Having trouble watching videos in VLC?

[k-pi]

Having trouble watching videos in VLC?

So was I, so I braved it, & installed Kodi, it has a weird interface, but it works, I can now watch videos on my desktop RPi3B setup.

If you follow suit, be aware that it starts up at full volume, needs altering pronto.

[topguy]

Yes, VLC dont use HW decoding of video so if has mediocre performance, there are 100+ threads about it on the forum.

That is why we have omxplayer:
https://www.raspberrypi.org/documentati ... /README.md ( this page should go I think.. too brief )
https://www.raspberrypi.org/documentati ... xplayer.md

Not bashing Kodi here, its just a bit of overkill if you just want to watch some video.

[k-pi]

I had noticed mention of this OMXplayer, but I thought it must be something special, as in special purpose software.

So, but those links, it is something similar to mplayer/mpv, which I looked for but didn't find.

I shall give it a try out for future reference, or maybe as my replacement, as I'm not very keen on the interface of Kodi.

Thanks for taking the time to post.

[DirkS]

I shall install it, & give it a try out for future reference, or maybe as my replacement, as I'm not very keen on the interface of Kodi.

You don't need to install Kodi to use omxplayer.
You can use it from the command line. And there's also @gkreidl's omxplayergui

[topguy]

I had noticed mention of this OMXplayer, but I thought it must be something special, as in special purpose software.

So, but those links, it is something similar to mplayer/mpv, which I looked for but didn't find.

"Special" as in the official optimized mediaplayer from the people that make the Pi

Its basically a commanline tool just like "mplayer" and "mpv". ( Which both are also installable with a simple "apt-get install" btw. but they have the same problem as VLC. )
As someone above posted, you can find gui for OMXplayer too.

[fruitoftheloom]

I had noticed mention of this OMXplayer, but I thought it must be something special, as in special purpose software.

So, but those links, it is something similar to mplayer/mpv, which I looked for but didn't find.

"Special" as in the official optimized mediaplayer from the people that make the Pi

Its basically a commanline tool just like "mplayer" and "mpv". ( Which both are also installable with a simple "apt-get install" btw. but they have the same problem as VLC. )
As someone above posted, you can find gui for OMXplayer too.

omxplayerGUI see:

https://www.raspberrypi.org/forums/view ... hp?t=40860

[k-pi]

So - I gave it a go last night - I had to kill it by switching off mains power!

It wouldn't respond to the keyboard commands - & I really hate pulling power on a computer.

So what went wrong?

P.S. Again, started out at full volume, beware of that, don't wear headphones.

[k-pi]

From using omxplayer at the command line, the help screen showed I should use ./omxplayer -p -o hdmi test.mkv
But having ./ at the front was obviously wrong, as it wouldn't start, so I went with omxplayer -p -o hdmi my.mp4
This started playing OK, but didn't respond to the keyboard.

[jamesh]

Here are the official docs for omxplayer

https://www.raspberrypi.org/documentati ... xplayer.md

[k-pi]

Thanks jamesh - I already have it bookmarked.

(I think starting a program with volume at 100% is bad practice though.)

Code: Select all

--vol n                 set initial volume in millibels 

What's a millibel?

[k-pi]

Hmm, so what this thread has shown so far, is that VLC, mplayer, & mpv are all 'broken' as regards to playing videos, (their main purpose).

This is a sad situation.

[fruitoftheloom]

Hmm, so what this thread has shown so far, is that VLC, mplayer, & mpv are all 'broken' as regards to playing videos, (their main purpose).

This is a sad situation.

They are not broken, they have not been compiled with Hardware Acceleration.

Semantics

[topguy]

From using omxplayer at the command line, the help screen showed I should use ./omxplayer -p -o hdmi test.mkv
But having ./ at the front was obviously wrong, as it wouldn't start, so I went with omxplayer -p -o hdmi my.mp4
This started playing OK, but didn't respond to the keyboard.

- "./" is for when you have a program/script in current directory you want to use.

- What is special about your keyboard ? Are you doing this over SSH or not ?

- Most medialplayers I have used over the last 15 years start with 100% volume, turn down your amplifier/screen instead.

[LTolledo]

Have not used VLC due to its known problems.

Tried omxplayer from time to time when I want to watch and browse at the same time.
Keyboard controls for omxplayer work on my setup.

And yes... I set the amp volume first before playing any playable media on omxplayer.....

If there is already a compiled version of VLC (for raspbian) in the repository then that is the time I'll try it again...

[k-pi]

- What is special about your keyboard ?

I know ./ is for when you run from your directory, but that's what it said!

Keyboard is a standard USB, nothing at all unusual about it, omxplayer just didn't respond to it!

P.S. Re sound level, my distro is & was set at 20%, this program just took over my sound card at full volume!

[topguy]

P.S. Re sound level, my distro is & was set at 20%, this program just took over my sound card at full volume!

You did use the "-p" audio passtrough option after all, which means send digital sound directly to the HDMI without any modification.

[k-pi]

That being the case, it wasn't clear from their sample command that it would bypass the system it was running on.

Could do with clearer info.

(Just in case you think I'm a newbie, I'm not, I've been using Linux & BSD since 1999.)