HDMI not full screen

[Guest Droibles]

Tap once to adjust vertical, tap again to adjust horizontal - or vice versa, no black bars top or bottom.

 

If this works then good news! I'll be testing tonight - VLC isn't the best player out there on Android at the mo with it's perpetual 'beta' status...

 

Now... how to get iPlayer, YouTube, Gallery, games etc to work full screen.

[Guest stoolzo]

sorry but this sounds dubious to me, the black borders left and right are pixels that the HUDL isnt outputting, there is no way to extend any app into this area by zooming as this area doesn't exist as such.  This is known bug with Android 2.2 - there is no way around it without rooting and hacking.

 

The only way to extend the picture left and right would be to zoom your TV, if you do this you lose the bars but the picture is then stretched horizontally which is worse that having black bars. 

 

If however you have got this working by dropping into 720x840 res on the HUDL and farted about with your TV zoom and aspect ratio to get something like roughly looks the part - I have already done this and it looks shite. Nothing less than full 16:9 1080x1920 output is required to get a properly picture here.

[Guest greyrider]

Dubious? Have you tried it? As I said, I don't know if it's the "correct" ratio - for your eyes - but it's full screen with no black bars.

[Guest stoolzo]

if you are playing a TV episode which is in 16:9 (normally completely fills the screen), before you do anything in VLC is there are black border at the sides and the top / bottom?

[Guest Droibles]

Yeah... as we suspected, it doesn't work.

 

Tested VLC on my pretty bog standard 1080p Hitachi TV last night and the TV only ever displays the Hudl's max width 1440 px so black bars left and right no matter what aspect ratio/zoom settings used in VLC or the aspect ratio / resolution of the video played

 

Oh.. and VLC is still crap. Of the 5 videos I played (2 AVI, 2 FLV and 1 MKV) none played without screen breakup / judder - all were loaded on the Hudl.

 

Not even sure why I tested this as I was about 99% confident it wasn't going to work.

[Guest greyrider]

Sorry, doesn't work for you, but it does for me. Are you rooted and running full screen?

[Guest greyrider]

OK, here you go, I ran TV Catchup, 4OD and iPlayer and it displays with black bars top & bottom whether I use Full Screen or not. But it doesn't detract from the "viewing experience" for me as I don't use it to watch TV via HDMI anyway.

 

As for using VLC to watch a movie on the TV, the various options give varying results with "Best Fit" displaying in a small box in the middle of the screen (?), 16.9 has bars top and bottom, 4.3 left and right. But, for me, choosing in VLC to fit vertical and then horizontal shows full screen with no bars. I can't say it any differently and have no reason to be lying.

 

I convert everything to AVI on the PC with a free utility, "Freemake", to give full compatability with my devices and for use elsewhere and will then watch them via USB stick, either through a digibox, BluRay player, laptop or the Hudl with no issues. Your mileage obviously varies. Maybe it's the difference between TVs. I don't know, but I'm happy it works for me.

Edited December 6, 2013 by greyrider

[Guest Droibles]

OK, here you go, I ran TV Catchup, 4OD and iPlayer and it displays with black bars top & bottom

 

 

Not suggesting anyone is fibbing, just disappointed that this doesn't appear to work on my setup.

 

For the record, my Hudl isn't rooted and as such can't use Full!Screen - which I've used before on my N7 with mixed results and from what I recall lets apps make use of the parts of the screen taken up by the nav and status bars. Also, as most video players - Dice player, BBC iPlayer, YouTube etc - now go full screen without requiring a special app I personally don't have much need for it.

 

What I'm seeing is that no matter what I do the Hudl absolutely will not drive my TV to the full width of the screen. It fills it vertically, but not horizontally.  I think this is what a lot or people are seeing. As the TV is the main variable here, it must be that some TVs behave differently, with the TV doing some pinching/zooming of the 16:10 aspect ratio output the Hudl into the TV 16:9 display, as some have suggested.

 

I know it doesn't detract too much from the viewing experince, but I think I'd prefer black bars top/bottom rather than left/right.

 

Other than that am still now using the Hudl for my daily dose of tablification over my old N7 2012!

 

Soooo... :)

[Guest stoolzo]

" I don't adjust anything either on the Hudl or the TV, just connect via HDMI"

What happened to the above Greyrider? so we've gone from doing nothing but plugging it in to rooting the device and installing the full screen app?, and then changing aspect ratio on your TV, thats at least three things you have done. 

 

I think you need to explain exactly what you've done here as you have clearly fiddled about and not just plugged it in. you also haven't told us which aspect ratio your TV is in.

[Guest stoolzo]

i have an acceptable workaround but it takes a bit of fiddling - note however i still believe there is no way watsoever to remove the side bars while you have the hudl set to 1080 output.

 

Workaround (some tv's only)

 

1. Set the hudl hdmi to 720x480 x60 hz (60 hz as most films will sync to this frame rate better than 50hz

2. in the same HDMI settings zoom until the picture to the right until you blacks have gone.

3. Install BS player free, awesome app, it can hardware decode just about anything these days, just remember to turn hardware decode in settings.

4. Load the movie, you should now see that it should touch both edges but will be stretched slightly on the horizontal plane. 

5. My tv has various picture sizing options, one allows you to increase the vertical height, set this to put the picture back in its correct aspect ratio.

 

This pretty much give you a decent 720p output, we would do this with the 1080p option of there was a little more room on the zoom option, although TESCO / GOOGLE really need to fix this bug,

[Guest greyrider]

I think you need to explain exactly what you've done here as you have clearly fiddled about and not just plugged it in. you also haven't told us which aspect ratio your TV is in.

Nope, I don't need to explain a thing, and I never mentioned adjusting the TV at all - what I did do, just for you, was to try watching TV programmes via HDMI to see if the dreaded black bars were present, and tried the other settings in VLC to see what effect they'd have, also to see if it would help you - despite your original post only asking about movies.

Once more for the hard of hearing, I run VLC, tap twice to set screen and enjoy the movie. I tried to help, the answers don't suit you, enjoy your acceptable workaround.

Edited December 6, 2013 by greyrider

[Guest stoolzo]

"I ran TV Catchup, 4OD and iPlayer and it displays with black bars top & bottom whether I use Full Screen"

 

Ok, here is the issue for me, if you get black bars both top and bottom when viewing apps like 4OD, iplayer etc then it means you have got the HUDL set differenty to everyone else. When setup correctly the home screen and normal apps should show bars only at the sides, the top should meet as should the bottom. This is because in home screen and normal apps the HDMI outputs to your TV with the same aspect ratio of the tablets home screen, this is why its called mirroring.

 

Go into settings, hdmi and have a look at your resolution, is it set to 1080p 50hz, 1080p 60hz, or one of the others, perhaps 720x480?

[Guest bruhv]

It strikes me that it is a complete con - with the current version of OS - to advertise this product as having 1080p hdmi output. To blame it on the devices built in display's resolution is retarded. My laptop has a 1024x768 display, but it happily outputs via hdmi at 1080p correctly. Android should treat an external display as a seperate device, but it just mirrors it's own display pixel count apparently, ignoring the fact the hudl's own display resizes and shows correctly (That bit makes zero sense imo). Why even have a 1080p option in there if it is unable to output a full 1080p signal?

 

In fact why have any of the options there apart from 480p+zoom (as it's the only one that gets close without 3rd party interference)? If i remember right both 1080p and 720p settings cause the same issue. Reading that nexus devices on the same version of Android suffer the same problem doesn't fill me with joy. Do KitKat devices work properly? Maybe there is hope.

 

[/rant]

 

(Due a mobile phone upgrade any day, gonna have to get one with hdmi out to check it out if it copes now lol)

[Guest stoolzo]

final correspondence from tesco "techical" with my reply.

 

Dear xxxx,

We have had this issue investigated and the Hudl is working as it was designed to do by mirroring the display from the Hudl on the TV when connected via HDMI.

As the aspect ratio of the two devices is different, unless this is altered by stretching the image via the TV, you will always have black bars or parts of the picture missing.

I acknowledge your suggestion that the movie app is supposed to ignore the aspect ratio of the Hudl, but the TV is mirroring the display of the Hudl, so it will not do this.

Once again I will reiterate that this is how the unit was designed to work and we will not be changing anything in any future updates.

If there is anything else I can help you with, please do not hesitate to contact me.

Kind regards

Iain

Technical Advisor
Tesco Tech Support

 

 

My reply:

 

So you've designed a tablet with an aspect ratio which will not properly fit any television screen in the known world on purpose - the sole purpose of a HDMI output - pure genius.

[Guest]

Well I do feel for you in the fact that your hudl does everything you want except work like a laptop would when connecting to an external display - in this case a FHD TV.

If this was one of the main reasons you bought the hudl, which you are clearly not happy with, then once politely explained to Tesco hudl support, they'd have to accept that on this occasion the hudl doesn't / didn't meet your requirements at time of purchase and so has not passed the 'sale of goods act'. In which case they shouldn't argue about you returning the hudl for a full refund and supply you with an email to that effect so in store staff don't have any issues.

If you don't want a refund but are just not happy about how the hudl doesn't do full screen properly on a FHD TV it's not worth the stress and maybe time to move on - it's just (dare I say it) a cheap but exceptional (in most cases) for the money tablet / electronic toy.

Just a different perspective......

Edited December 8, 2013 by Guest

[Guest bruhv]

Not too stressed about it really. My point was it should work correctly. It doesn't, and that's a shame.

Yes, the hudl is a great little gadget for the money, and i shan't be returning it. To be fair it's not even really Tesco's fault, more Android. I have learned a lesson though, use a standalone media player for hdtv needs ;)

 

I wonder if 'Wireless Display' exhibits similar behaviour...

[Guest stoolzo]

not too stressed either and also wont be returning it as I bought it for my mum for XMAS, just disapointed more than anything. Yeah, this is more a google problem than tesco, however they should have done their homework properly and brought out a table with the correct aspect ratio.

[Guest]

not too stressed either and also wont be returning it as I bought it for my mum for XMAS, just disapointed more than anything. Yeah, this is more a google problem than tesco, however they should have done their homework properly and brought out a table with the correct aspect ratio.

 

............. as long as the table comes with four chairs and fits in my kitchen I'm a happy bunny  :D

Edited December 9, 2013 by Guest