H.264: corrupt video in Ubuntu 16.04 & VLC 2.2.2

[The Bright Side]

Hey guys, anybody else getting this when playing back H.264 videos in VLC 2.2.2 in Ubuntu GNOME 16.04, 64-bit?



Here's a video showing the problem: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZD14OI9Olb4

Other players, like Parole or Totem, don't have this problem. Also, other codecs play back fine in VLC. Googling the problem, I found no solution.

I have ubuntu-restricted-extras installed and I'm using an NVidia GTX 970 graphics card with the drivers that came with 16.04 (361.42).

There might be some video setting I'm overlooking?

[Rémi Denis-Courmont]

This might be a driver issue. Try changing hardware acceleration and/or video output settings.

[The Bright Side]

Thanks Rémi! I should have added this to the OP... I tried disabling hardware acceleration and also went through every single output mode, but no success.

[The Bright Side]

Quick update: reported a bug, but the team closed it saying it was probably an issue with the NVidia drivers. I went ahead and switched to SMPlayer, which plays everything without problems. Hope the issue resolves itself some time in the future though, cos I love VLC. Still using it for all other formats.

[Rémi Denis-Courmont]

VLC devs cannot fix graphic drivers. It's up to you to install a non-buggy version of drivers, or to disable hardware acceleration as needed.

[The Bright Side]

Yeah, I hear ya. However, even after disabling Preferences => Video => Accelerated video output (Overlay), and even after cycling through all output modes available, the problem never really completely went away. The best I got was badly stuttering video with insane screen tearing. I'm guessing I'm stuck with a conflict between the drivers and VLC for now. Until something changes, I'm happy using any other video player for hi-res H.264. Thanks again for your suggestions, though!

[Rémi Denis-Courmont]

Hardware video decoding acceleration.

[The Bright Side]

A-ha! I found it, and that does the trick! Thank you very much for your help.

For anybody coming here in the future for reference, the correct option is in Preferences => Input / Codecs => Hardware-accelerated decoding. Set to "Disable".

[AndreD]

Well, forcing VDPAU works too, so there is something else that VLC chooses to use when using default "auto" setting

[Rémi Denis-Courmont]

No. Forcing VDPAU won't make a difference over automatic settings, at least not in VLC 2.2.2.