Zwift App Apple TV crashing on Sony KE-55XH9005

Sounds very odd. Are you using the same cable that works on the other TVs with the one that crashes?

Yes, the same cable.

Also the other applications (Netflix, Eurosport, HBO, etc work fine) only Zwift doesn’t work and crashes immediately.

I could make a short movie if you want with all the details. I hope you can give me some advice.

Best regards,

Juan Santos

Wow. That sounds like a really weird problem, and probably difficult for Zwift to debug. Though you can of course log it with them to see if they’ve got any ideas.

If it was me, I think I’d be trying to see whether putting an HDMI switch box in between the Apple TV and the Sony TV helps.

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Wow! HDMI switch box? I will look into it.

Thank you!

I will let you all know if I find a solution.

I’ve had some troubles with Apple TV’s in the past so throwing down some thoughts:

  1. If using older generation Apple TVs with lots of content / apps stored on them, Zwift might not have enough bandwidth to run.

2A. Could be the limited number of Bluetooth inputs on the Apple TV, yet when I ran into this issue, Zwift would simply stop reading an input, not completely crash. The two new Apple TV’s recently released (2021 HD and 4K) still only have 3 Bluetooth inputs, yet 1 is used for the remote.

2B. If your trainer has speed and cadence on two separate Bluetooth inputs, get an ANT+ bridge to combine these into 1 Bluetooth input. Just note the new 2021 Apple TV’s only have a USB-C input.

  1. Internet bandwidth is too low. Could be that the WiFi signal is too low in your gym, or the network is being saturated by the dual streaming or other users

  2. Make sure the Zwift app is up to date, the Apple TV system is updated

Dear Michaela,

Thank you very much for your insights. Unfortunately, the problem seems to be a different one in this case.

  1. I have in my house 4 Apple TVs, 1 is already 3 years old, another 2 are from the last year and the last one was purchased last week. I have tried exchanging them between screens, all of them work without any problem on the other 3 screens in the house but crashing on those 2 new screens.

2A. I don’t manage to get to the screen where the Bluetooth is an issue. Additionally when trying on the other screens there is no problem and I am able to Pair the devices.

2B. As in the case before, plugging the same Apple TV to another screen makes everything work flowless.

  1. The internet bandwidth in the gym is the best in the whole house. In the gym, we have the “server” and the main switch. I have tested the quality in both Apple TVs and the results are very good (above 800 download and 200 uploads)

  2. Everything is up to date.

I have even moved one of the “other” screens to the gym, unplugging the HDMI from the new ones and plugging to the old one (in the same place, same connection, same Apple TV) only different screen (also Sony) and different HDMI cable (hard to remove the cable from the TVs on the wall) and IT WORKS!. Plugging back to the new screens and the app crashes again.

It is CRAZY! Tomorrow a company specialized in such equipment is coming to my house to “play” with the new TV settings. I hope I will have good news soon.

I would check sound settings as a Hail Mary and dropping screen resolution . Good luck

Thank you!!!

Indeed ATMOS OFF and EVERYTHING WORKS!!!

Unbelievable…

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Sounds like you must be running an old Zwift app version. Because that bug got fixed a few weeks back.

How is that possible? I just downloaded the latest version from APP store on my Apple TV.

Is it possible that I downloaded somehow and older version?

The update has no effect on the Apple TV device:

FYI - we have also been working on a fix for a similar-seeming macOS crash and the patch for that is v 1.13.1 that’s releasing tonight on macOS only. Just want to be clear that 1.13.1 will not fix the AppleTV issues. We appreciate your patience!

See AppleTV problems with new update [1.13.0] [May 21 2021] [SOLVED] - #88

It was fixed in 1.13.2.

I will check today the version of the App in my Apple TV and let you all know

Thank you nonetheless for your message

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@Steve_Hammatt I have checked and the current version is 1.14 and if I switch ON again the ATMOS the app crashes again.

It seems that ZWIFT has solved the problem for many IOS devices but not yet for Apple TV.

@shooj Something has gone wrong here - wasn’t this fixed before?

It is solved.

I have to switch OFF ATMOS in APPLE TV and the app doesn’t crash.

I was just replying to the suggestion that this issues has already been tackled in the last update with the application. Unfortunately it hasn’t and therefore UNLESS I keep the ATMOS OFF the application crashes.

That’s a workaround. I assumed that when it was identified that switching off Atmos solved the problem, then Zwift fixed the bug where seeinf Atmos made it crash.

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@Steve_Hammatt, you are 100% right, rather than a solution is a workaround.

It seems that Zwift has found the solution and has applied it in the latest updates in other devices (Mac IOS, etc) but not yet for Apple TV.

I guess (and hope) that with the next update the problem will be properly solved.

Once again thank you very much for your support and insights.

The fix in 1.13.2 was specifically for Apple TV. Or at least that’s what we were told.

This isn’t anything to do with the MacOS crashes.

@Juan_Santos1 @Steve_Hammatt

Sorry for the erroneous information - the fix for this is slated for release in version 1.15.0
The known workaround the community found is to disable Dolby Atmos on the Apple TV’s sound setting. Please use stereo mode output until it’s solved for good.

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