I’ve noticed is the brightness and that is unchanged with either setting (the 4 in 4:x:x). I understand from some research a couple weeks back that your eye can’t perceive the color difference between these two options which is why 4:2:0 compression is even a thing. 4:2:0 simply looks better than 4:2:2 so I am going to stick with that. Enjoy your setup and good luck!!

 

[Macalicious2011]

It's because they are UK apps (doing 25/50fps instead of 60fps?) AVS review states "The automatic selection of 60Hz will also cause problems with certain apps in the UK and, although Netflix looked great, NOW TV and the BBC iPlayer exhibited noticeable judder and dropped frames unless 50Hz was manually selected. The Apple TV does have a large selection for different formats from 4K Dolby Vision 60Hz down to 4K SDR 24Hz, so thankfully there's room to manually change the format to suit your needs."
Their review is excellent: https://www.avforums.com/review/apple-tv-4k-hdr-media-player-streamer-review.13954

It would be AMAZING if Apple would introduce an auto frame rate switching auto detector.

Thanks for that. Apple clearly needs a solution for auto frame rate and HDR switching. This morning I tried switching to 50Hz but still experienced some judder in YouTube compared to my 1080p chromecast that was still plugged in and played the same video.

Today I have received a High-Speed cable from Amazon and will let you know if it resolves the judder.

On the positive side, iPlayer and YouTube vidoes look better than they do from my Chromecast.

 

[Juicy Box]

OP, it sucks having so many issues on a brand new device, I have been there.

The ATV4K issues might be due to bugs in the tvOS. I would like to say that Apple will fix these in future updates, but that has not always been the case since the launch of the ATV4. After two years, it seemed like most of the bugs plaguing my ATV4 were fixed, but tvOS 11 brought some of them back along with a bunch of new bugs.

In the future, hopefully Apple will focus a little more on quality when it comes to tvOS.

Return the ATV 4K while you still can. It's junk,

I currently own every model of the ATVs, and the ATV4K is the first one, other than the original, that I did not purchase at launch. Although, I do not currently own an 4K TV.

It's junk, the ATV4 is a better unit. Back to the drawing board Apple

If the ATV4 is a better unit, then the ATV4K must be junk. I think the ATV3 was a much better device than the ATV4. IMO, Apple should aim for that level of smoothness and stability, and app developers should aim for the UI quality of the ATV3 apps.

 

[BODYBUILDERPAUL]

Thanks for that. Apple clearly needs a solution for auto frame rate and HDR switching. This morning I tried switching to 50Hz but still experienced some judder in YouTube compared to my 1080p chromecast that was still plugged in and played the same video.

Today I have received a High-Speed cable from Amazon and will let you know if it resolves the judder.

On the positive side, iPlayer and YouTube vidoes look better than they do from my Chromecast.

Most definitely - I really hope that the do release auto switching for fame rate. Sadly I don't think that they'll switch from SDR & HDR - it goes against their design decision etc - they'll refine it better - let's see!
Cable wise, i'm going with the Belkin one that Apple recommends as I'm a design Attention To Detail guy and the HDMI plug matches the design of the Mains plug and i'm having the ATV on full show as I love it's design! I would be insulting to hide a Jonny Ive Apple design!!! Plus I think the ATV is one of the best - actually, for me, it is the best design of all the black boxes out there.

 

[Macalicious2011]

Cable wise, i'm going with the Belkin one that Apple recommends as I'm a design Attention To Detail guy and the HDMI plug matches the design of the Mains plug and i'm having the ATV on full show as I love it's design! I would be insulting to hide a Jonny Ive Apple design!!! Plus I think the ATV is one of the best - actually, for me, it is the best design of all the black boxes out there.

Nice. I'm skimping on this one and avoid spending more than £7 a HDMI cable unless I have to. Because the Apple TV remote uses Bluetooth I'll probably tuck it behind the TV this weekend.

I love gadgets by don't like them to be a primary visual focus. I cannot wait to hide the Sky box once I get the new Sky Q box with bluetooth remote next year.

 

[Juicy Box]

Because the Apple TV remote uses Bluetooth I'll probably tuck it behind the TV this weekend.

I love gadgets by don't like them to be a primary visual focus.

I didn't hide my ATV4, but I did make a mount for it for the top of my TV.

Due to a new baby, I was trying to eliminate the devices I had on my entertainment shelf, but I did not want to remove the ATV4. I couldn't hide it behind, because my family uses IR remotes as well as the Siri Remote.

So I made this.

The photo is at a high angle to show the mount and the cables, but sitting right in front of the TV, it blends pretty well with the Samsung.