1221625 - Youtube won't play videos with resolution higher than 1080p

Status: RESOLVED WORKSFORME

(Core :: Audio/Video: Playback, defect, P1)

Description

[Guniu]

Attachment: 2048 x 1152 resolution on a 1080p quality option

User Agent: Mozilla/5.0 (Windows NT 6.1; WOW64; rv:42.0) Gecko/20100101 Firefox/42.0
Build ID: 20151029151421

Steps to reproduce:

Resolutions on Youtube higher than 1080p won't play for me.

Example: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6tmbeLTHC_0 - Video plays normally in 1080p, but when I choose 1440p or 2160p it just stops (sometimes, depends on the video, it plays audio with frozen frame/black screen or with some glitchy pixels at the upper part of the video).

Also there are videos that quality option shows 1080p but in reality the video is in higher resolution in between 1080p and 1440p:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CHC8KJNBtw8 - This video's resolution is 2048 x 1152 on 1080p quality and it also won't play (I have to watch it in 720p).
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kmCublPK42c - 1920 x 1200, same as above.

I also noticed that enabling webm (media.mediasource.webm.enabled=true) 'fixes' the issue.

I'm on Windows 7 x64, Firefox 42.0, GTX 560Ti driver 358.50.

Comment 1

[Matt Woodrow (:mattwoodrow)]

Can you test this build please: http://archive.mozilla.org/pub/firefox/try-builds/[e-mail]-3d5029d05faf4800ccd9c8356c70bc132dcc76c2/try-win32/

You'll need to set media.client-side-upload=false as well as media.hardware-video-decoding.enabled=false and then restart (as well as disabling webm again).

Thanks!

Comment 2

[Guniu]

So it works, it plays the video by using webm. I don't know if that was the intent.
The media.mediasource.webm.enabled is set to false but then I found other webm setting (media.webm.enabled) that is enabled (disabling that causes it to use mp4 and fails to play the video).
The media.client-side-upload wasn't there so I assume I had to create it (btw that setting doesn't seem to have an impact on the results, no matter what value it works, the main impact was from media.hardware-video-decoding.enabled).

Btw does the "Use hardware acceleration when available" option doesn't work with this build? Because it looks like it, the fonts look really bad: http://i.imgur.com/PNmnqBe.jpg

Comment 3

[Jean-Yves Avenard [:jya]]

Just set media.mediasource.webm=true for the time being. If you could test the above build using the preferences described by Matt that would be useful. (Resetting the other pref to their defaults)

Comment 4

[Guniu]

Yeah, that's what I did and described it in my previous post. It does play videos at 1080p+ resolutions on that build and with those preferences.

Comment 5

[Jean-Yves Avenard [:jya]]

You wrote that it played the video by using webm. This isn't what this build was supposed to do. So you must have either disabled MP4 or enable media.mediasource.webm.enabled

This build disable the hardware accelerated copy with MP4/h264.

Comment 6

[Guniu]

That's why I was confused. I did exactly what he said, mp4 was enabled, media.mediasource.webm.enabled was disabled. Basically I tried it on a new profile and changed only media.hardware-video-decoding.enabled=false and added media.client-side-upload=false (because it wasn't there), the rest was left at default. And it played it with webm.

Comment 7

[Jean-Yves Avenard [:jya]]

weird... maybe that caused mp4 to be disabled...

While MSE / WebM is disabled in 42 by default, the code for it is identical at what's found in 43 and 44, so it's safe to enable.

Comment 8

[Guniu]

Hey guys, I found the issue. It was Windows Update KB2670838 (https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/kb/2670838).
This update came out somewhere in 2013 and it was causing graphical glitches in my Battlefield 3 back then, so because it was optional I uninstalled it. Also installing Internet Explorer 10 (and/or 11) caused this update to be automatically installed, so I hid those IE updates too.

Besides those youtube issues, I found out few days ago, that some twitter videos won't play for me either. I checked it on my other PC, that is basically same setup software wise, and it worked with no issues. That's when I remembered about this KB update. After installing it everything works, twitter videos and those youtube videos with 1080p+ resolutions.

So this topic can be considered fixed.

Comment 9

[Anthony Jones (:ajones, :kentuckyfriedtakahe, :k17e)]

Update mentions "H.264 Video Decoder".

Comment 10

[Guniu]

(In reply to Anthony Jones (:kentuckyfriedtakahe, :k17e) from comment #9)
> Update mentions "H.264 Video Decoder".

Yeah, the issues described in this topic are fixed by this update, but I still have some other issues.
Not sure if it's again my setup or this time Firefox's problem.
This video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MGyaR2sSBkA
It's recorded in 4K 60fps but the player only shows 1080p60 for me.
Is it me or Firefox? Or maybe Windows 7 limitation?

Comment 11

[Jean-Yves Avenard [:jya]]

The maximum resolution supported by the Windows 7 system  h264 decoder is 1080p

Comment 12

[Guniu]

(In reply to Jean-Yves Avenard [:jya] from comment #11)
> The maximum resolution supported by the Windows 7 system  h264 decoder is
> 1080p

But then how come I can play the NASA video (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6tmbeLTHC_0) in 4K? The only difference is it's not 60fps.
(Well at least it did work few weeks ago, now it says An error occurred, but I could watch it in older FF in 4k on Windows 7. Now I still can watch it in 1440p, so how come?)

Comment 13

[Jean-Yves Avenard [:jya]]

Some AMD cards are black listed for > 1080p or framerate > 45fps, can't think of any other reasons..

if you set media.mediasource.webm.enabled to true in about:config you should have access to those resolutions normally as we won't use the h264 hardware decoder

Comment 14

[Guniu]

(In reply to Jean-Yves Avenard [:jya] from comment #13)
> Some AMD cards are black listed for > 1080p or framerate > 45fps, can't
> think of any other reasons..
> 
I'm on NVIDIA.

> if you set media.mediasource.webm.enabled to true in about:config you should
> have access to those resolutions normally as we won't use the h264 hardware
> decoder

This doesn't seem to work anymore. I'm setting it to true and even disabling mp4 and it still says it's using mp4 but got only 720p as max quality.

Comment 15

[Jean-Yves Avenard [:jya]]

What version are you using, and please provide a copy of the output of the "Stats for nerds" (right click on the playback windows)

thank you

Comment 16

[Guniu]

I'm currently on FF v42.0 (on v43 I had some problems with youtube, it was very glitchy, skipping frames etc)
Here's the output: http://i.imgur.com/igob5Bp.jpg - this is with webm enabled and mp4 disabled.

Comment 17

[Jean-Yves Avenard [:jya]]

YouTube was broken with 43 (due to YouTube server misconfiguration) those issues are now fixed.

You should upgrade to 43 or use 44 which should be out now

YouTube is still broken with 42 and won't serve webm to firefox.

Comment 18

[Jean-Yves Avenard [:jya]]

(In reply to Guniu from comment #16)
> I'm currently on FF v42.0 (on v43 I had some problems with youtube, it was
> very glitchy, skipping frames etc)
> Here's the output: http://i.imgur.com/igob5Bp.jpg - this is with webm
> enabled and mp4 disabled.

That is probably with  media.mediasource.mp4.enabled set to false, but you haven't turned of mp4 playback. That's why you're getting plain mp4.

You're lucky to get 720p here, typically the limit is 360p. But just upgrade your firefox. Youtube has resolved their problems now

Comment 19

[Guniu]

Oh! That's good to hear. I'm gonna update first thing tomorrow morning.

> but you haven't turned of mp4 playback.
How do I do that?

Comment 20

[Jean-Yves Avenard [:jya]]

media.mp4.enabled in beta/aurora/nightly

in 42 (maybe 43) it was media.fragment-mp4.enabled

Comment 21

[Jean-Yves Avenard [:jya]]

sorry that was media.fragmented-mp4.enabled (Blame auto correction)

Comment 22

[Guniu]

Ok, so I'm on v44. With webm enabled everything works great, I have the 4K 60fps option on that video now. But when using mp4 I still see some glitches.

Like in this video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KS4m8PK_mqo
The intro just flashes with few proper frames, the rest is just black screen, after the intro is done it plays normally with no issues. It happens every time I refresh the page, not after I rewind to the beginning.

Comment 23

[Jean-Yves Avenard [:jya]]

(In reply to Guniu from comment #22)
> Ok, so I'm on v44. With webm enabled everything works great, I have the 4K
> 60fps option on that video now. But when using mp4 I still see some glitches.

that's typically due to graphic drivers bug, make sure you use the last version of the drivers for your card.

webm is good, but you need a fairly beefy machine to play those 4K 60fps videos. Quad-core minimum, likely > 3GHz

If you use Firefox Developer Edition, we have greatly speed up vp9 decoding thanks to ffvp9. If you intend to use webm/vp9 with youtube, I suggest you run developer edition, you'll get the best playback experience (across all browsers)


> 
> Like in this video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KS4m8PK_mqo
> The intro just flashes with few proper frames, the rest is just black
> screen, after the intro is done it plays normally with no issues. It happens
> every time I refresh the page, not after I rewind to the beginning.

That sounds like a gfx issue.
Matt, is there something more we can do to help trouble shooting those blank frames?

Comment 24

[Matt Woodrow (:mattwoodrow)]

Can you grab the graphics section of about:support for us please? With the right prefs for the broken setup :)

Comment 25

[Guniu]

I assume it's this (it's in polish):

Grafika
-------

Asynchroniczne przewijanie/powiększanie: brak
Data sterownika: 11-13-2015
GPU #2 Active: false
ID dostawcy: 0x10de
ID podsystemu: 351d1458
ID urządzenia: 0x1200
Okna ze sprzętowym przyspieszeniem grafiki: 4/4 Direct3D 11 (OMTC)
Opis adaptera: NVIDIA GeForce GTX 560 Ti
Parametry ClearType: Gamma: 2200 Pixel Structure: R ClearType Level: 100 Enhanced Contrast: 50
RAM adaptera: 1024
Renderer WebGL: Google Inc. -- ANGLE (NVIDIA GeForce GTX 560 Ti Direct3D11 vs_5_0 ps_5_0)
Sprzętowe dekodowanie H.264: Yes
Sterowniki adaptera: nvd3dumx,nvwgf2umx,nvwgf2umx nvd3dum,nvwgf2um,nvwgf2um
Wersja sterownika: 10.18.13.5900
windowLayerManagerRemote: true
Włączone Direct2D: true
Włączone DirectWrite: true (6.2.9200.17568)
AzureCanvasBackend: direct2d 1.1
AzureContentBackend: direct2d 1.1
AzureFallbackCanvasBackend: cairo
AzureSkiaAccelerated: 0
(#0) Error: Too many dropped/corrupted frames, disabling DXVA
(#7) Error: Too many dropped/corrupted frames, disabling DXVA
(#8) Error: Too many dropped/corrupted frames, disabling DXVA
(#9) Error: Too many dropped/corrupted frames, disabling DXVA
(#10) Error: Too many dropped/corrupted frames, disabling DXVA
(#11) Error: Too many dropped/corrupted frames, disabling DXVA

Comment 27

[Guniu]

(In reply to Guniu from comment #22)
> ...when using mp4 I still see some glitches.
> 
> Like in this video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KS4m8PK_mqo
> The intro just flashes with few proper frames, the rest is just black
> screen, after the intro is done it plays normally with no issues. It happens
> every time I refresh the page, not after I rewind to the beginning.

An update on this issue:
Few days after my last comment my GTX 560Ti broke. I was playing a game, it TDR few times, then BSOD, and after the restart I had artifacts during the POST. The GPU was fried.
So I bought a new GTX 970, and now I'm not experiencing the issue described in comment #22, the video starts as it should with mp4.
So it might be that my GPU was corrupted and causing those video glitches.