H264 mp4 files are not playing or playing and hanging

[redxii]

Any differences are likely the MPlayer version. SMPlayer is a interface for MPlayer (which is user unfriendly by itself). Ports for Windows just don't seem to come out well most of the time. The last known good build I have tested from Sherpya is r33216, I have a ton of files I test with and had problems with builds after r33216, and better with r33883 so I decided to include that in the installer.

You can configure SMPlayer to use a different MPlayer executable. If you could test the same files with MPlayer2 from http://mplayer2.srsfckn.biz/mplayer2-20110831.7z Extract it somewhere, go to the General prefs and change it to where you extracted it and change the MPlayer path to where mplayer2-20110831.exe is. It would help me out a lot, if MPlayer2 works better then I might consider using that. To reverse the change you put the mplayer path back as 'mplayer/mplayer.exe'

VLC WAS awful before 1.0. I watch a lot of fansubs, VLC did not support ASS/styling before 1.0 and it caused VLC to frequently crash, and showed "comments" which weren't supposed to be shown. If a line exceeded a certain amount of characters, subtitles did not show. Fansub groups exploited this to discourage use of VLC. In search of a player that did play a lot of formats and didn't install crap all over the OS, I found SMPlayer. Fansub groups always recommend a codec pack that puts crap everywhere.

[redxii]

Like so:

[Exeter]

Yeah, I know what you're saying, but Mplayer2 gave me nothing but trouble. From crashing, to no sound, to seriously de-synched sound (in avis as well as mp4s0). It seems much more resources-intensive than some other builds. Cheers.

[redxii]

I have a Pentium D 965 running Windows 7 and haven't noticed any problems running my videos with either with the exception of decrypted Blu-ray movie files, which are broken after r33216 and MPlayer2.

I'll probably put an older version back into the installer.. but you know, most people want the latest features/support but the newer builds are just buggy as hell.

[Exeter]

I dunno, redxii. That's why I made the voodoo comment. I'm still looking to see whether all my troubles are associated with a particular encoding codec, but I've already found two different ones among the six h264 mp4s I tested.

Something else I'm gonna test with SMPlayer is my own baking of Mpeg2 ts files (that I record from HDTV) to avi files via the Xvid 1.3.2 mp4 codec, which I'm told is as good as it gets. If that works I'll step forward in SMPlayer versions until it doesn't work any more. Converting any h264s that give me trouble to avis is a pain in the arse, but doable.

I'd like to share files with you so we could compare notes, but my bandwidth cost is prohibitive and I don't have the confidence that my tools and/or know-how extends to clipping a larger file without changing its properties.

I also accept that my system is now truly ancient in terms of chipset, and obscure for a PC in that I run Windows 2003 server. However, these are the givens for my daily private use. My dream box with quad processors and positively disgusting amounts of RAM is always just behind some other priority on my shopping list.

Nevertheless, I'm still poking about under the hood, and will keep posting here if I gain any startling new insights.

Regards
Exeter

[Exeter]

Does MPlayer support third party codecs like CoreAVC, which is recommended for H264 playback in Media Player Classic? If so, how can that be configured in the SMPlayer front-end?

[redxii]

There's an option in Performance.. "Use CoreAVC if no other codec is specified" disabled by default but I have no experience with that.

[Exeter]

For the thread: It appears to me that MP4s encoded with h264 and played back using ffh264 will give unpredictable results on older systems like mine (Windows 2003/Pentium 4). It appears that shorter files (0-40 minutes) will play mostly fine, while longer files (60 minutes plus) will show some stutter and/or desynchronised sound. Without more than gut feel to guide me, I think the playback problems are probably caused by CPU stutter during decompression; ergo, this problem is likely to be absent on newer systems.

Disabling ffh264 and using CoreAVC does not appear to offer any significant improvement, and is not recommended by me, particularly since CoreAVC is not free.

However, encoding MPEG1/2 files, such as those generated by recording digital TV, using the Xvid MPEG4 part 2 codec appears to offer compression and quality results similar to h264 with no discernible negative effects on playback in standard SMPlayer/MPlayer combos.

My workaround for MP4s I may want to keep is to re-encode as Xvid avis. This will probably mean loss of quality by downsampling, but c'est la vie.

For redxii: For the time being I have finished looking at this problem, but I will post again if I have any startling new insights. Thank you so much for your time and persistence in answering my questions.

[freedy]

Are there any codecs that we need to install first that is needed?