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Full Version: Kodi 17 on Ubuntu 16.04 - Freezes, crashes and flickers
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Hi,

I've been using Kodi(/Xbmc) for many years with much pleasure, but lately I am at a loss. After many hours of trying to fix things, I'm coming to ask for the communities' input Smile

My setup:
  • Kodi 17RC3
  • Ubuntu 16.04 / x86_64
  • Intel® Core™ i3-3225
  • Using HDMI to a plasma TV
  • Using optical out for audio

My issue:
  • Random flickering when playing video (depending on the video, sometimes frequent, sometimes less frequent, sometimes no issue at all);
  • Freezing interface, often when searching through a video, sometimes when a video ends. Only solution is to 'kill' kodi, or to reboot;
  • Crashing, sometimes when searching through a video, sometimes when a video ends.
  • Freezing on alt-tab, mostly when playing video but also (sometimes) when just showing the default kodi interface
  • Above happens pretty much with every codec & container

What I've tried so far:
  • Updating Intel drivers (with 01.org tools)
  • Disabling / enabling VAAPI render method
  • Installing the latest Kodi (hoping for a fix Wink)

Crashlog (of a 'random' crash) can be found here: http://pastebin.com/Zb2j2WBf
Regular log (of a typical 'freeze') can be found here: http://pastebin.com/SmqTg1YZ (freeze happens around 11:28, log entries continue after)

Thanks so much for any help you're able to offer!

Warner



p.s. thanks for all the fantastic work to all the developers out there! Kodi is a great program and keeps on getting better with each release!
Can you please start kodi directly from the login manager? E.g. not via your normal desktop environment?
Hi,

That does indeed seem to help (I was not aware of the option). Kodi is more stable like this. Should we always run Kodi like this, instead of normal desktop mode?

One strange thing though: after a few minutes, the kodi window (well, not really a window) was suddenly "displaced", showing the original background picture of the login screen for about 10% on the right and bottom (like kodi decided on a lower resolution). Re-starting kodi did not help, and a screenshot has a resolution of 1855*1056 (i.o. the normal full HD). Flipping between "full screen" and "windowed" in kodi settings seemed to re-initialize and solve the issue.

See a fresh log here: http://pastebin.com/Hg0pNipf

Thanks a lot for your help!

Warner
From your first log I did not see which window manager you used, which one is it? Unity is a bitch for some gpu drivers. Though works quite nicely on my haswell intel setup.
I'm using Unity 7.. Ubuntu straight out-of-the-box
Same here. Might want to update the kernel to http://kernel.ubuntu.com/~kernel-ppa/mainline/v4.9.8/ (you need the linux-headers, the 64 bit image, the 64 bit linux-headers NOT the realtime versions.

e.g.

Code:
wget http://kernel.ubuntu.com/~kernel-ppa/mainline/v4.9.8/linux-headers-4.9.8-040908_4.9.8-040908.201702040431_all.deb
wget http://kernel.ubuntu.com/~kernel-ppa/mainline/v4.9.8/linux-headers-4.9.8-040908-generic_4.9.8-040908.201702040431_amd64.deb
wget http://kernel.ubuntu.com/~kernel-ppa/mainline/v4.9.8/linux-image-4.9.8-040908-generic_4.9.8-040908.201702040431_amd64.deb

Followed by:

Code:
sudo dpkg -i *4.9.8*deb

sudo update-grub && sudo reboot
Hmm.. I'm running some other services that might be jeopardized by running another kernel.. I guess I have to wait for a bit for 4.9.

For now the system seems mostly stable by running Kodi from the login manager (but I guess the root problem remains).

Thanks a lot for your help Fritsch!
I'm also having the same problems with Kodi 17 in Ubuntu 16.04. I'm having a hard time finding how to start Kodi in the way that is suggested here, from the login manager.

I'm also in Unity, and the way I know to start a program upon login is to add it to the Startup Applications program. Is that what you are referring to? And does that mean I should leave Kodi running as long as I'm logged in? Minimize it to do other things?
No.
@pianowow: Kodi effectively is available as an "alternative desktop manager", and you use it just like when you have Gnome, Kde, Unity, etc, alongside each other.

There is no need to change any settings, just log out of your current desktop and, where you normally type your username/password, select the round icon. A pop-up will show, allowing you to select a different desktop environment (if you have only one environment and no Kodi installed the icon won't show).

Select the Kodi environment, type your password, and you're good to go. The only issue I found with this, is that by skipping the regular unity environment, my SQL doesn't initialize properly so Kodi doesn't show the collection from the database. A quick log-in and log-out to Unity resolves this, but I have to do this each time I restart the system.

Hope that helps.
Warner
Hello,

that does not work in my use case.

Indeed, I watch movies on my PC, and I like to do some pause and also do some activities on my PC (like checking my e-mails) while the movie is in pause.
This is very easily done thanks to the "multi-desktop" option. You are one keystroke away from your e-mail, even with Kodi fullscreen.

Runing Kodi as a "desktop" will make that impossible, and thus does not correspond to my use case.

Although you are pointing to another kernel as a workaround, I guess the real problem is not the kernel itself (otherwise for good it is a Kodi bug!) but rather a nasty interaction with Compiz/Unity.

Do you think running Kodi in a separate X server will help the issue?
Any feedback on that option?