Apple changed the spec of the ATV (current one), see also other thread:davilla wrote: ↑05 Sep 2017, 16:05 I suspect that 1080p HEVC (higher bit rates) will not have an issue under tvOS11 on the ATV4. While FFMpeg does use neon, it is not the most optimal implementation.
I would expect that Apple's sw implementation of HEVC would perform much better. Plus under videotoolbox, frames would be decoded direct to ioSurfaces and this would skip one copy of the frame plus upload to GPU as a gles texture. This step saves some CPU/neon time. Seeing the positive results of other Apps that have taken the tvOS11 HEVC step, this is a very safe bet.
But 4k HEVC would still be difficult under the ATV4's A8. This is where the new ATV5 would shine. I suspect that Apple 'could' do hw decode on ATV4 but since it can only display 1080p, there's not much reason for it plus they need something to promote the move to ATV5s
ATV5 aka ATV 4k
H.264/HEVC SDR video up to 2160p, 60 fps, Main/Main 10 profile
HEVC Dolby Vision (Profile 5)/HDR10 (Main 10 profile) up to 2160p
ATV4 (current one)
HEVC SDR up to 1080p, 30 fps, Main/Main 10 profile
H.264 video up to 1080p, 60 fps, High or Main Profile level 4.2 or lower
So looks like the ATV4 via hardware decode can do main 10 for 1080p30.
For 4k at 60 fps .. both HEVC and H.264 buy a new one.
Now when can MrMMC support the new tvOS 11 APIs ?