Zidoo Z9s Video Freeze

[raviprasanth]

When playing movie in the USB drive, the video freezes randomly and the drive gets disconnected. Then I have to reboot the player again to connect the drive and watch the movie. This happens to any random file. Whereas the same file plays in all other machines (Dune HD Pro 4k, Nvidia Shield, HiMedia Q10) without any problem.

As I like this player better than all listed above, is there any solution for this.

The software is the latest and I did a reset after  updating.

[futeko.com]

What sort of USB drive is it?

The problem sounds like it might be a lack of sufficient power from the USB port for a physical external HDD. Solutions would be to try another USB port (they may differ slightly in how much amperage they deliver), put a powered hub between the HDD and the Z9S, or use a lower power HDD (flash drive or SSD).

[raviprasanth]

It is actually a portable USB 3, 1 TB hard drive from Western Digital.

Sometimes,  the movie will play non stop, sometimes 1/2 hour or 45 minutes and then it freezes. If the problem is the power to the drive, will the player recognize the drive, I am not sure. This happened to me with two of the USB ports, changed the USB wires and tried also, still it persists.

I have tried all the movies again in another player as I said in my first message and it played without any issue.

I do not think this problem was there with the first software when I bought the same from Futeko..

[futeko.com]

It is possible that the drive would fail after a random time due to lack of sufficient power to the USB port. The amperage drawn will vary slightly and if the situation is marginal it would appear random.

If you think the problem has happened only after latest firmware please post on Zidoo's forum. They can investigate any change made in this area between firmwares. I will also mention it to them when they're back after Chinese New Year.

[PJUK]

How old is your hard drive? I have recently had the same symptoms with a 2TD drive plugged into my TV USB 3.0 port  and it turned out to be the hard drive failing. I am not sure if using the drive in this way was the problem. My drive was a WD Element bought in 2013.

[raviprasanth]

The drive is new and I think it is not the issue, since it plays in all other players. This problem is there only with Z9s...

[Svend007]

I am also having this issue with different USB 3 drives. Have also tried different cables.
Latest firmware applied a few days ago.

[antr]

Same issue for me freezing and disconned issue on USB and following have been noticed.

USB3 connectors:
-When freezing occurs USB3 connected drive (2TB WD) will always disconnect and a reboot of Z9s is needed to discover usb drive again.
Movie will always restart from the place it was freezed

- Playing a 4K movie do not or very seldom have this issue.
- Playing a 1080P movie, its more or less freezing 1-2 times per movie

Using USB2 connectors
Same 2TB WD connected to USB2:
Movies that freezes will reconnect automatically after going back to home theater v2 but starting same movie again... it always starts from the beginning
- Playing a 4K movie do freezes 1-2 times per movie.
- Playing a 1080P movie, its more or less freezing 1-4 times per movie

Anyone else seeing this differenices between 4k and 1080P movies ?