Serviio

Posted: **Sat Jan 07, 2017 8:00 pm**

Hey guys,

I've been having a weird issue that I would appreciate your help.

I have a bunch of avi files, that all have been ripped/encoded using the same configuration/settings (not by me, though),
I'm playing them using the latest Serviio version, without transcoding (although I had the same issue on previous Serviio versions, so I doubt it is version related),
anyway, for some reason, about half of those files plays just fine, and the other half play only the audio, and showing a black screen throughout the whole playback.

I've tried searching this forums for similar issues,
and encountered a post that users have suggested to the OP to use transcoding, since they've said that his DLNA client probably can't natively play avi files.
But since some of the avi files I have plays just fine, I don't think it is a compatibility issue with my client.

I'm clueless as to how to debug this issue.
Any suggestion / direction would be appreciated guys.
Cheers.

Posted: **Sat Jan 07, 2017 8:19 pm**

What matters is the video codec used. Just being an AVi doesn't mean they all have the same video codec. Need the codec information, either from ffmpeg -i filename or MediaInfo.

Posted: **Sun Jan 08, 2017 7:11 am**

atc98092 wrote:What matters is the video codec used. Just being an AVi doesn't mean they all have the same video codec. Need the codec information, either from ffmpeg -i filename or MediaInfo.

Appreciate your reply mate.
I'm aware that just being AVI doesn't mean they have the same video coded,
That's why I've mentioned in my OP that they were all ripped/encoded using the same configurations/settings (at least to the extent that I'm aware of).

Anyways, as to your suggestion, here are the MediaInfo outputs for a working video and non-working video.

Fully working video-

Code:: General Complete name : G:\Futurama Season 1-5\Futurama - Season 3\Futurama - S03E02 - War Is The H-Word [dd].avi Format : AVI Format/Info : Audio Video Interleave File size : 175 MiB Duration : 21mn 42s Overall bit rate : 1 127 Kbps Writing application : Nandub v1.0rc2 Writing library : Nandub build 1852/release Video ID : 0 Format : MPEG-4 Visual Format profile : Simple@L3 Format settings, BVOP : 2 Format settings, QPel : No Format settings, GMC : No warppoints Format settings, Matrix : Default (H.263) Muxing mode : Packed bitstream Codec ID : XVID Codec ID/Hint : XviD Duration : 21mn 42s Bit rate : 926 Kbps Width : 640 pixels Height : 480 pixels Display aspect ratio : 4:3 Frame rate : 25.000 fps Color space : YUV Chroma subsampling : 4:2:0 Bit depth : 8 bits Scan type : Progressive Compression mode : Lossy Bits/(Pixel*Frame) : 0.121 Stream size : 144 MiB (82%) Writing library : XviD 1.0.1 (UTC 2004-06-05) Audio ID : 1 Format : AC-3 Format/Info : Audio Coding 3 Format profile : Dolby Digital Mode extension : CM (complete main) Format settings, Endianness : Big Codec ID : 2000 Duration : 21mn 42s Bit rate mode : Constant Bit rate : 192 Kbps Channel(s) : 2 channels Channel positions : Front: L R Sampling rate : 48.0 KHz Compression mode : Lossy Delay relative to video : 24ms Stream size : 29.8 MiB (17%) Alignment : Split accross interleaves Interleave, duration : 40 ms (1.00 video frame) Interleave, preload duration : 500 ms

Audio-Only playback-

Code:: General Complete name : G:\Futurama Season 1-5\Futurama - Season 4\Futurama - S04E07 - A Pharaoh To Remember [dd].avi Format : AVI Format/Info : Audio Video Interleave File size : 175 MiB Duration : 21mn 40s Overall bit rate : 1 128 Kbps Writing application : Nandub v1.0rc2 Writing library : Nandub build 1852/release Video ID : 0 Format : MPEG-4 Visual Format profile : Simple@L3 Format settings, BVOP : 2 Format settings, QPel : No Format settings, GMC : No warppoints Format settings, Matrix : Default (H.263) Muxing mode : Packed bitstream Codec ID : XVID Codec ID/Hint : XviD Duration : 21mn 40s Bit rate : 927 Kbps Width : 640 pixels Height : 480 pixels Display aspect ratio : 4:3 Frame rate : 25.000 fps Color space : YUV Chroma subsampling : 4:2:0 Bit depth : 8 bits Scan type : Progressive Compression mode : Lossy Bits/(Pixel*Frame) : 0.121 Stream size : 144 MiB (82%) Writing library : XviD 1.0.1 (UTC 2004-06-05) Audio ID : 1 Format : AC-3 Format/Info : Audio Coding 3 Format profile : Dolby Digital Mode extension : CM (complete main) Format settings, Endianness : Big Codec ID : 2000 Duration : 21mn 40s Bit rate mode : Constant Bit rate : 192 Kbps Channel(s) : 2 channels Channel positions : Front: L R Sampling rate : 48.0 KHz Compression mode : Lossy Delay relative to video : 16ms Stream size : 29.8 MiB (17%) Alignment : Split accross interleaves Interleave, duration : 40 ms (1.00 video frame) Interleave, preload duration : 500 ms

As far as I can tell, everything is pretty much the same.

Any ideas?

Posted: **Sun Jan 08, 2017 11:58 am**

Try remuxing the file. This may fix it if it's a container issue. To do so use ffmpeg:

ffmpeg -I "sourcefile.avi" -c copy -map 0 "destfile.avi"

Posted: **Tue Jan 10, 2017 5:56 pm**

DenyAll wrote:Try remuxing the file. This may fix it if it's a container issue. To do so use ffmpeg:

ffmpeg -I "sourcefile.avi" -c copy -map 0 "destfile.avi"

Hi mate,
Thank you for your reply,
And sorry for the late delay.
I've been away for a couple of days.

Anyways,
Remuxing the file didn't change anything.
Still having the same issue with the remuxed file.

One thing I did noticed, though, is I have 1 mkv file that in previous Serviio version played perfectly fine, but now this specific mkv file is refuse to play.
Could the above 2 issues be version related after all?

Any other ideas?

UPDATE -
Another weird issue has happend.
I've tried remuxing a WORKING avi file (the one I've post its info in my post above), and the remuxed version of that file is NOT WORKING (the same black-screen-audio-only issue).
Does this helps identify the problem in some way?

UPDATE 2-
Regarding the unplaying mkv file, I've found another weird issue.
I'm using the generic serviio profile, and have transcoding set to 'off' in the serviio console.
When playing a working mkv, with have the same codec/settings/everything, as the non-playing mkv, everything plays just fine, and ffmpeg process is not starting.
HOWEVER, when playing the non-working mkv file, ffmpeg process suddenly starts (I can see it on task manager), eats up all of my cpu (around 90% cpu usage), and stopping the playback does not stop the ffmpeg process,
I need to manually 'kill' it via task manager.

What is that about?

Posted: **Tue Jan 10, 2017 8:58 pm**

Reference ffmpeg: if you have subtitle burn in enabled, that will run ffmpeg even with transcoding disabled. And once the process begins, ffmpeg will run until either the entire file is transcoded or another video is selected to play. The DLNA protocol does not provide a way for your player to tell the server that playback was stopped. And yes, it will take your entire CPU if you don't throttle the number of processors ffmpeg is allowed to use.

Posted: **Tue Jan 10, 2017 9:33 pm**

atc98092 wrote:Reference ffmpeg: if you have subtitle burn in enabled, that will run ffmpeg even with transcoding disabled. And once the process begins, ffmpeg will run until either the entire file is transcoded or another video is selected to play. The DLNA protocol does not provide a way for your player to tell the server that playback was stopped. And yes, it will take your entire CPU if you don't throttle the number of processors ffmpeg is allowed to use.

But why does it happens only with the mkv that play audio-only, while all other video files (including mkv's) play without 'triggering' ffmpeg, even though they all have subtitles?

Posted: **Tue Jan 10, 2017 9:54 pm**

ami289 wrote:
atc98092 wrote:Reference ffmpeg: if you have subtitle burn in enabled, that will run ffmpeg even with transcoding disabled. And once the process begins, ffmpeg will run until either the entire file is transcoded or another video is selected to play. The DLNA protocol does not provide a way for your player to tell the server that playback was stopped. And yes, it will take your entire CPU if you don't throttle the number of processors ffmpeg is allowed to use.

But why does it happens only with the mkv that play audio-only, while all other video files (including mkv's) play without 'triggering' ffmpeg, even though they all have subtitles?

Now that is the million dollar question

Since you're using XVID as the codec (which I'm not familiar with) I'm wondering if perhaps converting them to h264 might resolve the problem. Not a simple task, depending on the number of files involved, but I'd still try converting one. Either use Handbrake for an easier to use interface, or just ffmpeg at the command line. More complex than what DenyAll listed for remuxing, but not really difficult.

What are you using for a player? Depending on what it supports, h264 might not be necessary for the video codec. Using mpeg2 would go faster.

Posted: **Wed Jan 11, 2017 9:00 pm**

Hi again guys,

I've tried doing some experimentation, to try to narrow it down.

What I did was completely uninstall Serviio (making sure that there are no 'left-overs' of any config files or whatever), and installing previous Serviio versions.

Here is what I've found-
The mkv in question plays perfectly fine on versions 1.2, 1.4.1, 1.5.2, 1.6, 1.7.
It seems that on the last 2 versions (1.7.1, 1.8) it has suddenly stopped working, and every time I try to play that video, I get audio-only, with black screen, and ffmpeg is start running and 'hogging' all my CPU.
The ffmpeg issue does not happen with this video on Serviio versions that play it well, and not happens in the latest versions with files that are playing correctly.
So the playback\ffmpeg issue is definitely a Serviio (or one of it's dependencies) bug.

Regarding the XviD's in question,
I have got the same results as in my original post, with all of the Serviio versions mentioned above.
2 XviD with the same encoding settings,
One plays perfectly fine,
The other only playing the audio track, while showing black screen.

I love Serviio, and not planning to replace it,
But just for the sake of my experimentation, I've installed TVersity, which is another free DLNA Server.
It play the XviD in question just fine.

Any other ideas/suggestions on how can I debug this XviD issue?

And what informatin (and to who) would I need to provide, regarding the mkv, so this bug can be fixed?

Posted: **Thu Jan 12, 2017 1:19 am**

We'll need Zip (the developer) to weigh in on this. I believe he changed something in the Profiles file right around that version to support a new feature, but he'll need to ask more questions, I'm sure.

Posted: **Thu Jan 12, 2017 2:25 am**

For the mkv file: what you can do to assist zip in the meantime is:

Turn on detailed logging and restart
Play the file
From the log file copy the ffmpeg command that gets invoked, and the lines before that (which should show why transcoding is being invoked)

Would be handy if this was done across a working and non-working version. Make sure all of your settings (in respect to transcoding and subtitles) don't change from one version to the next. Also play the XVid files and post the section of the log file - it may shed some light on what's happening there.

For the XVid files: are you using the free version of TVersity? If so, this doesn't support transcoding afaik - so it could be using a different mime-type mapping (as you are using the generic profile which doesn't trigger transcoding - unless your burning in subtitles and the file has a sub - so Serviio serves the file as it is). Maybe try one of the Panasonic profiles with transcoding turned off - they map mime types for AVI's slightly differently.. but a long shot. There are other profiles that map AVI mime types differently as well, but I'm not at home at the moment....

Posted: **Thu Jan 12, 2017 10:58 am**

Panasonic Viera (2013), PS3, LG TV, Samsung TV / player (H-series), Samsung TV (A-series), and Sony BDP-Sx70/SMP-N100 (2010) - US Profiles all vary the standard mapping for AVI files. Try them and see if i makes any difference (with transcoding off).

Posted: **Fri Jan 13, 2017 1:03 pm**

Well, I've tried the profiles above, but nothing managed to play the Xvid in question.

Regarding the MKV in question, I've enabled detailed log, and after scanning thru it, I've think I've managed to 'zoom-in' on the problem,
Which is seems to me it involves 2 different problems.

In Serviio versions 1.7 and prior, when playing the MKV in qustion, I'm getting the following output-

Code:: 2017-01-12 20:17:58,005 DEBUG [VideoDeliveryEngine] Delivering item '314' for client 'Identifier=192.168.1.2, Profile=Generic DLNA profile' 2017-01-12 20:17:58,006 DEBUG [VideoDeliveryEngine] Delivering file 'twiz-hp7part1-1080p.mkv' in native format

No reference to transcoding, nor ffmpeg, in the entire log file.
It seems that the MKV file being played as-is.

However, in Serviio version 1.7.1 and above, I'm getting the following output-

Code:: 2017-01-12 20:34:37,120 DEBUG [VideoDeliveryEngine] Delivering item '7' for client 'Identifier=192.168.1.2, Profile=Generic DLNA profile, Name=Sagemcom STB' 2017-01-12 20:34:37,120 DEBUG [VideoDeliveryEngine] Delivering file 'twiz-hp7part1-1080p.mkv' using transcoding 2017-01-12 20:34:37,122 DEBUG [AbstractAVTranscodingDeliveryEngine] No suitable transcoding job exists yet, start one for client 'Identifier=192.168.1.2, Profile=Generic DLNA profile, Name=Sagemcom STB' 2017-01-12 20:34:37,123 DEBUG [FFMPEGWrapper] Invoking FFmpeg to transcode video file: G:\Harry.Potter.Complete.Story.Collection.BluRay.x264-ArenaBG\2010.And.The.Deathly.Hallows.Part.1.1080p.BluRay.x264-TWiZTED\twiz-hp7part1-1080p.mkv 2017-01-12 20:34:37,123 DEBUG [ProcessExecutor] Starting C:\Program Files\Serviio\bin\\..\lib\ffmpeg.exe -threads 0 -i G:\Harry.Potter.Complete.Story.Collection.BluRay.x264-ArenaBG\2010.And.The.Deathly.Hallows.Part.1.1080p.BluRay.x264-TWiZTED\twiz-hp7part1-1080p.mkv -y -threads 0 -c:v mpeg2video -pix_fmt yuv420p -qscale:v 1 -r 24000/1001 -g 15 -c:a:0 ac3 -b:a:0 384k -ac:a:0 2 -map 0:0 -map 0:1 -sn -f vob C:\Windows\TEMP\Serviio\transcoding-temp-a88e71c2857b84a4516e473d60dcd907.stf 2017-01-12 20:34:37,123 DEBUG [FileBasedTranscodingDeliveryStrategy] Sending transcoding stream 2017-01-12 20:34:37,124 DEBUG [VideoDeliveryEngine] Found Format profile for transcoded file "twiz-hp7part1-1080p.mkv": MPEG_PS_PAL 2017-01-12 20:34:37,124 DEBUG [VideoDeliveryEngine] Found Format profile for transcoded file "twiz-hp7part1-1080p.mkv": MPEG_PS_NTSC

Well, first of all, the obvious problem is the 'bad' transcoding, which plays audio-only, but maybe that could be a result of mismatching profile.
I haven't checked it thoroughly, since I don't want to use transcoding anyway.
Second, the above output occurs no matter if transcoding set to 'on' or 'off'.
So it seems that Serviio ignores this setting, and transcode the video regardless of what the user set.

So regarding the MKV, it seems that Serviio 'forces' transcoding, regardless of user's choice.
I still don't know why it happens on that MKV only, and not on others.

And I'm still clueless about the XviD issue, though.

Posted: **Fri Jan 13, 2017 3:33 pm**

Do you have Stacking enabled? It might think this is a part of a video stack (as you have part1 in the file name), which would then cause transcoding (to put the files together)

Posted: **Sat Jan 14, 2017 1:00 pm**

zip wrote:Do you have Stacking enabled? It might think this is a part of a video stack (as you have part1 in the file name), which would then cause transcoding (to put the files together)

Yes, you are correct!

I have never played with this feature, as it seems to be on by default on versions 1.7.1 and above.
Turning this feature off seems to resolve this 'forced' transcoding issue.

Thank you for your help guys!

Any insights or suggestions regarding the XviD issue?

Serviio

Audio-Only playback on some avi files.

Audio-Only playback on some avi files.

Re: Audio-Only playback on some avi files.

Re: Audio-Only playback on some avi files.

Re: Audio-Only playback on some avi files.

Re: Audio-Only playback on some avi files.

Re: Audio-Only playback on some avi files.

Re: Audio-Only playback on some avi files.

Re: Audio-Only playback on some avi files.

Re: Audio-Only playback on some avi files.

Re: Audio-Only playback on some avi files.

Re: Audio-Only playback on some avi files.

Re: Audio-Only playback on some avi files.

Re: Audio-Only playback on some avi files.

Re: Audio-Only playback on some avi files.

Re: Audio-Only playback on some avi files.