LE 11 choppy playback with VDPAU and NVidia

jettison · November 16, 2023 at 1:20 AM

Hello everybody,

I was using LibreELEC-Generic.x86_64-10.0.4 on some old laptop with Intel Core2Duo and NVidia Geforce 9300M GS (uses nvidia-legacy-340.180). I have seen, that the NVidia support has been continued in LibreELEC-Generic-legacy.x86_64-11.0.3, so I gave it a try. I am playing H264 on 1280x720. Seemingly HW Acceleration is enabled, I have CPU load about 20-30%, but the playback is choppy. It shows around 25-30 FPS. Same video on LE 10 plays seamless with the same VDPAU acceleration at ~60Hz. CPU load is similar, maybe a bit higher.

What is the reason for the stuttering on LE 11?

I am no linux expert, but tried my best to find something. Here are the significant differences of the two systems.

LibreELEC (official): 11.0.3 (Generic-legacy.x86_64)

Code

DMMultiplexK:~ # nvidia-smi
Wed Nov 15 19:06:22 2023       
+------------------------------------------------------+                       
| NVIDIA-SMI 340.108    Driver Version: 340.108        |                       
|-------------------------------+----------------------+----------------------+
| GPU  Name        Persistence-M| Bus-Id        Disp.A | Volatile Uncorr. ECC |
| Fan  Temp  Perf  Pwr:Usage/Cap|         Memory-Usage | GPU-Util  Compute M. |
|===============================+======================+======================|
|   0  GeForce 9300M GS    Off  | 0000:06:00.0     N/A |                  N/A |
| N/A   58C   P12    N/A /  N/A |     47MiB /   255MiB |     N/A      Default |
+-------------------------------+----------------------+----------------------+
                                                                               
+-----------------------------------------------------------------------------+
| Compute processes:                                               GPU Memory |
|  GPU       PID  Process name                                     Usage      |
|=============================================================================|
|    0            Not Supported                                               |
+-----------------------------------------------------------------------------+

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Code

DMMultiplexK:/etc/X11 # lspci -kv | sed -n "/VGA compatible controller/,/Kernel modules/p"
06:00.0 VGA compatible controller: NVIDIA Corporation G98M [GeForce 9300M GS] (rev a1) (prog-if 00 [VGA controller])
    Subsystem: Micro-Star International Co., Ltd. [MSI] G98M [GeForce 9300M GS]
    Flags: bus master, fast devsel, latency 0, IRQ 31
    Memory at fd000000 (32-bit, non-prefetchable) [size=16M]
    Memory at d0000000 (64-bit, prefetchable) [size=256M]
    Memory at fa000000 (64-bit, non-prefetchable) [size=32M]
    I/O ports at ec00 [size=128]
    Expansion ROM at 000c0000 [virtual] [disabled] [size=128K]
    Capabilities: [60] Power Management version 3
    Capabilities: [68] MSI: Enable+ Count=1/1 Maskable- 64bit+
    Capabilities: [78] Express Endpoint, MSI 00
    Capabilities: [100] Virtual Channel
    Capabilities: [128] Power Budgeting <?>
    Capabilities: [600] Vendor Specific Information: ID=0001 Rev=1 Len=024 <?>
    Kernel driver in use: nvidia

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Code

DMMultiplexK:/etc # vdpauinfo
display: :0.0   screen: 0
Segmentation fault

end of dmesg after running vdpauinfo:

Code

[  794.081336] vdpauinfo[819]: segfault at 0 ip 0000000000000000 sp 00007ffd7eb0b378 error 14 in vdpauinfo[400000+3000] likely on CPU 0 (core 0, socket 0)
[  794.081380] Code: Unable to access opcode bytes at 0xffffffffffffffd6.

Code

DMMultiplexK:/etc # vainfo
Trying display: x11
libva info: VA-API version 1.17.0
libva error: vaGetDriverNameByIndex() failed with unknown libva error, driver_name = (null)
vaInitialize failed with error code -1 (unknown libva error),exit

Code

DMMultiplexK:/usr/lib/nvidia # find / -name *nvidia*
/run/kernel-overlays/modules/6.1.38/nvidia/nvidia.ko
/usr/lib/kernel-overlays/base/lib/modules/6.1.38/nvidia/nvidia.ko
/usr/lib/nvidia/nvidia.ko
/usr/lib/nvidia-legacy/nvidia.ko
/var/lib/nvidia.ko

The same commands for LibreELEC (official): 10.0.4 (Generic.x86_64)

nvidia-smi and lspci -kv | sed -n "/VGA compatible controller/,/Kernel modules/p" are the same.

Code

DMMultiplexKodi:~ # vdpauinfo
display: :0.0   screen: 0
API version: 1
Information string: NVIDIA VDPAU Driver Shared Library  340.108  Wed Dec 11 14:31:24 PST 2019

Video surface:

name   width height types
-------------------------------------------
420     4096  4096  NV12 YV12 
422     4096  4096  UYVY YUYV 

Decoder capabilities:

name                        level macbs width height
----------------------------------------------------
MPEG1                           0  8192  2048  2048
MPEG2_SIMPLE                    3  8192  2048  2048
MPEG2_MAIN                      3  8192  2048  2048
H264_BASELINE                  --- not supported ---
H264_MAIN                      41  8190  2032  2048
H264_HIGH                      41  8190  2032  2048
VC1_SIMPLE                      1  8190  2048  2048
VC1_MAIN                        2  8190  2048  2048
VC1_ADVANCED                    4  8190  2048  2048
MPEG4_PART2_SP                 --- not supported ---
MPEG4_PART2_ASP                --- not supported ---
DIVX4_QMOBILE                  --- not supported ---
DIVX4_MOBILE                   --- not supported ---
DIVX4_HOME_THEATER             --- not supported ---
DIVX4_HD_1080P                 --- not supported ---
DIVX5_QMOBILE                  --- not supported ---
DIVX5_MOBILE                   --- not supported ---
DIVX5_HOME_THEATER             --- not supported ---
DIVX5_HD_1080P                 --- not supported ---
H264_CONSTRAINED_BASELINE      --- not supported ---
H264_EXTENDED                  --- not supported ---
H264_PROGRESSIVE_HIGH          --- not supported ---
H264_CONSTRAINED_HIGH          --- not supported ---
H264_HIGH_444_PREDICTIVE       --- not supported ---
HEVC_MAIN                      --- not supported ---
HEVC_MAIN_10                   --- not supported ---
HEVC_MAIN_STILL                --- not supported ---
HEVC_MAIN_12                   --- not supported ---
HEVC_MAIN_444                  --- not supported ---

Output surface:

name              width height nat types
----------------------------------------------------
B8G8R8A8          8192  8192    y  Y8U8V8A8 V8U8Y8A8 A4I4 I4A4 A8I8 I8A8 
R10G10B10A2       8192  8192    y  Y8U8V8A8 V8U8Y8A8 A4I4 I4A4 A8I8 I8A8 

Bitmap surface:

name              width height
------------------------------
B8G8R8A8          8192  8192
R8G8B8A8          8192  8192
R10G10B10A2       8192  8192
B10G10R10A2       8192  8192
A8                8192  8192

Video mixer:

feature name                    sup
------------------------------------
DEINTERLACE_TEMPORAL             y
DEINTERLACE_TEMPORAL_SPATIAL     y
INVERSE_TELECINE                 y
NOISE_REDUCTION                  y
SHARPNESS                        y
LUMA_KEY                         y
HIGH QUALITY SCALING - L1        -
HIGH QUALITY SCALING - L2        -
HIGH QUALITY SCALING - L3        -
HIGH QUALITY SCALING - L4        -
HIGH QUALITY SCALING - L5        -
HIGH QUALITY SCALING - L6        -
HIGH QUALITY SCALING - L7        -
HIGH QUALITY SCALING - L8        -
HIGH QUALITY SCALING - L9        -

parameter name                  sup      min      max
-----------------------------------------------------
VIDEO_SURFACE_WIDTH              y         1     4096
VIDEO_SURFACE_HEIGHT             y         1     4096
CHROMA_TYPE                      y  
LAYERS                           y         0        4

attribute name                  sup      min      max
-----------------------------------------------------
BACKGROUND_COLOR                 y  
CSC_MATRIX                       y  
NOISE_REDUCTION_LEVEL            y      0.00     1.00
SHARPNESS_LEVEL                  y     -1.00     1.00
LUMA_KEY_MIN_LUMA                y  
LUMA_KEY_MAX_LUMA                y

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Code

DMMultiplexKodi:~ # vainfo
libva info: VA-API version 1.11.0
libva info: Trying to open /usr/lib/dri/nvidia_drv_video.so
libva info: va_openDriver() returns -1
vaInitialize failed with error code -1 (unknown libva error),exit

Code

DMMultiplexKodi:~ # find / -name *nvidia*
/dev/nvidia0
/dev/nvidiactl
/etc/X11/xorg-nvidia-legacy.conf
/etc/X11/xorg-nvidia.conf
/proc/irq/31/nvidia
/proc/driver/nvidia
/run/systemd/units/invocation:[email protected]
/run/kernel-overlays/modules/5.10.161/nvidia
/run/kernel-overlays/modules/5.10.161/nvidia/nvidia.ko
/run/kernel-overlays/modules/5.10.161/nvidia/nvidia-uvm.ko
/run/kernel-overlays/modules/5.10.161/nvidia/nvidia-modeset.ko
/run/kernel-overlays/modules/5.10.161/kernel/drivers/i2c/busses/i2c-nvidia-gpu.ko
/sys/kernel/slab/nvidia_p2p_page_t
/sys/kernel/slab/nvidia_stack_t
/sys/kernel/slab/nvidia_pte_t
/sys/bus/pci/drivers/nvidia
/sys/module/nvidia
/sys/module/nvidia/drivers/pci:nvidia
/usr/bin/nvidia-legacy-smi
/usr/bin/nvidia-legacy-xconfig
/usr/bin/nvidia-main-smi
/usr/bin/nvidia-main-xconfig
/usr/bin/nvidia-smi
/usr/bin/nvidia-xconfig
/usr/lib/kernel-overlays/base/lib/modules/5.10.161/kernel/drivers/i2c/busses/i2c-nvidia-gpu.ko
/usr/lib/kernel-overlays/base/lib/modules/5.10.161/nvidia
/usr/lib/kernel-overlays/base/lib/modules/5.10.161/nvidia/nvidia-modeset.ko
/usr/lib/kernel-overlays/base/lib/modules/5.10.161/nvidia/nvidia-uvm.ko
/usr/lib/kernel-overlays/base/lib/modules/5.10.161/nvidia/nvidia.ko
/usr/lib/libGLX_nvidia.so.0
/usr/lib/libGL_nvidia-legacy.so.1
/usr/lib/libnvidia-glcore.so.340.108
/usr/lib/libnvidia-glcore.so.460.67
/usr/lib/libnvidia-ml.so.1
/usr/lib/libnvidia-ml.so.340.108
/usr/lib/libnvidia-ml.so.460.67
/usr/lib/libnvidia-tls.so.340.108
/usr/lib/libnvidia-tls.so.460.67
/usr/lib/nvidia
/usr/lib/nvidia/nvidia.ko
/usr/lib/nvidia-legacy
/usr/lib/nvidia-legacy/nvidia.ko
/usr/lib/udev/rules.d/96-nvidia.rules
/usr/lib/vdpau/libvdpau_nvidia-legacy.so.1
/usr/lib/vdpau/libvdpau_nvidia-main.so.1
/usr/lib/vdpau/libvdpau_nvidia.so
/usr/lib/vdpau/libvdpau_nvidia.so.1
/usr/lib/xorg/modules/drivers/nvidia-legacy_drv.so
/usr/lib/xorg/modules/drivers/nvidia-main_drv.so
/usr/lib/xorg/modules/drivers/nvidia_drv.so
/usr/lib/xorg/modules/extensions/libglx_nvidia-legacy.so
/usr/lib/xorg/modules/extensions/libglx_nvidia.so
/var/lib/nvidia-xconfig
/var/lib/nvidia-smi
/var/lib/libvdpau_nvidia.so
/var/lib/libvdpau_nvidia.so.1
/var/lib/nvidia.ko
/var/lib/nvidia_drv.so
/var/lib/libnvidia-ml.so.1

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Thank you for your help!:)

jettison · November 16, 2023 at 6:27 AM

Forgot to mention. If I disable VDPAU HW acceleration, the playback is fine, but of course it results in higher CPU load.

I have tried to disable C states, but it made no difference in the quality of playback.

**Da Flex** · November 16, 2023 at 5:11 PM

Maybe this helps: Click!