No wireless connectivity and poor H265 playback

Help and Support
1

Hello all,

Profile 1 = Raspberry Pi 3B - 2020-11-1 (Kernel: Linux 4.19.122-2-osmc)
Profile 2 = Raspberry Pi 3B - 2025-08-1 (Kernel: Linux 5.15.92-1-osmc)

Profile 1:
I have a Raspberry Pi 3B which has been running for years (circa 5-6 years). I initially set it up with a wired ethernet connection and programmed my own bespoke remote control. All working without issue and plays H264 without issue and most H265 files (some do not play but wasn’t really bothered as I would just get another file type to watch what I wanted). The one thing that I could never get to work was the wireless internet connection, but wasn’t bothered about that either due to the wired connection

Now my son wants one so I downloaded the OSMC download to set one up for him (Profile 2)

Profile 2:
This is also all setup and working with a minor niggle. This setup allows me to connect to my wireless network (enter parameters and connects no problem, whereas no matter how many times I try this with Profile 1 it doesn’t work). This setup however does not have as good playback of H265 files, they are stuttery and jump instead of playing seamlessly as in Profile 1 (exactly the same files). What has made this more pressing is having setup the second unit I did not have a spare remote to hand and if I did I could have done without programming it. The TV remote is LG and this doesn’t work very well with the setup, it jumps various elements of Pi menus as if a button is being pressed 3 or 4 times instead of just once. Having researched I found an android app called Kore which works really well so that negates this issue.

So, what I want to now is please:-
a) why can I not connect the Profile 1 Pi to a wireless network? It’s as if some wireless process or driver is not present or working but it was a standard install at the time so should have worked.
b) why the latest version of OSMC on Profile 2 does not play H265 files as well - the hardware is exactly the same?

Is anyone able to direct me regarding how to get the wireless connectivity working on Profile 1 please? If I can get it working, does Kore work with this version of OSMC? I ask regarding Kore as I recall reading somewhere that remote control GPIO pins have changed since the Profile 1 setup, as I could not get the Profile 2 setup to work with my remote, which is using exactly the same GPIO pins as Profile 1. I suspect I have to utilise a different pin.

Is anyone able to direct me to imroving the H265 playback on the Profile 2 setup?

Thanks in advance

Zan

2

H265 was never officially supported on Pi 3

You’ll need to use a version of OSMC using Kodi below v18.9 for better support for this

Sam

3

Hello Sam, thank you for your reply. A few questions if I may.

  1. Is there a repository that has previous versions of OSMC where I could obtain a version prior to v18.9? If so could you advise where to find it?
  2. Do versions below v18.9 support Kore to save using a physical remote control?
  3. Do versions below v18.9 provide wireless connectivity?
  4. Is there any reason why I cannot gain wireless connectivity suing the current version as detailed for Profile 1, which is Raspberry Pi 3B - 2020-11-1 (Kernel: Linux 4.19.122-2-osmc)? Using a version below 18.9 will, I surmise, mean disabling auto-updating?

Kind regards

Zan

4
  1. Index of /osmc/osmc/download/installers/diskimages
    Assuiming latest 18.9 version is OSMC_TGT_rbp2_20201227.img.gz
  2. Kore is using HTTP server that should be fine for 18.9
  3. Generally yes depending on the wifi chipset and maybe some authentification methods that are not working
  4. Without logs only wild guesses we can do. You might want to try to connect from CLI to maybe get a better idea why it doesn’t work.
5

Hello fzinken, thank you for your reply, appreciated.

In relation to the answers.

  1. yes, I did some reading after posting the question (probably should have done that before posting) and found the repository, but thank you for the link. Also thanks for detailing that 2021227 is the latest v18.9 - I would have most likely gone further back so it’s good to know to start there.
  2. Understood and thank you, saves me additional messing around.
  3. Ok, yep I get that.
  4. Understood, logs are always a good source of information. Not being overly proficient in where logs are located I would need some more information regarding this. CLI - I surmise you mean connect via Command line Interface which I would also most likely struggle with.

I think I will start with deploying v18.9 as detailed in (1) to see if that solves my overall issues. If you feel like giving me some pointers on where to find logs then please feel free. Getting them from the device may prove troublesome though as I cannot FTP to this build due to the lack of wireless connection. Connecting via wired would be convoluted as the Pi and router are quite far apart and moving stuff around is not currently ideal.

It may take me several days to mess around with different things, so if I don’t post back it is because I am still experimenting.

General question - why was H265 not supported by Pi 3?

Thanks for the help so far, appreciated.

Zan

6

After now creating a new build with V18.9 (OSMC_TGT_rbp2_20201227.img.gz) I can now report that:

  1. the device connects to my network wirelessly without issue, so can only assume there is some sort of bug with 2020-11-1 (Kernel: Linux 4.19.122-2-osmc), but will happily stand corrected.
  2. H265 playback seems to be like I have always been used to, i.e. not stutters or jitters, so that seems to also be ok.
  3. the Android Kore application connects and gives full functionality as a remote control, which is also great.

So, thank you very much to sam_nazarko and fzinken for providing the above information and getting me this far. Much appreciated.

One final question if I may which would create utopia.

I have Kore remote control functionality but it would be nice to also have the old stand alone infra-red remote control working as previously. The old remote control is a Yamaha DVD player remote control which I created my own file for via the learn new remote control information. I did this circa 6 years ago and it has worked fine, so I know my keypress file is good.

I have FTP’ed this file to the osmc Micro SDCard and saved it in the “osmc” directory and called it yamaha.conf (as previously with the old build).

I have then navigated to Main Menu\My OSMC\Remotes and selected Browse and chosen my yamaha file. This now has the file highlighted in yellow in the list as the selected file. Also Disable RC6 is selected. I hav ethen exited out of Remotes and My OSMC and rebooted the device.

However, the yamaha remote is not working. It’s as if the file is not being picked up. Is there something else that I have to do, i.e. edit a config file to point to the yamaha file? My apologies if this seems like a dumb question, but it was so long ago that I originally did this that I can’t remember. I thought that selecting the file and rebooting was the whole sequence. Does the Disable RC6 have to be unselected (which I didn’t think so and have tried it with this unselected as well - still no joy). Is there a conflict between Kore and my yamaha remote which means you can’t have them both active at the same time?

Any information would be appreciated.

Thanks in advance

Zan

7

It was a design choice when Pi was manufactured.
New Pis do not support H264 in hardware, but have plenty of CPU to decode.

8

Have you configured the GPIO IR remote?

9

Hello sam_nazarko,

Thank you for the information regarding the design choice involving H265. It makes me somewhat skeptical about upgrading at any time to Pi4 or 5. Can these devices fully support various video codecs such as H264 and H265 via CPU decode in a seemless manner without stutter and jitter?

Also, thank you for the GPIO configuration pointer. No, I omitted this but have now configured to use GPIO pin 18 and now everything is fully working - good video playback, Kore remote and my bespoke yamaha remote.

Thanks for you time in replying, it is much appreciated. Well done with all the work you have put in in getting these devices to where they are today. Efforts such as yours are an invaluable resource to communities such as this. Long may it continue.

Kind regards

Zan

10

Go for Vero V, full H265 and AV1 support

1 Like
11

Hello fzinkin,

I’ll bear it in mind. For what I want, which is mainly H264 (I only get H265 if I can’t find what I’m looking for in any decent quality at H264), the Pi 3B does the job well. Bearing in mind they cost circa £30 as opposed to circa £150 (from what i can tell) new, that the Vero V goes for (secondhand cheaper on fleabay), I think the Pi is good value for money. But as I say, I’ll bear it in mind. Thanks for the tip.

Zan

12

The Vero V is £149 new. If you’re paying over that for a second hand unit that doesn’t make sense.

It’s a bit of an outlay but given the future proofing and support timeframe it works out to about 5p a day.

Not sure there’s anything at £30 that can be recommended that runs OSMC and includes everything out of the box. If you paid £30 for Pi 3, case, PSU, storage, HDMI cable then I’d be impressed. But I suppose there might be a good second hand market.

1 Like
13

Hello sam_nazarko,

when you put the Vero V at 5p per day then yes, that is good value if it’s future proofed as you say.

Fair point with the £30 for the Pi 3B, I didn’t include the box, psu and micro sd card, just the board itself.

Kind regards

Zan

1 Like