Void Linux: Video playback works in Firefox and mplayer, fails in other programs

[Carl Fink]

Note: this question already posted to the Void forum. Repeating it here to
ask a different community. I'll duplicate any good answers from either side
to the other (or link) for maximum value.

Playing local files (OGG and MP4/H.264) works fine if I load them into a
Firefox tab, and also works if I run mplayer, but smplayer (which should
just be mplayer in a wrapper), vlc, mpv, and ffplay all show just a black
screen (while successfully playing audio from the files).

System: current Void
CPU: 12th Gen Intel(R) Core(TM) i9-12900K
GPU: AlderLake-S GT1

The problem may be that the GPU is not being used. I installed nvtop, and it always shows GPU usage as zero.

I have installed these packages: intel-video-accel, mesa-vulkan-intel,
xf86-video-intel. Apparently that's not enough.

I found the instruction in the Void manual to turn off IOMMU
(https://docs.voidlinux.org/config/graph ... intel.html). Doing that ...
did very little. Now mpv displays the first frame of the video, the just
flickers while the audio keeps playing. (Interestingly, nvtop reveals that
smplayer calls mpv, not mplayer!) However, GPU utilization does now go up
above zero, so that change did activate the GPU. Seemingly, something else
(missing library?) is preventing video playback for most software.

Firefox is playing video OK, but only because an i9 is really fast, is my
impression. Hardware acceleration is not used. Same with mplayer--GPU
usage remains zero, but the video does appear.

OK, the manual (https://docs.voidlinux.org/config/graph ... intel.html at the bottom) says:

For newer Intel chipsets, the DDX drivers may interfere with correct
operation. This is characterized by graphical acceleration not working and
general graphical instability. If this is the case, try removing all
xf86-video-* packages.

So, I ran

xbps-remove xf86-video-amdgpu xf86-video-ati xf86-video-dummy
xf86-video-fbdev xf86-video-intel xf86-video-nouveau xf86-video-vesa
xf86-video-vmware

The system responds with:

Code: Select all

xf86-video-amdgpu-23.0.0_1 in transaction breaks installed pkg `xorg-video-drivers-7.6_23'
xf86-video-ati-22.0.0_1 in transaction breaks installed pkg `xorg-video-drivers-7.6_23'
xf86-video-dummy-0.4.1_1 in transaction breaks installed pkg `xorg-video-drivers-7.6_23'
xf86-video-fbdev-0.5.0_2 in transaction breaks installed pkg `xorg-video-drivers-7.6_23'
xf86-video-nouveau-1.0.17_2 in transaction breaks installed pkg `xorg-video-drivers-7.6_23'
xf86-video-vesa-2.6.0_1 in transaction breaks installed pkg `xorg-video-drivers-7.6_23'
xf86-video-vmware-13.4.0_1 in transaction breaks installed pkg `xorg-video-drivers-7.6_23'

Suggestions on getting proper video playback and acceleration? I've never
had an Intel GPU on Linux before.

Thanks.

[Computer Nerd Kev]

Post by Carl Fink
Playing local files (OGG and MP4/H.264) works fine if I load them into a
Firefox tab, and also works if I run mplayer, but smplayer (which should
just be mplayer in a wrapper), vlc, mpv, and ffplay all show just a black
screen (while successfully playing audio from the files).
System: current Void
CPU: 12th Gen Intel(R) Core(TM) i9-12900K
GPU: AlderLake-S GT1
The problem may be that the GPU is not being used. I installed
nvtop, and it always shows GPU usage as zero.
I have installed these packages: intel-video-accel, mesa-vulkan-intel,
xf86-video-intel. Apparently that's not enough.

I know nothing about Void packages and what's in them, but you want
VA-API if Intel GPU video decoding is desired. Try installing vainfo
(from libva) and run it from the command line to see if a VA-API
driver is installed correctly.

Although they're for other distros, these links should contain
relevent info:
https://wiki.archlinux.org/title/Hardware_video_acceleration#Configuring_VA-API
https://wiki.gentoo.org/wiki/VAAPI

I think you want the "media" VA-API driver for your GPU
(installed as iHD_drv_video.so).

You can also compare video output drivers in mplayer with the "-vo"
option on the command-line. See "VIDEO OUTPUT DRIVERS (MPLAYER
ONLY)" in the mplayer(1) man page. One output driver might display
the same behaviour as VLC etc., and then you can pin down exactly
which display method has a problem. I'm not sure which if any do
use VA-API in mplayer though, if that's really the problem.

If VA-API isn't being used, it must be a problem with the X display
driver (assuming you're not using Wayland). Check the Xorg log
file (wherever that is in your distro).

[Carl Fink]

Post by Carl Fink
For newer Intel chipsets, the DDX drivers may interfere with correct
operation. This is characterized by graphical acceleration not working and
general graphical instability. If this is the case, try removing all
xf86-video-* packages.
So, I ran
xbps-remove xf86-video-amdgpu xf86-video-ati xf86-video-dummy
xf86-video-fbdev xf86-video-intel xf86-video-nouveau xf86-video-vesa
xf86-video-vmware
Code: Select all
xf86-video-amdgpu-23.0.0_1 in transaction breaks installed pkg `xorg-video-drivers-7.6_23'
xf86-video-ati-22.0.0_1 in transaction breaks installed pkg `xorg-video-drivers-7.6_23'
xf86-video-dummy-0.4.1_1 in transaction breaks installed pkg `xorg-video-drivers-7.6_23'
xf86-video-fbdev-0.5.0_2 in transaction breaks installed pkg `xorg-video-drivers-7.6_23'
xf86-video-nouveau-1.0.17_2 in transaction breaks installed pkg `xorg-video-drivers-7.6_23'
xf86-video-vesa-2.6.0_1 in transaction breaks installed pkg `xorg-video-drivers-7.6_23'
xf86-video-vmware-13.4.0_1 in transaction breaks installed pkg `xorg-video-drivers-7.6_23'
Suggestions on getting proper video playback and acceleration? I've never
had an Intel GPU on Linux before.

At a suggestion on the Void Forum, I also removed xorg-video-drivers. It worked.
All is normal now.