VLC video freezes on RasPi 3B+

[NY]

Should VLC 2.2.6 (Umbrella) be able to play an off-air SD (720x576x25) .ts
recording? This is installed from a NOOBS V2.8.2 boot image, and with a
normal installation of VLC (ie no performance tweaks).

I ask because the picture freezes after a couple of seconds and then maybe
updates once every 30 seconds, although the sound continues to play
perfectly.

It's not a great hardship: I wasn't expecting a RasPi to be used for playing
video (and especially not HD 1920x1080x25 H264), but I was surprised that it
was *so* bad even for SD which is less processor-intensive.

What are the normal tweaks to give best performance from VLC?

[Jan Panteltje]

On a sunny day (Thu, 13 Sep 2018 15:55:41 +0100) it happened "NY"
<m...@privacy.net> wrote in <kIKdnQNmBN3x5wfG...@brightview.co.uk>:

Dunno, but hd plays OK on my old raspi but I bought a decoding key from them.
That is it plays OK with OpenElec, no idea what the player was.
Not all players support the hardware acceleration,
was a thread about that here some time ago.

[Ahem A Rivet's Shot]

On Thu, 13 Sep 2018 15:55:41 +0100
"NY" <m...@privacy.net> wrote:

> Should VLC 2.2.6 (Umbrella) be able to play an off-air SD
> (720x576x25) .ts recording? This is installed from a NOOBS V2.8.2 boot
> image, and with a normal installation of VLC (ie no performance tweaks).

What format is it in ? A Raspberry Pi only supports software decode
for MPEG2 unless you have a license key:

http://www.raspberrypi.com/mpeg-2-license-key/

> It's not a great hardship: I wasn't expecting a RasPi to be used for
> playing video (and especially not HD 1920x1080x25 H264), but I was
> surprised that it was *so* bad even for SD which is less
> processor-intensive.

I think you'll find that with hardware decode it can keep up with
HD or at least 720P, I'm not sure that vlc gets to the hardware support
it's been a long time since I've used a pi for video.

--
Steve O'Hara-Smith | Directable Mirror Arrays
C:\>WIN | A better way to focus the sun
The computer obeys and wins. | licences available see
You lose and Bill collects. | http://www.sohara.org/

[Andy Burns]

Ahem A Rivet's Shot wrote:

> A Raspberry Pi only supports software decode
> for MPEG2 unless you have a license key:
>

> I think you'll find that with hardware decode it can keep up with
> HD or at least 720P, I'm not sure that vlc gets to the hardware support
> it's been a long time since I've used a pi for video.

My 3B (not plus) has no licence key, but with libreELEC it happily plays
1080p video, I expect VLC and KODI both use FFMPEG under the hood ...

[A. Dumas]

Yeah the licence key enables *hardware* decode. Software runs with or
without key.

[Ahem A Rivet's Shot]

In what format ? The license key is only needed for MPEG2 playback.

[Andy Burns]

A. Dumas wrote:

> the licence key enables *hardware* decode. Software runs with or
> without key.

My point being that software performance is good enough for fullHD, and
hardware is unlikely to give worse performance than software ...

[NY]

"Ahem A Rivet's Shot" <ste...@eircom.net> wrote in message
news:20180913191540.1ed7...@eircom.net...

> On Thu, 13 Sep 2018 18:35:46 +0100
> Andy Burns <use...@andyburns.uk> wrote:
>
>> Ahem A Rivet's Shot wrote:
>>
>> > A Raspberry Pi only supports software decode
>> > for MPEG2 unless you have a license key:
>> >
>> > I think you'll find that with hardware decode it can keep up with
>> > HD or at least 720P, I'm not sure that vlc gets to the hardware support
>> > it's been a long time since I've used a pi for video.
>>
>> My 3B (not plus) has no licence key, but with libreELEC it happily plays
>> 1080p video, I expect VLC and KODI both use FFMPEG under the hood ...
>
> In what format ? The license key is only needed for MPEG2 playback.

This is MPEG2. Are you saying that a licence key isn't needed for decoding
of H264, only for the older MPEG2?

[druck]

On 13/09/2018 19:15, Ahem A Rivet's Shot wrote:
> On Thu, 13 Sep 2018 18:35:46 +0100
> Andy Burns <use...@andyburns.uk> wrote:
>
>> Ahem A Rivet's Shot wrote:
>>
>>> A Raspberry Pi only supports software decode
>>> for MPEG2 unless you have a license key:
>>>
>>> I think you'll find that with hardware decode it can keep up with
>>> HD or at least 720P, I'm not sure that vlc gets to the hardware support
>>> it's been a long time since I've used a pi for video.
>>
>> My 3B (not plus) has no licence key, but with libreELEC it happily plays
>> 1080p video, I expect VLC and KODI both use FFMPEG under the hood ...
>
> In what format ? The license key is only needed for MPEG2 playback.

Plus where is the video coming from?

Local SD card, Local USB device, Ethernet to server, Ethernet to internet?

---druck

[Andy Burns]

Ahem A Rivet's Shot wrote:

> Andy Burns wrote:
>
>> My 3B (not plus) has no licence key, but with libreELEC it happily plays
>> 1080p video, I expect VLC and KODI both use FFMPEG under the hood ...
>
> In what format ? The license key is only needed for MPEG2 playback.

UK spec terrestrial TV, so H.264 for 1920x1080 and MPEG2 for 720x576
material.

[Andy Burns]

druck wrote:

> Ahem A Rivet's Shot wrote:
>

>> In what format?

>
> Plus where is the video coming from?

DVB-T2 capture card in a PC running TVheadend, streamed over wifi to
Kodi on the Pi.

[Jan Panteltje]

On a sunny day (Thu, 13 Sep 2018 21:37:04 +0100) it happened Andy Burns
<use...@andyburns.uk> wrote in <g0003i...@mid.individual.net>:

I get my movies from satellite, USB tuner on PC to harddisk.
Then copy to the Pi SDcard later,
or use that USB harddisk in the PI, with openelec.
Been a while since I used the Pi for video, as my Samsung big TV can also play from the USB harddisk.
Maybe your WiFi link is the bottle neck?

Try to copy a piece of 10 minute movie via WiFi and see how long it takes?
If more than 10 minutes then it is the WiFi.

[Björn Lundin]

On 2018-09-13 22:16, NY wrote:

>> In what format ? The license key is only needed for MPEG2 playback.
>
> This is MPEG2. Are you saying that a licence key isn't needed for
> decoding of H264, only for the older MPEG2?

Yes. It's not an age thing - it's a license thing.
When I was streaming MPEG2 over wifi ( long time ago)
I had wifi issues. It just was not fast enough. (11B and some distance
indoors)

Even if wifi is faset today - you may still be caught by speed degrading
with distance/obstacles

--
--
Björn

[NY]

"druck" <ne...@druck.org.uk> wrote in message
news:pnehdo$jk1$1...@dont-email.me...

In my case, I was playing from the local SD card (having initially copied it
over wifi from another computer). I particularly chose what I presume is the
fastest source, from a local "disc", to eliminate wifi delays. Normal UK SD
TV so MPEG2.

Youtube and BBC News site videos play fine: maybe the codec used for those
places less strain on the CPU. For playing MPEG2 in VLC, CPU was about
85-95% so I didn't do it for long because the CPU ran a bit hot.

[Andy Burns]

NY wrote:

> Youtube and BBC News site videos play fine: maybe the codec used for
> those places less strain on the CPU

They use DASH, so adapt to the bandwidth/screen-size/CPU-horsepower
available, picking from several available qualities of stream every few
seconds ...

[NY]

"Andy Burns" <use...@andyburns.uk> wrote in message
news:g02bk6...@mid.individual.net...

I've just played a video that is available in 1920x1080 quality. Youtube on
Firefox can play it perfectly well at up to 480p x 25, but stutters on 720p
x 50. That's assuming a full buffer, as shown in the Stats for Nerds
right-click option of Youtube; since I only have a 2 Mbps internet
connection (ie the ADSL speed), it can't keep up 720p very long, and once
the buffer is empty, the stuttering is a lot worse.

But for 480p (the closest equivalent to UK TV's 576i), the fact that it can
play it for as long as the buffer is not running on empty, whereas
720x576x25 MPEG freezes on one frame suggests a big difference.

Does it matter that I'm running Raspian rather than libelec? Once I get
round to moving my PVR from NextPVR on Windows to Myth or Kodi on RasPi,
I'll change the card to a libelec installation. I'm not over-impressed with
the rather clumsy, inconsistent and over-complicated UI for MythTV, but it
does a perfectly good job once you learn to live with certain operations
only being possible with a keyboard - eg you can't click on a programme in
the EPG to select it for recording. With a decent UI for the front end, it
could be a good PVR program.

[A. Dumas]

On 14-09-18 21:13, NY wrote:
> I've just played a video that is available in 1920x1080 quality. Youtube
> on Firefox can play it perfectly well at up to 480p x 25, but stutters

They haven't worked on video support (ie. hardware acceleration) in
Firefox, only on the pre-installed Chromium.

[NY]

"A. Dumas" <alex...@dumas.fr.invalid> wrote in message
news:5b9c28d3$0$32253$e4fe...@news.xs4all.nl...

I'll try Youtube in Chromium and see how it compares. I hadn't thought of it
being browser-specific, though I should have done. Of course, with my low
internet connection I can only test it for the few seconds until the buffer
empties, but that's enough to see what resolution the video decoding can
handle without stuttering or freezing.

[Ahem A Rivet's Shot]

So without an MPEG2 license you'll get better results from the
1920x1080 than the 720x576 as long as the player supports hardware decode
at all.

[Ahem A Rivet's Shot]

On Thu, 13 Sep 2018 21:16:30 +0100
"NY" <m...@privacy.net> wrote:

> "Ahem A Rivet's Shot" <ste...@eircom.net> wrote in message

> > In what format ? The license key is only needed for MPEG2 playback.
>
> This is MPEG2. Are you saying that a licence key isn't needed for
> decoding of H264, only for the older MPEG2?

Exactly so - it's a legal thing.