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Anonymous User
Not applicable

Judder when watching on Now Tv Stick

Hi, Don’t know why but my TV prefers 60hz as it is really smooth but the default 50hz for Now Tv produces slight judder in the picture no matter if I watch Now Tv or Netflix on the stick. 

 

Is is there anyway of me changing 50hz to 60hz on Now tv?

1 ACCEPTED SOLUTION
schnapps
Legend 5
Legend 5

Hi @Anonymous User 

 

No solution if you keep using the NowTV stick which outputs video at 50hz.

 

You will need to look at another nowTV supported device such has a Roku which offers 60hz forced playback.

 

From my various testing on 50hz and 60hz playback on all my Panasonic Televisions when watching UK broadcasted content such has NowTV, BBC iPlayer etc 50hz is smoother for me on all my TV's where 60hz on UK video content introduces micro judder on panning camera shots or news ticker bars.

 

Sounds like to me that your Television screen can handle 60hz better than 50hz.

 

Out of interest what is the make and model number of your television and if you are playing 50hz native content and if your television remote controller offers on screen information on the incoming signal is it displaying 50hz or converting the signal to 60hz on your TV screen ?

 

Back in the early days, when NowTV brought out their old white and black boxes these devices originally outputted all video at 60hz (inline with the full blown Roku Players in the USA) and a lot of NowTV customers complained about 60hz playback on UK content where micro judder was introduced on their TV screens.

 

Since NowTV rectified this by forcing 50hz on their boxes and stick, the 60hz micro judder discussion seems to have disappeared on the forum, where the majority of customers find 50hz more watchable over 60hz here in the UK.

 

So unless NowTV can offer a functionality in the future, like the option of selecting 50hz or 60hz in the menu settings which i don't know if it is possible with their hardware or software then you are stuck with 50hz using their NowTV stick.

 

View solution in original post

19 REPLIES 19
schnapps
Legend 5
Legend 5

Hi @Anonymous User 

 

Just another thought you could have a play around with your television picture motion settings to see if you can smooth out the judder on the Sky Sports News ticker bar, but this might introduce the Soap Opera effect to the picture which is especially noticeable when watching things like movies.

 

I personally can't use any motion or smoothness picture processing on my televisions, where i can't tolerate the soap opera effect.

 

No harm giving it a go, where i am assuming your television has some sort of motion / smoothness processing available to adjust ?

schnapps
Legend 5
Legend 5

Hi @chai 

 

I am happy to report that the Auto Refresh Frame Rate functionality with 50hz default video output on my NowTV 4K Smart box running on OS 9.0.3 is working fine again as intended 😀.

 

What i should have checked early on was the Display settings in the box menu, where the box was set to 4K HDR 60hz.

 

Changing back to Auto Detect sorted it out, so everything is now hunky-dory again 😊.

 

I am sure when running the older software versions previously in 4K HDR 60hz mode on the box the Auto Refresh Frame Rate was working perfectly for me (where i haven't played with the box settings since last year).

 

Anyway all sorted now including Netflix 😆.

 

 

Anonymous User
Not applicable

Thanks all for your responses, very helpful.

 

I Will just have to get used to the judder on 50hz. I have been using Sky Q through my Xbox One console which has the 60hz settings in the menu.  But I will be cancelling Sky Q when contract expires next month and be going full Now TV as this is much cheaper.

 

Unfortunately my TV is a 50” Bush which is a full HD tv but as it’s a budget TV it doesn’t include any picture motion options or anything related in its settings. It just forces me to watch at 50hz for Now TV and changes to 60hz for Xbox One/Sky Q.

 

Watching Netflix on Now TV stick is almost unwatchable as when the camera pans around the judder is really noticeable like when you used to try to watch a full HD program on an old computer. Luckily I have Netflix on Xbox One and that through 60hz is smooth for me. 

 

schnapps
Legend 5
Legend 5

Hi @Anonymous User 

 

Reading your post, i am assuming you have compared the NowTV App which is available on your Xbox One against the NowTV App on the NowTV stick and there is no noticeable difference between both devices when watching NowTV ? 

Anonymous User
Not applicable

To be fair I didn’t realise Xbox One had a Now TV app 😂 

 

I bought the stick as it had good reviews especially about how quick it is and the voice support. Plus I got a deal with passes when buying it. Was a no brainer at the time.

schnapps
Legend 5
Legend 5

Hi @Anonymous User 

 

The NowTV App is definitely available on the Xbox One if you are a UK customer.

 

Maybe check it out and see if there is any improvement with your Bush TV.

JonnyB147
Scholar

What about the Now TV stick though? This doesn't have an auto refresh option (unless there is one and I'm missing it) and this is very frustrating watching Netflix!!!

schnapps
Legend 5
Legend 5

Hi @JonnyB147 

 

The NowTV Stick doesn't have the Auto Frame Rate feature 😠.

 

Only the NowTV 4K Smart box has it on NowTV branded devices.

 

Auto frame rate doesn't work anymore on the Netflix App where everything is displaying 60hz on my television and the micro stuttering is quite noticeable on camera panning shots 😠.

 

The Auto Frame rate was first lost on Netflix on my Roku Stick Plus, then a few months later lost on my NowTV 4K box.

 

I haven't looked into it for a while but not sure if it's Netflix or Roku fault (reading some early posts on the Roku Forum each party was saying the fault lie with the other).

 

Other Apps still work fine with the Auto Adjust Frame Rate on both my Roku & NowTV 4K Smart box.

 

Just wished that Roku & Netflix would sort this out and offer playback at the native frame rate the movie or TV show was filmed at on the Netflix App.

JonnyB147
Scholar

I've ditched the NOW TV stick and gone for the Roku Streaming Stick+ and this is now my go to, one size fits all, one stick to rule them all stick. Menu is a bit cheap and simple but it works for every major streaming app out there (apart from Eurosport player). Looks good and sounds tremendous.

Anonymous User
Not applicable

Hello there. Hopefully I can be of some help to you today.

 

For all UK produced tv content, 50Hz is the correct refresh rate 100%. What you're noticing in terms of the Sky Sports News ticker tape at the bottom of the screen is that through NowTV, the maximum quality stream you can get (at the moment) is 720p 25fps. On a normal sky hd or sky q box, the hd channels comes through at 1080i50. This is where 50 half fields per second are captured and then the box/tv deinterlaces the images to try and effectively reproduce 1080p 50 fps.

 

As I stated before, NowTV maxes out at 720p which is a lower resolution, and also the frame rate is literally half the effective frame rate of the deinterlaced normal sky image. This is why you are seeing the 'skipping'. It is absolutely nothing to do with 50hz vs 60hz. 60hz for uk tv content is just WRONG.

 

Where 60hz is an issue is for Netflix. A lot of content on netflix is either 24 or 30 fps, and naturally this doesn't play nicely with a 50hz refresh rate.

 

To be honest you may have been better off with a Roku Streaming Stick + which has auto frame rate matching and auto dynamic range matching (and maybe auto resolution matching as well), which has a dedicated NowTV app as well as Netflix, Youtube, Prime Video, iPlayer etc.

 

Also on your Xbox One, deep in the video output settings there is an option to enable 50hz output for content that needs it (like iPlayer and PAL DVDs). If you are watching the sky q app or bt sport or nowtv through the xbox one you want this 50hz output setting ENABLED so that you are viewing at the correct frame rate.

 

I hope this clears a few things up for you.

 

Cheers.