4K VP9 video no longer plays after upgrade to Buster + Kodi 18.4
#1
I recently upgraded my Raspberry Pi 3 system from Stretch and Kodi 17 to Buster and Kodi 18.4.  Following the upgrade, I find that Kodi is no longer able to play a video that it used to play just fine.

The video in question is in a WebM container; it contains a 3840x2160 25fps VP9 video and Vorbis audio.  (I know that this resolution is higher than what the Pi 3 handles natively, but since it played fine before I assume that it was being downsampled on the fly.)  In the "Videos" tab of my "Player" settings, I normally have "Adjust display refresh rate" and "Sync playback to display" turned off.  With this setup, trying to play the video results in a message from my TV complaining that the mode/resolution is not supported.  I can still press the stop button on my remote control to get back to the Kodi menu.  I've tried changing the aforementioned settings, but at best this results in playback with good audio but garbled video (either a black screen, or a static image of the first frame of the video).

Any idea why Kodi/my Pi is no longer properly downsampling the video?  Was there some change to Kodi between versions 17 and 18 regarding how it downsamples?  Or is it possible that when I upgraded my OS, some requisite video library didn't get properly updated or installed?
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#2
I don't believe 3840x2160 VP9 has ever played successfully on any Pi.
It is way too hard to software decode and there is no hardware for VP9.
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#3
(2019-11-11, 16:29)popcornmix Wrote: I don't believe 3840x2160 VP9 has ever played successfully on any Pi.
It is way too hard to software decode and there is no hardware for VP9.

I assure you that the video in question was playing for me just fine up until a couple weeks ago.  If you have youtube-dl you can even download it yourself and test it out on your system.  (Actually, it seems YouTube now serves that video only with Opus audio and not Vorbis audio, though I doubt that will make any difference; the highest-quality video it offers is still 25 fps VP9 at 3840×2160.)
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#4
(2019-11-11, 16:42)Logological Wrote:
(2019-11-11, 16:29)popcornmix Wrote: I don't believe 3840x2160 VP9 has ever played successfully on any Pi.
It is way too hard to software decode and there is no hardware for VP9.

I assure you that the video in question was playing for me just fine up until a couple weeks ago.  If you have youtube-dl you can even download it yourself and test it out on your system.  (Actually, it seems YouTube now serves that video only with Opus audio and not Vorbis audio, though I doubt that will make any difference; the highest-quality video it offers is still 25 fps VP9 at 3840×2160.)  

Were you playing a downloaded version of it - or streaming it online?  If the latter could it be that the youtube-client was streaming a lower tier version of it, and now isn't ?
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#5
(2019-11-11, 17:30)noggin Wrote:
(2019-11-11, 16:42)Logological Wrote:
(2019-11-11, 16:29)popcornmix Wrote: I don't believe 3840x2160 VP9 has ever played successfully on any Pi.
It is way too hard to software decode and there is no hardware for VP9.

I assure you that the video in question was playing for me just fine up until a couple weeks ago.  If you have youtube-dl you can even download it yourself and test it out on your system.  (Actually, it seems YouTube now serves that video only with Opus audio and not Vorbis audio, though I doubt that will make any difference; the highest-quality video it offers is still 25 fps VP9 at 3840×2160.)    

Were you playing a downloaded version of it - or streaming it online?  If the latter could it be that the youtube-client was streaming a lower tier version of it, and now isn't ?  

I wasn't streaming it through a YouTube add-on; I downloaded it from YouTube using youtube-dl and moved the file to my Music Videos library.  Below is what mediainfo reports about the file. As you can see, there's only one video stream in the file, and it's 4K.

Code:
$ mediainfo Little\ Big\ -\ Faradenza.webm
General
Complete name : Little Big - Faradenza.webm
Format : WebM
Format version : Version 2
File size : 427 MiB
Duration : 3 min 37 s
Overall bit rate mode : Variable
Overall bit rate : 16.4 Mb/s
Writing application : Lavf58.20.100
Writing library : Lavf58.20.100

Video
ID : 1
Format : VP9
Codec ID : V_VP9
Duration : 3 min 37 s
Bit rate : 15.6 Mb/s
Width : 3 840 pixels
Height : 2 160 pixels
Display aspect ratio : 16:9
Frame rate mode : Constant
Frame rate : 25.000 FPS
Color space : YUV
Bits/(Pixel*Frame) : 0.075
Stream size : 406 MiB (95%)
Language : English
Default : Yes
Forced : No
Color range : Limited
Color primaries : BT.709
Transfer characteristics : BT.709
Matrix coefficients : BT.709

Audio
ID : 2
Format : Vorbis
Format settings, Floor : 1
Codec ID : A_VORBIS
Duration : 3 min 37 s
Bit rate mode : Variable
Bit rate : 128 kb/s
Channel(s) : 2 channels
Sampling rate : 44.1 kHz
Compression mode : Lossy
Stream size : 3.32 MiB (1%)
Writing application : Google
Language : English
Default : Yes
Forced : No
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#6
I'm afraid you are mistaken. I've looked at file and it can't be played by any Pi (even Pi4) at more than a slideshow.
No way a Pi can software decode 4K video at 25fps.
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#7
(2019-11-11, 19:33)popcornmix Wrote: I'm afraid you are mistaken. I've looked at file and it can't be played by any Pi (even Pi4) at more than a slideshow.
No way a Pi can software decode 4K video at 25fps.

On reflection, I suppose you are right and that my memory is playing tricks on me.  If I have time I'll reload my pre-upgrade SD card image and try to play the video again, if only to confirm to myself whether I need to get my brain checked. Smile
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4K VP9 video no longer plays after upgrade to Buster + Kodi 18.40