Swiftfin AppleTV + Stereo Homepods Audio Delay

[mvonwismar]

Describe the bug

Audio is lagging by seconds when using a Homepod mini pair with 2nd gen Apple TV 4K. This is the only app that has a delay like this on my apple TV. Even when I play something and exit the app, the audio still plays for a few seconds, I switched to tv audio and the issue disappeared (though obviously the audio is much worse)

Application version

1.0.1

Where did you install the app from?

None

Device information

Apple TV 4K (2nd Generation)

OS version

tvOS 16.3.3

Jellyfin server version

10.8.9

[anujdeshpande]

Same - happy to help debug!

[robgjansen]

This also happened to me after recently updating the Apple TV and my stereo-paired Homepods to the latest version of iOS/tvOS. I believe the issue is with the OS generally becoming out of sync after the update. I was able to fix the issue by resetting and re-running the wireless audio calibration in:

AppleTV -> Settings -> Video and Audio -> Calibration -> Wireless Audio Sync

Re-running the audio calibration in the above seemed to fix the audio lag in Swiftfin, and also made a tighter sync in other apps (e.g. the AppleTV app).

[LePips]

Sadly, this is a limitation of VLCKit and nothing that we can do about it. However, if those calibration settings do help, I may link it shortly in an issue I will create soon regarding playback shortcomings.

[overdrive31]

Funny they label it as Wireless Audio Sync. It defaults to the TV Speakers for each Calibration and the audio lag is still in Swiftfin. Why will it not Calibrate the HomePod’s? Guess it will never get fixed.

[robgjansen]

I believe that the Apple calibration procedure uses the TV speakers and the Homepod microphones during calibration to help the Homepod learn the latency between the TV audio path and the Homepod audio path. So I think it is indeed doing what we want it to be doing.

I think the problem here is that when Swiftfin does not use the native Apple video player (which is well calibrated), then it does not automatically get the Apple TV OS-provided calibration. Ie., the VLCKit video player that Swiftfin uses would need to have its own calibration procedure which I'm guessing it does not. I think Swiftfin does have an experimental setting to force it to use the Native Apple video player, but using it can significantly degrade video quality.

[overdrive31]

When issuing the Calibration, it actually uses my iPhone’s Microphone to do the listening. The HomePod’s are never involved in the Calibration despite being the default audio output.

[Phaired]

Actually having the same issue, however using Infuse the audio seems to be perfectly synchronized.

[shi-vy]

Just +1'ing that I also have this issue.

Playing it in the experimental native fixes it, but I lose the actual image 🥲.

As others have suggested, I moved to Infuse and that's been working great. Integrates will with Jellyfin so it makes Swiftfin redundant for me.

[han-steve]

Same issue here. Other apps like YouTube have no delay whatsoever (if you press play, the audio starts immediately).

[robgjansen]

I'm disappointed that the fix seems to be "we can't/won't fix it, go use infuse instead". There are many reasons why Swiftfin is preferred. Are there viable alternatives to VLCKit (e.g., the native player?) that could help?

[anujdeshpande]

Fwiw changing to the native player from settings worked well for me. Didn't have to move to infuse.

[han-steve]

The native player doesn’t work for me at all. I’m using vp9 codec.

[smellslikemoose]

Same issue here, using Apple TV + HomePods. Switching to the experimental native player fixes the audio but I lose video in most cases.

Edit: switched to infuse as others suggested and have had zero issues so far