VLC stutters playing 720p h264 video with processor to spare

[jonstew1983]

When playing pretty much any HD h264 video VLC often stutters and ceases displaying frames with no interruption of the audio. CPU usage never goes above 50% percent of a single core (after setting process affinity to that core) and drops to background levels while the video is frozen. 0.8.6 has similar issues for me but it seems to be more willing to hard drop frames and have a messed up image rather than not show anything at all. If it was a case of the processor being maxed out I could understand but having issues like this with 50% or less processor usage seems rather odd. Disk activity is minimal to none as well.

The file I tested with is "Zero no Tsukaima: Princess no Rondo - 1 [SS-Eclipse] [9B3DBD00].mkv" and can be found at lolipower.org

Any help is much appreciated. System information follows.

Vista Ultimate SP1
VLC 0.9.2

Sager 9262 with:
Intel Core 2 Quad 9450 2.66
GeForce 9800M GT
Integrated Realtek HD Audio

[Lotesdelere]

Try this tip:
viewtopic.php?f=2&t=42328

Also try to use the DirectX 3D video output instead of the default one.

[jonstew1983]

I've tried the recommendations in that thread and using DirectX 3D output but they made minimal difference. I think it may be related to how this file is encoded as I have other x264 video that plays fine. As I noted before what bugs me about this is the fact that even when I limit VLC to a single core it still has issues playing and never uses more than 50% of that single core. I even made sure to disable any kind of processor throttling/power saving and it still has the problem.

[VLC_help]

You tried loop filter trick?

[Lotesdelere]

I'm afraid there is something wrong on your system.

This video is using a quite high bitrate (18 Mbps):
http://trailers.nerodigital.com/Warner/GetSmart_HD.mp4

and it's playing fine for me with VLC on a Core2Duo @ 2.66 MHz with an average CPU utilization of 40%.

As the M of 9800M GT stands for Mobility, I assume you are using a laptop so I guess there might be a bandwidth problem somewhere, most likely a motherboard issue.

[jonstew1983]

I tried the loop filter trick and although it helped it made maybe a 10% improvement, still far from watchable. I have 8 hours left on the trailer (~5KB/s right now) but I can play to the point where he tries to open the door without losing a frame so I think my issue must be tied to the source file in some fashion. [...a bit later...] After playing around a bit more I'm almost certain the problem is related to the source file, but I don't know where to start checking in that case.

The first 50MB of the file that is giving me problems can be found here http://www.kc8onw.net/~jonathan/torrents/ZnTs_S3_E1.mkv

[VLC_help]

You can also test with CoreAVC/FFDshow + Media Player Classic. If either combo plays it correctly, then FFmpeg used in VLC just can't handle it.

[jonstew1983]

Using CCCP and Zoom player the files play back fine. Hopefully the devs will have to time find a solution. I won't worry about it as I know developer time is hard to get these days and there has been some very definate progress and large changes with the new GUI that took a lot of that time.

[VLC_help]

Making the H.264 decoding faster is job for the FFmpeg devs.

[js2756]

Ayu's encode of ZnT (which is also 720p) works fine on my machine, as does Eclipse's release of Code Geass R2 (1280 x 720 h264) using either 0.8.6 or 0.9.2. I think it may be your machine setup.

WinXP SP2
Core2 Duo 6750 @ 2.66GHz
Geforce 8800GT
2GB Ram

[digitall2]

Ayu's encode of ZnT (which is also 720p) works fine on my machine, as does Eclipse's release of Code Geass R2 (1280 x 720 h264) using either 0.8.6 or 0.9.2. I think it may be your machine setup.

WinXP SP2
Core2 Duo 6750 @ 2.66GHz
Geforce 8800GT
2GB Ram

Same type files run smooth on Vista x64 and VLC 0.9.2 and must agree that could be the machine setup, but is definitely capable, so hope that persistence will find a solution.