Ubuntu 18.04 performance issue playing high quality videos

Question

I have a clean installation of Ubuntu 18.04 in my Lenovo Thinkpad T510 with Intel i915 graphic card. Playing videos 1080p with both VLC and Totem has severe performance issues. I have tried the fixes suggested in Video playback performance issue Ubuntu 18.04, but none of them worked for me.

Bug #1767468 seems to be related but it does not apply in my case since I have installed Ubuntu from scratch, I did not upgrade from Ubuntu 17.04.

$ sudo lspci -nnk | grep -i vga -A3 && sudo lshw -c display
00:02.0 VGA compatible controller [0300]: Intel Corporation Core Processor Integrated Graphics Controller [8086:0046] (rev 02)
    Subsystem: Lenovo Core Processor Integrated Graphics Controller [17aa:215a]
    Kernel driver in use: i915
    Kernel modules: i915
  *-display                 
       descripción: VGA compatible controller
       producto: Core Processor Integrated Graphics Controller
       fabricante: Intel Corporation
       id físico: 2
       información del bus: pci@0000:00:02.0
       versión: 02
       anchura: 64 bits
       reloj: 33MHz
       capacidades: msi pm vga_controller bus_master cap_list rom
       configuración: driver=i915 latency=0
       recursos: irq:25 memoria:f2000000-f23fffff memoria:d0000000-dfffffff ioport:1800(size=8) memoria:c0000-dffff

Bug #1752938 is also similar but the packages libgle-mesa0 and libglx-mesa0 are already installed in my case.

Does anyone know how to solve this?

vainfo output:

libva info: VA-API version 1.1.0
libva info: va_getDriverName() returns 0
libva info: Trying to open /usr/lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/dri/i965_drv_video.so
libva info: Found init function __vaDriverInit_1_1
libva info: va_openDriver() returns 0
vainfo: VA-API version: 1.1 (libva 2.1.0)
vainfo: Driver version: Intel i965 driver for Intel(R) Ironlake Mobile - 2.1.0
vainfo: Supported profile and entrypoints
      VAProfileMPEG2Simple            : VAEntrypointVLD
      VAProfileMPEG2Main              : VAEntrypointVLD
      VAProfileH264ConstrainedBaseline: VAEntrypointVLD
      VAProfileH264Main               : VAEntrypointVLD
      VAProfileH264High               : VAEntrypointVLD
      VAProfileNone                   : VAEntrypointVideoProc

Have you tried with a lighter desktop environment? The Ubuntu community flavours Lubuntu, Ubuntu Budgie, Ubuntu MATE and Xubuntu have ligther desktop environments than standard Ubuntu, which makes it easier to play video. Try Ubuntu (Kubuntu, Lubuntu, Xubuntu, ...) before installing it. — sudodus, Jul 02 '18 at 04:08
Does mplayer from the command line make it a bit more usable? — andrew.46, Jul 02 '18 at 06:31
I had a Debian system (with gnome) in the same machine and I could reproduce videos without any problems, Ubuntu seems to have an issue with Intel drivers. — Leo Rodríguez, Jul 02 '18 at 14:47
See my question at https://askubuntu.com/questions/1036242/17-10-to-18-04-upgrade-freezes-during-boot, updates 6 & 7, for things that might be helpful. Report back. — heynnema, Jul 02 '18 at 19:22
Can you check with vainfo (maybe need to install it) if the codec of the video is supported in hardware? — Sebastian Stark, Jul 03 '18 at 02:01

score 2 · Answer 1 · edited Sep 05 '18 at 08:59

2

Try with this command,

sudo apt remove gstreamer1.0-vaapi

I faced same problem with videos displayed in distorted manner. After this the video displayed is now with better quality.

Screenshot of earlier how it displayed: Screenshot of later how it displayed:

edited Sep 05 '18 at 08:59

abu_bua

10,783

answered Sep 05 '18 at 07:55

Radheshyam Kori

39

Solved my problem on HP TouchSmart tm2, thank you – cm-t Oct 07 '19 at 08:16

score 1 · Accepted Answer · answered Jul 08 '18 at 20:03

1

It seems to be an issue with VLC 3.0.2 installed using the repository package.

I have compiled VLC 4.0 from source and the issue dissapeared. I could also reproduce high quality videos with MPlayer (sudo apt-get install mpv).

Totem is unable to reproduce 1080p videos, it shows a green screen with audio and subtitles only.

answered Jul 08 '18 at 20:03

Leo Rodríguez

121
6

Regarding the green screen, it might be the same issue as https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/gstreamer-vaapi/+bug/1784242 : a workaround is to remove the gstreamer1.0-vaapi package. – Mossroy Aug 18 '18 at 20:54

Ubuntu 18.04 performance issue playing high quality videos

2 Answers2