Apple TV 4K White Flashes

I'm seeing flashing frames when my Apple TV is in Dolby Vision mode. The flashes are ghost images of the screen offset to the right. The flashes last a microsecond (a single frame, it seems), and they occur several times per minute, no matter what I'm watching on the Apple TV. The image below is a single frame of the Apple TV home screen taken from video that I shot with my iPhone. You can see the ghost images of app icons superimposed over other app icons. (The rectangular thing over the HBONow, hulu, and AMC app icons is a reflection of a window in the room; but the other ghost images are the flashing frames on the screen.)

I'm running the latest tvOS software, but the issue began to appear several days before I updated the system software. It's not an issue with my LG TV, because when I watch Dolby Vision content through the built-in Netflix app on the TV, without Apple TV, there are no flashes. Anyone else experiencing this?

I am having the same problem with Samsung UHD TV. I did the cable check and tried different settings. Seemed to go away for a while but has now come back.

My internet speed is 89mbs with speed test.

I am wondering if there is a hardware or firmware issue. I ordered mine first day it was available and shipped directly from China.

This could be an issue with the handshaking between the source, the AVR, and the display device. I have the same problem, when I by-passed the AVR (any brand), the problem went away.

Hope this helps

Ed

It might be a handshaking issue... however i have switched from 4K HDR to 4K SDR resolution and the problem is now gone, i am still running through my AVR.

So I believe it is a problem Apple has to look into because i would really like to use HDR.

For my Samsung TV, I have one HDMI input that is 'UHD' compliant. Apple TV works in UHD on the other HDMI ports - but with the flashes and black out issues... I swapped Apple TV 4K to this port and all seems OK now. The only problem is that my UHD Blue-Ray is now plugged into a non-UHD HDMI port.

So it may be time to upgrade to a TV that has more than one UHD HDMI port.

I am having difficulty locating that info in the manual or the tv. It’s the 6950 and the hdmi port is marked MHL. Online sources say the port does support the copy protection standard hdcp 2.2.

I remember when I set up my Samsung UHD blueray I had to use this port to support UHD. Now that I have moved my blueray to a different HDMI port, I get warning when playing a UHD dvd that my tv doesn’t support the resolution required.

Now that hat the Apple TV 4K is in the MHL port, all is well with Apple TV 4K.

This is an industry problem, the consumer electronic folks don’t advertise the fact that we will need a display device that is HDCP2.2 compliant. And they (Apple et al) are wondering why people are complaining their stuff is not working.

A little knowledge is a dangerous thing....

Ed

I have the same problem on Apple TV 4K 64GB with LG OLED65B7V and Denon AVR-X2400H. Checked various HDMI cables and problem exists. However sometimes when the flashing is often (every 2-3min) I turn everything off and then on and the flashing disappears or is much less frequent. It definitely looks like some Apple TV 4K bug, as this is common hardware for all configurations. Let's only hope that this is software bug and will be fixed soon.

I am having the same problem.

LG OLED65E7P, connected to ATV 4K directly via HDMI using a certified high speed HDMI cable. My ATV is set to 4:2:2 and Dolby Vision. The issue seems to have started for me after the latest LG firmware update this past Monday as I did not notice any flicker or flashes prior to this. The flicker/flash only exists on the ATV 4K and can be seen in the menu and during content playback.

I am having a similar issue on a brand new LG Oled B7. I am running the Apple TV 4k through a (also brand new) Sony STR DN1080. I see occasional regular flashes both when playing content through the Netflix app, as well as when the Apple TV is running its aerial screensavers. It definitely seems to be some kind of HDMI issue. I already moved from HDMI 1 to HDMI 2 (HDMI 2 is ARC compatible HDMI 1 isn't) on the TV and swapped my old HDMI cables for brand new Amazon basic cables (the one from the Apple TV to the receiver is 0.9 meters, and the one from the receiver to the TV is 1.8 meters). I am running the ATV4k in 60hz Dolby Vision and I am on the SAT/CATV HDMI port on the receiver. Help. 😟

Scott, I have found that most receivers are the problem of passing 4K to the display. Try by-passing the receiver and go directly from the ATV4K to the display.

Also check your cables are 4K compatible.

hope this helps,

Ed

Yeah, same issues. Changing true motion to 0-0 instead of simply turning it off seemed to help on my LG. Still not sure if they are entirely gone when watching Mindhunter, but at this point anything that resembles a white frame is driving me nuts. Paranoia is a dangerous drug.