Heads up Kodi fans! You can now download Kodi 17.4! Before you get too excited; this Kodi update likely won’t change your life. Kodi 17.4 is an update that focuses more on bug fixes rather than adding new features. In case you don’t believe me, you can check out the Kodi blog post for yourself. It’s literally titled, “Kodi v17.4 final: Just a bunch of fixes.” Of course, fixes are always good. Less crashing, more enjoying the entertainment you love!
So, what are some of the big fixes for those that download Kodi 17.4? There’s pretty much something for everyone, no matter which platform you use Kodi on. Here’s the list from their blog post:
- Potentially fix crashing on Windows due to an issue in Python
- Potentially fix crashing on Windows when enabling zeroconf
- Fix sporadic crash on Windows when installing or updating add-ons
- Fix issue for users with reverse proxies attempting to forward websockets.
- Fix possible issue if Linux distro uses system ffmpeg and cause black screen with 10-bit H.265
- Properly throttle scraping music information online to prevent overloading the provider
- Fix native keyboard on iOS 11
- Fix potential crash on Android O loading App icons
- Fix non showing Kodi banner on Android O
- Fix potential crash on Android with certain keymaps
- Fix wrong detection of VP6 and VP8 videocodec on Android
- Update FFmpeg to 3.1.9
- Set hard requirement to use FFmpeg 3.1.x only
- Fix for Hangup when viewing recording and pressing next/previous
- Fix merged scraped album type and label correctly with that derived from tags from music files
- Fix possible crash on Linux when using ALSA
- Save skin settings immediately after they have changed instead of only on shutdown
Not a very sexy release, sure. If you were hoping for something groundbreaking then you will be happy to know that the Kodi team is already hard at work on v18. Kodi v18 is named “Leia” after the late Carrie Fisher. Leia will include some new features to get excited about. One of the biggest features in Leia will be the availability of a 64-bit Windows application. This means that Kodi will be able to use more than 4GB of RAM. No more delays when you make selections! Kodi v18 should be snappy and quick on 64-bit Windows systems.
There’s also been confirmation that the team is working on an Xbox One application. However, they are open about the challenge that this poses. The Xbox One version may not be ready once Leia launches but hopefully it won’t be far behind. After all, Kodi started as XBMC (Xbox Media Center) so it would be fitting if the popular media software made a return to the Xbox.
There will also be plenty of improvements for Android users which will mainly focus on improving search functionality. A big feature of Leia will be voice search. This will be great news for people who have Android set top boxes with voice search. I’m looking at my MiBox 3 right now which has voice search but, unfortunately, Kodi can’t make use of that feature. So, therefore, I have to type in all of my searches like some kind of peasant.
If you want to enjoy all of the latest bug fixes you can download Kodi 17.4 from their website. I found that Google Play had automatically updated my version of Kodi and I didn’t notice any issues with any of the addons I had previously installed. That’s always good news considering the legal battles that many addons are going through. You never know when your favorite addon will bite the dust and cease to work properly.
Like I said, if you download Kodi 17.4 then you shouldn’t expect any new features. This is purely an update aimed at fixes for known issues. Hopefully this reduces any crashes or bugs you have been experiencing and tides you over until the Kodi team has v18 completed and ready to go.
