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Sudden poor quality?

M

Macguy31

macrumors member
Original poster
Jan 12, 2015
30
5
Is anyone else having trouble with really poor picture quality when streaming purchases from the Apple store on an AppleTV 4K?

Last night it was fine and then all of the sudden the quality became poor on both of my AppleTV’s. I had trouble with HBOMax too but that seems to be ok now.

I reset my router, tried a different network, the signal appeared strong in the settings, and late last night it seemed to go back to normal. Now tonight I have the same issue. I plugged in my AppleTV with an ethernet cable but still having the same problem. From Apple’s website it appears that the servers aren’t having any issues. I also tried to AirPlay a tv show and it looked just as bad.

I’m currently restoring one AppleTV to factory settings and I hope that might help but if it doesn’t I’m not sure how to fix this. I’ve never had an issue streaming before.

Anything else I can try if the restore doesn’t work?
 
Apple_Robert said:
More than likely, the problem is on Apple's end. You are wasting time doing a restore.
Click to expand...
I had a feeling that would be the case - I just couldn’t let it go. I did a restore on the bedroom AppleTV and no luck. The living room AppleTV I selected restore and update and it’s looking like it’s going to take hours to finish. I guess I should have just left it alone.
 
Watched Escape Room 2 4k DV off USA iTunes and Terminator Genysis 4k DV off Paramount and no issues with either movie for me. I'm in Canada using smartDNS for Paramount.
 
HDFan said:
Sounds like slow network. What are your intranet and internet speeds?
Click to expand...

Update:
The full reset/restore with updates did work. Still seems a little slow and maybe the first 5-10 seconds are bad but then I’m back to normal.

The basic restore without the updates did not work on the bedroom AppleTV. All other streaming apps seem fine - it’s just Apple content. I called their support line and they were somewhat stumped themselves - everything works fine on my phone and iPad. I did the full restore and the bedroom device is as good as the living room now.

I don’t know much about internet speed but I’ve never had an issue with my Fios setup - what should I look for? I did plug in my 4K AppleTV prior to the reset via Ethernet but no luck.

I would imagine I’ve had the latest update for a while otherwise I might blame it on that. But for both devices suddenly having issues I initially did think I was having some sort of internet issue-but no problems anywhere else in my home.
 
Technically, it may not have been the restore/reset as much as the time waited until you tried it again. If it were some sort of network/bandwidth glitch, those tend to correct themselves over time. We just think we are somehow affecting the outcome by plugging/unplugging cables et al. Reality is, things needed time on the backend to be corrected and we just spent that time fiddling with the device.
 
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I tend to think it might have to with other devices in your network eating of bandwidth when trying to watch! I found many instances when people in small town called for help when their kids we video conferencing while the parents try watch on roku device! so make sure others around you is hogging up network speed for watching!
 
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Macguy31 said:
I don’t know much about internet speed but I’ve never had an issue with my Fios setup - what should I look for?
Click to expand...

There are types of speed test apps on the Apple TV you can use with examples:

1. Internet - Speedtest
2. Intranet - network speed tester (requires a server app on another device)
 
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I have been having this issue for a while now (since 15.2, I think), but only in Apple own apps (Itunes and Apple TV+).

The stream start ultra pixelated/in very low resolution, and after a few seconds it correct itself to the maximum quality.

My Apple TV is hardwired, I have fiber 300/300, and the rest of tvOS apps always start in maximum quality. Always.

Since it also happens in the Apple TV app of my Macs, I´m inclined to think its an Apple server side issue.
 
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B/D said:
Since it also happens in the Apple TV app of my Macs, I´m inclined to think its an Apple server side issue.
Click to expand...

Does it also happen with videos on the Apple TV played via home sharing?
 
I’ve noticed a serious diminished quality on only youtube videos since last week. I am not seeing the quality issues when playing youtube video on any other device.

Very perplexing because it is not a problem on other streaming services. My guess is a 15.4 API change that is only affecting how youtube is delivering video?
 
I just noticed the same decrease in quality. My second gen ATV4K updated last night and since the update nothing looks like it’s high quality HD let alone 4K. I’m sure a restore would leave my with the latest update (if. It, someone please let me know) so that probably wouldn’t do anything. I sure hope Apple didn’t break something. I guess I could swap it out with my first gen 4K box and see if there is a difference but that would have to wait until the weekend.
 
Last edited:
I’ve been having horrible quality streaming anything Dolby Vision since the last tvOS update. Nothing in my setup or internet has changed. This treadmill of updates fixing one thing and breaking another is getting rather old.
 
Macguy31 said:
Is anyone else having trouble with really poor picture quality when streaming purchases from the Apple store on an AppleTV 4K?

Last night it was fine and then all of the sudden the quality became poor on both of my AppleTV’s. I had trouble with HBOMax too but that seems to be ok now.

I reset my router, tried a different network, the signal appeared strong in the settings, and late last night it seemed to go back to normal. Now tonight I have the same issue. I plugged in my AppleTV with an ethernet cable but still having the same problem. From Apple’s website it appears that the servers aren’t having any issues. I also tried to AirPlay a tv show and it looked just as bad.

I’m currently restoring one AppleTV to factory settings and I hope that might help but if it doesn’t I’m not sure how to fix this. I’ve never had an issue streaming before.

Anything else I can try if the restore doesn’t work?
Click to expand...
Just experienced this problem with my 4K unit. Soft resets fixed nothing. But a hard restart fixed the problem for the moment. I think the latest TVOS has bugs.

BF1M said:
I’ve been having horrible quality streaming anything Dolby Vision since the last tvOS update. Nothing in my setup or internet has changed. This treadmill of updates fixing one thing and breaking another is getting rather old.
Click to expand...
True. I thought I had a hardware problem with my old HD unit so I bought the 4K unit thinking it was hardware when in reality the issue is TVOS.

B/D said:
I have been having this issue for a while now (since 15.2, I think), but only in Apple own apps (Itunes and Apple TV+).

The stream start ultra pixelated/in very low resolution, and after a few seconds it correct itself to the maximum quality.

My Apple TV is hardwired, I have fiber 300/300, and the rest of tvOS apps always start in maximum quality. Always.

Since it also happens in the Apple TV app of my Macs, I´m inclined to think its an Apple server side issue.
Click to expand...
Let me ask you a question. Do you have major issues with the appletv app on your Mac? Like it not being able to resume where you last left off at if you start a movie on your appletv and continue it on your Mac?

Macguy31 said:
I had a feeling that would be the case - I just couldn’t let it go. I did a restore on the bedroom AppleTV and no luck. The living room AppleTV I selected restore and update and it’s looking like it’s going to take hours to finish. I guess I should have just left it alone.
Click to expand...
Do a hard restart. Unplug the unit for a minute and plug it back in. For me this fixed my problem.
 
Another weird issue I’ve been having lately, again only in the tv app, is that I can’t move to certain part of the movie; it just starts over. That and the Dolby vision quality issue is killing me.
 
BF1M said:
Another weird issue I’ve been having lately, again only in the tv app, is that I can’t move to certain part of the movie; it just starts over. That and the Dolby vision quality issue is killing me.
Click to expand...
Not experiencing this
 
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