Some Kodi settings to help with Live TV Buffering

[Alucard]

Below are some advanced settings to help with Live TV buffering. This will slow channel switch but helps with buffering issues. It is not 100% but will help quite a bit.

The following will need to be put in your advancedsettings.xml file. If you are not sure where that or what that is, please visit the Kodi Wiki for more information.

<pvr>
<minvideocachelevel>65</minvideocachelevel>
<minaudiocachelevel>65</minaudiocachelevel>
<cacheindvdplayer>true</cacheindvdplayer>
</pvr>

Below contains some Advanced Settings for cache/buffer settings. The file names have the general settings based on how much memory your device has. Copy the file to one of the following locations based on your OS. You will need to rename the file to advancedsettings.xml. Only use this if you do not have a advancedsettings.xml already. If you do then add the above to it instead.

Windows:
C:\Users\<UserName>\AppData\Roaming\Kodi\userdata

Android:
/sdcard/Android/data/org.xbmc.kodi/files/.kodi/userdata

Updating Fire TV and Fire Stick.
I am assuming that you do not have a advanced settings.xml file yet.
1. Download the zip.
2. For Fire Stick extract the advancedsettings_1Gig_Mem.xml, for Fire TV extract the advancedsettings_2Gig_Mem.xml. Rename it to advancedsettings.xml
3. Now you need to copy the file to your fire stick to /sdcard/Android/data/org.xbmc.kodi/files/.kodi/userdata on your Fire Stick/TV.
3. Restart Kodi.

Now getting the file to the Fire Stick can be done several ways.
1. If your computer is shared on your network, then you can use the Kodi File manager
2. Assuming you used Amazon FireTV Utility to side load Kodi, you can use the Push File To Download Dir option and send the file over that way. Then you can use the Kodi File Manager to move it to the correct location.
3. Side load ES File Explorer and use that as a File Manger to copy the file from your computer as in #1. Or you can enable the FTP Server in ES File Explorer and use a FTP Client to copy the file over.

[sat-junkie]

i suggest getting notepad++ when editing xml and other config files

[sat-junkie]

those are not what you think.

http://kodi.wiki/view/Codecinfo

edit: sorry that did help you much, its because its a rtmp stream.. hold on

thats a good link to explain whats going on

[tuxen]

thats a good link to explain whats going on

yeah but I seem to remember it had the above info more elaborated.

[sat-junkie]

fernetmenta who coded the fuction say
"There are live streaming protocols like hls or rtmp which don't have caching before demuxer. It won't make much sense to cache a real time stream because the server won't buffer either. Means that if a client don't read a data packet in time, it is lost. Like the name real-time suggests, a client also can't read data in advance and put it into a cache."
and
"check pvr section of advanced settings:

<minvideocachelevel>5</minvideocachelevel> <!-- Cache up to this level in the video buffer buffer before resuming playback if the buffers run dry. -->

This post-demuxer cache can hold up to 8 seconds of video. "

there is no holy grail setting that will fix buffering in a instant. tweaking can help though.

Good info +1

[tuxen]

it also means if you cant get the data fast enough but fill the buffer you will have holes in your bufferstream from missing packets the server can not throttle the streaming speed when it is realtime. like it for example can when streaming a moviefile, you can pause and let it buffer and still have a non-broken stream in the buffer, you can not do that with a fixed realtime stream. the contents of the buffer will still be broken because the speed is fixed and the net cant keep up.

its the same as if the stalker client had recording option you could pre-record a hour if you wanted to but the pre-recording will have missing parts and skip like hell if you have buffering in the first place.

apparently there is a 8 second post-demuxer cache you can tweak around if your bandwidth is fluctuating.

basically what fernetmenta says.
if they haven't forgot themselves. heh

[sat-junkie]

example: I can unplug the router from the Ethernet connection in the wall and the stream will continue to play for around 8 seconds, if I replug the router within that period the stream will continue to play without any buffering or skips. but if I unplug it more than 8 seconds (drain the buffer) the stream freezes, I can actually replug it again and the stream will continue but NOT from where it was, but where it now is coz the tv is offcause live..

ever wondered why you cant pause and let the buffer fill with any livetv streams as you can when streaming a movie file.

when i first started playing around with external players in kodi i got MPV player to pause these stalker streams and it kept filling the buffer but now whn i use mpv player it doesn't do it anymore...i know ya can depends on the player...

[tuxen]

when i first started playing around with external players in kodi i got MPV player to pause these stalker streams and it kept filling the buffer but now whn i use mpv player it doesn't do it anymore...i know ya can depends on the player...

yeah it does depend on the player, the rtmpdump command for example can save or playback the stream.
i just think they made kodi pvr plugins like that a protocol for keeping realtime tv, and then its up to the plugin to provide time-shift and recording trough a different method. its always been a problem to record or save live streams in kodi, don't ask why, but i never seen it, i seen it requested many times though.

edit: read my edit lol, that's my best idea why. keeping it realtime or within 8 secs. as the kodi-team writes "You won't expect caching for your TV via SAT or cable, do you?"

[xechostormx]

still solid and helpful. just used it today to fix 1080p issues on a new Matricom Gbox Q. its an AMAZING difference and I thank you from the bottom of my heart.

[Ghilteras]

still solid and helpful. just used it today to fix 1080p issues on a new Matricom Gbox Q. its an AMAZING difference and I thank you from the bottom of my heart.

I have it too, can you please tell me how you managed to fix? what exactly did you use for advancedsettings.xml?

thanks