Jerky Flash Video (FLV) => FIXED, thanks!

[porcorosso]

Minor irritation here, but I'd like to fix it. Can someone steer me?

Cassandra has been a real eye opener. Linux (at least this one) has become pretty darned easy! But when I play an flv file (flash video captured via the UnPlug add-on for Firefox) the sound is fine, but the video jerks at about 1-2 times per second. It's bizarre because, as I said, the sound is fine. And other videos are played smoothly.

I find this odd because I installed the gstreamer stuff when I ran an Ubuntu 7.04 installation, all pretty much the same player and codecs, and that installation played these same videos smoothly.

I checked the settings for the player but didn't see anything that looked as though it could help. Does anyone have a suggestion to help me troubleshoot this issue?

Many thanks for any bones you can throw my way.

[Husse]

So you download the video with unplug and then watch it?
Neither totem nor mplayer has any settings that has something to do with your error
The only thing I can think of is HAL which makes requests about twice a second - but that is really far fetched...

[porcorosso]

So you download the video with unplug and then watch it?
Neither totem nor mplayer has any settings that has something to do with your error
The only thing I can think of is HAL which makes requests about twice a second - but that is really far fetched...

Yeah, I know. Here's the funny thing. On the Ubuntu distribution I saw some similar weirdness (not in videos like this, but in other video subsystem functions) following a HAL update on this same box (Dell Precision M70 notebook with an nVidia Quadro FX Go1400 display card). But, if I remember correctly, that only happened following a HAL and kernel update while running the OS under Wubi. I don't think those updates affected video behavior at all when I did a regular installation of Ubuntu FF. (Wubi cripples the HAL, preventing stuff like hibernation and suspend.)

I appreciate your reply. If you can think of anything in particular that I might do to correct this, I'd be thankful for your thoughts.

I'm thinking this could be an issue with the nVidia drivers themselves (or perhaps with Dell's particular implementation of the video chipset on this computer).

I hate to start doing the Microsoft two-step, but I guess I might start uninstalling and reinstalling codecs and players. And, if that doesn't help, I'll move on to the kernel / HAL updates.

Or maybe I'll just wait for the release of Celena. It's not like this is a huge issue, but it makes watching a guitarist's hands for insight into her/his technique a little futile.

[porcorosso]

Eh, sorry for being a lazy dunce.

After you mentioned mplayer I decided to take another look at that player. I was just double-clicking on the .flv files before and playing them in totem.

After I told mplayer to "see" all files it showed me the flash video files, and it plays them flawlessly!

Wonder what's the matter with totem on this system? Not that it matters much now.

And, btw, holy cow but this is a fine distro! I can't believe how good the choices are across the board! I wasn't really a Gnome fan until I came across Ubuntu and Linux Mint, but you folks really have nailed it for me in this distro. I don't have to remove any unwanted stuff. I only add a few design apps, and I'm in business.

Well, there is the matter of my much preferring Wicd for controlling my wireless connections -- and the fact that I like setting up my own login screens. But this distro really shines.

Fan-danged-tastic!

[Husse]

You can install Wicd if you wish - we have given it some thought and if I remember correctly it's the default in Cassandra XFCE
If I remembered the commands to stop HAL (and/or dbus) and then start it again I had given them earlier - but I cant find a post that had a long discussion about HAL (in the Ubuntu forums I think)

[porcorosso]

Again, thanks for your help.

I guess I should have actually said what I meant. Yeah, I've already installed wicd. I like it better than using the original connection manager with the pam-keyring workaround.

I'll have to take a look at XFCE, since I haven't examined that environment before anyway. Its adherents seem to really like it.

I don't think I'm going to pursue the possible HAL connection further right now. Everything is "just working" (other than totem), if you know what I mean.

When I have a bit more time on my hands, which likely won't be until after Celena is out, I'll probably get curious enough to follow up on it -- if the problem even exists in Celena.