[vlc] Smooth in mplayer, choppy in vlc

[Grant]

>>>>>> My camera produces 1080p 60fps videos which play back choppy on
>>>>>> mplayer and vlc on my Dell XPS13 laptop.  If I use -lavdopts threads=4
>>>>>> with mplayer, playback is smooth.  I tried increasing ffmpeg threads
>>>>>> from 0 to 4 in the vlc settings but playback is still choppy.  I'm
>>>>>> also curious if vaapi should be negating the need for threads in vlc.
>>>>>>
>>>>> I suggest you enable hardware acceleration.
>>>>
>>>>
>>>> My results are the same with 'vlc --avcodec-hw=vaapi'.
>>>>
>>>> - Grant
>>>
>>> Maybe the video output drive? XV, OpenGL etc...
>>
>>
>> Actually, if I disable audio in vlc, playback is smooth.  Why would
>> audio bog things down so much for vlc?
>>
>> $ ffmpeg -i 00000.MTS
>> ffmpeg version 1.2.6 Copyright (c) 2000-2014 the FFmpeg developers
>>    built on Jul 23 2014 04:24:34 with gcc 4.7.3 (Gentoo 4.7.3-r1 p1.4,
>> pie-0.5.5)
>>    configuration: --prefix=/usr --libdir=/usr/lib64
>> --shlibdir=/usr/lib64 --mandir=/usr/share/man --enable-shared
>> --cc=x86_64-pc-linux-gnu-gcc --cxx=x86_64-pc-linux-gnu-g++
>> --ar=x86_64-pc-linux-gnu-ar --optflags='-march=native -O2 -pipe
>> -fomit-frame-pointer' --extra-cflags='-march=native -O2 -pipe
>> -fomit-frame-pointer' --extra-cxxflags='-march=native -O2 -pipe
>> -fomit-frame-pointer' --disable-static --enable-gpl --enable-postproc
>> --enable-avfilter --enable-avresample --disable-stripping
>> --enable-version3 --enable-nonfree --disable-indev=oss
>> --disable-outdev=oss --enable-bzlib --disable-runtime-cpudetect
>> --disable-debug --disable-doc --disable-gnutls
>> --enable-hardcoded-tables --enable-iconv --enable-network
>> --disable-openssl --enable-ffplay --enable-vaapi --disable-vdpau
>> --enable-zlib --enable-libvo-aacenc --disable-libvo-amrwbenc
>> --enable-libmp3lame --disable-libfdk-aac --disable-libaacplus
>> --enable-libfaac --disable-libtheora --disable-libtwolame
>> --enable-libx264 --enable-libxvid --disable-libcdio --disable-l
>> libavutil      52. 18.100 / 52. 18.100
>>    libavcodec     54. 92.100 / 54. 92.100
>>    libavformat    54. 63.104 / 54. 63.104
>>    libavdevice    54.  3.103 / 54.  3.103
>>    libavfilter     3. 42.103 /  3. 42.103
>>    libswscale      2.  2.100 /  2.  2.100
>>    libswresample   0. 17.102 /  0. 17.102
>>    libpostproc    52.  2.100 / 52.  2.100
>> Input #0, mpegts, from '00000.MTS':
>>    Duration: 00:00:05.99, start: 1.016689, bitrate: 26129 kb/s
>>    Program 1
>>      Stream #0:0[0x1011]: Video: h264 (High) (HDPR / 0x52504448),
>> yuv420p, 1920x1080 [SAR 1:1 DAR 16:9], 59.94 fps, 59.94 tbr, 90k tbn,
>> 119.88 tbc
>>      Stream #0:1[0x1100]: Audio: ac3 (AC-3 / 0x332D4341), 48000 Hz,
>> stereo, fltp, 256 kb/s
>>      Stream #0:2[0x1200]: Subtitle: hdmv_pgs_subtitle ([144][0][0][0] /
>> 0x0090)
>>
>> - Grant
>
>
> The sound server.
>
> Try playing other 48K or above ac3 audio streams.


You're right, I tried a 1080p Blu-Ray rip and it is also choppy with
audio enabled and smooth with audio disabled.  mplayer plays both the
Blu-Ray rip and the 60fps file smoothly.  I fiddled with the vlc audio
settings to no avail.  Do you know how to fix this?

- Grant