Question: Differences between Kodi client and NPVR native client?

[2leftfeet]

Hi,

I recently have been experimenting with Kodi and have enabled the Kodi NPVR client and have tried using the LiveTV function with Kodi. What I have found is that several persistent LiveTV issues that I experience with the native NPVR client are not issues at all with the Kodi NPVR client (using the same exact hardware & OS).

Two particular issues are (1) channel channel change freezes and (2) pause/resume/skip jitter instability.

I believe that sub is the author of both clients, yet one works very well relating to the above issues and the other not so much. (By the way, I want to echo the sentiment of GaryJ73167, that "I love nextpvr" and use it every day!)

My question is: Would/could anyone shed some light relating to the differences between the two different clients - that might possibly be causing the variance in behavior between the two clients while running on the same hardware/OS? Could it be the decoders? Timing? HDHomerun Prime tuner control?

Thanks.

[mvallevand]

Sub doesn't provide the media playback engines. In NextPVR it is the decoders that you select that do the work in a Microsoft framework called DirectShow Kodi has its own open source demux and playback engine that varies by platform OS.

Martin

[2leftfeet]

Thanks Martin!

Followup question: Since the Kodi stuff is open source, is there a way to enable/use Kodi's demux and playback engine in npvr's native client?

[jcjefferies]

I am one who abandoned the NextPVR client over two years ago because of payback issues. Unfortunately I am not keen on the KODI user interface but Martin's X-NEWA add-on hides it behind a NextPVR interface. Aditional advantages is that you dont need a Windows license as I run OpenElec on a RPi2 and Celeron Nettop pc as my NextPVR clients.

Chris

[scJohn]

You may want to look at MPC-HC and good old Window Media Player (WMP) for playback problems.. Those two are my goto players when NextPVR chokes on file playback. For Live TV problems, this is usually a codec problem. The best solution for this is SAF6. Search this forum for SAF6.

[2leftfeet]

jcj,

I also prefer the native npvr user interface over Kodi's. I have also tried Martin's X-NEWA UI, which is better than Kodi's UI, but lacks certain functionality (i.e, timeshift operations) and some remote control functions are very different. I think it would be a great feature in npvr to have the ability to select the codecs from KODI in npvr's settings.

scJohn,
Thanks for the tip, but, my issues are with LiveTV, not file playback. File playback work well for me. An yes, I use Hoborg's unlocked SAF decoders plus several others (including Microsoft's), which work very well, except for channel change.