retropie 4.2 videopreview slowdowns/crashes

qanba

Hi i do a new clean install of retropie 4.2 in mi raspi 3 for have the videopreviews, i have installed the CRT theme and when i am a little time seeing the game list with the videos , the videos start to slowdowns and fails codecs in image and shuttering and in the corner of raspberry i see the thunder icon ( i have a new 3.A power supply, strange happen that ).

All systems work fine , and i have no HDD conected or other high consume periphericals only a 8bitdo controller, that only happens with CRT videopreviews if i use standar themes with no videos all work fine.

and my carbon theme of retropie 4.2 dont have videopreview i need to update it on packages? probably is a problem of the theme? im desesperate, please help me.

Thanks a lot!

TMNTturtlguy

@qanba the carbon theme needs to be updated. Got to retropie and then ES themes, choose carbon and then choose update. Restart your computer.

For the video issue, I have not heard of power issues with video, but overheating is an issue with the standard VLC video player. First off I assume you have not overclocked your pi? If not, how large is the file size of your video? I would use a program like handbreak to reduce your video file size down, probably to 320x240. I would also set your screensaver to black and have it start after 1 or 2 minutes.

Lastly, while the pi typically doesn't need a fan, a fan helps keep the pi cool when running video previews. Again, I have not heard of underrvoktage with videos? But maybe reducing the heat will also alleviate the power issue? Hope this helps.

qanba

@TMNTturtlguy my rpi3 is default , the videos are .mp4 and around 2 to 15 mg and 0:30 sec , usually res about 360/480p i dont understand what is the problem for that poor performance, maybe is the CRT theme... i need to try when i go to home with the carbon theme updated...

when thunder appears in my screen with the slowdowns maybe if i disable the warning ( avoid_warnings=2 ) the rpi dont low the performance and works fine... or apply OC i dont know.

qanba

no one can say me what happen? i need to overclock to 1400/500/500/6 + disable_warnings=2 in config.cfg
to can manage the videopreview work fine witout shuttering / slowdonws and crashes. i try diferent things to find if is the problem or not but no chance:

reconvert videos from 60fps to 29-30fps : dont work
reconvert video to h.265/264 codec: dont work
reconvert video to mpeg-2: dont work but seems to play little better.

dont know what more do i dont trust about no one have this problem with the new videopreviews in rpi 4.2

matchaman

The videos should be 240p. Anything more than that will require too much CPU power.

ezra84

Hi, for me the videopreview work great with the original Carbon theme in RetroPie 4.2 on a Pi3.

Most of the previews work fine, but some videos show a lot of artefacts or blurring/smudging whilst playing. After a while I also get the overheating icon in the top right of the screen.

All the previews were automatically scraped with SSelph Scraper. I see the resolution is 640x480. Taking the comment from @matchaman I will try to convert them to 320x240 and hope that it helps. Will let you know..

Any other suggestions how I can improve the performance of this feature in RetroPie and also taking care of the overheating?

Any help is much appreciated! Thanks!

TMNTturtlguy

@ezra84 in the start menu change the video player to OMX. That should solve all of your video and over heating issues.

pjft

@ezra84 What @TMNTturtlguy is correct.

As for the resolution, if you're going to downscale them, 480x360@30fps should work well.

Best.

ezra84

@tmntturtlguy hey thanks for your response.
I saw a youtube video showing exactly what you're saying, but I can't find that option (use omx player) in the start menu->other settings. Could you please tell how to add it?

I tried to install OMX player via commandline but it says it's already installed.

Regarding my previous comment, it actually works converting the videos to 240p. No more artefacts or overheating but it's a hassle of work. Obviously your solution is much much better :)

pjft

@ezra84 You might need to update ES, if that's the case, via RetroPie-Setup.

ezra84

@pjft @TMNTturtlguy Indeed it was an ES update. Enabled OMX player and works like a charm!

Thanks guys!

ezra84

Hi guys,
I noticed that (when using OMX player) the sound level of the video previews is much louder than the sound level in-game.
Is there a way to normalize this?

Thanks in advance.

pjft

@ezra84 there have been reports of that, and it's something I'll look into.

In this thread, someone has managed to get a set up that normalizes the volumes to a certain extent:

https://retropie.org.uk/forum/topic/12460/can-i-adjust-volume-when-using-omxplayer-in-emulationstation

Thanks.

ezra84

@pjft Alright thanks for the info!

pjft

@ezra84 Hi.

I apologize for bothering. Could you test with VLC and confirm whether the volume is different or the same as OMX Player? What volume do you have set in EmulationStation?

Thanks.

ezra84

@pjft no need for apologizing, it's only fair to return the favor.

I recall that VLC was similar to the emulator sound and since I've changed it to OMX it was much louder. I believe the sound slider was set on 77%, which is the standard setting in ES.

One more note, yesterday I pumped up the sound slider to 100% and it seemed the OMX video preview was the same as the emulator sound. So from that alone I can conclude that the slider affecting the emulators, but not OMX. And that 100% slider matches OMX sound level.

Anyway, I will test it properly tonight, will keep you posted

pjft

@ezra84 Thank you - that would be very much appreciated. If you can also test with VLC, that would be helpful, as I'm trying to understand what or how to address this.

By the way, what ES version are you in, though? I have recently-ish submitted a change to allow the ES sound slider to also affect the OMX Player volume - could you check that you're on 2.6.1 or above, and if not, update ES from the latest Binary and check again. If you reduce the ES volume it should reduce the video audio as well - on both VLC and OMX Player.

I just want to understand what exactly is the issue.

The reports in the other thread seemed to suggest that OMX was louder than VLC, so I was thinking that it would be an issue with how I implemented the audio volume on the OMX end.

However, yesterday I tested both VLC and OMX Player on 95% and they seemed to be pretty much the same volume between the two. It might be a volume scaling thing when I convert the % volume to the OMX Volume, or it might be that the video volume will always be louder than the emulator's one because different systems will have different default volumes in the original hardware - which would then beg the question of whether we want to force video volume as a whole to be quieter, and how.

Thanks for the help and let me know what you find!

jwcbronski

@pjft Here's what I found out: If you set the ES sytem volume to 100% the VLC and OMX sound levels are nearly the same. If you lower the ES volume the volume difference between the two players get's bigger. At 80% ES volume OMX is much louder that VLC and the emulators.

pjft

@jwcbronski Thanks. That's quite helpful. I'll try to look into that then and get a better approximation of the sound volumes as it gets lower.

ezra84

@pjft I don't even know how to check the version :) but I just updated everything (OS/Kernel etc.). I can only see I'm on RetroPie 4.3.1 right now.

You're right, the slider affects both VLC and OMX. on 100% it's pretty much the same (good enough) but I think VLC is a little bit louder. If I slide back to 77% or even 50% the difference gets bigger, OMX is much louder than VLC.

Hope this helps.