amd64 VLC fails to play mencoder-produced h264 movies

[liontooth]

This bug is reasonably well confirmed and tested.

Summary:

In brief, the problem is that h264 files produced with mencoder don't display properly on Linux amd64. The picture is full of blocks to the point of looking milky. The sound is perfect.

Delimiting the problem:

xine and mplayer will play the same files perfectly on amd64. In addition, vlc on i686 plays the files perfectly -- the same files that don't display correctly on amd64.

Finally, h264 files created with ffmpeg play perfectly fine with VLC on Linux amd64.

This is true of all versions of VLC from Debian's 0.8.4 to the nightly builds 0.8.5-svn20060219-0.

The problem appears to be triggered by mencoder's way of creating h264 files, and it is triggered only for VLC on Linux amd64.

Details:

When I encode a file with mencoder, using a script with these commands:

mencoder $1 -o /dev/null -oac copy -ovc x264 \
-x264encopts pass=1:bitrate=$2:bframes=3:subq=2:threads=2

echo "Starting second pass"
mencoder $1 -o $STEM-h264-$2.avi -oac mp3lame -lameopts cbr:br=64 -ovc x264 \
-x264encopts pass=2:bitrate=$2:bframes=3:subq=6:threads=2:frameref=4:8x8dct

I get a file that plays without problems in mplayer/kplayer, xine (1.1.1), and ffplay. In vlc, the sound is fine, but the video is all fuzzy, lots of small blocks, and unwatchable (8-second sample available).

If instead of mencoder I use this command in ffmpeg, vlc has no problems:

ffmpeg -i $1 -f avi -vcodec h264 -b $2 -s 640x480 -acodec mp3 $OUTFILE

Does someone know what's going on? This is with vlc for amd64, nightly build 0.8.5-svn20060212-0 on Debian sid.

I'd love to have this fixed, as I'd like to be able to stream the files produced by mencoder. BTW I asked on the mencoder list and they suggested it was a VLC problem -- which is plausible, since ffplay shows the mencoder file fine.

Dave

[liontooth]

Is anyone else seeing this? Is there a better place to report the bug?

[Teetrinker]

I would suggest not to use avi. Try a different container like mp4 or mkv.
Create the video with -of rawvideo and mux it with MP4Box or mkvmerge. Mkvmerge come without h264 raw import support. You have to create a mp4 and import this with mkvmerge, if you want use mkv.

MP4Box http://gpac.sourceforge.net/
mkvmerge http://www.bunkus.org/videotools/mkvtoolnix/

[liontooth]

Thanks -- different containers may be useful. However, this is an amd64-platform specific bug, not a general shortcoming of vlc. The avi container works fine on i686, even with files encoded on amd64.

Who develops vlc on amd64?

Dave

[olb]

Thanks -- different containers may be useful. However, this is an amd64-platform specific bug, not a general shortcoming of vlc. The avi container works fine on i686, even with files encoded on amd64.

Who develops vlc on amd64?

Dave

I've the same bug on Linux version 2.6.15-1-k7 on a athlon XP (Debian unstable). It used to work with mplayer (not vlc which was up to date). But since I've updated mplayer, it doesn't work. No way to play x264 encoded video....

Any suggestion ?

[Guest]

If it happens in both VLC and MPlayer, then it's probably an ffmpeg bug. Try compiling VLC with the lastest ffmpeg SVN. If the problem still occurs, then report it to the ffmpeg-devel list.

[xtophe]

indeed the snapshot look like a old ffmpeg.
Sadly the amd64 debian nightlies are brocken at the moment.

You should try to compile ffmpeg from svn.