The VideoLAN Forums

Hi, i'm using vlc to stream some video cameras to a local website, we used different versions for it, but they all had this issue, including 9.2 : after a random period of time, the stream is closed, it sometimes lasted for 24 hrs, other times 1-2 hrs.. and the max was about 48 hrs... we're using an appro type cammera if it matters, mailed the manufacturer and they said they had the same issues with vlc... searched the forum and saw the topic with "timeout after 2 mins" but nothing worked for me... any ideas ? my test machine is with windows xp sp2, and the server is using windows 2003 server. any tips / suggestions / something would be appreciated.

You have enabled logger interface and checked the log file after closedown?

Or maybe force-repeat VLC to restart itself with same options.

i'll check the logs, the force-restart isn't an option because since it's for the survailance cameras, i have no way of knowing when the vlc server is down other than actually checking it...

i'll post the logs as soon as i can

edit : um.. where should the logs be located ? just set the verbosity to 2, and waiting for the crash

--verbose 2 --extraintf=logger
it should default to VLC directory. You can use --logfile=<string> to specify the location.

sorry for the delay...

the forum doesn't allow me to put the output here {uses up too much memory} so i've uploaded the file to my server :

http://razvan.ase.ro/asd.log

it's in plain text format

Can you monitor VLC memory usage? If so, could you check if VLC eats more memory after every minute?

i meant the forum's memory usage...

as for vlc, no, it uses about the same amount

I know. I am just trying to figure out what causes the crashes. I was wondering if maybe mjpeg decoder has memleak that causes this. But if the VLC doesn't eat all the memory, I don't know what is the issue.

yeah... the issues isn't from bandwidth either... also, vlc doesn't work when i set the cameras in mpeg mode... only mjpeg... any ideas why ? it worked with 0.8.6a but nothing newer than that...

update :

this is the response i got from the camera manufacturer :
"
Past two weeks, our IP cam team try to reproduce this issue.
They think that maybe VLC process the network connection timeout and recover connection issue that is not very smart.
Our ipcam's website and software that get the same stream can work in long time just because these software has method try to keep connection and image stable.

In the other hand, they try to port rtsp stream on ipcam in our lab, and use VLC and quicktime to play this stream.
They find out that VLC's image stops, but quick time play normally after a long time.
They consider this may quicktime do effort on resolving image stop problem like our software."

Can you give message log when you try to open mpeg stream from that camera with VLC?

this is the dump from the vlc that works : and this from the other one:

ffmpeg warning: header damaged
(mpeg4@00BFC970)
ffmpeg warning: cannot decode one frame (111 bytes)
main warning: late picture skipped (2505736)

Either your camera doesn't produce spec compliant streams or FFmpeg devs have made an error.

How can i check if the camera produces such a stream, and if it doesn't , can i do anything about it ?

You can at least test latest ffmpeg and if that gives same errors, report the issue to FFmpeg devs (at least they can say who to blame). I don't remember any free tools that to MPEG-4 verification.

i'll try the ffmpeg but atm i'm trying something else : updated one camera's software.... no breaks in 24 hrs...

hi, works perfect with firmware update. Mark as solved please.