Stutter issue with software cause

[mark235 5]

1. When I play any mkv file in Emby Theater with default settings, there is always (micro)stutter present. This scenario often maxes out the CPU to 100%. 

 

2. When Direct3D hardware acceleration is enabled, CPU load drops to max 30%, but stutter remains.  

 

3. When I play the same files with MPC-HC configured as external player, there is no stutter (max 30% cpu load, MadVR renderer and H/W acceleration enabled).

 

Hardware: Intel NUC with N3700 CPU, HD Graphics 400, 8 GB RAM, SSD. 

 

It's obvious that my client is not powerful enough for smooth playback with CPU decoding only (1) But with H/W acceleration enabled (2), there should be no stutter. So whatever is going wrong must be software / renderer related. Enabling Video Display Syncing in Emby Theater does not help. Neither does changing the refresh rate on my HTPC. Enabling MadVR in combination with H/W acceleration results in a black screen with no video. Disabling H/W acceleration brings back video but now the CPU is even more hammered than before. 

 

I'd appreciate any help to get nr 2 working properly. Server log is attached. Issue was reproduced around 23:30, 21-08-2017. User: HTPC

server-63638890567.txt

Edited August 25, 2017 by mark235

[mark235 5]

More stuff I tried:

 

Enable Interpolation in MB Theater, with and without H/W acceleration

Increase VRam to maximum in BIOS (3800MB). Dedicated RAM is 128 MB

Removed all non-critical software

Set Power Plan to performance

Disabled visual themes and transparency effects

 

No joy

[Luke 37112]

Hi, have you checked that your graphics drivers are up to date? Have you tried other gpu rendering modes besides direct3d?

[Guest asrequested]

Does it happen with everything you play? Have you tried auto copyback hardware acceleration?

[mark235 5]

Hi, have you checked that your graphics drivers are up to date? Have you tried other gpu rendering modes besides direct3d?

 

They were not. However, updating them didn't help

 

 

Does it happen with everything you play? Have you tried auto copyback hardware acceleration?

 

It happens with all MKV's and M2TS files. I tried the copyback H/W acceleration but it didn't help. Rather seemed to make the issue worse

[Luke 37112]

copy back is only intended for higher end systems, per mpv docs. Have you tried DXVA?

[Guest asrequested]

Your memory may not be keeping up. That's what copyback is, it copies to your RAM. Can you post a screenshot of the file details? You'll find in the web app, right below the movie details.

[mark235 5]

Ok, that's interesting: the issue is gone when I resize Emby theatre. Stutter is back as soon as I go full screen again. 

 

Edit: another thing I'm noticing is that the Emby Theatre interface itself is also more responsive when in resized state. IE: transitions between screens are smoother. It's most noticeable when clicking Play to start a movie: the movie's splashscreen comes up fast here right before playback starts. This is not smooth at all in full screen.

Scratch that, probably was a caching thing, resized interface just experienced a few slowdown's again when loading titles I had not viewed yet tonight. The above about movie playback in resized mode still stands though.

Edited August 22, 2017 by mark235

[mark235 5]

copy back is only intended for higher end systems, per mpv docs. Have you tried DXVA?

 

Yes, but h/w acceleration doesn't seem to be active? CPU utilization is still very high. MPC-HC has no problem playing the same file back in DXVA mode, with low CPU utilization. 

 

Your memory may not be keeping up. That's what copyback is, it copies to your RAM. Can you post a screenshot of the file details? You'll find in the web app, right below the movie details.

 

See attached

Edited August 22, 2017 by mark235

[Luke 37112]

Have you tried dxva copy back? I know copy back is probably not good for your machine, but it is usually effective at forcing HWA.

[mark235 5]

Just tried it, and yes, h/w acceleration is now active, cpu utilization lower. But as expected, my client won't pull it. There's still stutter with this setting, even with MB theatre in windowed mode.

 

Any idea why the issue is linked to windowed mode / fullscreen?

[Luke 37112]

I notice in your logs it is using the emby http server to obtain the file. this is happening because the emby theater app does not have direct access to this location:

E:\Movies\Guardians of the Galaxy Vol2 (2017)\Guardians.of.the.Galaxy.Vol.2.2017.1080p.BluRay.DTS.x264-ZQ.mkv

You might see better performance if you can update your library setup so that the theater machine can directly access the media through the file system.

[mark235 5]

But does't this mean that direct access over the network is already happening?

 

 

[Guest asrequested]

This may sound strange, but sometimes the audio can cause issues like this. Humor me, try playing Guardians with the AAC audio. If nothing else, we can rule it out.

[Luke 37112]

But does't this mean that direct access over the network is already happening?

 

Yes but with the added layer of going through Emby server's http server. For the vast majority of environments this is just fine, but you might want to consider going a step further and getting direct file playback working. When this happens, the app will bypass emby server and just play the file.

[mark235 5]

I notice in your logs it is using the emby http server to obtain the file. this is happening because the emby theater app does not have direct access to this location:

E:\Movies\Guardians of the Galaxy Vol2 (2017)\Guardians.of.the.Galaxy.Vol.2.2017.1080p.BluRay.DTS.x264-ZQ.mkv

You might see better performance if you can update your library setup so that the theater machine can directly access the media through the file system.

 

I did see that the library folders on the server were setup with the server drive letters in the paths (D:, E: etc), rather than the full share path (\\Server\Share1...). I have corrected that, and have to wait for the full library scan to complete

 

This may sound strange, but sometimes the audio can cause issues like this. Humor me, try playing Guardians with the AAC audio. If nothing else, we can rule it out.

 

Thanks, will give that a shot

[Luke 37112]

Well, i would have kept the folders as they are and filled in the optional network path instead.

[mark235 5]

Apart from my previous path change being unnecessary, it also doesn't seem to help.

 

So to start from scratch:

I created a new share called "Test" with the Windows user group "Everyone" having full access, and put the testmovie in it.

I created a new test library in Emby Server with the optional network share path, and played back the testmovie.

Looking at the end of the log, it seems Emby's http server is still active? What Am I doing wrong?

 

 

server-63639043200.txt

[Luke 37112]

In this log it's still streaming through the server. You need to make sure the machine running Emby Theater can access that network directory.

[Guest asrequested]

Yes but with the added layer of going through Emby server's http server. For the vast majority of environments this is just fine.

 

I actually didn't know this could happen. That's interesting. I'll keep that in mind.

[mark235 5]

In this log it's still streaming through the server. You need to make sure the machine running Emby Theater can access that network directory.

 

On my Emby Theater client pc, if I doubleclick a shortcut to the test share, I see the files, and I can read / edit / delete them. I can also browse any server UNC path from the client's Windows Explorer, since all of the server's drives are shared at the root (except for C: drive). Is there anything else I should verify or test? 

 

Access to the network shares is granted through cached credentials of the servers administrator's account. I entered those once on this client, and saved them to the credential store so they are not asked everytime I browse the shares. Is that causing the webserver to kick in?

Edited August 23, 2017 by mark235

[Luke 37112]

It's really hard for me to say what's happening in your environment but I know that windows 10 updates have caused some network share related probes.

 

The video player we use is MPV. If you would like to try downloading the standalone version you can do so here:

https://mpv.io/installation/

 

That will give you an idea of what you should be able to expect.

[Guest asrequested]

If you want to try the standalone, Here's a zip I made with a basic config. It's portable, so it won't affect anything else. Just unzip it anywhere you want. Double click mpv, then drag 'n' drop your movie on it. I left HWA at auto. If you want to change it and test different settings, I can help with that.

Edited August 24, 2017 by Doofus

[mark235 5]

It's really hard for me to say what's happening in your environment but I know that windows 10 updates have caused some network share related probes.

 

The video player we use is MPV. If you would like to try downloading the standalone version you can do so here:

https://mpv.io/installation/

 

That will give you an idea of what you should be able to expect.

 

I'll start testing this then. 

 

Does my finding in post 8 give you anything else to go on? The problem does not exist in windowed mode.

 

If you want to try the standalone, Here's a zip I made with a basic config. It's portable, so it won't affect anything else. Just unzip it anywhere you want. Double click mpv, then drag 'n' drop your movie on it. I left HWA at auto. If you want to change it and test different settings, I can help with that.

 

Thanks, I'll give it a go tonight. 

[Guest asrequested]

When you try it, I've put the stats in. If you want to check them, press shift+i.