Fire TV Stick Audio Sync

[kallom93]

Hey there,

I bought a Fire TV Stick 4k (2024 discontinued edition) and I can't get a enjoyable experience with JF on it. I think it's JF server 10.10.3
When I use the internal player the sound delay gets progressivly worse, so after 10-15 minutes it's unwatchable. A restart of the stream fixes it...for another 10-15 minutes. It's h.264 1080p BR remux with 5.1 DTS-MA sound and JF says it's direct play. The problem consists with various contents. And doesn't exist on Web or iOS.

Since the audio delay isn't always the same I can't get good results with the AVR/Fire TV Audio Sync options.
I couldn't get different results with Bitstream enabled in the JF options. It tried every sound setting on the Fire TV sound options -currently it's on "best possible options".

My current solution is using exoplayer (VLC) but I only get PCM with two channels.


The FireTV Stick is connected to the 4k Port on the AVR and the AVR is connected to Samsung 4k TV. The Fire TV stick's USB is plugged into an outlet.

Since the Fire TV Stick is commonly used I wondered how I could figure out the culprit here. I saw a lot of JF unrelated sound desync problems with the Fire TV Stick but no "real" fixes. Unplugging the Fire TV Stick for half and hour didn't change anything.

I still wonder if the problem is on my side, maybe with the AVR/TV setup or with the Fire TV Stick, now I want to sell it but I'm not sure if that fixes the problem.

[TheDreadPirate]

What do you have refresh rate switching set to?

Settings > Playback > Advanced playback preferences (bottom of first page).

[kallom93]

What do you have refresh rate switching set to?

Settings > Playback > Advanced playback preferences (bottom of first page).

It's currently on "deactivated"
I will change it and check if it makes a difference.

[kallom93]

What do you have refresh rate switching set to?

Settings > Playback > Advanced playback preferences (bottom of first page).

What would you recommend? Set it to "device" or "TV"?
I tried device and it was off after a couple of minutes.

Weird thing was when I checked the AVR settings the movie+audio usually continues in the background but somehow it triggered the audio to fall back from DTS to PCM 2.0. I don't know if that comes from jellyfin or from the Fire TV stick.

It's a cumbersome thing to check   I watched the first minutes of X-Men now 5 times...

[TheDreadPirate]

Pretty sure the Jellyfin app is triggering the conversion to PCM when refresh rate switching is enabled.

Does this issue happen with every video? Only some?

[TheDreadPirate]

Can you try upgrading the server to 10.10.5? That may fix the PCM audio issues when refresh rate switching is enabled.

Regarding which type, I use "scale on device". But I don't have audio sync issues, regardless of which mode I am in. So not entirely sure what is going on.

[theguymadmax]

Upgrading to the latest server version, like 10.10.5, is always a good idea, so I definitely recommend doing that. However, the fixes in that update are focused on transcoding issues, which aren't relevant to refresh rate switching. Since you didn’t have that option enabled and your video was playing directly without transcoding, it shouldn’t impact your current setup.

I’d suggest leaving refresh rate switching off, as enabling it on the Firestick can sometimes lead to problems, such as high-resolution audio being mistakenly treated as PCM.

I also use a Firestick 4K, so I can relate to the issue of DTS-HD MA audio going out of sync after a while. This isn’t likely a problem with your TV or AVR, but more with the Firestick itself. High-res DTS audio support in the Jellyfin Android TV client isn’t great, which is why I usually convert the audio to EAC3 when possible to avoid issues. Additionally, the Firestick only passes through the DTS Core track, so you won’t be getting the full DTS-HD MA audio experience.

Regarding the original problem of audio going out of sync during direct play, that can be tricky to troubleshoot. My suggestion would be to try a different player, like Just Player. It’s based on ExoPlayer and supports DV/HDR and high-res audio compatibility, similar to the ExoPlayer used in Jellyfin for Android TV. I’ve had good results with it.

[kallom93]

Upgrading to the latest server version, like 10.10.5, is always a good idea, so I definitely recommend doing that. However, the fixes in that update are focused on transcoding issues, which aren't relevant to refresh rate switching. Since you didn’t have that option enabled and your video was playing directly without transcoding, it shouldn’t impact your current setup.

I’d suggest leaving refresh rate switching off, as enabling it on the Firestick can sometimes lead to problems, such as high-resolution audio being mistakenly treated as PCM.

I also use a Firestick 4K, so I can relate to the issue of DTS-HD MA audio going out of sync after a while. This isn’t likely a problem with your TV or AVR, but more with the Firestick itself. High-res DTS audio support in the Jellyfin Android TV client isn’t great, which is why I usually convert the audio to EAC3 when possible to avoid issues. Additionally, the Firestick only passes through the DTS Core track, so you won’t be getting the full DTS-HD MA audio experience.

Regarding the original problem of audio going out of sync during direct play, that can be tricky to troubleshoot. My suggestion would be to try a different player, like Just Player. It’s based on ExoPlayer and supports DV/HDR and high-res audio compatibility, similar to the ExoPlayer used in Jellyfin for Android TV. I’ve had good results with it.

I already tried Just (video) player and nova player and I didn't get any audio for DTS-HD MA audio, other languages in just DTS got through. I think I tried with and without the JF bitstream output setting turned on.
But good thing to know that a audio conversion to EAC3 might be a fix.

To be clear, the audio sync problem was with the internal player which I would prefer to use because of progress etc. For external players it was more of a problem to get the proper surround sound.

I will try again with content that has a different audio codec.

Can you try upgrading the server to 10.10.5?  That may fix the PCM audio issues when refresh rate switching is enabled.

Regarding which type, I use "scale on device".  But I don't have audio sync issues, regardless of which mode I am in.  So not entirely sure what is going on.

Yes I will update. I looked into the JF log, which was quite short because of direct play but I couldn't see anything related to a change in audio output.

[theguymadmax]

You won’t notice any difference in audio sync with 10.10.5, as the fixes in that version were focused on transcoded audio. Also, I forgot to mention that Kodi works great with DTS audio and can pass through DTS-HD MA on the Firestick, unlike ExoPlayer clients which only pass through the DTS Core. You can use the Jellyfin for Kodi plugin or even use Kodi as an external player, you’ll need to enable High-Res audio output in Kodi’s audio settings.