Topic: AMD GPU Acceleration Problems (Switching Back to 104 Fixes) (Read 8592 times)

CraigNZ · « **on:** January 24, 2014, 12:54:40 am »

I updated to v108 and that is when the problems started. As soon as I tried to play a Blu-ray movie or DVD movie the program would lock up. The last message showed was: Loading *** and up above the status showed "collecting". I then had to use CTL ALT DEL to stop the program. I am using ROHQ and tried all kinds of things, one thing that helped was to disable MadVR changing the video settings. But when I tried it in JRiver it also failed. So I switched back to v104 and everything works fine.

I noticed in the updates to 108 a comment about video acceleration on ROHQ and AMD cards. I am using an AMD 5700 series card. I did update the card to the latest drivers but it made no difference.

Can I get more details about what v108 did to video acceleration .. or does it mean that from this point on the AMD card will no longer work?

Hendrik · « **Reply #1 on:** January 24, 2014, 02:15:41 am »

If you disable hardware accelerated decoding in the options, does that change anything?

Daveyravey · « **Reply #2 on:** January 24, 2014, 02:29:56 am »

yes i had similar problems using nvidia hardware. I too have reverted back to 104 and problem went away.
JRiver would hang, i would get loads of stutter using madvr also if i tried to go back to the guide from live tv jriver just hung

Hendrik · « **Reply #3 on:** January 24, 2014, 02:36:12 am »

Nothing changed for NVIDIA in regards to hardware acceleration, so that must be something else.

Daveyravey · « **Reply #4 on:** January 24, 2014, 03:22:37 am »

I have some log files if that will help?

CraigNZ · « **Reply #5 on:** January 24, 2014, 04:09:14 am »

Same .. disabling HW acceleration made no difference.

CraigNZ · « **Reply #6 on:** January 24, 2014, 04:11:01 am »

Oh .. but if I went to Red October standard it sort of worked .. I could watch videos but there was a lot of tearing up in the upper half of the image.

Hendrik · « **Reply #7 on:** January 24, 2014, 04:57:23 am »

Which OS are you on?
And if you're on Vista/7, did you disable the Aero Glass? Because if its on, you really should never get tearing.

I can play all files just fine with both RO Standard or ROHQ, of course. On both Windows 7 and Windows 8.1, so that leaves me a bit stumped right now.

I'm still a bit confused about your actual issues, though.
- You can play in RO Standard, but the image has tearing?
- You cannot play in RO HQ with madVR at all? What exactly happens when you try? A log of this case may help.

Daveyravey · « **Reply #8 on:** January 24, 2014, 06:48:30 am »

i have sent a log file to logs@jriver.com

CraigNZ · « **Reply #9 on:** January 24, 2014, 12:40:02 pm »

I am running on Windows 7 .. and I thought I switched the display to Windows Classic (right click on on desktop, personalize) .. I will check again. Maybe there is another setting in JRiver software that needs to be set?

Hendrik · « **Reply #10 on:** January 24, 2014, 12:43:41 pm »

If you run Windows Classic, you can get tearing. Not sure if there is much that can be done about that in RO Standard, since it uses Microsofts default video renderer.
Personally I would advise to not use Windows Classic, for the sake of video playback, unless you have some real reasons for it.

CraigNZ · « **Reply #11 on:** January 25, 2014, 02:39:57 am »

I changed the desktop from Windows Classic to Windows Aero, then reinstalled v108, ROHQ and HW Acceleration. Launched JRiver which immediately enters Theater View .. launched a bluray movie and it locked up the software .. used CTL ALT DEL to recover.

I then rebooted (to make sure everything was back to normal) and did same as above but launched a DVD instead .. it locked the program.

Rebooted again, but this time exit Theater View, went to options and turned off HW acceleration. Then tried a bluray movie .. worked perfectly. Then tried a DVD, again it worked great. ROHQ switched video modes correctly. So all appears to work now in v108 as long as HW acceleration is disabled.

Hendrik · « **Reply #12 on:** January 25, 2014, 03:11:02 am »

Thanks for testing and reporting. I'll have to try again on my test box with an AMD card installed next week, we'll see if I can reproduce something.
As long as turning it off works for you, then thats OK, as you'll get the exact same behaviour as in 104 again with that. However we'll want to try to make sure it doesn't cause such issues in the first place, and if it needs to fail, maybe more gracefully would be neat.

CraigNZ · « **Reply #13 on:** January 25, 2014, 04:21:10 am »

Let me know if I can be of any assistance.

kstuart · « **Reply #14 on:** January 25, 2014, 06:54:35 pm »

This is a data point on the issue in this thread.

I tried the AMD hardware acceleration with 108 and it used more of the GPU than before, indicating that it is now working.

Previously I had hardware acceleration checked, thinking it was doing something, and then adjusted the madVR settings so that the 6750 GPU was not overly taxed. Now adding hardware acceleration causes lip sync issues (presumably due to overburdening the GPU), so I turned it off, and everything is fine.

Apparently the LAV software video decoder (MPEG4 H264) had been doing just fine all along... I'd be curious to know if you are using a particular pre-existing open source decoder, or is it of your own design ?

CraigNZ · « **Reply #15 on:** January 26, 2014, 11:28:20 am »

I replaced the AMD 5700 board with a NVIDIA GTX650ti board and v108 now plays successfully with HW acceleration on. No problems playing bluray or DVD movies.

Hendrik · « **Reply #16 on:** January 26, 2014, 11:38:34 am »

I'll try to investigate further in the coming days, maybe we can fix it, or worst case disable it again if its a commonly occuring problem.
Hardware Acceleration with AMD is a complicated topic, their support for it is rather bad in many situations.

CraigNZ · « **Reply #17 on:** January 26, 2014, 12:56:59 pm »

One thing I am not sure of but thought it might be helpful to mention this. When I switched to the NVIDIA card and was making changes in MADVR I nothiced a check box for DXVA2 which I think was specific for AMD cards. I did not check this box when I had the AMD card installed. Would this have been the reason why using the AMD card with HW acceleration locked the program?

Hendrik · « **Reply #18 on:** January 27, 2014, 12:40:09 pm »

I finished setting up my test box with a AMD card today, a 4800 generation card, the closest to 5700 I had at hand.

Of course for me HW acceleration with ROHQ just works, what else did I even expect to happen.

In the future, I hope we can do more to automatically configure madVR for ROHQ, so that we can offer quality/performance presets, and the majority wouldn't even need to mess with madVR settings, which should hopefully help with a number of such issues.

glynor · « **Reply #19 on:** January 27, 2014, 12:46:28 pm »

I might have an old 5750 on a shelf at home that could go to a good home...

Hendrik · « **Reply #20 on:** January 27, 2014, 12:48:44 pm »

I doubt its that specific series that would be causing such an issue.
I have a 7750 around as well, I might try again with that one, since it uses the updated driver, and the 4800 is on the legacy driver, so maybe that makes a difference.

I would however bet its some kind of weird interaction somewhere, that my clean test system won't be able to reproduce anyhow...

kstuart · « **Reply #21 on:** January 27, 2014, 03:02:00 pm »

Hendrik -

I am pretty sure that the OP had a problem because it was working correctly for the first time.

In the course of this thread, and another one, he mentions changing a number of madVR settings. I believe that he had madVR set to use GPU resources very close to the max, but the hardware acceleration failure in 104 made that one task go to the CPU instead. When 108 fixed hardware acceleration, then his 5750 GPU became overloaded, causing the observed problems.

--

In my case, with a 6450, 108's fix of hardware acceleration then caused stutter and lip sync problems, which were easily fixed by simply unchecking hardware acceleration.

So, I don't think there is a reversion or any new bug introduced.

glynor · « **Reply #22 on:** January 27, 2014, 03:11:58 pm »

Quote from: Hendrik on January 27, 2014, 12:48:44 pm

I doubt its that specific series that would be causing such an issue.

I agree. If it was going to be a hardware-specific bug, it is likely it would apply to only pre-UVD2 devices (Radeon HD 3x00 series and earlier), or to all UVD2 and UVD2.2 devices (which, since it includes the 6700 series and a whole raft of mobile parts would probably be much more apparent).

Still, though, the 6870s I use in both of my main machines now, the 6450 kstuart mentioned, and the 7750 you mentioned, are all UVD3 devices, so you could have some variance there.

I'll look when I get home. I'm not sure, at all, but I do have a giant pile of older AMD and Nvidia video cards lying about (most of my Nvidia ones are really, really old though). I know I had an unused 5750, though I might have given it away already.

If not, and it would be helpful for validation, I'm happy to pack it up and send it off to someone.

Hendrik · « **Reply #23 on:** January 27, 2014, 03:29:38 pm »

Quote from: kstuart on January 27, 2014, 03:02:00 pm

When 108 fixed hardware acceleration, then his 5750 GPU became overloaded, causing the observed problems.

You cannot "overload" a GPU like this. If it would be too much, it would just start dropping frames in madVR, and not fail playback entirely.
What you have seen on your system is the far more likely outcome, not enough performance results in glitchy playback, not in no playback.

In any case, hardware acceleration is unchecked by default, since its never guaranteed to be a flawless experience.
I'll run some more tests to validate everything works as expected on different hardware, but unless new evidence comes to light, the answer is to simply disable it if it causes issues.

Hendrik · « **Reply #24 on:** January 28, 2014, 01:15:09 pm »

I may have found a reason for hangs/crashes in some configurations, a fix will be in build 111 and newer, please report if it solves anything for you, or there are still problems, thanks!

Daveyravey · « **Reply #25 on:** January 30, 2014, 10:29:46 am »

Thanks Hendrik

Any idea when this build will be released? I am still on 104 at the moment due to the hangs i am experiencing with 108

Thanks

JimH · « **Reply #26 on:** January 30, 2014, 11:55:48 am »

19.0.111 is available now:
http://yabb.jriver.com/interact/index.php?topic=87120.0

Daveyravey · « **Reply #27 on:** January 30, 2014, 01:36:29 pm »

Thanks I will install and let you know if it fixes my problems.

Daveyravey · « **Reply #28 on:** January 31, 2014, 02:07:37 am »

Still crashing randomly reference post below

have sent a log file. Gone back to 104 now that build works fine on my hardware

Hendrik · « **Reply #29 on:** January 31, 2014, 05:53:17 am »

To my own surprise, I found another ATI/AMD card in my hardware pile (which I really should sort at some point). If I only knew where I got it, but oh well!
I now have a 3650, 4850, 5670 and 7750 at my disposal for testing, the first two tested with the 13.9 legacy driver and the two newer models with the 13.12 driver, and everything is working quite perfectly here.

I can still test with a bunch of different NVIDIA cards, I have at least a 430 GT and a 570 GTX around, maybe even something older.
So far however, everything is working just perfectly here, and sadly without reproducing issues, its extremely hard to even try to fix any.

The only issue I managed to reproduce was fixed in 19.0.111.

If you still have any issues, please be more specific than "It crashes" or "It hangs", details of what exactly happens and what exactly you were doing when it happened, in as much detail as possible: what were you watching, what were you trying to do, do you have hardware accelerated decoding on, RO Standard or ROHQ, etc, etc. Details! Always try tuning off hardware accelerated decoding, see if that helps.
Otherwise I'll not be able to do something about it. The log doesn't always provide the clear information of whats going on, especially if I have nothing to go on.

Daveyravey · « **Reply #30 on:** January 31, 2014, 08:07:26 am »

Thanks for the response Hendrik

My system is Windows 8.1 64 bit, Intel Z87 chipset with Nvidia GV-N760OC-4GD latest Nvidia drivers etc
Use madvr for my video output, also running a pioneer plasma , with a yamaha amp in the hdmi chain.

My problem is mostly around the following.

When watching recorded tv for example i will click (in theater view) to play a recorded tv show
If i then stop the recording and press back Mc19 freezes (by hanging i mean windows blue circle) it never unfreezes and clicking just caused windows to ask if i would like to kill the programme.. then MC19 crashes

It does seem to happen more often when i press the back button after watching something.

If i go back to 104 it always fixes the problem.

If there is any other debugging you would like me to do just ask.

Thanks for your support.

Dave

glynor · « **Reply #31 on:** January 31, 2014, 09:47:40 am »

What button or command do you mean, specifically, by the Back Button? Do you mean MCC_BACK (22005) (the same thing as the back button you can add to the toolbar)? Or do you mean Escape or some other key?

Daveyravey · « **Reply #32 on:** January 31, 2014, 09:56:00 am »

yes the back button on the theater view screen using a keyboard or remote has the same effect MC19 just hangs blue circle. Not all the time though annoyingly. It usually happens after playback of a recorded show

Daveyravey · « **Reply #33 on:** January 31, 2014, 11:55:56 am »

i have also tried without hardware acceleration and the same things happens.. something has definitely changed between builds 104 and 108.

Hendrik · « **Reply #34 on:** January 31, 2014, 11:59:35 am »

Weird. We may need some additional debug information in an upcoming build to figure out whats going on. Sadly I simply cannot get it to fail on my box.

Daveyravey · « **Reply #35 on:** January 31, 2014, 12:00:42 pm »

anything i can do to help let me know.

JimH · « **Reply #36 on:** January 31, 2014, 01:15:15 pm »

What are you using as antivirus software? Is any installed?

Daveyravey · « **Reply #37 on:** January 31, 2014, 03:21:01 pm »

No Jim I don't run any Av security essentials is installed but inhale exceptions for all jiver services

JimH · « **Reply #38 on:** February 01, 2014, 07:06:53 am »

Until we find the reason for this, please use this thread, and don't report it as a bug in the build thread.

glynor · « **Reply #39 on:** February 01, 2014, 09:41:24 am »

I changed the title of the thread to make it easier to identify and track on the main board.

glynor · « **Reply #40 on:** February 01, 2014, 09:45:14 am »

For the record, I have two machines with AMD 6870s. Not sure which drivers, probably a few months old. I've had no issues with recent builds with ROHQ with Acceleration enabled, though I don't know that I've used any really "difficult" files recently. I mostly use the HD AVC TS and MPEG-2 files (recorded by SageTV) on a daily basis. Like I said, though, certainly no crashing or trouble to speak of. I haven't noticed any CPU utilization issues, though I haven't really watched. I think my CPU can do ROHQ in software-only mode without too much trouble, so...?

ldoodle · « **Reply #41 on:** February 01, 2014, 04:19:24 pm »

Quote from: daveyravey1972 on January 31, 2014, 08:07:26 am

My system is Windows 8.1 64 bit

I'm starting to wonder if this is the problem. I have exactly the same problems as you, as well as Theater View crashing by just going into it - sometimes it does't even get to display the menus!

Long story short - I moved in June last year and only earlier this month got to plugging in my AV gear, which includes the HTPC. At the time of the move, I had Windows 8 (not 8.1) and Windows was last installed in about January (2013) so whatever ATI drivers were available then were what I was using. I did not have a single problem with this build - no crashes, no judder, no stutters. Nothing. Even with blurays as demanding as Casino Royale and The Dark Knight.

Fast forward to 2 weekends ago when I installed Windows 8.1 from scratch with MC 19.104 and 13.12 (I think) GPU drivers (I have an ATI 5450 card) and it's terrible now. My hardware has not changed at all! Theater View crashes all the time (I have stopped using it!), blurays have major judder/stutter (see my Slowdowns thread), to the extent they're unplayable so I'm back to using real discs on the PS3.

So it's either Windows 8.1 or ATI/AMDs latest driver release. Funnily enough, there's no drivers listed now for the 5450 on AMD's website, when you follow the dropdown lists route to get them!

Hendrik · « **Reply #42 on:** February 04, 2014, 01:13:27 pm »

Quote from: daveyravey1972 on January 31, 2014, 12:00:42 pm

anything i can do to help let me know.

Can you update to 19.0.114, available from the top of the board, reproduce the crash, and then send the new logs again?
I hope the new version gives us some more information.

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Author Topic: AMD GPU Acceleration Problems (Switching Back to 104 Fixes) (Read 8592 times)