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firestick 4k lock up with interlaced playback
Hi Aman

I have had a report of mediacodec playback locking up with interlaced
h264 on a firestick 4k. I have been using the fire stick for a lot of
playback of progressive h264 without problems. It seems that interlaced
content may be what is causing the issue.

Peter
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Re: firestick 4k lock up with interlaced playback [ In reply to ]
On Tue, Dec 18, 2018 at 09:56:40AM -0500, Peter Bennett wrote:
> I have had a report of mediacodec playback locking up with interlaced h264
> on a firestick 4k. I have been using the fire stick for a lot of playback of
> progressive h264 without problems. It seems that interlaced content may be
> what is causing the issue.

FWIW, I let mine run for ~35 minutes on h.264/1080i this weekend as a
test. No issues found. I can try to let it run longer this evening
if it would help.

David
--
David Engel
david@istwok.net
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Re: firestick 4k lock up with interlaced playback [ In reply to ]
On 18/12/2018 15:29, David Engel wrote:
> On Tue, Dec 18, 2018 at 09:56:40AM -0500, Peter Bennett wrote:
>> I have had a report of mediacodec playback locking up with interlaced h264
>> on a firestick 4k. I have been using the fire stick for a lot of playback of
>> progressive h264 without problems. It seems that interlaced content may be
>> what is causing the issue.
>
> FWIW, I let mine run for ~35 minutes on h.264/1080i this weekend as a
> test. No issues found. I can try to let it run longer this evening
> if it would help.
>
> David

Mine had an update on Friday, too. With MediaCodec decoding it still
reliably locks up at the end of the station ident on the recording (BBC
FOUR HD, DVB-T2, Feb 2016) from which I took the clip posted earlier.
After what seems a long time it quits with 'Video frame buffering
failed too many times.'

With standard decoding nothing seems wrong and the playback quality is
excellent. I have looked at adb log output in both cases but see
nothing that seems unusual at the position where things lock up.

I bought two, mainly to give 'Smart' capability to my daughter's unSmart
Sony family TV, which has the required HDMI port; 4K can wait and as yet
there's no MythTV installed there. I have reservations about some of
the on-line aspects of the device, but there is already full exposure to
tablets and phones. The picture and sound seem fine, and the remote
works, at least as a viewer's control device.

John P





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Re: firestick 4k lock up with interlaced playback [ In reply to ]
On 18/12/2018 15:29, David Engel wrote:
> On Tue, Dec 18, 2018 at 09:56:40AM -0500, Peter Bennett wrote:
>> I have had a report of mediacodec playback locking up with interlaced h264
>> on a firestick 4k. I have been using the fire stick for a lot of playback of
>> progressive h264 without problems. It seems that interlaced content may be
>> what is causing the issue.
>
> FWIW, I let mine run for ~35 minutes on h.264/1080i this weekend as a
> test. No issues found. I can try to let it run longer this evening
> if it would help.
>
> David

Mine had an update on Friday, too. With MediaCodec decoding it still
reliably locks up at the end of the station ident on the recording (BBC
FOUR HD, DVB-T2, Feb 2016) from which I took the clip posted earlier.
After what seems a long time it quits with 'Video frame buffering
failed too many times.'

With standard decoding nothing seems wrong and the playback quality is
excellent. I have looked at adb log output in both cases but see
nothing that seems unusual at the position where things lock up.

--------------

ISTR that mythtranscode used to have problems when subsidiary streams
would suddenly start up or close. That could perhaps be what is
happening here. In the sample I posted there was no obvious event in
the main streams that coincided with the failure, but it was close to
the end of the programme. The one I mentioned above was at the start of
the content. Stream analyses around the fail points might be useful; at
present I don't know the easiest way to do that and I can't record from
the HD channels.

John P





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Re: firestick 4k lock up with interlaced playback [ In reply to ]
On 18/12/2018 15:29, David Engel wrote:
> On Tue, Dec 18, 2018 at 09:56:40AM -0500, Peter Bennett wrote:
>> I have had a report of mediacodec playback locking up with interlaced h264
>> on a firestick 4k. I have been using the fire stick for a lot of playback of
>> progressive h264 without problems. It seems that interlaced content may be
>> what is causing the issue.
>
> FWIW, I let mine run for ~35 minutes on h.264/1080i this weekend as a
> test. No issues found. I can try to let it run longer this evening
> if it would help.
>
> David

Mine had an update on Friday, too. With MediaCodec decoding it still
reliably locks up at the end of the station ident on the recording (BBC
FOUR HD, DVB-T2, Feb 2016) from which I took the clip posted earlier.
After what seems a long time it quits with 'Video frame buffering
failed too many times.'

With standard decoding nothing seems wrong and the playback quality is
excellent. I have looked at adb log output in both cases but see
nothing that seems unusual at the position where things lock up.

--------------

ISTR that mythtranscode used to have problems when subsidiary streams
would suddenly start up or close. That could perhaps be what is
happening here. In the sample I posted there was no obvious event in
the main streams that coincided with the failure, but it was close to
the end of the programme. The one I mentioned above was at the start of
the content. Stream analyses around the fail points might be useful; at
present I don't know the easiest way to do that and I can't record from
the HD channels.

----------------------

https://www.mediafire.com/file/ah09b5pzh1o5ggy/firestick_itvHD.ts/file

is a longer file cut from a recording made this year. It plays in
mythfrontend on the firestick with the Standard decoder but sticks at
'Please wait' with MediaCodec. It plays with my nVidia card too.

John P





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Re: firestick 4k lock up with interlaced playback [ In reply to ]
On 18/12/2018 15:29, David Engel wrote:
> On Tue, Dec 18, 2018 at 09:56:40AM -0500, Peter Bennett wrote:
>> I have had a report of mediacodec playback locking up with interlaced h264
>> on a firestick 4k. I have been using the fire stick for a lot of playback of
>> progressive h264 without problems. It seems that interlaced content may be
>> what is causing the issue.
>
> FWIW, I let mine run for ~35 minutes on h.264/1080i this weekend as a
> test. No issues found. I can try to let it run longer this evening
> if it would help.
>
> David

Mine had an update on Friday, too. With MediaCodec decoding it still
reliably locks up at the end of the station ident on the recording (BBC
FOUR HD, DVB-T2, Feb 2016) from which I took the clip posted earlier.
After what seems a long time it quits with 'Video frame buffering
failed too many times.'

With standard decoding nothing seems wrong and the playback quality is
excellent. I have looked at adb log output in both cases but see
nothing that seems unusual at the position where things lock up.

--------------

ISTR that mythtranscode used to have problems when subsidiary streams
would suddenly start up or close. That could perhaps be what is
happening here. In the sample I posted there was no obvious event in
the main streams that coincided with the failure, but it was close to
the end of the programme. The one I mentioned above was at the start of
the content. Stream analyses around the fail points might be useful; at
present I don't know the easiest way to do that and I can't record from
the HD channels.

----------------------

https://www.mediafire.com/file/ah09b5pzh1o5ggy/firestick_itvHD.ts/file

is a longer file cut from a recording made this year. It plays in
mythfrontend on the firestick with the Standard decoder but sticks at
'Please wait' with MediaCodec. It plays with my nVidia card too.

-----------
And it plays with the android-for-firestick VLC, with differences in the
picture for the various acceleration options.

Here are ffprobe results for the two clips.Sometime next year, when I've
finished reading ffprobe --help, I might be able to look at different
testpoints. I'm posting only grepped results, and without the
multicoloured error preamble.

mythffprobe -hide_banner -v error -show_streams -show_format -of json
firestick_test_h264.ts | grep field

"field_order": "progressive",

mythffprobe -hide_banner -v error -show_streams -show_format -of json
firestick_itvHD.ts | grep field

"field_order": "tt",

HTH,

John P





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Re: firestick 4k lock up with interlaced playback [ In reply to ]
I've put a section of playback log at

https://www.mediafire.com/file/f9x0d2liq648op4/firestick_h264_playback.log/file

Section of log during playback of recording from DVB-T2 UK itv HD using
MediaCodec; ccommand line 'adb logcat mfe:D'

All the recordings from UK HD DVB-T2 channels that I have tried show a
similar pattern, a stream of log output rapidly filling the screen, if
they haven't already failed.

'Dropping frame' is reported at intervals of around 40 ms. Maybe it's
normal? But MDP has errors.

It looks as if this file has been processed by mythTScut, which removes
all but one video and one audio stream, but all playable files give logs
like this.
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