Since the Pie OTA update for my S9, I've noticed some media (videos and images) are pixelated in some apps in some contexts, whereas elsewhere they're OK.   Notably, this affects video playback in VOD apps like BBC iPlayer in the UK, as well as video playback in Snapchat, Twitch and image display in Twitter (e.g., profile images appear pixelated when viewed on a profile page or on a timeline, although tapping to view fullscreen displays them properly). Video playback looks really awful.   It appears to be an interpolation issue - when they are rendered degraded, the device appears to be rendering on-screen using nearest neighbour interpolation. When stuff looks correct, it is only because it's being interpolated correctly.   One of my colleagues has a Pixel 2 running Pie which does not exhibit this problem. We tested side by side. However I've reported it as a bug to AOSP: https://issuetracker.google.com/issues/124593215   Another person with the same problem has posted a video clearly demonstrating the issue, which I recommend watching: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FC6jYTI8GM4   The video clearly demonstrates the same issue with Twitch video, Twitter image displays, and so on.  I'm having the same issue in various apps, including  Twitter profile photos (until they're tapped to go fullscreen), BBC iPlayer video playback, Sky Go and NOW TV video playback,  Instagram video playback  and  Twitch video playback.   Another user on the YouTube comments wrote, Some media appears pixelated after the Pie update, as if it were being rescaled with nearest-neighbor scaling instead of bilinear/bicubic. This is easier to showcase with lower resolution media, so I took the first very low-res image I could find on Twitter (which is affected) and used 160p quality on Twitch to make it more obvious. Only some apps are affected, in specific ways (like here, on Twitter, the bug goes away when you click on the image), so I'm not sure whether this is something that has to do with a potential GPU hardware acceleration bug, something that the apps have to do, or a mix of both?   Interestingly, YouTube and Netflix video seem to not be affected. Those apps also offer a feature most others do not - pinch-to-scale the video window, allowing you to crop letterboxed widescreen content to fit non-16:9 displays.   Also interestingly, playing exactly the same video file in a web page player using Chrome yields correctly rendered, high quality video:   Playing the same video in-app, which must use a different screen draw method, looks ugly:   Another screenshot from another video playing fullscreen. Be sure to view this image at 100%, not zoomed to fit (as ironically that will interpolate the image and make it look correct): https://i.imgur.com/oajpPq8.jpg   On that YouTube video's comments thread, other users have also reported the same issue with more detail:   I'm on a US Verizon Galaxy S9 (Snap 845) recently updated to Pie and seeing this as well. The Twitch app shows it at its worst; video quality settings at and above 480p upscale with nearest-neighbor instead of the more filtered approach from before. It makes 1080p streams look TERRIBLE since 1080p > 1440p (S9's native res for 16:9 content) isn't an integer factor. Messed with it some more and it's even weirder: on anything other than 720p, I could occasionally get the filter to engage, but not in any consistent way. Unfiltered output was the norm, and filtered, the rare exception. This shows it does not seem to be a Snapdragon- or Exynos-specific issue, so perhaps a graphics driver or kernel fault?   I've just done the February 2019 update and it's made no difference. I've tried all the usual things - checked CPU speed, ensured display resolution is highest (and tried all other modes), no change.   I also factory reset my device, and did a fresh setup with Pie installed. I first installed just the Twitch, iPlayer and YouTube apps to test before installing anything else to avoid any potential app or software conflicts. Unfortunately it's made no difference. ... View more

Now that Android 9.0 has broken most third-party call recording apps, I'm looking to enable the inbuilt call recording feature I've seen in YouTube videos. (e.g., https://youtu.be/JhCoKbSOxxg?t=32 )   I have the SM-G960 model (UK/Europe dual sim, unlocked, BTU CSC/firmware). I performed the OTA update to Android 9.0 the other day. I was expecting to see the Record Calls setting in Call Settings, but it's missing.   There is no legal limitation preventing a call recording feature from being included, so I wonder if it's an oversight on Samsung's part. I'd appreciate confirmation either way from Samsung on this. ... View more

I've noticed that when charging over USB with headphones connected via the headphone socket, you can hear a loud buzz if there is no audio playing.   I first thought it was whenever the audio DAC was not playing an audio stream: the buzzing disappears the instant you play any audio or any notifications play. The buzzing returns the instant the audio stops.   However, I was listening to a YouTube video earlier (https://youtu.be/b753qCxQcGw) and I noticed at 10 seconds in the the buzzing very briefly occurs - in a momentary gap between the intro and the start of the main video.   This seems to be due to null samples in the audio stream and is a reproducible behaviour. Playing the video at half or quarter speed makes it easier to notice the effect.   This is not a fault of my headphones, I'm using regularly serviced HD25 and HD650 Sennheisers.   So, from my crude tests, it seems that if the DAC is not initialized - or it is initialized but is decoding null audio samples - the design of the main board reaults in the audio output passing through electrical buzzing/humming from the charging circuit as audible interference to the analogue headphone output.   This is not very impressive design for a £700 flagship handset. Samsung, please address this. ... View more