Youtube stuttering and frame dropping or skipping issues
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Ok, so I have read a few random post around the forum about people having performance issues watching videos on YouTube, and maybe more.
I have been experiencing these too for a few versions now, but unfortunatey no word from the developers on that front. From what I'm told they can't really reproduce the error so they cannot fix what can't be tested.
I am creating this thread in the hopes that anyone with YouTube video stuttering issues, dropped or skipped frames, low performance or bad frame rates would post as thorough details as possible to try and get this solved if possible.
So my system specs are Windows 7 64bits, Intel Core i7 2600k 16Gb RAM, NVidia GT580 + GT980ti, dual monitor setup 2560x1600 x2 each monitor connected to each card. Here's what else I could find out.
- I have never experienced any stuttering before with any dedicated video player software or other browsers
- Videos randomly stutter or not, can't reproduce reliably, some times only HD or high-res misbehave, some other times low quality too.
- Pausing and playing the video seems to fix the issue.
- Moving the browser window from monitor 2 to monitor one and back seems to alleviate the issue.
- Full-screening also seems to fix the issue, reverting brings stuttering back
- Whole page rendering seems to stutter, but not Vivaldi UI itself, or other tabs.
- Scrolling the video out of view also eliminates the stuttering while video is offscreen.
Here are some random video where the problem happened from me, i'll test again later see if the frame dropping persists on the same video. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=60ItHLz5WEA and https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6SUj7nRmX0E
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Forgot to mention this seems to happens exclusively in "Cinema Mode", Fullscreen mode and default view are mostly not affected
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@Ameisenwuerger Ohh now they will be surely motivated to fix it despite the multiple reports done in the past, well done
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@liyin It's actually "Theater mode", the button on the left of full screen mode button in YT videos
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My only "problem" with dropped frames are 60fps videos, no single drop from normal 720@30fps. The workaround is to watch them in full screen or even just by hiding the tab bar (alt-shift-t for me)
https://forum.vivaldi.net/topic/11638/vivaldi-and-youtube-stutter-and-dropped-frames -
<speculation> Could it be related to the animated sound icon drawn in the tab?
I seem to see a noticeable difference in playback fluidity when I mute the sound of the tab, and hence the animated icon stops moving and is replaced by the mute icon.
This would be in line with @iAN-CooG remark that hiding the tab bar seems to alleviate the stuttering. </speculation> -
OK, it definitely seems related, muting a stuttering video seems to speed it up, and even non stuttering videos seem more fluid when the sound icon is not animating. It doesn't seem to be sound related directly, more cause by the animated sound icon drawn in the tab bar.
Hope this helps the developers narrow down the issue.
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@duarte.framos I doubt that the tab's sound animation maybe one of the root cause. From your description, It can be recovered by some action (ex: pause -> replay). I have tried to reproduce this issue on my three computers, but can't reproduce. It seems base on some condition.
Could you do me a favor ? I can give you some steps to record trace, which maybe more clear to find out the root cause. -
@liyin said in Youtube stuttering and frame dropping or skipping issues:
Most people have one GPU.
I do a lot of 3D model rendering using Blender, so I upgraded some time ago and kept both GPUs in because they provide a significant speed boost under Cycles render engine.
If it is relevant they are in a non-SLI config, that is each one is installed independently, and each monitor connected to each graphics card.
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@WillyYu said in Youtube stuttering and frame dropping or skipping issues:
Could you do me a favor ? I can give you some steps to record trace, which maybe more clear to find out the root cause.
Certainly, I'm up for it if it helps fix problem. Just let me know what to do.
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@Gwen-Dragon said in Youtube stuttering and frame dropping or skipping issues:
Strange for me inspecting nerd statistics on YT videos.
On my NVidia GT700 a Fullscreen HD has less drops than a smaller windowed view.Same here. Lotsa dropped frames windowed, hundreds, almost none in fullscreen. Also seems to increase with rapid mouse movement. Tested the same video posted earlier (https://youtu.be/RbUMKenn5l8) in Firefox and not a single (not one!) dropped frame no matter what i tried. Bouncing the scrollbar up and down, moving the window all over the place; Nothing. There's definitely something going on.
Maybe it matters that one is PPAPI and the other NPAPI?
I'm on 1.9.818.44 (Stable channel) (64-bit) by the way.
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composer.user_said_in
OK, it definitely seems related, muting a stuttering video seems to speed it up, and even non stuttering videos seem more fluid when the sound icon is not animating. It doesn't seem to be sound related directly, more cause by the animated sound icon drawn in the tab bar.
Hope this helps the developers narrow down the issue.
Good find, that's it: I've disabled "use animation" in settings/appereance, and now I got ONLY 4 dropped frames after 2000 frames played on ANY 720@60 fps video, watched in normal Youtube window with tab bar visible, full screen, HW decode enabled or disabled.
Now watching
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-Yi9f4idKpU (vp9/webm)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wL1mreUL4LU (mp4/avc1) -
@WillyYu To me the bottleneck it's exactly there.
@Gwen-Dragon
Summary: Bottleneck while rendering 60fps videos on YouTube (part2)
Key: VB-28119 -
Never noticed any particularly high CPU usage, but something is definitely interfering/conflicting with videoplay.
BTW how are you guys seeing those precise play statistics like dropped frame count? I was just 'eyeballing' it up until now using naked eye visual inspection. Dropped frames were easily noticeable, but seeing those numbers is probably a lot more accurate.
Will do a bug report and link to this thread for reference.
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@duarte.framos rightclick in YT video, stats for nerds
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Disabling animation is a big improvement! Very few frame drops on 1080/24 video, however the numbers are still fairly high on 60fps video for me, but now the trouble is in fullscreen mode! While the theater view is doing mostly fine.
I know my system can handle it because even with 60fps i cannot get the same video to drop a single frame in Firefox, with a bunch of other tasks running at the same time.
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@Aborto said in Youtube stuttering and frame dropping or skipping issues:
I have been getting a similar issue as well I think. Occasional pauses as if the video is buffering, even when the buffer is completely full. Not really dropped frames, these are actual pauses complete with loading circle.
exacly what I get most of the times if I leave HW video rendering enabled in vivaldi://flags so I prefer leaving it software rendered.
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@iAN-CooG Ah hiding in plain sight, hadn't seen it yet.
Ok, bug reported as VB-28120
Tested again, on a fresh 1.10 snapshot (no addons installed) and this 60fps video was not stuttering at all, playing smooth but was still dropping frames like hell, turning off animated icon (via muting), no more dropped frames.
For me it hasn't been reliable at all, the same video plays smooth as silk one time, and the next is stuttering all over the place. Not even talking about dropped frames, I am really talking about visibly low frame rate and choppy interaction all over the page (like clicking stuff too) while video is in view. scrolling it offscreen and no more problems.
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@iAN-CooG Ahh, had not considered that.
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No change after enabling the new Youtube design, if anyone was wondering.