video neophyte with raspberry pi 4,VLC,4K TV fails

[gamb00ler]

I "acquired" a 4K version of Avatar, but it will not play.

I'm running current Raspbian and VLC with output to a new Sony Bravia KD-49X7500H.

 

The audio plays but I only see a picture of the VLC traffic cone for video.

 

I think I have all the settings correct.  The pi desktop displays just fine in 4K resolution.

 

VLC says the video is: H.264-MPEG-4 AVC(part10)(avc1)

Video Resolution: 3840x2160

 

VLC statistics for audio says: decoded 4 blocks, displayed 0,lost 0.

 

The file name says: Avatar.2009.4K.DCP.2160p.x264.mkv

 

 

[RichCor]

Likely a missing CODEC issue. You could try doing an apt update/upgrade for VLC, but likely you'll find posts similar to the following:

 

https://www.raspberrypi.org/forums/viewtopic.php?t=243414

 

The H264 decoder is the same as before so limited to 1080p60.
Kodi is currently the only way to play back H265, which in turn is the only HW decoder capable of 4k.

 

Google Search: Raspberry Pi 4K x264

 

[Jai Dee]

On 11/14/2020 at 12:11 PM, gamb00ler said:

VLC says the video is: H.264-MPEG-4 AVC(part10)(avc1)

Video Resolution: 3840x2160

 

I agree with RichCor above in that it is likely a missing CODEC issue in your VLC but it could also be a hardware issue with the Raspberry.

 

H.264/Advanced Video Coding (AVC) is an industry standard for video compression. The H.264 standard is also known as MPEG-4 Part 10 and is a successor to earlier standards such as MPEG-2 and MPEG-4. An ITU standard for compressing video based on MPEG-4 that is popular, especially for high-definition video. AVC stands for Advanced Video Coding. Actually its identical to H.264 so you can find it as H.264, H.264/AVC, H.264/MPEG-4 AVC or MPEG-4 Part 10 (it can be twice as efficient as MPEG-4 Part 2). (reference)

 

I have a 4K video library (which includes Avatar) and I use Kodi (not VLC) to play them back. I also make sure that they are the 8bit H264 format not the 10bit H265 format as even Kodi struggles with that.

 

Having said that, it would appear from the Raspberry Pi 4 specifications, that it can play H.265 4K video (4kp60 decode), but H264 is limited to Full HD or 1080p (1080p60 decode, 1080p30 encode) so your video will not work properly.

 

See also this information.

 

Perhaps you could try "acquiring" an H.265 4K version of the film and trying that out with either VLC or Kodi on your Raspberry?