mplayer unable to play DV avi files

[Juan-Carlos Amengual]

I can't play any of my DV (Sony Digital Video) avi files with mplayer in kubuntu hardy heron (as captured by kino). I could with last two versions of kubuntu. I play video, mplayer opens window for video, I can hear the sound but the window with video remains black :-¿? I have installed w32 codecs and the qdv.dll seems OK. In fact, it seems that everything is fine for mplayer but I can see no video.

jcamen@hermes:~$ mplayer danza001.avi
MPlayer 1.0rc2-4.2.3 (C) 2000-2007 MPlayer Team
CPU: Intel(R) Core(TM)2 CPU T7200 @ 2.00GHz (Family: 6, Model: 15, Stepping: 6)
CPUflags: MMX: 1 MMX2: 1 3DNow: 0 3DNow2: 0 SSE: 1 SSE2: 1
Compiled with runtime CPU detection.
mplayer: could not connect to socket
mplayer: No such file or directory
Failed to open LIRC support. You will not be able to use your remote control.

Playing danza001.avi.
AVI file format detected.
AVI: ODML: Building ODML index (1 superindexchunks).
AVI_NI: No video stream found.
libavformat file format detected.
[lavf] Video stream found, -vid 0
[lavf] Audio stream found, -aid 1
[lavf] Audio stream found, -aid 2
VIDEO: [dvsd] 720x576 0bpp 25.000 fps 28800.0 kbps (3515.6 kbyte/s)
xscreensaver_disable: Could not find XScreenSaver window.
==========================================================================
Opening video decoder: [dshow] DirectShow video codecs
Decoder supports the following YUV formats: YUY2 UYVY
Decoder is capable of YUV output (flags 0x9)
VDec: vo config request - 720 x 576 (preferred colorspace: Packed YUY2)
[PP] Using codec's postprocessing, max q = 4.
VDec: using Packed YUY2 as output csp (no 0)
Movie-Aspect is 1.37:1 - prescaling to correct movie aspect.
VO: [xv] 720x576 => 786x576 Packed YUY2
Selected video codec: [qdv] vfm: dshow (Sony Digital Video (DV))
==========================================================================
==========================================================================
Forced audio codec: mad
Opening audio decoder: [pcm] Uncompressed PCM audio decoder
AUDIO: 32000 Hz, 2 ch, s16le, 1024.0 kbit/100.00% (ratio: 128000->128000)
Selected audio codec: [pcm] afm: pcm (Uncompressed PCM)
==========================================================================
AO: [pulse] Failed to connect to server: Connection refused
AO: [alsa] 48000Hz 2ch s16le (2 bytes per sample)
Starting playback...
A: 1.5 V: 1.5 A-V: 0.000 ct: 0.000 38/ 38 22% 1% 3.3% 0 0
Exiting... (Quit)

As you can see mplayer identifies the video and select the right video codec (qdv) but video screen is black.

Any ideas? Thanks a lot in advance!

[Duncan Lithgow (duncan-lithgow)]

Are you sure that mplayer is designed to support playing dv files? They're not really video files as such anyway. They're not on the list of supported file formats when looking for a file with mplayer.

Have a look at these:

* bug #113107
* Has mplayer been compiled with DV support? http://lists.mplayerhq.hu/pipermail/mplayer-users/2005-April/052862.html

[Juan-Carlos Amengual (jcamen)]

> Are you sure that mplayer is designed to support playing dv files?

Yes. If not, what is doing by adequately selecting the qdv video codec. Just see these lines in my first post (mplayer output):

---> libavformat file format detected.
---> Selected video codec: [qdv] vfm: dshow (Sony Digital Video (DV))

And, in fact, I was able to play DV files with mplayer in previous kubuntu versions. I think that there is a problem with the qdv.dll and the new version of mplayer.

I had a look at the two references you gave and :-¿? I don't really understand what are you trying to mean: both of them seem to support my bug report.

[Gord Wait (gordwait)]

Me too, I get blank video, but audio out.

DV type 1 and 2 in an AVI container files are very much video files, from Sony (and others) digital video camcorders.

Gxine on the same system will play them, and I'm about to try vlc, but mplayer would be my choice..

[Reinhard Tartler (siretart)]

can you please add what exact version of mplayer you were trying? if you were using 1.0rc2, please try karmic, which ships rc3. That version has a lot of code changes, very possibly it works now.

[Craig (craig-scott)]

I'm guessing the user has/had an nvidia graphics card. It sounds like a known problem with a fairly easy workaround. See the following link:

http://www.nvnews.net/vbulletin/showthread.php?t=131221

In short, the XVideo settings get zeroed. I personally suspect the culprit is actually nvidia-settings and users perhaps have this run as part of their login sequence. I only saw the problem after I had run nvidia-settings (it had been working fine for me before that). The easy workaround is to start nvidia-settings, go to the "X Server XVideo Settings" item and you will probably see contrast, hue and saturation all set to zero. Click on the "Reset Hardware Defaults" button, contrast and saturation will change to 4096 and your picture will instantly appear.

HTH.

[Juan-Carlos Amengual (jcamen)]

As a matter of fact, mplayer plays this kind of avi files in kubuntu karmic koala:

jcamen@hermes:~$ mplayer capture002.avi
MPlayer SVN-r29237-4.4.1 (C) 2000-2009 MPlayer Team
mplayer: could not connect to socket
mplayer: No such file or directory
Failed to open LIRC support. You will not be able to use your remote control.

Playing capture002.avi.
AVI file format detected.
AVI: ODML: Building ODML index (1 superindexchunks).
AVI_NI: No video stream found.
libavformat file format detected.
[lavf] Video stream found, -vid 0
[lavf] Audio stream found, -aid 1
[lavf] Audio stream found, -aid 2
VIDEO: [dvsd] 720x576 0bpp 25.000 fps 28800.0 kbps (3515.6 kbyte/s)
open: No such file or directory
[MGA] Couldn't open: /dev/mga_vid
open: No such file or directory
[MGA] Couldn't open: /dev/mga_vid
[VO_TDFXFB] Can't open /dev/fb0: No such file or directory.
[VO_3DFX] Unable to open /dev/3dfx.
==========================================================================
Opening video decoder: [ffmpeg] FFmpeg's libavcodec codec family
Unsupported PixelFormat -1
Selected video codec: [ffdv] vfm: ffmpeg (FFmpeg DV)
==========================================================================
==========================================================================
Opening audio decoder: [pcm] Uncompressed PCM audio decoder
AUDIO: 32000 Hz, 2 ch, s16le, 1024.0 kbit/100.00% (ratio: 128000->128000)
Selected audio codec: [pcm] afm: pcm (Uncompressed PCM)
==========================================================================
[pulse] working around probably broken pause functionality,
        see http://www.pulseaudio.org/ticket/440
AO: [pulse] 32000Hz 2ch s16le (2 bytes per sample)
Starting playback...
VDec: vo config request - 720 x 576 (preferred colorspace: Planar YV12)
VDec: using Planar YV12 as output csp (no 2)
Movie-Aspect is 1.82:1 - prescaling to correct movie aspect.
VO: [xv] 720x576 => 1048x576 Planar YV12
A: 5.0 V: 5.0 A-V: 0.040 ct: -0.002 0/ 0 22% 8% 56.9% 39 0
Exiting... (Quit)

So I think you can close this bug because current version of mplayer in karmic koala plays DV avi files OK (sound and image work perfectly).

[Reinhard Tartler (siretart)]

thanks for testing with karmic!