Hello devs and users,
you probably heard of the big news: the next major release of macOS will FINALLY come with system-level support for GPU-accelerated fixed-function HEVC/h.265 10bit decoding! 
The feature will be available to third party programs via the VideoToolbox API, as usual.
To take advantage of the feature, you will need
– any Kaby Lake mac
or
– [YET TO BE CONFIRMED] any Mac with thunderbolt + a suitable external GPU (nvidia 950, 960 or 1000-series, amd rx 4xx or 5xx)
or
– skylake macs? (limited to 8bit HEVC, not Main10)
So, imagine a 2011-2012-2014 mac mini turned into a 4K 10bit HDR htpc with an eGPU + High Sierra + updated Kodi. Cool huh?
Now the questions
– will Kodi on High Sierra support HEVC hw-acceleration “automatically”? (by simply keep using the VideoToolbox API)
– or will support need to be added “manually” by the devs?
– are kodi devs working on all of this currently? registered apple devs can download High Sierra beta right now, but I also understand buying a Kaby Lake mac (the cheapest is the 1080p iMac but then you can’t even test 4K content properly, the 4k iMac would be ideal..) is a bit pricey…
So, here we are.
Thoughts?