Closed Bug 1280141 Opened 8 years ago Closed 8 years ago

Firefox 47 Widevine not playing Netflix

Categories

(Core :: Audio/Video: Playback, defect, P3)

Product:
Core
Component:
Audio/Video: Playback
Version:
47 Branch
Type:
defect

Tracking

()

Status:
RESOLVED INVALID
Tracking Flags:
Tracking Status
firefox47 --- affected
firefox48 --- affected
firefox49 --- affected
firefox50 --- affected

People

(Reporter: jiang_wq, Unassigned)

Details

User Agent: Mozilla/5.0 (Windows NT 10.0; WOW64; rv:47.0) Gecko/20100101 Firefox/47.0
Build ID: 20160604131506

Steps to reproduce:

(1) disable PrimeTime plugin, and make sure WideVine is enabled
(2) visit netflix
(3) netflix said "you must enable DRM"
(4) press the button to enable DRM in netflix page and then netflix plays
(5) get back to plugin page to find PrimeTime enabled.


Actual results:

WideVine won't play netflix; PrimeTime will.


Expected results:

The only DRM in enabled status, WideVine, should go ahead and play netflix.
I correct the jargon: enabled should be "always activate", and disabled means "never activate".

I have played Netflix in an earlier Firefox versions (using Primetime).  I tried to clear all cookies in Firefox 47 but that didn't help.  Also tried to uninstall, removed profiles and then did a clean installation of Firefox 47 but that did not work (means activated Widevine did not play Netflix when Primetime is not activated), either.
It's said that Primetime is using old (and unsafe) plugin mechanisom while Widevine is using a different (and better) plugin technology.  So I'm curious how to make Widevine work without Primetime activated.  Currently Netflix is not broken in Firefox as one can always use Primetime.
> It's said that Primetime is using old (and unsafe) plugin mechanisom while Widevine is using a different (and better) plugin technology.

Who is saying that? Probably he is mixing up Primetime with NPAPI.
https://blog.mozilla.org/futurereleases/2016/04/08/mozilla-to-test-widevine-cdm-in-firefox-nightly/

"The Widevine CDM runs in an open-source CDM sandbox in Firefox, providing better user security than NPAPI plugins."

Not sure if Primetime is using the sandbox or NPAPI?

Anyway, is there a way to disable Primetime and use Widevine intsead?  Thanks ...
https://blog.mozilla.org/blog/2015/12/17/firefox-users-can-now-watch-netflix-html5-video-on-windows/

"Adobe’s Primetime CDM runs in Mozilla’s open-source CDM sandbox, providing better user security compared to NPAPI plugins."
Ah, thanks!  So they're equal to each other.
Sorry, equal except that Netflix prefers Primetime?  Or it's just some setting issue at my side?
I tried it on a Macbook (OS X 10.10).  It plays Netflix well using MS Silverlight plugin.  I disabled the plugin and left Widevine enabled ("always activate"), and there is no Primetime in the add-ons.  Then I went ahead to play Netflix but got the message -

    Microsoft Silverlight is required to play this title.
    Install the Microsoft Silverlight Plug-in.
    ...

Am I missing anything?
In my understanding, Widevine on Netflix is unsupported yet. Mozilla people is working with Netflix to support it (for example, see several last comments from bug 1198381).
That explains everything!  So if the issue is being addressed in other bugs would you please close this one.  Thanks a lot for you help!
Component: Untriaged → Audio/Video: Playback
Product: Firefox → Core
Thanks for reporting this problem, Wenqing. Netflix does not currently support Widevine on Firefox. Like Masatoshi said in comment 8, we're testing it but we still have some work to do.
Status: UNCONFIRMED → NEW
status-firefox47: --- → affected
status-firefox48: --- → affected
status-firefox49: --- → affected
status-firefox50: --- → affected
Ever confirmed: true
Priority: -- → P2
Summary: Firefox 47 Widevine not playing NetFlix → Firefox 47 Widevine not playing Netflix
Mass change P2 -> P3
Priority: P2 → P3
I notice now that 49 is using widevine for Netflix, that it is a little bit more cpu intensive than primtetime was. In general,  why is CPU utilization in plugin-container so high when dealing with DRM material? I can see that the GPU is also being used on my system for hardware acceleration in process explorer when netflix is running, and still plugin-container pegs one of my CPU cores close to 100% playing 720p material. In a laptop on battery or in an HTPC environment where noisy fans have to kick on this can be an annoyance. On non-DRM material, like youtube, even streaming 1080p the CPU utilization is so tiny in comparison that the same machine doesn't even need to get out of powersave mode on the CPU. I am really curious as to why performance is so bad with these plugins on DRM streaming. Is this something that can also be handled by the GPU more efficiently?
I'm now at version 48.0.2 (in Windows 10), and I tried to use widevine to play netflix again (by disabling the primetime plugin first).  Surprisingly it worked!  Comment #10 told that the issue affected versions up to 50.  Thus I guess that may just mean some rough needs smooth out (which I didn't bump into in my tests).  Also because of Simon's comment in #12 I took note on CPU in my tests, and it seems that both cases (widevine and primetime) used roughly the same CPU in the laptop I used (widevine might be slightly higher, but I'm not sure), and both are under 20% most of the time.
Wait ... in v48.0.2 when I disabled widevine and leave primetime activated, then played netflix, I was asked to enable DRM.  When I pressed enable DRM button, the widevine plugin was activated, and netflix played.

So now it's the opposite of the initial issue of this ticket.  The ticket complains that widevine could not play netflix (v47).  Version 48.0.2, at least in my tests, has just showed that only widevine plays netflix, and primetime alone won't work.

In my previous comment (#13), "playing using widevine" means the widevine is activated and primetime is not, playing using primetime means both are activated.  In the latter case I had assumed that it was the primetime working.  But now I'm not so sure...
(In reply to Simon from comment #12)
> On non-DRM material, like youtube, even streaming 1080p the CPU
> utilization is so tiny in comparison that the same machine doesn't even need
> to get out of powersave mode on the CPU. I am really curious as to why
> performance is so bad with these plugins on DRM streaming. Is this something
> that can also be handled by the GPU more efficiently?

Unlike non-DRM video playback, the DRM plugin-container (CDM: Content Decryption Module) for Google Widevine or Adobe Primetime does not use GPU for hardware-accelerated video decoding because that would allow other processes to copy the unencrypted high-resolution video from the GPU. Firefox, however, may be using the GPU for hardware-accelerated compositing of the decoded video frames when rendering the web page.
(In reply to Wenqing Jiang from comment #14)
> So now it's the opposite of the initial issue of this ticket.  The ticket
> complains that widevine could not play netflix (v47).  Version 48.0.2, at
> least in my tests, has just showed that only widevine plays netflix, and
> primetime alone won't work.

Netflix is testing Widevine for Windows and Mac with more users, so it is not surprising that they may now be serving you Widevine video instead of Primetime.

Wenqing, if you are now receiving Widevine video, can we resolve this bug as "fixed" or "works for me"? Or is there still a problem?
I'm going to close this bug. It's actually invalid because Netflix is making the call about what DRM systems to support. I'm confident that at any point in time Primetime or Widevine will work so the recommendation is to leave both enabled.
Status: NEW → RESOLVED
Closed: 8 years ago
Resolution: --- → INVALID
Yes I agree.  Thanks a lot for all the efforts!
You need to log in before you can comment on or make changes to this bug.