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4K YouTube videos beamed to atv4k via AirPlay. HDR?
- Thread starter sd13
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In the case of youtube, airplay and an iPhone you are more or less sending a link for the ATV to play and the iPhone is becoming a remote to control it via the app. Its not streaming the content.
We don't get 4k youtube because Apple doesn't support the codec Google uses for 4k and Google doesn't update the app to software decoding it (assuming it could).
Google could via the YouTube app. Infuse Pro proves this since it can play 4K VP9 videos downloaded directly from YouTube today via their software decoding.
That said, AirPlay YouTube still might be limited to the HEVC codec since the AirPlay protocol can’t access a decoder within an app (at least I don’t think it can)
I'm not doubting what you are saying however I would like more information if you have any available? Link?
I can get it to work however only for VP9 encodes that are less complex (comparatively speaking). 4k HDR 60fps VP9 (worst case I suppose) content just gives me a black screen as the scrubbing bar slides across.
Is this actually something Infuse Pro should be able to do or is it just an error on my part?
Prior to your statement I didn't find that inability too surprising. You can encode h265 to a complexity that Infuse (or any app) on the ATV 4k can decode fast enough if you wanted too. However the difference is we are unlikely to run into media encoded like that very frequently, whereas the youtube app needs to be able to decode ALL of their library.
Thanks in advance for any info.
You can check out the forums on their site. I have not seen issues with the few videos that I have tried, but it is rather inconvenient to use in practice so my testing is limited. I mention them as a proof of concept, not as a viable day to day alternative. They do support VP9 profile 2 playback, so assuming it has the horsepower/optimizations, all videos should be playable. YouTube already has fallback capability if 60hz is too much.
That all said, we have seen examples from Google themselves where lesser hardware can decode 4k. For example the software decoding on the Pixel 1 or Chrome running on an aging PC.
Apple doesn’t support VP9 at all, so, no. All Apple products are limited to 1440 max for YouTube, as Google uses VP9 above that.
Keep in mind this is Google going it’s own way this time, virtually everyone else is adopting H.265 for 4K.
This is annoying stubbornness on both sides.
Apple could easily add VP9 support, or at least allow YouTube to use VP9 within their own app. But they don't allow it.
YouTube could easily use HEVC/H.265 - or even 4K H.264. When they first launched 4K on YouTube, it was H.264. Some of the earliest 4K videos still have H.264 4K copies available. (For example, playing on Safari on a Mac, a few very early 4K videos will play in full 4K, because they're available in 4K in H.264. Almost all (newer) 4K videos on YouTube are VP9, with 1440p or even only 1080p the maximum H.264 version available, so playing newer 4K videos in Safari will limit to 1440p/1080p.)
Edit: Well, looks like YouTube is feeling particularly obnoxious, those early 4K videos have had their H.264 4K versions removed - they all top out at 1440p on Safari now. When I know I viewed them in Safari in 4K maybe a year or two ago. (I was looking at a 5K iMac in the store, couldn't load Chrome, so had to find one of the few Safari-compatible 4K videos to test out the screen for video.)
Apple could easily add VP9 support, or at least allow YouTube to use VP9 within their own app. But they don't allow it.
YouTube could easily use HEVC/H.265 - or even 4K H.264. When they first launched 4K on YouTube, it was H.264. Some of the earliest 4K videos still have H.264 4K copies available. (For example, playing on Safari on a Mac, a few very early 4K videos will play in full 4K, because they're available in 4K in H.264. Almost all (newer) 4K videos on YouTube are VP9, with 1440p or even only 1080p the maximum H.264 version available, so playing newer 4K videos in Safari will limit to 1440p/1080p.)
Edit: Well, looks like YouTube is feeling particularly obnoxious, those early 4K videos have had their H.264 4K versions removed - they all top out at 1440p on Safari now. When I know I viewed them in Safari in 4K maybe a year or two ago. (I was looking at a 5K iMac in the store, couldn't load Chrome, so had to find one of the few Safari-compatible 4K videos to test out the screen for video.)