Sudden video playback issue on 24.04.2 LTS

Suddenly overnight I am having issues with video playback.

First I noticed it in Discord, where video wouldn't play in the app, then vlc would crash trying to play a video. I was able to fix vlc by changing the output to x11, but what do I do for Discord and the rest of the system and what could have happened to make this happen?

Do you have sotware updates done automatically in the background?

If so, when/what was your last video-related software update?

If you revert that to the earlier version, does it fix the issue?

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Honestly I don't remember if there was any kind of update that may have messed things up for me or not. And since after a bit of a failed hardware upgrade I do not currently have access to the lenovo right now I'm going to put a pin in this.

(Tried to do a keyboard replacement and it booted once then didn't boot again. Hoping to comb through it to find something that get pulled loose or something of that nature and be back using the lenovo again. Currently using a Dell Precision M4800 loaner.)

I've had the same issue since upgrading to 24.04.2 LTS. Some videos and audio (eg. YouTube) refuse to play. I don't think it's a codec issue though and I've tried logging into a Xorg session instead of Wayland and that didn't solve it.

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Hi, @qj2025 and welcome to the Ubuntu MATE Community!

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I got this with sudo apt upgrade:

The following upgrades have been deferred due to phasing:
ubuntu-drivers-common
0 to upgrade, 0 to newly install, 0 to remove and 1 not to upgrade.

So I'm wondering whether it's maybe a driver issue with a fix in the works.

I still have this issue, but I can playback audio only via bluetooth which suggests to me it's the audio driver specifically.

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Maybe some specifics about what applications you are using and what you are trying to do would help; I haven't had interruptions to video or audio playback with the applications I use.

Hardware can also be a source of problems, for example, if using VA-API or NVENC (or 'NVDEC') for video decoding.

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Do you get the same issue using a different browser on your existing desktop?

Are you able to play a video file that was previously stored locally?

  • if YES ... the issue is NOT the video player software
  • if NO ... the issue IS the browser API or the player software or the driver

If the local video file is the same file-type as the YouTube stream file-type, and you don't get the video track,

  • it IS likely the driver

Otherwise, it is likely how your browser is interacting with YouTube's resource specifications. :frowning:


Suggestion:
I use the following tool to download almost ALL video files before viewing.

After all, I may wish to keep that for future reference, or manipulate it for finer control for viewing. You may wish to consider that alternative approach, and maybe that will bypass what may be a browser-centric issue. If you can play from local disk, after saving using that plug-in, it is definitely a browser-based issue.


Comment:
Mozilla has been gradually "shedding" what they consider "edge" functionality which is not core to the browser itself, especially where there are strong 3rd-party Apps/plug-ins that demonstrate that they outperform what Mozilla already has in their "stable" of capabilities. I am not convinced that Mozilla still perceives Video-Playing one of their "core" capabilities. :frowning:

P.S. Firefox is my preferred browser.

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When attempting to play a video on YouTube, it looks like it's loading but never completes and I get the message, "If playback doesn't begin shortly, try restarting your device." (it doesn't begin shortly and restarting doesn't help.) Same with a different browser. Local video files play back but with no audio. MP3 files don't play at all (Rhythmbox, Videos, VLC), except via Bluetooth.

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Is that every YouTube video, or just specific ones?

  • are the videos from any "publisher", or
  • only from specific "publishers"?

I thought your issue was a problem with processing of video portion, not the audio.

Starting from basics:

  • did you check the mute function for each of Rhythmbox, VLC, etc. (not the system's global mute) ???

You may wish to try the following.

Using your preferred package manager, search for all currently-installed packages referring to "audio", then, from those, perform a full re-install of at least the Ubuntu "core" packages, the ones showing the orange icon, and also those which you feel apply to your circumstance.

Below is the list I got thru synaptic for my search:

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Without knowing which browsers - probably both are Chromium based so not surprising the results are the same (FireFox and its derivatives might be worth a try if you havent already).

If its an audio problem; its not the codec side because you are able to get sound from a bluetooth device. That means there's some other problem in the stack. That can be anywhere from the kernel, ALSA libraries, pipewire, or pulseaudio - depending which distribution you are using.

Might be helpful to start a new topic describing your issue because it doesnt sound quite like the OP's issue; your issue is possibly a two-parter. One being audio, and another being video playback within browsers (NOTE: many apps like Discord, Signal etc are just browsers - and this very well could be a Chromium bug by way of Electron). It helps to keep things organised if different issues are in different posts (see FAQ). There are also some tips in the FAQ about helpful details , e.g. some details about the system from the output of inxi -SMz, or in your case because its an audio issue inxi -SMAz (which will provide some info about the audio drivers that are in use).

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