Jerky movies with DVDplayer

[CapedCrusader]

All the films I play with DVDplayer have this jerky effect, as if the movie stopped for a split second, and then speeded to catch up. These are very short moments, but repeat every 2 seconds or so. It's very annoying, makes it unwatchable. With mplayer, everything's ok, no such effects. I experimented with video play settings and DVDplayer cache settings, all ends the same - with this defect.

I'm running a Trusty 1.4/ 128mb with a speed switch - doesn't matter which CPU speed I choose, the problem remains. I tried Trusty-patched and non-patched default.xbe for XBMC - no difference.

Here's the log with 3 example movies:

http://pastebin.com/igG6pF2t

Can it be HDD-related? Or maybe because of the speed switch installed? One guy on a forum noticed that Trusty with a speed switch does not perform as well video-wise as the switchless one. I also don't recall such problems with my previous switchless Trusty and the same HDD.

Thanks!

Edit: Most movies also almost stop at the very beginning of playing for a few seconds.

EDIT 2: Now I remember! Few days back I was still using some XBMC version from more than a year ago (I don't remember which one) and there weren't any problems with DVDplayer! I even checked now, the same series I was watching plays choppy now and played well on an old XBMC. I suppose that previous XBMC version had been from before 128mb full utilisation was implemented.

EDIT 3: I was right! XBMC 3.3.3 does not have this problem - DVDplayer works flawlessly. So, it is 3.5-related, maybe also some versions between 3.3.3 and 3.5.

BTW: Does 3.3.3 support 128 mb?

[CapedCrusader]

So, is it possible to fix this problem?

Currently, for the above reason, I'm running 3.3.3, but Youtube can't be installed on this version for example. I suppose there are more differences, and, of course I would love to be running 3.5.

Does anyone else have this problem with 3.5? Any ideas how to deal with it?

Thanks!

[professor_jonny]

maybe you could provide a full debug log?
but testing indidivual versions up to the latest may provide some insight ?

[BuZz]

The log that was posted was not a debug log. You didn't enable debugging.

Where were you when we were posting up nightly builds / betas / release candidates ? We do rely on user feedback and testing to squash bugs before release.

Please try some more files on it, and see if it is limited to certain rips/encodings.

I may be able to provide a build to test with a couple of changes as I have at least one idea, but first please provide the debug info thanks. You can help further by uploading an example file that has the problem to ftp://aero.exotica.org.uk/incoming (call it CapedCrusader.zip or so)

[CapedCrusader]

Thanks for the replies!

The log that was posted was not a debug log. You didn't enable debugging.

Where were you when we were posting up nightly builds / betas / release candidates ? We do rely on user feedback and testing to squash bugs before release.

I was off Xboxing for about a year or so, my Xbox was broken, unfortunately.

I will enable debugging and post the log. I will also test different versions, between 3.3.3 and 3.5, as professor_jonny suggested.

[CapedCrusader]

Here is the log with a couple of jerky movies played with DVDplayer (debug enabled):

http://pastebin.com/JyijcPQU

Thank you!

[CapedCrusader]

I've just uploaded a .zip with 2 jerky files. Details in PM to Buzz follow.

[Dan Dar3]

@CapedCrusader
The second video ("Predestination") is a Xvid / MPEG4, 720x304 video stream and MP3, 128 kbps stream playing from the HDD (F: drive), CPU wise it should probably handle that, you could confirm how the CPU usage looks like from the debug mode at the top of the screen. You can see the stutter in your log every few seconds, and video stream queue getting drained. RAM looks healthly with 80 MB free (M: column).

Code: Select all

13:05:20 M: 81076224   DEBUG: CDVDPlayerAudio:: Discontinuity1 - was:24853811.073211, should be:24953822.509223, error:100011.436012
13:05:22 M: 81088512   DEBUG: CDVDPlayerAudio:: Discontinuity1 - was:26700521.022591, should be:26801830.701510, error:101309.678919
13:05:22 M: 81092608 WARNING: CDVDMessageQueue(video)::Get - asked for new data packet, with nothing available
13:05:23 M: 81104896   DEBUG: CDVDPlayerAudio:: Discontinuity1 - was:28548513.239317, should be:28649822.464459, error:101309.225141
13:05:25 M: 81108992   DEBUG: CDVDPlayerAudio:: Discontinuity1 - was:30396512.180905, should be:30497821.669638, error:101309.488733

If anything I would load the video through VirtualDub and see if it complains about it:
https://youtu.be/l5QmdNCk6Tc?t=54s

[CapedCrusader]

The thing is the two videos I uploaded as well as many others work flawlessly on 3.3.3, but stutter on 3.5 as well as 3.5.1. So, looks like there's a problem in the XBMC bulids, not in the videos themselves.

[CapedCrusader]

Just made an experiment - installed 3.5.1 on a non-modded xbox, and guess what - the video which was choppy on a Trusty works well here! I will check more files, but I'm sure it will be the same case.

It means there is an issue with build higher than 3.3.3 on my Trusty xbox, not in general! I have a Trusty board with a frequency switch, choppy videos happen on both frequencies. Unfortunately, I can't try it on another Trusty, I don't have one. Can someone please check it on a Trusty and let me know? I can send the files or point to them. It is important if this is only my board or all Trusty boards, as the latest builds are supposed to utilise the 128 mb.

Or could it be something in the code?

I will also e-mail Trusty about the issue, maybe he has some ideas.

Thank you all in advance.

[BuZz]

I didn't get around to replying to this thread before, but I did spent a couple of hours rolling back stuff to see if it made a difference - However any jerkiness I saw seemed normal (occasional slight stutters due to differing refresh rate vs video rate etc). There wasn't any major difference between 3.3 and 3.5 from my testing.

I will send you a file to try though with some sync stuff changed, and let me know if it makes a difference.

[CapedCrusader]

Great, thanks! I'm still testing different options, just checked 32589 - stutters as well. You probably won't see any difference on a stock Xbox - it's a pity I didn't come up with the idea before, it would have saved you some time maybe. Anyway, I would love to be able to use the newest builds on my Trusty. I will upload a log of the same movie file played o Trusty (incorrectly) and on the stock Xbox (correctly). Maybe this will show more clearly what the problem is. But first I will try your file maybe. I'm really grateful for your effort!

[RextheC]

For some movies i have to choose the mplayer that they play well. The most movies plays good for me with dvd-player but only since i have choose the dvd-player option fast mode (MPEG2/MPEG4/H264) and the "skip not references frames" option. If there is no higher resolution than 720p it should be run.
Also i have recognize that when i scroll fast through my movies and than select one immediatelly the ram is running out and xbox freezes.
Using rev. 3.5. Perhaps it helps a little bit.

[CapedCrusader]

Ok, as promised, I'm submitting two logs with the same movie file played (both XBMC4XBOX 3.5.1):

Trusty (1.4 Mhz, 128 mb ram) - playing very jerky:

http://pastebin.com/tQ0RCmF6

Stock Xbox - playing perfectly:

http://pastebin.com/1cdXeKwu

Once again - Buzz, thank you very much for the custom version you compiled, which enables me to play movies almost perfectly on the Trusty.

EDIT: One more log from the test build, Trusty, plays well (maybe as well as on the Stock Xbox, I'm not able to tell 100% if it is any worse):

http://pastebin.com/ELWnd1sW

[CapedCrusader]

I tested more - some videos are still jerky on the test build/ stutter at the beginning. It's still much better than 3.5 though, about 60 - 70 % improvement. I will submit logs soon.

[iray1979]

Just made an experiment - installed 3.5.1 on a non-modded xbox, and guess what - the video which was choppy on a Trusty works well here! I will check more files, but I'm sure it will be the same case.

It means there is an issue with build higher than 3.3.3 on my Trusty xbox, not in general! I have a Trusty board with a frequency switch, choppy videos happen on both frequencies. Unfortunately, I can't try it on another Trusty, I don't have one. Can someone please check it on a Trusty and let me know? I can send the files or point to them. It is important if this is only my board or all Trusty boards, as the latest builds are supposed to utilise the 128 mb.

Or could it be something in the code?

I will also e-mail Trusty about the issue, maybe he has some ideas.

Thank you all in advance.

I dont mean to resurrect an old thread here, but I am having the same problem with my Trusty Xbox. I run 3.3.3 and video playback isnt jerky, but on 3.5.1 or higher it is. If someone has a fix or a file for this it would be extremely appreciated!

[Dan Dar3]

Can you provide a DEBUG log from 3.5.1 at least if not both (see viewtopic.php?f=6&t=65 on how to produce one) and a screenshot of video play back while in debug mode (press Black button on controller, will produce a band with codec / playback information about the video being played, as well as dropped frames if any).

Once you provide that information, you could try checking / playing with the settings in the DVDPlayer section.
https://www.xbmc4xbox.org.uk/wiki/File: ... player.jpg