H.264 video lagging with MPlayer

Electrode · 05-17-2010, 08:00 PM

If it helps anyone, I have uploaded a 10 second dump (19 MB) of the stream I'm trying to watch.

mac.tieu · 05-17-2010, 08:45 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Electrode

Some observations:

* the latest ffmpeg gives garbled video output. SVN r20373 works better.
* I tried building a 32-bit ffplay binary in a chroot, and that uses much less CPU (102% vs. 130%).
* Building a 32-bit mplayer seems to make no difference vs. 64-bit.

Have you ever tried hardware video acceleration version of mplayer (vdpau/vaapi)? It must be less CPU usage.

MT.

Electrode · 05-17-2010, 09:06 PM

Hardware-accelerated playback doesn't appear to work on x86-64. -vo xv, gl, gl2 all give similar results.

Further observations:
* CPU utilization with mplayer is about 75-80% with 32-bit build and 70-73% with 64-bit build (video still runs slow and desyncs)
* -vo null does not have any effect on CPU usage or desync
* -nosound or -ao null has no effect, video still runs slightly faster than half speed, no change in CPU usage

mac.tieu · 05-17-2010, 09:50 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Electrode

Hardware-accelerated playback doesn't appear to work on x86-64. -vo xv, gl, gl2 all give similar results.

Further observations:
* CPU utilization with mplayer is about 75-80% with 32-bit build and 70-73% with 64-bit build (video still runs slow and desyncs)
* -vo null does not have any effect on CPU usage or desync
* -nosound or -ao null has no effect, video still runs slightly faster than half speed, no change in CPU usage

I am running ArchLinux (x86_64) and mplayer-vaapi work just fine. All I need are libav, vdpau-video driver and mplayer-vaapi.

Have a look at:
Video Acceleration (VA) API

MT.

H_TeXMeX_H · 05-18-2010, 03:06 AM

When I try to play that dump it says:

Code:

h264 @ 0xf056c0]number of reference frames exceeds max (probably corrupt input), discarding one

lots of times with mplayer, which then hangs.

However, it plays fine with 'ffplay', try that.

I think that this message might be correct, the input may be corrupt. It could be a driver problem with the capture card or something.

Electrode · 05-18-2010, 09:06 AM

I have already tried ffplay, as mentioned earlier in the thread. It maintains sync but stutters due to high CPU consumption.

H_TeXMeX_H · 05-18-2010, 09:41 AM

Did you enable vdpau in ffplay ? when compiling it ? that might help.

Electrode · 05-18-2010, 02:56 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by H_TeXMeX_H

Did you enable vdpau in ffplay ? when compiling it ? that might help.

Makes no difference

mac.tieu · 05-20-2010, 12:04 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Electrode

Makes no difference

I've tried to play your 'test.ts' sample on my ArchLinux (x86_64)

Code:

mplayer -va vaapi -vo vaapi test.ts

CPU usage is very low. This is output log:

Code:

... 
Playing test.ts.
TS file format detected.
VIDEO H264(pid=517) AUDIO MPA(pid=751) NO SUBS (yet)!  PROGRAM N. 9
FPS seems to be: 29.970030
libva: libva version 0.31.0
Xlib:  extension "XFree86-DRI" missing on display ":0.0".
libva: va_getDriverName() returns 0
libva: Trying to open /usr/local/lib/dri/nvidia_drv_video.so
libva: va_openDriver() returns 0
==========================================================================
Opening video decoder: [ffmpeg] FFmpeg's libavcodec codec family
[VD_FFMPEG] VA API accelerated codec.
Selected video codec: [ffh264] vfm: ffmpeg (FFmpeg H.264)
==========================================================================
==========================================================================
Opening audio decoder: [ffmpeg] FFmpeg/libavcodec audio decoders
AUDIO: 48000 Hz, 2 ch, s16le, 384.0 kbit/25.00% (ratio: 48000->192000)
Selected audio codec: [ffmp2] afm: ffmpeg (FFmpeg MPEG layer-1 and layer-2 audio)
==========================================================================
AO: [oss] 48000Hz 2ch s16le (2 bytes per sample)
Starting playback...
[VD_FFMPEG] Trying pixfmt=0.
Movie-Aspect is 1.78:1 - prescaling to correct movie aspect.
VO: [vaapi] 1920x1080 => 1920x1080 H.264 VA API Acceleration 
[vo_vaapi] Using 1:1 VA surface mapping
[VD_FFMPEG] XVMC-accelerated MPEG-2.
...

Regards,
MT.

Electrode · 05-20-2010, 01:23 AM

Alright, tried building mplayer-vaapi as mentioned earlier in the thread. Builds OK but I get this when I try to run it:

Code:

Playing test.ts.
TS file format detected.
VIDEO H264(pid=517) AUDIO MPA(pid=751) NO SUBS (yet)!  PROGRAM N. 9
FPS seems to be: 29.970030
libva: libva version 0.31.0-sds6
Xlib:  extension "XFree86-DRI" missing on display ":0.0".
libva: va_getDriverName() returns 0
libva: Trying to open /usr/lib64/va/drivers/nvidia_drv_video.so
vdpau_video: error: Assertion failed in file vdpau_driver.c at line 227

mac.tieu: What versions of mplayer, libva, vdpau_video and Nvidia driver are you using?

mac.tieu · 05-20-2010, 05:20 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Electrode

...What versions of mplayer, libva, vdpau_video and Nvidia driver are you using?

I am using nVidia driver version 195.36.15-2, latest snapshot of libva, vdpau_video, mplayer-vaapi.

You should check for valid path of nvidia_drv_video.so (your is /usr/lib64/va/drivers/nvidia_drv_video.so). There are a utility named 'vainfo' which use to check whether libva installed properly or not.

Code:

$ ./vainfo
libva: libva version 0.31.0
Xlib:  extension "XFree86-DRI" missing on display ":0.0".
libva: va_getDriverName() returns 0
libva: Trying to open /usr/local/lib/dri/nvidia_drv_video.so
libva: va_openDriver() returns 0
vainfo: VA API version: 0.31
vainfo: Driver version: Splitted-Desktop Systems VDPAU backend for VA API - 0.6.3
vainfo: Supported profile and entrypoints
      VAProfileMPEG2Simple            :	VAEntrypointVLD
      VAProfileMPEG2Main              :	VAEntrypointVLD
      VAProfileH264Main               :	VAEntrypointVLD
      VAProfileH264High               :	VAEntrypointVLD
      VAProfileVC1Simple              :	VAEntrypointVLD
      VAProfileVC1Main                :	VAEntrypointVLD
      VAProfileVC1Advanced            :	VAEntrypointVLD

You should also pay attention at matching two defines of libva and vdpau-video. Mine is:

Code:

File config.h of vdpau-video: 
#define VA_DRIVER_INIT_FUNC __vaDriverInit_0_31

Code:

File va.c of libva: 
#define DRIVER_INIT_FUNC "__vaDriverInit_0_31"

Good lucks,
MT.

Shadow_7 · 05-20-2010, 08:39 AM

Is your user in the video group?

What's your specs with regards to other baselines speeds?

$ glxinfo | grep -i "direct"

$ glxgears -info
(or -printfps depending on distro / version)

$ xvidtune -show

$ ffmpeg -i <video>

$ cat /proc/cpuinfo | grep -i "bogomip"
(while you're trying to play the video, frequency scaling ruins it if you're not maxed)

Electrode · 05-20-2010, 09:25 AM

mac.tieu: I checked the defines you mentioned and they match. I'm using the same versions of everything as you except for the Nvidia driver: 195.36.24

vainfo does the same thing:

Code:

electrode@belphegor:~$ vainfo
libva: libva version 0.31.0-sds6
Xlib:  extension "XFree86-DRI" missing on display ":0.0".
libva: va_getDriverName() returns 0
libva: Trying to open /usr/lib64/va/drivers/nvidia_drv_video.so
vdpau_video: error: Assertion failed in file vdpau_driver.c at line 227
Aborted

/usr/lib64/va/drivers/nvidia_drv_video.so exists and is a symlink to vdpau_drv_video.so in the same directory.

Shadow_7: User is in video group. All video and 3D apps run correctly and at reasonable speeds. MPEG-1/2/4 HD video plays without difficulty. CPU scaling is disabled in the kernel (I was using it at one point but found that it screwed up virtualbox).

mac.tieu · 05-20-2010, 10:02 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Electrode

Code:

electrode@belphegor:~$ vainfo
libva: libva version 0.31.0-sds6
Xlib:  extension "XFree86-DRI" missing on display ":0.0".
libva: va_getDriverName() returns 0
libva: Trying to open /usr/lib64/va/drivers/nvidia_drv_video.so
vdpau_video: error: Assertion failed in file vdpau_driver.c at line 227
Aborted

vdp_device_create_x11 had been failed. It may be due to multiple nvidia library existed. I suggest you to search 'vdp_device_create_x11 error', there are several results related.

Hope that help,
MT.

Electrode · 05-22-2010, 08:48 PM

After doing some research, it looks like my card (Geforce 7800 AGP) does not support VDPAU/VA API, so this was all a dead end.

If there are no other suggestions, I give up.