RTSP Live Stream - How to disable buffering/caching?

[dcreeron]

Hello VLC Gurus.

We are trying to use VLC 0.9.8a to play live streams from cameras that use RTSP and H.264. We can successfully connect and play the stream but there is a 2-3 second delay. I've tried changing a number of caching/buffering options with no success.

Our network is all internal, 100mb and Gigabit ethernet, so the delay isn't related to any distance/travel time.

If it makes any difference in configuration our end goal is to use the player as an embedded control. Right now we are using the ActiveX control in a Windows Forms application for testing. The 2-3 second delay is the same whether we use our test app or the VLC player itself.

Does anyone know what options I need to set to lower/remove this delay so it is as close to real-time as possible?

Thanks in advance.

- Daniel

[Rémi Denis-Courmont]

You can't disable caching, because any real-life computer network has non-zero delay jitter. You can lower rhe "rtsp-caching" configuration option defines the RTSP input buffer in millisecond, but zero will simply not work (properly).

[dcreeron]

Thanks for the quick response Rémi.

Using the parameter you mentioned I went back and looked at my code/option settings. 'rtsp-caching' was one I tried but I had used the double-dash ( -- ) syntax and not a colon ( : ). Once I switched to a colon the playback delay was reduced as hoped for.

Final result is that I am now using ':rtsp-caching=50' as an option parameter when I add a new item to the AxACVLC playlist.

Thanks again!