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I cannot stream 4K UHD with VLC, and this has been a persistent issue with 2 different PCs with different CPUs/GPUs. I have the latest version of VLC installed on each PC. Although VLC fails to stream in 4K, I can however play 4K UHD videos that I have downloaded and saved.
This problem occurs on my
Lenovo Legion 5 Gaming Laptop (AMD Ryzen 7 5800h CPU, Nvidia RTX 3050 ti discrete GPU, 32 GB 3200 RAM) running Windows 11.

The same scenario occurs using my Lenovo Legion 5i Gaming Desktop (Intel Core i5-11400, GTX 1660 Super discrete GPU, 32 GB DDR4 3200 RAM) running Windows 10.

Both are 64 bit systems with the latest updates.
Both PCs can be connected to a 4K UHD HDR external display via HDMI (or USB C with displayport).

Issue: When I want to steam a video in 4K, I paste the url in the "Open Network Stream" and proceed from there. It NEVER plays the 4K resolution, always reducing it to 1280 x 720.

When I play a saved 4K video, it will play it at the 2160 resolution, always with huge amounts of frames dropped, and with significant stuttering and gittering.

I have tried every suggestion that I have seen including: enable/disable hardware/GPU acceleration, increasing network/file caching in "ms", changing the Output to every possible option including "disable", "automatic", Direct 3D11 and 9", Open GL (and I completely lose the media control bar at the bottom of the playing video). I have also tried changing the FFmpeg settings including changing the number of threads to 4.

I can't believe that I am the only one with this problem. This obviously is a problem I have created because this 4K streaming issue has occurred with different PCs with different CPU/GPUs, in Windows 10 and 11.
This problem does not occur when I use Daum Pot Player, but I prefer VLC for its superior audio, etc capabilities.
It's frustrating.
Any help would be really appreciated.
Thanks

Where are you streaming from and which country are you located in?

Sorry for the delay. Streaming from USA and youtube

Sorry for the delay. Streaming from USA and youtube

This applies to you then: https://www.pcworld.com/article/398929/ ... he-us.html

This is an interesting video on the subject, but take note of the comments regarding the network overhead when streaming 4K video. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u28IqO2V0yE

Thank you so much for your reply. I am going to check it out right now.

OK. I just checked out the suggested article and video. Perhaps I should have included in my description that I do not have any problem watching 4K HDR videos on Youtube. Both of my computers are capable of displaying 4K HDR and I watch these videos all the time. It's only when I attempt to stream these videos by capturing the url and pasting it into VLC that it always reduces to 1280 x.
I can't figure out why this problem only occurs with VLC, and not with the other media players. Like I said earlier, I prefer VLC for many reasons over the other media players because, but not limited to, superior audio.

I just wish I could figure out how to fix it.

Try a nightly version of the forthcoming 4.0 series release: https://nightlies.videolan.org/

Thanks for the reply. I will give it a try and hope for the best. I appreciate your help.

I am familiar with the nightly versions having tried them in the past. I went ahead and downloaded the nightly version 4.0, as per your suggestion, 64 bit .exe file and started VLC.
From the get-go, I attempted to stream a known 4K video and it still reverted to 1280 x.
I then made some of the other adjustements I mentioned above, including the hardware disable/enable etc, changing the FFmpeg settings, etc, and none brought the display up to 4K.
I appreciate your help, and if you have any further suggestions, I look forward to hearing from you.

This article on the reddit forum is fairly old, but seems to still work for some users. https://www.reddit.com/r/youtube/commen ... treams_in/

Thank you. I will eagerly give it a try and let you know.
I appreciate your suggestions.

Gave it a try multiple times since receiving your suggestion, and upon pasting the url in and hitting enter, it repeatedly comes back with "An unknown error occurred. Please try again in a few seconds". I tried it at least a dozen times over the last two days. Comments on that page suggest it hasn't worked properly in quite a long time.
I do thank you again for your help.
If you or anyone can come up with any possible solutions for me, I will deeply appreciate it.

Still trying to figure this out, and with no success.
Thanks for your help though. I appreciate the time you took trying to help me.