[Q] DLNA Divx/Xvid playback - TouchPad Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting

I am trying to stream my anime using DLNA BubbleUPNP. My computer is running PS3 Media Server because its been a reliable DLNA server for me for quite some time on many different platforms. It is hosting over a terabyte of anime.
I am having issues with divx/xvid playback strangely. All my videos that require hardware acceleration (1080p h264s) work fine but older encodes using divx/xvid in an AVI/MKV container do not work. I've tried MX Video, dice player, rock player, and bs player. Only BS Player would seem to actually render the videos at all but it strangely cuts to the middle of the video.
I watch tons of anime so pretty much my older anime episodes do not work but newer ones do. I am running the latest CM9 nightly (3/29). Well any insights would be helpful. I would think any recent player would play my old anime without a problem but it just freezes and crashes. Sometimes it would play audio before it does that.
Sorry if this is in the wrong forums and I haven't had much luck finding an answer while searching.

Problem solved.
I am not entirely sure what I did but I did a few changes to the ps3 media server client and fixed everything. It may have been related to me changing the number of transcoding cores to 4 instead of 8. It somehow thought I had 8 cores. I also added avi to the streaming extensions of the Android.conf in rendered and that may have done something. (I actually dont know what that did but I just wanted to try)
So it seems I am able to use Dice Player, BS Player, and MX Video to watch my videos now. BS Player seems to be the most reliable but all the players seem very fickle. Dice player likes to try HW acceleration on everything then crashes. BS Player knows when to switch between SW and HW so it seems to be the most compatible. I really don't like BS Player because I can't seem scroll through the video which is pretty bad. I've also noticed my video stops for no reason after a while which is frustrating too.
I would like to know if anyone has a better setup with a particular combination that works for them best.

I'm also using Bubble pnp, but with TVersity and also Samsung's All Share. Both seam to work, though All share adds metadata to all your media files for thumbnail generation. So if you have a large library, it takes a while to generate the extra files the first time you start the program. but having thumbnail previews is really nice.
I've also been using Dice player, but on a different tablet without any issues on most formats. I'll try it out on my TP and see if I can get it to work.

One thing I've done, which is probably something you might wanna consider at some point if you plan on continuing to stream, is doing a permanent transcode of your video files. Handbrake is a free tool that allows you to transcode almost anything into almost anything else, and it has an Android setting. I really like how that works, personally. I have all of my video files (TV series, anime, movies, etc.) all transcoded into M4V files, and they all play gorgeously on everything - my PS3, my ATV2G, my tablet, my phone. Beats the crap out of the AVI files, and they're slightly smaller, too. H264 is the way to go, and this changes everything to work great for that. You can even soft-code and hard-code subs into the shows if you want.
As I said, my favourite part of all this is the files are universally accepted on everything. My TP, my Android phone (running CM7), my PS3, my ATV2G, my dad's iPhone, everything.

Hah, I am firmly against re-encoding all my anime because I have a lot and it just bothers me when I change things from its original format.
I wish these DLNA browsers software like skifta and bubbleupnp were more customizeable in their UI. They all function perfectly fine but sometimes I want to try some different layout once in a while. I can see thumbnails fine for everything but I think it would be better if there were more modern 3d effects to sort of flip through all my anime playing small clips. Overall, I really have no complaints of my set up and have just minor stability issues with certain anime encodings.

Using ES File Explorer and MX Player, I can stream XviD flawlessly with no transcoding of any kind. 720p MKV mostly the same. 1080p does naturally buffer quite a bit due to the high bit rate.

My PS3 media server method has stopped working for whatever reason . It seems anything with mencoder avi files just crashes any chance for playback for some reason.
I've looked into SMB file sharing via ES File Explorer + MX Video player but for some reason everything refuses to even run. I can browse my windows shares fine but I can't play anything. It actually worked at one point but I am not sure what changed. Streaming my anime seems so fickle.
I've tried using TVersity + BubblePNP and everything also worked flawlessly at one point. Then TVersity refuses to even load itself and crashes right away. This is getting a little sad.
I've tried Windows Media Center and shared my videos but it magically refuses to show all my folders containing only mkv and ogm files. These are apparently unsupported formats so they won't even show up in my bubbleupnp browser. Somehow everything that did show up worked perfectly.
I've tried and gotten a lot of different ways to work...but somehow it magically just stops working. I am hoping someone has like some magic bullet solution to all of this. As of now I can only play stuff that are hardware accelerated. Maybe I shouldn't be so stubborn about re-encoding all my anime but I really like it the way it is now lol.

Has anyone tried Serviio? I'm getting ready to upgrade my home file server and was searching for solutions when this popped up.
It seems to support transcoding and the like but would be interested in informed opinions if any are available.
ByteWrencher

So I reinstalled TVersity a few times and now it mysteriously works like a charm. I really like it now. Seems to reliably play all my stuff fine. The really cool part is I can host my files online and access it while away from home as long as my computer is on.
I also tried Serviio. It seems to really surprisingly well also. Its a little bit user unfriendly without a default GUI. I just used the Serviidroid app to configure the Serviio server so its fine now. I think its actually pretty good. I guess it lacks the polish of more mainstream programs but it seems to do the job just fine. I'll have to play around more to see if it chokes on anything.
For now I hope TVersity is my last stop because it seems to work pretty well when it works.

Related

[Q] Video Questions

I've installed RockPlayer on the NC and it seems to run standard def video (avi) that I've got in the 20-25 fps range while hd (720p) video is pretty much a slide show. What are the NC's capabilities video wise?
I ran quadrant and can see that the 3D performance isn't good compared to my Samsung Captivate but does that apply to video as well? I've played the same videos on my Captivate using RockPlayer and the stock video player and the stock player works much better than RockPlayer on the phone with much smoother playback. I've tried to copy the video player to the NC but get install errors every time so I'm guessing that it's incompatible.
Are there better video players that people recommend?
I am using mixzing to watch my movies. Works great!
Anyone else getting out of sync audio on... Everything? I've tried lots of sw player and not a one was in sync (avi, mp4, sd, hd). From what I've read, 2.2 should fix this, but bummer if it doesn't. I've got an ipad, and want to want the nook instead since the ipad isn't the laptop replace I thout it would be.
EDIT: Looks like MP4's are in Sync, so I assume it's the FFMPEG software decode that these players are using, as the MP4 should be done in hardware. Hopefully this thing'll get 2.2 before Jan. 3rd when my B&N return is up!
plympton said:
Anyone else getting out of sync audio on... Everything? I've tried lots of sw player and not a one was in sync (avi, mp4, sd, hd). From what I've read, 2.2 should fix this, but bummer if it doesn't. I've got an ipad, and want to wNt the nook instead since the ipad isn't the laptop replace I thout it would be.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I'm having the same problem and hoping someone figures out why. I can't imagine it's a hardware problem...
What exactly is the point on watching a HD file in a non HD device? With the Nook's screen you can get away with a 480P video and it'll look fantastic. Lower resolutions will look pretty decent too. Pixels are all nice and good but there's a time and a place for everything... well, in this case only a place and that's your living room big screen TV
Using the stock player on the Nook I am having no issues with audio and video staying in sync.
Mixzing is great, but won't play avi files. I don't want to have to convert all my files just to play on one device...
act 1 video player works fine for me no sync issues
godsfilth said:
act 1 video player works fine for me no sync issues
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Per your post I checked this out and you are right...it does work great with more options while playing. I think the only way to "back" out of a movie is to use the "n" button though. ?

yet another video thread...

what I've tried...
-rockplayer 1.6.3
-qqplayer
-vplayer (unlocked)
-vital player
What I watch..
-mostly divx avis haven't bothered trying nor do i care about mkvs at this point
ideally, where I would play video from nfs/cifs mounted storage
-cifs is working via cifs manager
what I've noticed
-rockplayer doesn't want to play anything
-qqplayer plays things but its choppy
-vplayer doesnt want to play anything either
- vital player cant play anything outside of /sdcard and doesnt play anything.
by doesnt work i mean i see the file in the player, i select it, either nothing happens or it appears to load and just closes the app. (yes software decode mode)
as a side note I've also noticed adb push file.avi /sdcard is much slower than my old 32gb class2 microsd card in my evo, and slower than the internal 16gb storage in my nexus s. (1266 KB/s (732659712 bytes in 565.100s))
anyone else having as much trouble as I?
My avi's play fine with rockplayer universal
Sent from my Xoom using XDA Premium App
You know whats strange? This device can handle the mkv format just fine.. whereas my gtab cannot.. yet plays avi's without any issues what so ever.
My m4vs, at first, will blank with weird rainbow lines for first few seconds but play terrific on RockPlayer afterward. Every time I select a m4v file.
Didn't try other formats such as avi, mkv, wmv, ogg, etc.
Tried VPlayer Unlocker, QQPlayer, all no good.
I'm looking forward to either VLC or CorePlayer which I think will hit first, on twitter, it's said to be expected to go out by middle of this month. Let's hope.
i dont know why, but every time i try to load an MKV file onto my xoom, windows explorer crashes. anyone else have this problem?
Blades said:
You know whats strange? This device can handle the mkv format just fine.. whereas my gtab cannot.. yet plays avi's without any issues what so ever.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
But do you get audio?
Here's what I've found:
I suppose it depends on the audio that's muxed in. AAC should work in place of AC3 - downmixed to stereo. Though I actually haven't tried multichannel aac, I doubt it would work out correctly. Question is, do dts and ac3 pass thru work (thru HDMI)
Sent from my HTC HD2 using Tapatalk
I stated this in another post for video, so here goes again.
PLEX
I am working with the Android devs for Plex right now as a beta tester. At this very moment he is working on the video subsystem. Once the kinks are ironed out the next update will be pushed to the market.
I dont know about you, but I dont like having to encode my movies into another format just so I can watch them on my phone/tablet. Also having a collection closing in on 1000 movies makes that even more of a pain. I like the idea of having a server at home push my movies, NO MATTER the format to my phone/tablet.
Plex on my Nexus S looks near perfect, and there is early work being done to improve the video quality.
If I had to take a guess I would say the public is about two weeks or less away from an update that enables playback on the Xoom. Even better the interface will be tweaked to take advantage of the screen size and Tegra chip after that.
I will post in the forum the moment the official release goes live for our new toy.

Watching DVDs (sort of) on the Xoom

I tried out an app I've used on my phone before for streaming. VLC Stream & Convert. Basically you leave VLC running on your PC, the app connects to it through the VLC web interface and lets you browse for files, once you pick something it has VLC convert it to an Android compatible format then streams the output to your device.
Since it can stream anything that VLC can play that means it capable of using ripped DVD. I tried it out with a couple ISOs I had on my file server and they worked. three were a few problems though. Obviously it's a video stream so menus won't work. That's fine if the DVD goes straight into the movie, but otherwise you can end up in a loop of the menu. I did find that you can pick which title you want to play in the VLC menu and it'll just switch over to streaming that.
Also, you have to run the app in zoom mode, not stretch to fit or the video is really small. Which was the only other snag I ran into, since the app was written for phone the video options Max out at settings for a smaller screen.
Have you tried Plex for streaming movies, its a lot more efficient way of streaming to your Xoom
Sent from my Xoom using Tapatalk

BSPlayer - A good video player, but with a quirk.

BACKGROUND STORY NO ONE ASKED FOR FIRST:
I was using MX Video Player for awhile, but was kind of annoyed at how it would drop a frame every now and then with some of my video files (even using the Motorola sanctioned x264 encoding options of no CABAC, no B-Frames, no weighted-P or 8x8 DCT) and wanted to look for a new video player.
I was turned onto both Dice Player and BS Player. Both of these players seemed to play back video much better than MX Video Player, with no stutter or frame drop in my 720p files, so I was mostly happy. However, both of them had an issue I didn't like. Dice Player's software was only available in Trial form since their checkout account was suspended. BS Player wouldn't seek in some of my MKV files.
I scrapped Dice Player as there was no workaround for the BIG ASS CLICK HERE TO BUY BANNER AT THE TOP OF THE SCREEN at the moment, but I started to investigate why BS Player wouldn't seek in some of my movies yet seek in others. (Dice Player seeked no problem, same for MX Video Player.)
My investigation concluded with BS Player having some sort of seeking problem with any movie file that was over 2GB. (That's 2,147,483,648 or 2,048MB.)
Other than that and what some say an interface that needs to be worked on, I think it's a great program. Just wanted to give a heads up to anyone who uses this player or is looking for a good movie player the quirk I found with it...
Most of my encodes with the proper baseline profile at CQ 22/AAC 160 are usually under 2GB, but I s'pose for the 3 movies I have that have issues, I'll try for CQ 23/AAC 128 and see if it is under 2GB and acceptable quality.
Hope this helps someone!!
Yea man - I agree. I was having issues w/ my MKV files - found Dice player and it worked fine - went to buy it but nogo. Found BS Player - works great as well.
Interface is a bit clunky - but I can live w/ that!
+1
Hi,
How you installed the bsplayer on xoom, since market says it's incompatible?
using tiamat rom. Any help?
mateoosh said:
Hi,
How you installed the bsplayer on xoom, since market says it's incompatible?
using tiamat rom. Any help?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I'm stock.
New version of this app in the Market today. Fixes my quirk plus adds ICS support. What what!
I must issue a warning... don't download the latest update to this software. Although it fixes seeking in files over 2GB, it breaks hardware acceleration so videos now play back in slow motions.
Very disappointed.
EDIT: Attached the old version as well as the old plugin for those who upgraded and didn't have a backup of it!! Old version works nicely minus the >2GB seek bug.
Will give it a try thanks.
Luckily I bought the Dice player before the market went down. One thing that is not mentioned a lot about it though.
I work in Africa every other month, no wi-fi. So after two weeks Dice player stops working as it cannot call home. This annoys me.

Chromecast Video - A Chrome App That Streams Local Video From Your Computer To Chrome

I've posted my Chrome App late last night and has been a big hit on Reddit. Anywho, while we've ran into a couple people with issues it's been a pretty smooth rollout.
If you want to try it, here it is. It's, rather cleverly, called "Chromecast Video" .
https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/chromecast-video/cnciopoikihiagdjbjpnocolokfelagl
Let me know how much you love it, hate it, and want to see your bug fixed
-----------
Known issues:
// TODO
Mat.
Great start! So far gives me about a 50% success ratio, at least with mp4 files. And some of those that start successfully die after about 30 seconds. But the ones that stream successfully are smooth.
Reddit comments thread, that should be added in OP:
http://www.reddit.com/r/Chromecast/comments/1ybzw3/chromecast_video_a_chrome_app_that_streams_local/
Could you also add download link that does not require google account login?
PS if you want to know literally everything about acidhax start HERE and dig google
Avia does that
I'm going to check this out tonight, but given that there doesn't appear to be any transcoding going on, is it safe to assume that you still can't play .mkv files with audio?
I keep holding out in hopes that I don't need to convert my huge collection of media to h.264 in an .mp4 container.
mkhopper said:
I'm going to check this out tonight, but given that there doesn't appear to be any transcoding going on, is it safe to assume that you still can't play .mkv files with audio?
I keep holding out in hopes that I don't need to convert my huge collection of media to h.264 in an .mp4 container.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
LOL, well, if anyone here is good at NaCl development we can get some ffmpeg transcoding happening
Yet another reason to run Chrome... I may be converted yet...
BTW, added your extension to the FAQ.
It seemed to work but would stop after a few minutes
mkhopper said:
I'm going to check this out tonight, but given that there doesn't appear to be any transcoding going on, is it safe to assume that you still can't play .mkv files with audio?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Doesn't play mkv at all as far as I can tell. I just get a spinning circle forever if I try.
enricong said:
It seemed to work but would stop after a few minutes
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Some users have this problem. I honestly don't know what it is, it could be a Chrome bug or a WiFi driver bug.
Edit:
All I'm really doing is creating a Webserver on the Chrome App, and the Chromecast requests media from you. It'll just drop randomly for certain people.
acidhax said:
Some users have this problem. I honestly don't know what it is, it could be a Chrome bug or a WiFi driver bug.
Edit:
All I'm really doing is creating a Webserver on the Chrome App, and the Chromecast requests media from you. It'll just drop randomly for certain people.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Is there an option to show debugging info or logging to try to determine the cause?
acidhax said:
All I'm really doing is creating a Webserver on the Chrome App, and the Chromecast requests media from you. It'll just drop randomly for certain people.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Could also be other extensions or antivirus
On this thread the tab casting problem (yes, I realize it probably uses a different mechanism, but it's still within Chrome) ended up being Adware Antivirus, and reinstallation of the Cast extension.
enricong said:
Is there an option to show debugging info or logging to try to determine the cause?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Not that I'm aware of..
enricong said:
Is there an option to show debugging info or logging to try to determine the cause?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Fixed it. Update is being processed as we speak!
Thanks
MKV plays fine, but without sound.
Also, is it possible to support subs?
acidhax said:
Fixed it. Update is being processed as we speak!
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Confirmed - all better now. With version 0.9.6.5 all mp4 videos play without interruption.
Another minor problem: if I attempt to play a video that doesn't load successfully (for example one of my mkv files), the Chromecast remains stuck on a blank screen and I cannot cast any more videos successfully until the Chromecast Video extension is shut down and restarted. It looks like the UI is still functioning, but maybe the background http server is stuck?
DJames1 said:
Confirmed - all better now. With version 0.9.6.5 all mp4 videos play without interruption.
Another minor problem: if I attempt to play a video that doesn't load successfully (for example one of my mkv files), the Chromecast remains stuck on a blank screen and I cannot cast any more videos successfully until the Chromecast Video extension is shut down and restarted. It looks like the UI is still functioning, but maybe the background http server is stuck?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Guys MKV is a container, and have slim to none information about whats in it.
Really think the developer would love to know which Audio/Video codec you use
http://www.videohelp.com/tools/MediaInfo <- Download that tool and the codecs will show up, they would help the developer understanding which codecs works and not.
bormeth said:
Guys MKV is a container, and have slim to none information about whats in it.
Really think the developer would love to know which Audio/Video codec you use
http://www.videohelp.com/tools/MediaInfo <- Download that tool and the codecs will show up, they would help the developer understanding which codecs works and not.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Generally my mkv files are all H.264 video generated by Handbrake, the same as my mp4 files. The difference is likely to be in the audio tracks. My mkv files all have either a single AC3 DD5.1 sound track, or else an AC3 DD5.1 sound track plus an AAC stereo sound track like the mp4 files. I stopped including the AC3 DD5.1 sound track in my mp4 files because I found that many (if not most) mp4 players will only accept a single AAC stereo sound track and nothing else. I sometimes wonder what was the point of designing container file formats that allow multiple sound tracks when so many players seem to choke on files that use that capability! Even Microsoft Windows Media Player doesn't have the basic ability to select which audio track to use when there are multiple tracks.
DJames1 said:
I sometimes wonder what was the point of designing container file formats that allow multiple sound tracks when so many players seem to choke on files that use that capability! Even Microsoft Windows Media Player doesn't have the basic ability to select which audio track to use when there are multiple tracks.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Yes, that's the general problem with containers... Having multiple streams requires additional logic on the player's side that takes it more toward a DVD/BD player, while most media players are more simple. In some cases players "cheat" and their "support" for a container is simply "pretend it's just a raw media stream."
While it does often work, it's bad practice because the kludge fails once the container is actually used as a container.
It's much like how people often like to rename VOB files to MPG to make them "work" but run into trouble when things leave the most-simple cases as VOBs also contain other data like navigational data, subtitles, etc. A proper demux works, but of course requires actual understanding of the container format.
bhiga said:
Having multiple streams requires additional logic on the player's side that takes it more toward a DVD/BD player, while most media players are more simple.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Exactly! MKV was pretty much invented as a Universal Library container format to better support the different media that would normally be on a DVD/BR disc such as Multiple Language, Commentary tracks and Multiple Subtitles all in one tidy package.
But to support all that it requires Client side support that allows you to pick which tracks to actually use.
Unfortunately the player apps on the CCast are still very young and not yet mature enough to deal with this complexity as most developers are more focused on the communication and linkage needed to cast than they are with developing a full featured player on the CCast side.
This is why Subs and Multi Audio track content have hit or miss issues when sent to a CCast.
It gets even worse if transcoding is required.
And the fact that MKV can contain just about any codec it's even harder to write a transcoder profile or CCast player that can deal with it all.
There is no hardware I know of that supports MKV on chip. All the devices that play them without transcoding use software decoding built into the player. and I suspect in time someone will create a CCast player capable of doing that at some point as well as the capability to select Subtitle Overlay and Audio Track from the client side.
Once someone does that most if not all of our MKV issues will go away. Transcoding will no longer be needed and the selection of what gets seen and played will all happen where it should on the client side.

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