[Tutorial] - Build (or download) SMplayer with mpv support

This tutorial is about building SMplayer with mpv support for ubuntu mate, lubuntu and xubuntu for raspberry pi 2.

SMplayer is a GUI for mplayer and mpv in the lasts versions.
Native SMplayer is package in ubuntu mate but the version is old and support only mplayer and not mpv.

First step install mpv with hardware video decoding for raspberry pi.

Now you can download my build of SMplayer or build it from source.

Download SMplayer with mpv support

Open a terminal then :

wget http://dl.free.fr/rRI9fayra -O smplayer_16.1.0_armhf.deb

Check the sha1 :

echo “0e24f06dfde63084dde439469f682bf084cb8dc2 smplayer_16.1.0_armhf.deb” | sha1sum -c -

You must have :

smplayer_16.1.0_armhf.deb: OK

If you don’t the archive is corrupted or hacked !

Go to Install SMplayer

Build SMplayer with mpv support
Open a termibal then :

sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get install smplayer
sudo apt-get build-dep smplayer
wget http://downloads.sourceforge.net/smplayer/smplayer-16.1.0.tar.bz2
tar jxvf smplayer-16.1.0.tar.bz2
cd smplayer-16.1.0/
./create_deb.sh
cd …

Install SMPlayer

sudo dpkg -i smplayer_16.1.0_armhf.deb

Configure SMPlayer

With Fullscreen mode (work very good)
Launch smplayer, then go to menu “Options -> Préférence”, then choose Video tab and un the first list of videos output choose “rpi”.

It will play videos with hardware acceleration decoding in full screen mode.

With windowed, resizable or fullscreen mode (work not bad depending on video)
Create (if not exist) or edit :

~/.config/mpv/mpv.conf

Add the line :

vd=lavc:h264_mmal

Launch smplayer, then go to menu “Options -> Préférence”, then choose Video tab and un the first list of videos output choose “X11”.
Play a video.
If you want to go back to fullscreen mode you have to delete the line “vd=lavc:h264_mmal” in ~/.config/mpv/mpv.conf file.

Enjoy !

Aworan

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Dear All,

New to the forum, but loving Ubuntu. I have minimal Linux knowledge, only what I’ve learnt from 4 years of dabbling with Pi’s using Raspbian. I am loving Ubuntu MATE. I’ve got SMPlayer installed and working following the above instructions. (Except I swapped out version 16.1 for 16.4. I also followed the instructions to build MPV, it now plays videos beautifully, howeve the audio is around 1 second behind. I’ve tried fiddling with various settings to do with AVSync, but all to no avail. Any suggestions please?

I have tried this with local media and when streaming Youtube videos, all still around a second out. (audio lagging)

Thanks for your tireless work and keep pushing this little device and distro forward!

RPi 3
Ubunut MATE 16.04

Hi,
I anwser late sorry.
I have trouble too with AVSync, it is a pulseaudio problem.
I try to configure it better without success but I did’nt try too much.
I uninstall pulseaudio and every thing works perfectly !
Alsa is use by default after and works perfect :wink:

Aworan

Does this give more features and things like that?

Isn’t it just enough with this command? It installed smplayer and gave me “mpv Media Player”.

sudo apt install smplayer

Maybe it’s updated now since your tutorial was made, I’m not sure :stuck_out_tongue:

Yes I wrote this tutorial for Ubuntu mate 15.10, it is useless with 16.04 :wink:
The new version package of smplayer in 16.04 have MPV support :slight_smile:

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