Okay, I’m fairly certain now one of the main things that cause the unit to slow down to a crawl is using the YouTube app (the main one, the Leanback version). At the very least I’ve noticed for sure the unit crawls after you play some videos in that and then exit to the main interface afterwards.
If this has been noted by someone else, I’m sure I’ll get lectured on not having searched for that, of course. :lol: I know that people have said they have problems with the app in this firmware overall, but the actual App itself works fine–it’s just what the WD acts like afterwords that’s nightmarish (until you restart the unit–and its got to be a total power off, not just using the off button on the remote). Again, to me, this seems like a memory leak. The App is grabbing all of those resources and not letting them go.
Yes the app leakes memory as it is used. The more u use it, the less remains avilable for the system when u exit - it doesnt clean up like a a proper Operating System can (Windows, Android, Lynux etc). This can cause slowdown in the UI, slow to start playing videos if possible at all and maybe provoking a warning dialog about low memory to appear.
To cure it u just need to cold boot the box: power it down by doing a long power key press on remote or from options/system/restart so it does a cold start next time. Or more savegly pulling plug on it, but its always better to do it via system than just yanking power cord out - that can lead to options beiong corrupted if u very unlucky.
Yes the app leakes memory as it is used. The more u use it, the less remains avilable for the system when u exit - it doesnt clean up like a a proper Operating System can (Windows, Android, Lynux etc). This can cause slowdown in the UI, slow to start playing videos if possible at all and maybe provoking a warning dialog about low memory to appear.
To cure it u just need to cold boot the box: power it down by doing a long power key press on remote or from options/system/restart so it does a cold start next time. Or more savegly pulling plug on it, but its always better to do it via system than just yanking power cord out - that can lead to options beiong corrupted if u very unlucky.
Yeah, the more I poke around the more I see this. Simply going in the app and leaving won’t immediately kill the system. Playing a video won’t either. But play a LONGER video, or even worse use the Link function to remotely play from your computer, and the system response gets worse and worse.
I imagine this must be known to WD by now, but if the app is actually being made by Google (it must be–because I know the version of Leanback on XBox, for example, has the identical looking interface), then I guess there’s not much they can do other than tell Google to fix it (which probably won’t happen if they consider the WD userbase fairly small).
The one other thing I’ve pegged onto a bit more is that issue where some files drop out the video but keep playing the audio. I think it may only be with MKV files (but I have to pay better attention and see if that bears out). Since it didn’t happen with the same exact files (not just the type, but the actual files) with earlier firmwares, I don’t think the blame is as simple as saying “they must be corrupt files” though. Clearly how the WD is handling decoding them has changed.
