Android: DrmManager server died

Question

We are streaming the Widevine protected movies. Our problem is that the media player is crashing on some devices.

We are aware about the "problematic" Widevine support, but there are devices like e.g. Samsung Galaxy Tab2 10.1 P5100 we expect DRM should work.

We had the P5100 for testing and it works for us perfectly, customers however have same devices (with the original ROM, none root) and on their devices our application is crashing. Funny is that this problem does not apply to all devices of the same type, but only to some, which means that on your P5100 it might work perfectly, but on e.g your wife's P5100 not. If the player crashes, then it happens either never or always, so it is easy to simulate.

Of course even same devices' types can be little different, but still... See the error we get from the logcat:

08-07 12:36:49.455  2901  3099 I DrmManagerClient: getErrorType return TYPE_PROCESS_DRM_INFO_FAILED becauseof widevine or STATUS_ERROR
08-07 12:36:49.455  2901  3099 E Clix  : [Activity_Player]::[DRM]::[TYPE_PROCESS_DRM_INFO_FAILED]
08-07 12:36:49.455  2901  2913 W DrmManagerClientImpl(Native): DrmManager server died!
08-07 12:36:49.455   118  3116 D HTTPBase: [4] Network BandWidth = 349 Kbps
08-07 12:36:49.455   118   328 W DrmManagerClientImpl(Native): DrmManager server died!
08-07 12:36:49.455   358   640 W DrmManagerClientImpl(Native): DrmManager server died!
08-07 12:36:49.462   102   102 I ServiceManager: service 'drm.drmManager' died

Our understanding is that this log means that the native Widevine process died during the license acquisition handling - it seems the Widevine compatibility across different devices and firmware versions is not the best even on Samsung new devices.

Anyone had the same problem and can help us?

Regards, STeN

Answer 1

After searching on the internet we found on Samsung forum (http://developer.samsung.com/forum/thread/widevine-drm-issues-/77/200522) what we suspected and what we were told byt the content publisher: Even we have 2 devices of the same type, both capable of playing the Widevine, it can happen that the so-called Widevine keybox is not provisioned to one of those and such a device cannot use the Widevine DRM. The key-box is kind of encrypted data, where keys used to decrypt some parts of the DRM information are stored.

Why that can happen I do not know... Devices might be used in different regions, where manufacturer did not expect the Widevine to be necessary...

Also note that when you root the Android according to http://source.android.com/devices/drm.html, then depending on the security level, the Widevine key-box might be stored in a region of memory that is erased.

BR STeN