xine-lib and video playback issues?

[phenigma]

New pluto-xine-player built this afternoon.  I've updated the archive link in the first post.

J.

[purps]

After a few weeks away from LMCE I am now attempting a new install. I look forward to trying this out, thanks for doing it.

[sedgington]

I went through these instructions and got 8.10 to play flawlessly with the mythtv frontend over hdmi. Thanks!

However when it comes to libxine, xine player crashes when you try and start up a DVD under video with the plea that:

I'm unable to initialize m_pXine's 'alsa' audio driver. <0xb6498b90>

I went back to /etc/pluto/xine.conf and changed the audio.driver setting back to "auto" and it gave me the same plea.

Reading around various posts it seems that it might be caused by another program hijacking alsa and not releasing it (for example mythtv) but without pursuing this further, I wondered it anyone had a similar problem or had ideas about how to overcome it.

I have the 1.0.24.2 alsa drivers installed and the latest libxine2 and pluto-xine dpkg packages from phenigma.

My only other thought is that I have 3 devices available from the NVIDIA driver install, and I have set up one device as default as per the instructions in ~/.asoundrc   and /home/linuxmce/.asoundrc:


pcm.!default {
      type hw
      card 1
      device 7 
}



Would there be a way to tell xine to use a different device, say 1,9? It doesn't work by just going in and setting the audio.alsa setting in xine.conf. 

As you can tell, alsa is a big black box to me so I need some help troubleshooting what went wrong, since mythtv uses this fix so perfectly.

here is my aplay -l if that helps:

root@moon272:~# aplay -l
**** List of PLAYBACK Hardware Devices ****
card 0: Intel [HDA Intel], device 0: ALC887 Analog [ALC887 Analog]
  Subdevices: 1/1
  Subdevice #0: subdevice #0
card 0: Intel [HDA Intel], device 1: ALC887 Digital [ALC887 Digital]
  Subdevices: 1/1
  Subdevice #0: subdevice #0
card 1: NVidia [HDA NVidia], device 3: HDMI 0 [HDMI 0]
  Subdevices: 1/1
  Subdevice #0: subdevice #0
card 1: NVidia [HDA NVidia], device 7: HDMI 0 [HDMI 0]
  Subdevices: 1/1
  Subdevice #0: subdevice #0
card 1: NVidia [HDA NVidia], device 8: HDMI 0 [HDMI 0]
  Subdevices: 1/1
  Subdevice #0: subdevice #0
card 1: NVidia [HDA NVidia], device 9: HDMI 0 [HDMI 0]
  Subdevices: 1/1
  Subdevice #0: subdevice #0

Thanks!

[phenigma]

After a few weeks away from LMCE I am now attempting a new install. I look forward to trying this out, thanks for doing it.

You're welcome.  I hope it works as well for you as it does for me.

I went through these instructions and got 8.10 to play flawlessly with the mythtv frontend over hdmi. Thanks!

Great to hear!  I havn't actually tested with mythtv.

I went back to /etc/pluto/xine.conf and changed the audio.driver setting back to "auto" and it gave me the same plea.

This should work as 'auto' or 'alsa'.

Reading around various posts it seems that it might be caused by another program hijacking alsa and not releasing it (for example mythtv) but without pursuing this further, I wondered it anyone had a similar problem or had ideas about how to overcome it.

I don't expect this is an issue unless you've installed extra software that may hijack the audio card.

I have the 1.0.24.2 alsa drivers installed and the latest libxine2 and pluto-xine dpkg packages from phenigma.

My only other thought is that I have 3 devices available from the NVIDIA driver install, and I have set up one device as default as per the instructions in ~/.asoundrc   and /home/linuxmce/.asoundrc:


pcm.!default {
      type hw
      card 1
      device 7 
}

I don't believe I altered /etc/asound.conf or any .asoundrc files. 

Make sure you have enabled 'Passthrough' for ac3 & dts in the webadmin for the media director in question.

I use the following in my xine.conf.

Code: [Select]

audio.device.alsa_pcm_device:hdmi
audio.device.alsa_passthrough_device:hdmi
audio.device.alsa_surround40_device:hdmi
audio.device.alsa_surround51_device:hdmi
audio.output.speaker_arrangement:Pass Through


As you can tell, alsa is a big black box to me so I need some help troubleshooting what went wrong, since mythtv uses this fix so perfectly.

Alsa config is very cryptic, I havn't found any really good resources for configuring.

here is my aplay -l if that helps:
...

I have my motherboard's onboard sound disabled in bios so that it is not detected and doesn't interfere in anyway with my configuration.

J.

[phenigma]

Updated the archive in the first post to include a newer libxine2 from the yavdr ppa recompiled for intrepid.  For best results use the nvidia 285 driver with it.  Merry Christmas and happy media playing!

J.

[gurumaia]

Updated the archive in the first post to include a newer libxine2 from the yavdr ppa recompiled for intrepid.  For best results use the nvidia 285 driver with it.  Merry Christmas and happy media playing!

J.

Just as a feedback, I tried to install the current package linked in the first post and was unable to resolve its dependencies. It requires libavcodec52 which was nowhere to be found on the repos configured on my MD. I was able to find libavcodec51 but not 52. I was also able to find libavcodec52 on the linuxmce jaunty repo but was afraid to add that repo to my sources.list and break something else.
I then proceeded to install the previous version still linked in the original post and everything went smoothly.
720p MKV playback is MUCH better now, with almost no framerate issues. Prior to installing this it was unwatchable.
Video is still a little dark but it might be an issue with the actual file I'm testing with. It's an old file and I don't remember if it looked good on my windows box or not.
I'll test 1080p playback tonight and report back with my findings.
If help is needed to setup a repo for this package, I can try and help, as it is too helpful not to be easily available.

[kyfalcon]

Do an apt-get install mplayer.

That should pull the codec you are looking for.

[kyfalcon]

By the way I am seeing something similar on my Zotac box. I installed the MD ran the AVWizard and chose HDMI for sound. I then went and installed the alsa 24 drivers etc. Changed my sound conf, ran alsa mixer and unmuted everything and now I have sound in everything when running from the command prompt, but only have sound from mythtv when running from the oribitor, ie no sound for xine or mplayer when playing music or video from orbiter.

Is this possibly a permissions issue?

[gurumaia]

Do an apt-get install mplayer.

That should pull the codec you are looking for.

I think I now know what the problem might be. the medibuntu repo fails on apt-get update. Something about GPG verification failing. On the core it goes fine but on the MD it fails. I'll check it out when I get home.
Thanks for the help!

[phenigma]

Your medibuntu repo is fine, the gpg error is telling you the signing key is missing, it will not affect the repo.  The key is added to the core during installation, it must not be included in /usr/pluto/bin/Diskless_CreateTBZ.sh or it would be automatically applied to the MD as well. 

I left the original libxine2 version linked in the post in case anyone had problems with the updated version.

libavcodec52 will not be immediately available to you through any intrepid repos I know of.  I apparently neglected to include the dependencies (new libav build).    I have updated the first post with the latest libav dependencies.  Let me know how it goes and if you have any more missing dependencies.

J.

[gurumaia]

Your medibuntu repo is fine, the gpg error is telling you the signing key is missing, it will not affect the repo.  The key is added to the core during installation, it must not be included in /usr/pluto/bin/Diskless_CreateTBZ.sh or it would be automatically applied to the MD as well. 

I left the original libxine2 version linked in the post in case anyone had problems with the updated version.

libavcodec52 will not be immediately available to you through any intrepid repos I know of.  I apparently neglected to include the dependencies (new libav build).    I have updated the first post with the latest libav dependencies.  Let me know how it goes and if you have any more missing dependencies.

J.

Awesome, I'll try to install it tonight. Should I expect a difference in performance between the version I have installed and this new version?

[phenigma]

I don't really expect performance increases, but definitely compatibility updates.  Some people were having problems playing back media recorded with some hand-held digital video recorders.  The updated 285 nvidia driver and newer libxine2 seemed to fix these issues for some people.

J.

[phenigma]

First post updated with link to nvidia 290 drivers, lots of bug fixes over the 285 version.  Xine has now officially released xine 1.2.0 so I hope to update the libxine package this weekend sometime.

J.

[bugui]

Hey guys,
I upgraded xine-ui and I can see the .mkv movies with subtitles !!!!


dcerouter_1024067:/home/hernan# apt-cache policy xine-ui
xine-ui:
  Installed: 0.99.7~hg20111005-0yavdr3~lucid
  Candidate: 0.99.7~hg20111005-0yavdr3~lucid
  Version table:
 *** 0.99.7~hg20111005-0yavdr3~lucid 0
        500 http://deb.linuxmce.org/ubuntu/ lucid/beta2 Packages
        100 /var/lib/dpkg/status
     0.99.5+cvs20070914-2.1 0
        500 http://ar.archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu/ lucid/universe Packages
        500 http://archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu/ lucid/universe Packages


Hernan

[phenigma]

Well isn't that interesting...  Thanks for the info!

I'll try to include that with the next 0810 libxine build I do, so those on 0810 can benefit from this.  I haven't had a chance to build libxine1.2 final yet like I said, but decoding wise it shouldn't be much different than the existing build I posted.

J.