HD video stutter / judder with VP9 Codec Topic is solved

[ph0b0s]

Hi,

I wanted to find out if anyone else if getting stuttering with HD video streaming. I noticed when watching YouTube that videos at 720p and above had an odd judder. For example the vid link below:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cZ5GReNC5Tk


Please don't give me grief for my taste in political satire... Anyway at 00:13 in there is a news ticker at the bottom of the screen. If I set the video quality to 720p or above that ticker has a judder and is not smooth. If I set the video quality to 480p or below it is perfectly smooth. If I run the video in Edge instead of Pale Moon, it is smooth no matter the quality setting. I also see the same behaviour on my laptop as well as my main PC. I did play with the video settings in the content tab, in preferences, but ticking or unticking the boxes did not resolve the issue. I see the behaviour on other videos and on other streaming sites, but the example video, I posted, is the most obvious.

This with ver 28.2.2. Both my main PC and laptop are running Win 10. I don't know if this started in a particular version, as I only just started watching streamed content over 480p.


So it would be interesting to see if others are getting the same behaviour or not.


Thanks.

[Night Wing]

I have no problems watching streaming YouTube videos in HD and I mostly watch them in 720p. No stuttering, no freezes, etc; when using windows Pale Moon (28.2.2). And I've got 4 computers (2 desktop towers, 2 laptops).

But then again, when I'm using windows, I'm using Windows 7 and you're using Windows 10.

[ph0b0s]

I have no problems watching streaming YouTube videos in HD and I mostly watch them in 720p. No stuttering, no freezes, etc; when using windows Pale Moon (28.2.2). And I've got 4 computers (2 desktop towers, 2 laptops).

But then again, when I'm using windows, I'm using Windows 7 and you're using Windows 10.

Hi, Thanks for the response. How did the video I posted seem?

[snertev]

Hi,

I wanted to find out if anyone else if getting stuttering with HD video streaming. I noticed when watching YouTube that videos at 720p and above had an odd judder. For example the vid link below:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cZ5GReNC5Tk

I'm on Win 10 and I've no issue at all.

But:

1) are you seeing this video in VP9 or h.264? Try to right click on this video and choose "statistics for nerds" in the context menu and look at codecs.

2) if you're seeing it in VP9, have you a GPU that can hardware accelerate it? If not, and the video is CPU accelerated, are you using other applications that use a lot of CPU in background?

BTW, for 720p, h.264 is the best solution, IMO. You can even disable webM in about:config.

[badnick]

Confirmed but only for this video.
I tested many HD/full HD videos on youtube and no problems.
However, for this video is no stuttering on Firefox.

[badnick]

1) are you seeing this video in VP9 or h.264?

I don't think is VP9 , videos like this (1080p/60fps) play very well for me: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LXb3EKWsInQ
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=79ImZE0K7xc

[cartel]

I do notice youtube videos default at 480 instead of switching to HD.
I seen some stutter at first but it played ok.
It might be the video itself as this one plays fine
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XZkumsoVrvk

[ph0b0s]

Thanks everyone for your posts.

First it won't be a GPU load issue as I have a 1080ti on my main PC. I understand that it could just be this one video, but the other videos posted were not so good for checking as there is not something to hook on to like the scrolling news text. So it was hard to see if the same judder was there.

I did not know you could force youtube to use different codecs. So I had a go at disabling Webm in the about:config section. This forces the video to use AVC1 instead of VP9, and at 1080p the video and news scroll is now super smooth. It looks like forcing AVC1 may restrict videos to 720p though. Edge is smooth whether AVC1 or VP9.

So to update the issue, it is HD video using the VP9 codec that stutters, at least for me. I could not tell from the comments in the thread if anyone else had confirmed the issue.

[Night Wing]

Hi, Thanks for the response. How did the video I posted seem?

The "Colbert" video played without any problems for me from start to finish. And on a side note, it played the same when I just viewed it again using linux Pale Moon 28.2.2 using both 720p and 1080p as well.

[ph0b0s]

Hi, Thanks for the response. How did the video I posted seem?

The "Colbert" video played without any problems for me from start to finish. And on a side note, it played the same when I just viewed it again using linux Pale Moon 28.2.2 using both 720p and 1080p as well.

Hi,

Thanks for the response. That was with Win 7 and Linux? Did either for them show when runing the video smoothly, that it was using the VP9 codec, as that is the senario in which it stutters from me. If not maybe it is a Pale Moon with VP9 codec on Window 10 thing?

[Nigaikaze]

Just FYI, there's another thread about VP9 video playback stuttering in the Linux forum:

viewtopic.php?p=157615

[Night Wing]

Whether I'm using linux Mint or Windows 7, I don't think I'm using the VP9 codec in Pale Moon. Both of my Pale Moons in linux and Windows are using the default settings.

[ph0b0s]

Whether I'm using linux Mint or Windows 7, I don't think I'm using the VP9 codec in Pale Moon. Both of my Pale Moons in linux and Windows are using the default settings.

Thanks for the response. In Youtube you can tell the codec being used by right clicking and selecting 'stats for nerds' option. On Palemoon on Windows 10, it appears that VP9 is default, as I had to change from default, to provoke AVC1 being used instead. The issue is that this looks to limit videos, on youtube at least, to 720p. So not really a solution.

[Goodydino]

I had no problem with the video, but I use MacOS.

[serkir]

yes. i have the same issue with palemoon 28.*. that because i downgraded to 27 version. i hope this problem will be fixed in upcoming releases.
i turn on vp9 in config to enable hardware acceleration because use my new gtx 1050 videocard. hw acceleration works but videos on youtube are stuttering all time.
my system is win10 x64 palemoon 28.2.2

[trava90]

VP9 playback has been smooth on my systems; I've been unable to reproduce any stuttering. Just curious, can you reproduce the problem with Pale Moon 28.1.0?

[serkir]

VP9 playback has been smooth on my systems

me too. but only in software more. i have stutters when hardware acceleration is on.

can you reproduce the problem with Pale Moon 28.1.0?

windows 10 x64 palemoon 28.*
1 first of all i set media.wmf.vp9.enabled to true (to enable hwa)
2 open gpu-z on tab sensors to see that hwa is working (video engine load string)
3 open any vp9 video on youtube (for example https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eB1hW1I7Ros )
but this little remark i noticed that 60fps videos work correct (hwa and no stutters).
so only hd videos with 30fps that can be accelerated by hardware.

[badnick]

I can reproduce this issue for this particular video even with PM-unstable/64///Win10/64 (clean profile, no addons). Look at the guy when is moving!
https://streamable.com/9vkxd

[trava90]

@serkir

The media.wmf.vp9.enabled is set to false by default for a reason. There are known issues when that pref is set to true.

That said, I will investigate what all may be needed to get it enabled by default. I can't make any promises or provide an ETA as to when it will be fixed/enabled by default, but I will look into it.

[ph0b0s]

@serkir

The media.wmf.vp9.enabled is set to false by default for a reason. There are known issues when that pref is set to true.

That said, I will investigate what all may be needed to get it enabled by default. I can't make any promises or provide an ETA as to when it will be fixed/enabled by default, but I will look into it.

Thanks everyone for your responses. Trava90, for me no rush as I know how busy you all are. The main point for me making the thread was to see if it was just me and if not, get it on the list to be looked into. So mission accomplished there.

With all of the comments above I did some more testing. I downloaded Pale Moon portable versions 28.1.0 and 28.2.2. I extracted them both and fired up the vid from my first post. I use this vid as at 0:13 in, there is an interview with Trump on Fox News. This has a news ticker at the bottom with text scrolling across the screen. This makes any motion issues pretty obvious.

With default out of the box settings the AVC.1 codec is used and 1080p is available as a quality option. So apologies to Night Wing, as I was inaccurate above that VP9 is default with the default settings, there is a reason I believed this, more later.

Anyway after going in and ticking 'Enable MSE for WebM video' and reloading the video, VP9 codec is then used. On 28.1.0 the scrolling text scrolls smoothly, with 28.2.2, there is stuttering.

Right about the VP9 codec being picked by YouTube. Since AVC.1 is smooth, picking that looks to be best. So you go back in and untick the 'Enable MSE for WebM video' setting, (this looks to be the 'media.mediasource.webm.enabled' setting in about:config). Once this is unticked, YouTube still uses VP9 codec, both with 28.1.0 and 28.2.2. Hence why I thought VP9 was default as I had defaulted my settings, but youtube appears to be stubborn. The only way I have found to force AVC.1 code again is by unticking the 'enable media source extensions' ('media.webm.enabled' in about config). Then though the maximum quality options is 720p. Or by extracting the portable install again...

The 'Use hardware acceleration when available' being ticked or not had no effect for me on any stuttering.

I also played with the 'media.wmf.vp9.enabled', but enabling this made the video kind of 'kludgy', I have no other way of describing it, not smooth, but not obviously stutering. So it looked like it hindered when set to 'true'

Anyway those were my findings on my system.