Ok, for months we have been battling why some videos we transcode play and some (about 8%) just will not. We have submitted HLS samples, and never really gotten any definitive answers, always pointing towards possibly an audio samplerate or some other issue.
Well, finally, we have nailed it. Screen resolution. Basically ROKU will continue to download segments progressively, but the status indicator remains anywhere from halfway to 3/4 and never play the video.
We had always thought that the ROKU will resize the video, or whatever it does to support varying resolutions. That NOT being the case it seems to vary with what setting you have opted for in the SETUP of your ROKU. A lot of the failures happen with "un-uniform" aspect ratios, we all know the standard 16x9,4x3, etc.. But in reality, not all videos are created alike, and ROKU has done a fairly decent job in playing odd sizes, but is NOT consistent in this respect.
What is troublesome though, if I send a 1280x500 video to the ROKU XD for example, and it is configured for 720p, this hanging happens. (Though it should not as 720p = 1280x720) - Aside from the fact it should play, Could not/Should not, the ROKU just fail with an error, size not supported or something, instead of just hanging in no-mans land? This can be reproduced 100% of the time.
It also seems, it varies though, depending on the actual HEIGHT as well. If i resize the video, it will play.
So I have the following questions:
1. Does the ROKU require specific sizes for each mode (4:3,16:9,HDTV 720p, HDTV 1080p) ?
2. Does the ROKU require the sizes to be specifically divisiable by any specific number of pixels? eg: 16
3. Does the ROKU require specific aspect ratio's, and other will not supported?
4. Does the ROKU behave differently say if I have HDTV 720p in my SETUP, yet I do not have an HDMI cable plugged in, only the analog video?
5. Programming wise:
a. Can the mode the user has selected, be retrieved in code?
b. Can whether or not a valid HDMI device is attached to the ROKU be detected and retrieved in code? As Even if user has HDTV 720p selected in config, if a user does NOT have an HDMI cable attached, but rather only an analog cable, a 720p movie could not play?
Shawn
