Topic: Streaming Videos to Android (Read 12070 times)

park · « **on:** August 18, 2011, 10:01:07 pm »

I have just tried watching a movie in Gizmo again.

First I confirmed that my old slow server, with plug in usb sound stick was able to play a file. I had to use dsp studio to set downmixing to stereo and then it worked, albeit very slowly and jittery (because the server isnt very powerful). I suggest that when a file cant play, a useful message is presented to the user. I was told "audio output can't connect to the audio decoder" or something like that. It would have been better if MC could have suggested some reasons for me.

I waited about 10 minutes for a movie to start playing, and things appeared to be working ("Server preparing file..." message stayed up, and on the server the cpu was pegged at 100% for the whole time) but I gave up waiting in the end.

I guess my server is just too slow to be able to reliably convert on the fly. Here are the features I would need to see in order to really get much use out of gizmo for video.

1. The ability to set the server to pre-convert everything in a smartlist or playlist. This is the ideal way for us as users to be able to queue up what we think we will want to watch in the short term.

2. Following on from 1, a simple way to add files to playlists in Gizmo, so that I dont have to keep doing everything at home.

3. The option in Gizmo to maximise the use of internet connections to pre-download everything in Playing Now, so that when we enter tunnels or whatever, we can continue watching our film, listening to an album, etc.

jmone · « **Reply #1 on:** August 18, 2011, 10:47:54 pm »

Did you manually grab the latest Gizmo for your Android here: http://jriver.com/install_gizmo.html ? I run MC Server on an i7 box so it has plenty of grunt but I don't see the "server preparing file" msg any more instread it is a set of four stars that rotate for no more than a second or so then playback starts.

On my testing, I found the video playback was great on over my Wireless LAN, but no good via the Internet and WCDM. The video will play, pause, play, pause etc due to the badwidth constraints of trying to stream a 2.5Mbps file..... Unfortunately even pre transocoding the file will not help as my upload is less than this (and in many cases the download over the phone network may also be less). A good option would be to "copy" the file first rather than "playing it"

park · « **Reply #2 on:** August 18, 2011, 11:59:29 pm »

jmone, thanks. I downloaded the new version on android and now I see the four stars turning. I also get playback within about 30 seconds of hitting play.

It works great. Would still love to see some form of offline pre-loading though since half of my commute is on the subway.

Hendrik · « **Reply #3 on:** August 19, 2011, 01:28:39 pm »

Since i got me a Galaxy Tab just today, i've been testing this feature as well. Thanks for the hint on the updated Gizmo, before that nothing worked.

However, while with the updated Gizmo playback does start, i only get Audio, no Video. The screen remains black.

This was a typical 720p24 H264 MKV i was trying to play.

Anything i'm missing?
Gizmo not compatible with the Galaxy Tab 10.1? It does show video on my Samsung Galaxy S2

If i can get this to work properly, i would probably upgrade my media server, and setup a Windows VM on it so it can run transcoding for me, and not my desktop.

Matt · « **Reply #4 on:** August 19, 2011, 01:48:03 pm »

Quote from: nevcairiel on August 19, 2011, 01:28:39 pm

Since i got me a Galaxy Tab just today, i've been testing this feature as well. Thanks for the hint on the updated Gizmo, before that nothing worked.

However, while with the updated Gizmo playback does start, i only get Audio, no Video. The screen remains black.

This was a typical 720p24 H264 MKV i was trying to play.

Anything i'm missing?
Gizmo not compatible with the Galaxy Tab 10.1? It does show video on my Samsung Galaxy S2

If i can get this to work properly, i would probably upgrade my media server, and setup a Windows VM on it so it can run transcoding for me, and not my desktop.

Try installing Flash Player from the market. It's required, but I don't think Gizmo has graceful detection / error handling yet for when it's not there.

JimH · « **Reply #5 on:** August 19, 2011, 01:51:24 pm »

javascript also needs to be on. It may be off by default.

Osho · « **Reply #6 on:** August 19, 2011, 02:00:49 pm »

Quote from: nevcairiel on August 19, 2011, 01:28:39 pm

Since i got me a Galaxy Tab just today, i've been testing this feature as well. Thanks for the hint on the updated Gizmo, before that nothing worked.

However, while with the updated Gizmo playback does start, i only get Audio, no Video. The screen remains black.

I had exact same experience with Galaxy Tab (with the latest version of Gizmo from jriver's website and 16.0.155 MC).

Another problem: when I start audio playback in Gizmo on this tablet, the audio does not start. The "Playing Now" Gizmo page is now completely blank with no UI displayed.

Thanks,
Osho

Matt · « **Reply #7 on:** August 19, 2011, 02:01:19 pm »

Quote from: JimH on August 19, 2011, 01:51:24 pm

javascript also needs to be on. It may be off by default.

This should message nicely now, but if someone wants to confirm on a non-development machine I'd appreciate it.

Hendrik · « **Reply #8 on:** August 19, 2011, 02:09:17 pm »

Flash came preinstalled, but i installed the update from market to be sure, nothing changed.

Does it use flash only for video, not for audio? Because that plays, as mentioned.

Matt · « **Reply #9 on:** August 19, 2011, 02:10:05 pm »

Quote from: Osho on August 19, 2011, 02:00:49 pm

Another problem: when I start audio playback in Gizmo on this tablet, the audio does not start. The "Playing Now" Gizmo page is now completely blank with no UI displayed.

This copy of Gizmo is a little broken for things other than testing the new video work. I'll try to get a better version up later today.

JimH · « **Reply #10 on:** August 19, 2011, 02:48:20 pm »

Did you try turning on javascript?

Video is working on my 7 inch Galaxy Tab, using 16.0.155 and Gizmo from this page:
www.jriver.com/install_gizmo.html

Matt · « **Reply #11 on:** August 19, 2011, 02:58:08 pm »

You could also test WebPlay instead of Gizmo to see if it gives any clues.

Direct: http://192.168.0.100:52199/WebPlay/
Access Key: http://wp.jriver.com/[Access Key]

Matt · « **Reply #12 on:** August 19, 2011, 03:02:13 pm »

There's an updated Gizmo here:
http://www.jriver.com/install_gizmo.html

Hendrik · « **Reply #13 on:** August 19, 2011, 03:05:10 pm »

As far as i can tell JS is active.

Webplay works.

Testing new gizmo now.
Edit: no change.

Regarding the 7 inch - the 10 inch is a completely different device, with a much different version of android.
Like i said, my phone plays just fine.

Matt · « **Reply #14 on:** August 19, 2011, 03:16:59 pm »

If WebPlay works, what happens if you play a video, then replace "play_flash.html" with "play_flash_simple.html"?

Basically Gizmo just shows play_flash_simple.html fullscreen now when playing a video.

If that works, it seems like there must be some permission issue blocking the browser in the app from using Flash. I'll have to dig around a bit on this problem.

bennyd · « **Reply #15 on:** August 19, 2011, 03:24:03 pm »

Quote from: Matt on August 19, 2011, 03:02:13 pm

There's an updated Gizmo here:
http://www.jriver.com/install_gizmo.html

Same problem with this version of Gizmo, black screen for video, only sound.

On my phone (Samsung Galaxy Sii) it's playing fine (which has Android 2.3.4)
My Asus Transformer tablet has Android 3.2 (Honeycomb).

If it's playing on the 7inch tablet, I suspect it has something to do with the android version, as the 7inch has Android 2.2 or 2.3

bennyd · « **Reply #16 on:** August 19, 2011, 03:25:23 pm »

What I also noticed if Authentication is turned on (for library synching), Gizmo does not want to connect anymore.

Hendrik · « **Reply #17 on:** August 19, 2011, 03:32:15 pm »

Using the page directly works.

Something else i noticed was that the new bottom android status bar does not hide when its trying to play, but its impossible to say if thats being caused by playback not working.

I set plugin support to "on demand" in the browser, would that cause issues? I dont want flash to auto-load on web pages.
Im still puzzled about audio playing but video not, as if its rendering off-screen.

Matt · « **Reply #18 on:** August 19, 2011, 03:43:19 pm »

Quote from: bennyd on August 19, 2011, 03:25:23 pm

What I also noticed if Authentication is turned on (for library synching), Gizmo does not want to connect anymore.

Gizmo should ask for a password on connect. I keep authentication on with my development machine to test, and also on my home machine for security.

It's possible switching the authentication requirements for the same server exposes a bug? You could try an uninstall and reinstall of Gizmo to erase any settings.

Matt · « **Reply #19 on:** August 19, 2011, 03:52:45 pm »

Quote from: nevcairiel on August 19, 2011, 03:32:15 pm

I set plugin support to "on demand" in the browser, would that cause issues? I dont want flash to auto-load on web pages.
Im still puzzled about audio playing but video not, as if its rendering off-screen.

Since the audio works, it sort of rules out flash not loading or authentication issues.

It could be a page layout issue, but the activity and HTML are both really simple.

Quote

Something else i noticed was that the new bottom android status bar does not hide when its trying to play, but its impossible to say if thats being caused by playback not working.

We may need to get 3.2 running on one of our tablets.

Hendrik · « **Reply #20 on:** August 19, 2011, 04:13:30 pm »

Its actually 3.1, they didnt push 3.2 out to the galaxy tabs yet, well at least not over OTA, didn't connect it to its update software yet.

Maybe testing in the emulator would do already?

Matt · « **Reply #21 on:** August 19, 2011, 04:40:04 pm »

Quote from: bennyd on August 19, 2011, 03:25:23 pm

What I also noticed if Authentication is turned on (for library synching), Gizmo does not want to connect anymore.

There's a new Gizmo up (again) and it should fix this.

I had some namespace issues due to internal renaming and the compiler doesn't warn about them.

jmone · « **Reply #22 on:** August 19, 2011, 04:59:10 pm »

New version on my Galaxy Tab 7" works well and fixed:
- PN for Audio is how shown (not a blank screen)
- Audio stops playing when you play a Video

Video still plays well.

jmone · « **Reply #23 on:** August 19, 2011, 05:36:43 pm »

FYI (trying to keep it all in once place), these bugs still exist:
- AR: The Aspect Ratio is not being correctly displayed with 16:9 PAR material, they show at 4:3(ish). This includes for me 1440x1080 MPEG2 in M2TS, 720x576 MPEG2 in MPG container, and 720x576 DV in AVI Container. No problem I could see with 1:1 PAR material with both 4:3 and 16:9 being displayed correctly.
- Subtitles: No a "big" one but do you expect to render subs from the MC Sub Engine as a part of the stream?
- WMV Hang: If I try to play a WMV/WMA in WMV Container then Gizmo's stars just rotate and playback never commences + the process at the backend seems to then be stalled as no subsequent video will then stream (more spinning stars). You have to close and restart MC to bring it back to life.

bennyd · « **Reply #24 on:** August 19, 2011, 11:08:10 pm »

Quote from: Matt on August 19, 2011, 04:40:04 pm

There's a new Gizmo up (again) and it should fix this.

I had some namespace issues due to internal renaming and the compiler doesn't warn about them.

Authentication working now with Gizmo3, thx.

Video still black screen on Android 3.2 (Asus Transformer)

park · « **Reply #25 on:** August 20, 2011, 12:59:52 am »

My setup:
WHS hosts Media Server build 156
HTPC LS client build 156
HTC Desire HD phone Gizmo, latest installed.

Working great for me today. Video playback is quick and works for all different types of files. HD content is playback isnt smooth though, I guess because the server is too slow at converting it. I see constant buffering. Hopefully, if you implement the pre-converting queue feature that will allow people like me with older hardware to overcome this hurdle.

I can see playing now for my htpc now, but it's seems to be a little funky still. It's showing a movie that I was playing last night, even though I'm now playing music on my htpc. The play and pause commands are working though.
The Commands screen is still funky too. Next/previous dont work in either the Commands screen, or the Playing Now one, for controlling the htpc.

JimH · « **Reply #26 on:** August 20, 2011, 02:48:21 pm »

Quote from: nevcairiel on August 19, 2011, 04:13:30 pm

Its actually 3.1, they didnt push 3.2 out to the galaxy tabs yet, well at least not over OTA, didn't connect it to its update software yet.

I bought one today. It's also 3.1. Hopefully we'll get it going for you next week.

Hendrik · « **Reply #27 on:** August 20, 2011, 04:17:41 pm »

I'm looking forward to it, now i just need a faster connection at home so i can stream videos to work. :p

jmone · « **Reply #28 on:** August 20, 2011, 05:05:15 pm »

Quote from: JimH on August 20, 2011, 02:48:21 pm

I bought one today....

What a great job! the back shed must be full of tech

Matt · « **Reply #29 on:** August 22, 2011, 10:39:16 am »

Quote from: nevcairiel on August 20, 2011, 04:17:41 pm

I'm looking forward to it, now i just need a faster connection at home so i can stream videos to work. :p

There's a new version that should work nicely with your tablet:
http://jriver.com/install_gizmo.html

As an added bonus, we turned on hardware acceleration for browsing and image playback. Both feel much nicer now on the tablet.

Hendrik · « **Reply #30 on:** August 22, 2011, 10:46:19 am »

Video plays now, however it seems a bit laggy. Movements dont seem to be really smooth.
This is a typical 720p 24fps movie in H264 MKV.

Is there any control over what format, quality, etc the movie is converted to for streaming?
Going to test some more.

Also, as a small bonus, can you get the bottom status bar to hide?

JimH · « **Reply #31 on:** August 22, 2011, 10:53:54 am »

Quote from: nevcairiel on August 22, 2011, 10:46:19 am

Video plays now, however it seems a bit laggy. Movements dont seem to be really smooth.

What speed is the connection?

Hendrik · « **Reply #32 on:** August 22, 2011, 10:57:31 am »

Local WLAN, faster then the original files bandwidth. =)

Matt · « **Reply #33 on:** August 22, 2011, 10:58:32 am »

Quote from: nevcairiel on August 22, 2011, 10:46:19 am

Video plays now, however it seems a bit laggy. Movements dont seem to be really smooth.
This is a typical 720p 24fps movie in H264 MKV.

Is there any control over what format, quality, etc the movie is converted to for streaming?
Going to test some more.

There's only one quality right now, but adding more options isn't technically challenging. It may even be possible for playback to auto-adjust based on the dropped frame percentage.

For now, we're trying to find one profile that works reasonably well on a variety of devices. Once we achieve that, we'll add more complexity.

Quote

Also, as a small bonus, can you get the bottom status bar to hide?

I looked a little on this, and saw people say that it wasn't allowed because the user would lose access to the home and back buttons. But Jim said some programs fade the buttons down, so there must be some call we can make.

Matt · « **Reply #34 on:** August 22, 2011, 11:04:57 am »

While we have your attention, I've gotten a few server crashes using Gizmo because of what seems like an issue with the new LAV audio decoder:
http://yabb.jriver.com/interact/index.php?topic=66018.0

bennyd · « **Reply #35 on:** August 22, 2011, 12:51:45 pm »

Quote from: Matt on August 22, 2011, 10:39:16 am

There's a new version that should work nicely with your tablet:
http://jriver.com/install_gizmo.html

As an added bonus, we turned on hardware acceleration for browsing and image playback. Both feel much nicer now on the tablet.

Cool, working now on android 3.2

JimH · « **Reply #36 on:** August 22, 2011, 01:34:59 pm »

Quote from: bennyd on August 22, 2011, 12:51:45 pm

Cool, working now on android 3.2

What do you have that's running 3.2?

Hendrik · « **Reply #37 on:** August 22, 2011, 03:46:51 pm »

The ASUS EEE Pad Transformer has 3.2 already.

bennyd · « **Reply #38 on:** August 22, 2011, 11:58:57 pm »

Quote from: JimH on August 22, 2011, 01:34:59 pm

What do you have that's running 3.2?

Indeed, Asus Transformer

Hendrik · « **Reply #39 on:** August 23, 2011, 01:24:46 am »

I did play around with Gizmo a bit last night, and i really like it alot more then the web interface. The web thing was really bad to navigate and slow, not sure what caused it, but Gizmo is fast, navigation is smooth, and everything works just fine.

One thing i noticed though - i was watching some recorded tv show and fell asleep. When i woke up this morning, the tablets screen was still active, even though the show stopped playing 6 hours ago.
I did not try to re-test yet to confirm, but if that was really caused by Gizmo, can that be fixed? (allowing the screen to shut off if playback finished)

Anyhow, good job!
Now all i need is different bandwidth presets, so i could potentially even watch over a 3G connection, or from work. My home upload bandwidth is only 1Mbit, so it would have to fit in that, but still offer more bandwidth/higher quality solutions when i watch from the WLAN. =)

Matt · « **Reply #40 on:** August 23, 2011, 02:04:45 pm »

Thanks for testing nevcairiel.

A coming build will detect the end of a video and return to Gizmo. This will allow the device to sleep.

You can get the new Gizmo here, but you'll also need 16.0.158 (later today):
http://www.jriver.com/install_gizmo.html

Maybe we can add an alarm clock to wake you back up next

park · « **Reply #41 on:** August 23, 2011, 10:34:04 pm »

Great news on the subtitle support. Can't wait to try it out. Where can you set the position/ size of subtitles though? It says in playback options in the latest build thread, but I havent seen those options. Since moving to RO I have noticed that japanese subtitles seem to have too big a border on them, dwarfing the the actual white strokes within, and also they appear half way up the screen instead of near the bottom.

Osho · « **Reply #42 on:** August 24, 2011, 01:07:47 am »

New video support is working very well in Gizmo on Android phone (HTC EVO 4G running Stock 2.3.3 Gingerbread).

* seek works now - no crashing MC16 when seeking

* playback starts almost instantly !! Yeah !
* seek bar is more finger friendly - glad to see volume gone from it. But, it would be nicer if the seek bar was still a little bigger (for smaller screen sized phone such as my wife's HTC Hero).

Quality of video was pretty good but not excellent - I am not sure what resolution and bit-rate it was - but the video was more than watchable quality over local WiFi. I will test with 4G connection tomorrow at work.

Testing next on Galaxy tab 10.1 (3.1 Android).. will post here when done testing.

Also, looking forward to testing the subtitles.
thanks,
Osho

Matt · « **Reply #43 on:** August 24, 2011, 12:05:58 pm »

Quote from: park on August 23, 2011, 10:34:04 pm

Where can you set the position/ size of subtitles though? It says in playback options in the latest build thread

There are some global settings in Options > Video > Subtitles & Language.

You can also set the size and position per-file from the 'Subtitles' submenu when you right-click a playing video.

Osho · « **Reply #44 on:** August 24, 2011, 12:14:47 pm »

Tested on Galaxy tab 10.1 (running touchwiz 3.1 Honeycomb stock ROM) over home Wi-Fi. The video playback works really well. Seek works really well. Resolution/bit-rate could have been better for higher quality video for the tablet (but still very much watchable).

One problem that I kept on having was that when I was using seekbar to seek - I repeatedly ended up touching the Honeycomb UI bar at the bottom. Could the seekbar be a little higher to avoid this problem?

Thanks,
Osho

bennyd · « **Reply #45 on:** August 24, 2011, 12:30:02 pm »

All my movies have subtitles with the same filename in .srt format.

I can't get Gizmo to show these.

Is there any option I need to turn on ?

In general settings for Video I selected the following:
- Show subtitle in selected language if available
- Default subtitle language : Dutch
- Default Audio language : Dutch

But for DIVX or MKV movies, how does MC knows which language a movie is ?

Via MC itself, the subtitles play fine (if I turn it on via Stream menu, it doesn't show by default)

Matt · « **Reply #46 on:** August 24, 2011, 12:31:15 pm »

bennyd, make sure you have Media Center 16.0.158 or newer installed.

bennyd · « **Reply #47 on:** August 24, 2011, 01:09:39 pm »

Quote from: Matt on August 24, 2011, 12:31:15 pm

bennyd, make sure you have Media Center 16.0.158 or newer installed.

I have, no luck...

bennyd · « **Reply #48 on:** August 24, 2011, 02:53:28 pm »

I've setup Red October with Additional Filters/JRiver Video Engine/FFDShow , then it works properly.
When selecting Red October Standard, no subtitles are shown.

Media Center 16.0.159.0 Registered -- C:\Program Files\J River\Media Center 16\

Microsoft Windows XP Workstation 5.1 Service Pack 3 (Build 2600)
Intel Core 2 1978 MHz MMX / Memory: Total - 2088 MB, Free - 1399 MB

Internet Explorer: 8.0.6001.18702 / ComCtl32.dll: 5.82.2900 / Shlwapi.dll: 6.0.2900 / Shell32.dll: 6.0.2900 / wnaspi32.dll: N/A
Ripping / Drive D: Mode:ModeSecure Type:Auto Speed:Max
Digital playback: Yes / Get cover art: Yes / Calc replay gain: Yes / Copy volume: 100
Eject after ripping: Yes / Play sound after ripping: No

Burning / Drive D: Optiarc DVD RW AD-7191S Addr: 2:1:0 Speed:48 MaxSpeed:48 BurnProof:Yes
Test mode: No / Eject after writing: Yes / Direct decoding: Yes / Write CD-Text: Yes
Use playback settings: No /

Portable Device Info
Removed devices: F:\

Interface Plugins:
TiVo Server

JimH · « **Reply #49 on:** August 24, 2011, 03:02:06 pm »

You may need the latest Gizmo (158).

INTERACT FORUM

Author Topic: Streaming Videos to Android (Read 12070 times)