Same issue here. Just experienced the same thing. Even with both (PC and TV Box) connected via Ethernet! Connection test shows Excellent result. After starting whatever game, connection icon shows orange or red and black screen with it within a minute - then I have to unplug the Box from power to unfreeze it (WTF?). This even broke Box's OS GUI (It hasn't be able to show scrolling thru the apps).

I think it's terrible optimalization, because even streaming to iMac or iPad on gigabit home network doesn't work good. I'm courious what are the minimum devices hardware requirements to run Steam Link streaming smooth..
It has to do something with the hardware, when gigabit ethernet connection is not enough?! And you Seeko, u've got some shiny iron under the PC's hood - that should be mooooore then enough to host the stream. For the games I've tried to stream, is my PC and iMac also more then enough.

Gigabit ethernet doesn't help with this, so as I'm looking at he TV Box specs. - the 2GB RAM might be the limit - but it sounds like poor optimalization to me. SteamLink app is availeble to even worse devices. One way or another we are screwed with Xiaomi TV Box S seems like..

I Did some research and found this:
“Amlogic S905X4/S905X5 devices running Android 12+, where MediaCodec HEVC decoder doesn’t release frames after a dynamic bitrate change.”

I had to disable every HEVC option in Remote Play settings on PC in enabled Advanced Options for Client" but I had to do it also on the Box in Steam Link app Settings > Streaming > Edit button at the bottom > DISABLE HEVC.

Black screen is not the issue anymore, but still getting red connection icon and laggy unplayable experience ... even when I set fixed bitrate speed to 75 Mbps and the test proves that it's reachable.

Let me know if you are able to play after disabling HEVC coding..?

Well it can be connected with ethernet to USB cable for stable connection.

According to your test disabling HEVC to get a stable image instead of black screen.
HEVC (H.265) usually needs much less bitrate than H.264 (AVC) for the same visual quality, but it costs more CPU/GPU to encode and a bit more to decode.

So if the BOX cant have enough computing power to decode HEVC so you are right to disable it. Will try that later and see if improve the results.

I searched online, and it seems HEVC decoder bug on the Xiaomi TV Box S (3rd Gen), not that it “can’t compute” HEVC. The box officially supports HEVC/H.265 in hardware. So it is more like an APP side issue?

que fallo? lo desactive y me lo soluciono pero luego volvi a hevc y me anduvo, que sera? mi xiaomi box tiene el format en automatico

Use av1 or h264. In streaming via artemis/sunshine/moonlight or steam link. HEVC gets a black screen/ 2 fps per 10 secs lol. Some bug/issue that maybe will get fixed in a future software update, but from xiaomi, who knows. . Av1 should give you great quality as well as 264. I use av1.

Originally posted by Dard:

que fallo? lo desactive y me lo soluciono pero luego volvi a hevc y me anduvo, que sera? mi xiaomi box tiene el format en automatico

Are you saying hevc works?

Originally posted by Dard:

que fallo? lo desactive y me lo soluciono pero luego volvi a hevc y me anduvo, que sera? mi xiaomi box tiene el format en automatico

Te funcionó? Que modificaste? Me ayudas por favor. Acabo de recibir el Xiaomi TV box S tercera generación y no me funciona

En la configuración de Steam Link o Moonlight, configúrelo en H264 o AV1, no HEVC, ya no le dará una pantalla negra cuando inicie la aplicación de transmisión.

Originally posted by Rusosky:

Originally posted by Dard:

que fallo? lo desactive y me lo soluciono pero luego volvi a hevc y me anduvo, que sera? mi xiaomi box tiene el format en automatico

Te funcionó? Que modificaste? Me ayudas por favor. Acabo de recibir el Xiaomi TV box S tercera generación y no me funciona

Out of curiosity, does the new Android beta build (the one linked in the actual Android discussion forum under here) work better?

It appears to do two main things:

1. It looks for codecs which explicitly support low-latency mode (which may or may not be relevant to the Xiaomi box you have) and prefers to use them, rather than just taking what the box offers, and
2. When getting a stream reset and keyframe sync, it will manually flush the codec to *force* it to drop pending frames (and this seems potentially *very relevant* to the behavior you describe with HEVC)

Also, 75 Mbit is way too high. Try setting the bitrate to automatic and see how that goes.

It seems to work properly now on the Xiaomi TV Box S after the latest firmware update and the latest Steam Link app update.

I noticed a lot of improvements, but for the best experience I still recommend disabling HEVC on the device.

The black screen issue also seems to be gone now.

For stable streaming, I use:

60 FPS
Fast streaming mode
Upload bitrate locked to 40 Mbps
HEVC disabled
AV1 disabled

With these settings, Steam Link works fine at 1080p and below on the Xiaomi TV Box S.


I tested these games below, and it was a good experience:

Dragon Ball Fighterz,
Dragon Ball Sparking Zero,
Tekken 8,
Mortal Kombat 11


After more exploring, I noticed the main culprit for the issues is setting low latency. Make sure to keep low latency disabled!

Originally posted by ChickenOnFire:

It seems to work properly now on the Xiaomi TV Box S after the latest firmware update and the latest Steam Link app update.

I noticed a lot of improvements, but for the best experience I still recommend disabling HEVC on the device.

The black screen issue also seems to be gone now.

For stable streaming, I use:

60 FPS
Fast streaming mode
Upload bitrate locked to 40 Mbps
HEVC disabled
AV1 disabled

With these settings, Steam Link works fine at 1080p and below on the Xiaomi TV Box S.


I tested these games below, and it was a good experience:

Dragon Ball Fighterz,
Dragon Ball Sparking Zero,
Tekken 8,
Mortal Kombat 11


After more exploring, I noticed the main culprit for the issues is setting low latency. Make sure to keep low latency disabled!

Hi, I want to buy a TV box. Do you recommend one? The only quality TV box sold in my country is the one I'm not sure will work properly with the current issues.

Originally posted by RESET.UwU:

Originally posted by ChickenOnFire:

It seems to work properly now on the Xiaomi TV Box S after the latest firmware update and the latest Steam Link app update.

I noticed a lot of improvements, but for the best experience I still recommend disabling HEVC on the device.

The black screen issue also seems to be gone now.

For stable streaming, I use:

60 FPS
Fast streaming mode
Upload bitrate locked to 40 Mbps
HEVC disabled
AV1 disabled

With these settings, Steam Link works fine at 1080p and below on the Xiaomi TV Box S.


I tested these games below, and it was a good experience:

Dragon Ball Fighterz,
Dragon Ball Sparking Zero,
Tekken 8,
Mortal Kombat 11


After more exploring, I noticed the main culprit for the issues is setting low latency. Make sure to keep low latency disabled!

Hi, I want to buy a TV box. Do you recommend one? The only quality TV box sold in my country is the one I'm not sure will work properly with the current issues.

Yes it's great. Turns the TV into a smart one and you can easily install Moonlight / Sunshine / Appolo, up to you, can stream steam / any games to the tv easily.