MediaPlayer unable to keep up with 4K video

[kallisti5]

MediaPlayer isn't able to keep up with 4k video.

Example:

• Big Buck Bunny 4k, 60fps, H264 ​http://bbb3d.renderfarming.net/download.html
• Quad core Intel i5 hardware installation of hrev48368 x86_64
• Vesa driver

Video updates around once every 10 seconds. I have a feeling this isn't due to the lack of video acceleration as shrinking the video window down doesn't result in any performance improvements. All of the CPU time is in the "frame generator" thread. (maxed out, one core)

MediaPlayer memory utilization is ~1GB

[vidrep]

Some of the sites that provide 4K UHD video clips for download recommend a minimum quad core i7 for proper playback. My experience from testing AVCHD, was that you need a minimum of a core 2 duo E8500 for playback without stuttering (both CPU's at nearly 100%). I'm willing to bet an i5 is barely adequate for 4K video.

[vidrep]

I downloaded a pair of 4K UHD video clips to test on my quad core i5. MediaPlayer will not play the video - there is either a black or a white screen. However, audio plays normally. I have attached a screenshot of each clip playing in MediaPlayer with latest build (hrev48404 x86_gcc2).

[vidrep]

I finally got Haiku to pkay 4K UHD video, but I had to use an 8 core Opteron, and even with that there was not smooth playback. All 8 cores were nearly maxed out. It doesn't look like 4K is in Haiku's future until we get some hardware GPU acceleration.

[forart.eu]

BBB 4K 60fps plays smootly on my i5 / Windows 8.1 + VLC 2.1.5 x64 with onchip GPU.

I believe that the Haiku "problem" is due of lacking of GPU accelleration.

[vidrep]

Until we get GPU accelleration, or 12 core CPU's are the norm, I'm afraid 4K UHD is not in Haiku's future. This ticket may as well be closed, because I don't see either scenario anytime soon.

[diver]

Would be interesting to try these files wikth mplayer. Hopefully, it should be available in HaikuDepot in a few days.

[vidrep]

Personally, I don't think it will make a difference. As stated earlier, I did get 4K UHD playing in Haiku, using an 8 core Opteron, but even then it wasn't smooth playback. My system is upgradable to 12 core "Istanbul", and I have thought about doing this upgrade just for such experiments.

[diver]

Could you please check with mplayer which is available in HaikuDepot starting from hrev49207?

[vidrep]

Updated to hrev49207 x86_gcc2 Test system is an Intel Core i5 3.33GHZ with 2GB of RAM Mplayer plays the video, but the video is freezing, audio dropout and a warning "Your system is too SLOW to play this!" (see attached screenshot1) I upgraded my other test system to a 12 core Opteron. I'm willing to bet the same file will play on that system, as it did before using Haiku MediaPlayer. The issue here is not the video player, but the lack of GPU hardware acceleration and/or CPU processing power.

[diver]

I wonder if Unsupported PixelFormat has anything to do with the warning you are getting.

Out of curiosity, could you try QMPlay2, which uses ffmpeg 2.6 and doesn't use mplayer.

[vidrep]

I'll test MPlayer and QMPlay2 this weekend and report back. Ticket #12065 is possibly related to this ticket. Is there any possibility of getting ffmpeg to 2.6 to work with the Haiku MediaPlayer? When its working, I definitely have a preference for Haiku MediaPlayer over any of the ported apps. Currently ffmpeg is broken (#11272). I have read "stippi's" article, and understand that it is not a trivial matter to update ffmpeg, and may also break compatibility with Web+.

[vidrep]

hrev49244 x86_gcc2 Intel Core i5 3.33GHz 2GB RAM Interstellar-TLR_1b-5.1ch-4K-HDTN.mp4 QMPlay2 - stuttering video, good audio Mplayer - stuttering video, audio noisy and dropouts

[vidrep]

Apparently there is something lacking in the ffmpeg version currently used by Haiku. Both QMPlay2 and Mplayer are using the current ffmpeg revision, and will produce video output (stuttering) when playing 4K UHD files, wheras the Haiku MediaPlayer only shows a black screen. Is this an issue with ffmpeg itself, the MediaPlayer, or something in the Haiku configuration?

[vidrep]

Can somebody give a quick explanation of what may be affected by the update to ffmpeg 2.8? How does Haiku gcc2 use ffmpeg vs the gcc4 builds?

[pulkomandy]

Hi,

Only the gcc4 version of ffmpeg was updated. This means only gcc4 apps get to use it. This means at least WebPositive (on youtube and other HTML5 video/audio elements), and possibly mplayer_x86? (I'm not sure if they use it).

On gcc2h, the MediaPlayer and all gcc2 apps will still use the 0.10 version. On gcc4/gcc4h/x86_64, the package has not been updated yet, but once it is, all gcc4 apps can use the 2.8 version of ffmpeg there as well.

[diver]

mplayer uses built-in version of ffmpeg which is statically linked into mplayer binary, so that won't change anything for it.

[vidrep]

Tested a variety of 4K UHD video clips and movie trailers using hrev51307 x86_64.

Most of these clips render reasonably well with the Haiku MediaPlayer, and in some cases better than mplayer (which has audio playback issues with these samples). I have provided links to some of the samples I tested.

wget (download) ​http://distribution.bbb3d.renderfarming.net/video/mp4/bbb_sunflower_native_60fps_normal.mp4

​http://videos.hd-trailers.net/AFTER-EARTH_TLR-D_GEN_EN-XX_INTL_51-4K-HDTN.mp4

​http://videos.hd-trailers.net/Interstellar-TLR-3-51ch-4K-HDTN.mp4

[cocobean]

hrev 52012 x86_64 test. I've run some test videos for awhile and 4K videos as well. Mediaplayer displays 4K videos, but not a memory issue...moreso VRAM and buffering issue at this level. Can do 1080p well, but get missing frames around 3840× 2160 and 4096 × 2160 video resolution playback - with minimal CPU/memory overhead (on my end).

System: Dual-core 64-bit CPU, Radeon_HD driver, FFMPEG 3.4.2/GCC 5.4.0-compiled

[waddlesplash]

This is pretty well improved now thanks to the FFmpeg upgrade, and could only be improved further through GPU acceleration, which there is already a separate ticket about.

[diver]

3dEyes just tested this again on his core i5 4400 under x86_64 Haiku hrev52958 with radeon_hd driver ​http://distribution.bbb3d.renderfarming.net/video/mp4/bbb_sunflower_2160p_60fps_normal.mp4

Results: QMPlay2 opens it instantly and plays the video smoothly and uses 300MB. MediaPlayer drops a lot of frames and uses 1GB of memory.

See comparison here: MediaPlayer vs mplayer vs MPV vs QMPlay2 ​https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v_bLDU8z19E&feature=youtu.be

QMPlay2 is clearly a winner here.

[vidrep]

Tested several 4K UHD video trailers with hrev54387 x86_64, then updated to hrev54389 x86_64. All now run smoothly on Intel Core i7-3770 with 16GB ram.

[kallisti5]

Thanks for confirming vidrep! :-)

Pulkomandy pointed out a minor potential bug around audio playback... this one is definitely resolved.

[kallisti5]

(also, the fix was in hrev54839) ;-)