Bad sound with Kaffeine and .wmv files

[Qqmike]

In 14.04, Kaffeine fails to play .wmv files correctly:
The video is OK;
but the sound is terribly distorted with static (the sound plays, but with serious distortion).

(Aside: This problem does not exist in my 12.04, playing the SAME .wmv files)

In 14.04, these .wmv files ...
run OK with VLC; and
run OK with Dragon Player.

I did check and configure File Associations in System Settings: Kaffeine is set up to play .wmv.
I did have this installed: kubuntu-restricted-addons
In addition, as you know, when installing Kaffeine, Dragon Player, and VLC, tons of supporting packages are pulled in.

Then, I also installed libavcodec-extra: No change: Kaffeine sound fails with .wmv
Then I installed kubuntu-restricted-extras: No change: Kaffeine sound fails with .wmv


Any ideas? Any one else noticing this in 14.04?

[Qqmike]

... and to clarify:

Kaffeine, in 14.04, so far seems to play the other video formats without problems.
Its failure to play the .wmv format occurs with ALL .wmv files tried so far.

[vinnywright]

from what I have read it uses xine-lib as default ,,,,,or GStreemer or mplayer .........look in it's settings to see it you can switch to a different back end .

VINNY

[Qqmike]

In Muon, looking at list of dependencies, it does seem you're right about using libxine. But I don't see any options to change that. Nothing under Settings in Kaffeine, for example. Strange the problem is only with wmv files; and only in 14.04, not 12.04.

[Rog132]

Kaffeine/Xine

Tested with



Test file from:
http://samples.mplayerhq.hu
--> http://samples.mplayerhq.hu/asf-wmv/
------> http://samples.mplayerhq.hu/asf-wmv/welcome3.wmv

It is (mediainfo):

General
Complete name : /home/rog132/Downloads/welcome3.wmv
Format : Windows Media
File size : 175 KiB
Duration : 17s 31ms
Overall bit rate : 84.1 Kbps
Maximum Overall bit rate : 103 Kbps
Encoded date : UTC 2001-05-24 16:41:24.270

Video
ID : 2
Format : MPEG-4 Visual
Codec ID : MP4S
Codec ID/Info : Microsoft MPEG-4 (Windows Media 7.0)
Codec ID/Hint : MS MPEG-4 v3
Description of the codec : ISO MPEG-4 Video V1
Bit rate : 84.8 Kbps
Width : 320 pixels
Height : 240 pixels
Display aspect ratio : 4:3
Color space : YUV
Chroma subsampling : 4:2:0
Bit depth : 8 bits
Compression mode : Lossy

Audio
ID : 1
Format : WMA
Format version : Version 2
Codec ID : 161
Codec ID/Info : Windows Media Audio
Description of the codec : Windows Media Audio V7 - 16 kbps, 16 kHz, mono
Duration : 17s 31ms
Bit rate : 18.3 Kbps
Channel(s) : 1 channel
Sampling rate : 16.0 KHz
Bit depth : 16 bits
Stream size : 38.1 KiB (22%)

Trusty

The Kaffeine with the 14.04 is build with the libxine1 (xine-lib 1.1) -> It is using the older Xine.

The sound is distorted.

If tested with the xine-ui: http://packages.ubuntu.com/trusty/xine-ui
the sound is OK (well as ok as the 16 kHz mono can be).
The xine-ui is using the libxine2 (xine-lib 1.2).

Utopic

The Kaffeine with the 14.10 is build with the libxine2 as there is a Debian bug: https://bugs.debian.org/cgi-bin/bugr...cgi?bug=741361

The sound is OK.



You could ask backporting (rebuild with the xine-lib 1.2) of the Kaffeine or rebuild your own version.


Kaffeine future

The Kaffeine doesn't have developer/maintainer anymore:

--> https://projects.kde.org/projects/ex...media/kaffeine
----> https://www.mail-archive.com/kde-dev.../msg04046.html

[Rog132]

...and testing more

The Utopic Kaffeine can be grabbed and installed to the Trusty...



... and the test file sound is playing OK.

:~$ apt-cache show kaffeine
Package: kaffeine
Version: 1.2.2-3
Architecture: amd64
...
Depends: kde-runtime, libc6 (>= 2.14), libkdecore5 (>= 4:4.4.4), libkdeui5 (>= 4:4.4.4), libkfile4 (>= 4:4.4.4), libkio5 (>= 4:4.4.4), libqt4-dbus (>= 4:4.5.3), libqt4-sql (>= 4:4.5.3), libqt4-xml (>= 4:4.5.3), libqtcore4 (>= 4:4.8.0), libqtgui4 (>= 4:4.6.1), libsolid4 (>= 4:4.4.4), libstdc++6 (>= 4.1.1), libx11-6, libxine2 (>= 1.2.0), libxss1, libxine2-ffmpeg, libxine2-x, libqt4-sql-sqlite
Suggests: libdvdcss2
Filename: ./kaffeine_1.2.2-3_amd64.deb

[Qqmike]

Thanks for all this work and this info. OK, for Trusty. Through Muon, I did get xine-ui, and I see that the libxine2 files seem to be there as well. For Kaffeine, Muon lists only the libxine1 as dependency. Can I get that Kaffeine to use the xine-ui/libxine2 stuff in this Trusty? (without taking programming classes ;-) )
(Or, do I somehow have to fetch the Kaffeine from Utopic and bring it into Trusty?)

[Qqmike]

Btw, I tested my Kaffeine with the welcome3.wmv file, and it didn't play well at all -- video choppy, sound static/distorted/unclear.

(My VLC played the video OK, but no sound--usually, so far, my VLC plays wmv's OK, sound and video, but not that welcome3.wmv test file. My Dragon Player played both the video and the sound very well on this test file.)

[Rog132]

New (or old) packages.

Can I get that Kaffeine to use the xine-ui/libxine2 stuff in this Trusty? (without taking programming classes ;-) )
(Or, do I somehow have to fetch the Kaffeine from Utopic and bring it into Trusty?)

You only need the kaffeine package - when you install the kaffeine it will draw all the necessary packages from the ordinary (Trusty) repositories.




By the Kubuntu docs: KDE Menu > Applications - Help: Kubuntu - Advanced - Software Management







Searching and downloading Ubuntu packages

You could go to the Ubuntu Packages Search: http://packages.ubuntu.com

This site provides you with information about all the packages available in the Ubuntu Package archive.

Search the wanted package kaffeine/utopic.



You should get a hit: http://packages.ubuntu.com/search?ke...ic&section=all



Click the 'Utopic' - and there should be package information and an option to download: http://packages.ubuntu.com/utopic/kaffeine



Pick the right arch and you will get the download page.





An alternative - PPA packages

A search: https://launchpad.net/ubuntu/+ppas?name_filter=kaffeine

Picking one: https://launchpad.net/~samrog131/+archive/ubuntu/ppa




Installing...

Log of sudo apt-get install kaffeine
Mon Oct 6 17:42:35 2014

Reading package lists...
Building dependency tree...
Reading state information...
The following extra packages will be installed:
libmng2 libva-glx1 libxine2 libxine2-bin libxine2-doc libxine2-ffmpeg
libxine2-misc-plugins libxine2-plugins libxine2-x
Suggested packages:
gxine xine-ui
The following NEW packages will be installed:
kaffeine libmng2 libva-glx1 libxine2 libxine2-bin libxine2-doc
libxine2-ffmpeg libxine2-misc-plugins libxine2-plugins libxine2-x
0 upgraded, 10 newly installed, 0 to remove and 0 not upgraded.
Need to get 3,103 kB of archives.
After this operation, 10.0 MB of additional disk space will be used.
Do you want to continue? [Y/n]

[Rog132]

Players...

Btw, I tested my Kaffeine with the welcome3.wmv file, and it didn't play well at all -- video choppy, sound static/distorted/unclear.

(My VLC played the video OK, but no sound--usually, so far, my VLC plays wmv's OK, sound and video, but not that welcome3.wmv test file. My Dragon Player played both the video and the sound very well on this test file.)

There are plenty of media players. Some of them are using the gstreamer /1/ some are using the Xine /2/. There are also players that are using the libraries directly from the ffmpeg /3/, libav /4/ etc.

Some of the players are playing more than the others - And now there are two set of the shared libraries (ffmpeg/libav) as the ffmpeg has been forked - earlier: Avconv, Winff, ffmpeg /5/...


Links

1. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/GStreamer
2. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Xine
3. https://www.ffmpeg.org
4. https://libav.org
5. https://www.kubuntuforums.net/showth...v-Winff-ffmpeg

[Qqmike]

Many thanks, again, for all this. Definitely an area I need to learn more about. Will study your posts here and pursue the links. Thanks.

[Rog132]

...and one more

Andrey Pavlenko's PPA: https://launchpad.net/~aap/+archive/ubuntu/kaffeine has a Kaffeine build with the VLC libs:

~$ apt-cache show kaffeine
Package: kaffeine
Status: install ok installed
Priority: optional
Section: video
Installed-Size: 2500
Maintainer: Andrey Pavlenko <@>
Architecture: amd64
Version: 1.3-972~78fc9ec-ppa1~trusty
Depends: kde-runtime, libc6 (>= 2.14), libkdecore5 (>= 4:4.4.4), libkdeui5 (>= 4:4.4.4), libkfile4 (>= 4:4.4.4), libkio5 (>= 4:4.4.4), libqt4-dbus (>= 4:4.5.3), libqt4-network (>= 4:4.5.3), libqt4-sql (>= 4:4.5.3), libqt4-xml (>= 4:4.5.3), libqtcore4 (>= 4:4.8.0), libqtgui4 (>= 4:4.6.1), libsolid4 (>= 4:4.4.4), libstdc++6 (>= 4.1.1), libvlc5 (>= 2.0.0), libx11-6, libxss1
...

libvlc5:

:~$ apt-cache show libvlc5
Package: libvlc5
Priority: optional
Section: universe/libs
...
Description: multimedia player and streamer library
This package contains the shared library required by applications using VLC
features.
.
VLC is the VideoLAN project's media player. It plays MPEG, MPEG-2, MPEG-4,
DivX, MOV, WMV, QuickTime, WebM, FLAC, MP3, Ogg/Vorbis files, DVDs, VCDs,
podcasts, and multimedia streams from various network sources.
Description-md5: 7aeaccf15924abc072d91cc9a8630df1
Homepage: http://www.videolan.org/vlc/

[Qqmike]

It worked! I'll be darned. I did not use the PPA alternative; I followed the Search Package Directories at Ubuntu and install .deb.

The resultant kaffeine 1.2.2-3--from Utopic--does indeed depend on the libxine2 packages. --> And it plays the .wmv files perfectly well.

I took a couple hours today, giving myself a refresher course on all your links and many consequent links, and documenting all this. Remember trying to build from source when I was in Kubuntu 6.06 (I think), and gave up, not 'making' much of anything successfully. Then using the apt- command line. Then I felt the GUI at the time was doing a good job for me, so I went to GUI. Now I like Muon, but think I will do a quick refresher on the apt commands and use both, like this: https://help.ubuntu.com/community/Ap...ct=AptGetHowto (I think that's also in MY command line how-to! https://www.kubuntuforums.net/showth...sole-Beginners ). If you don't use this stuff, it's easy to forget it.

So, I guess the only consideration now might be whether I'll get updates to this Kaffeine version through Muon Updater? Certainly, I would get anything listed in the dependencies, as they are in my repositories and on my system. But maybe not to the Utopic Kaffeine version 1.2.2-3 proper ... obviously, not clear yet on some of this.

Next, I'll look at The Players some more, Post #10.

Again, many thanks. It's been an informative morning.