[Mesa-dev] [PATCH] st/va: disable cabac for h264 baseline profile

[Andy Furniss]

Christian König wrote:
> Am 18.10.2016 um 15:42 schrieb Andy Furniss:
>> Andy Furniss wrote:
>>> Christian König wrote:
>>>> Am 18.10.2016 um 11:19 schrieb Andy Furniss:
>>>>> boyuan.zhang at amd.com wrote:
>>>>>> From: Boyuan Zhang <boyuan.zhang at amd.com>
>>>>>>
>>>>>> cabac is only supported in the h264 main and higher
>>>>>> profiles
>>>>>
>>>>> So shouldn't there be code allows it if the user space
>>>>> doesn't set baseline?
>>>>>
>>>>> I don't know how in gstreamer as it seems to try to use
>>>>> b-frames if you use other than baseline which doesn't work.
>>>>>
>>>>> With avconv it is possible to call main/high and set b-frames
>>>>> to 0.
>>>>>
>>>>> I know it's technically correct spec wise, but seems a shame
>>>>> as it costs a fair bit in "free" efficiency.
>>>>>
>>>>> On Windows the raptor game recording app produces files
>>>>> flagged as high with cabac - but without b-frames.
>>>>
>>>> The problem is that it can easily break decoders. CABAC is
>>>> simply not allowed in a stream flagged as baseline compliant.
>>>
>>> But with ffmpeg/avconv I can make a stream flagged as main/high
>>> even if it's really baseline + CABAC. I guess Windows may vary
>>> but the test I did seems to take this pragmatic approach, as it
>>> seems do other h/w encoders eg. smartphone output.
>>>
>>>> It's a pity that we don't support B-frames any more.
>>>
>>> Anymore? Now I am curious, seems to work with omx (cqp single
>>> instance)
>>>
>>>
>>>> With that in place we could easily advertise support for
>>>> mainline profile.
>>>
>>> MBAFF/PAFF?
>>
>> Sorry if that came over as being pedantic, silly as I think
>> pragmatism is the way to go and I know intel advertise main/high,
>> but doubt they do interlaced.
>
> Exactly, I mean we are talking about features to support encoding
> into interlaced format. Is anybody still actively doing that?

Well, broadcasters, but I guess "users" never did anyway.

> But even then, it's not so much of a problem advertising mainline
> profile and then not using MBAFF/PAFF.
>
> But when you advertise B-frames and then can't encode it you got a
> serious problem because your frames are not in the right order any
> more :)

Yea, it's a shame - was there a reason that b-frame support was abandoned?

>> In fact vce vaapi is currently advertising them as well (I did
>> mention it in some thread). Good for letting ffmpeg flag as such
>> while not using b-frames, not so good for gstreamer as they have
>> changed the default to high so old command lines will not
>> explicitly fail, but will produce junk.
>>
>> I see va.h has a cabac switch and gstreamer exposes it - though
>> it's not read by the driver. Maybe if that were hooked up then
>> users could turn it on and profit :-).
>
> Yeah, but again turning it on while the SPS/PPS only advertise the
> stream to be baseline compliant is a clear violation of the codec
> standard. (Is that actually encodeable in the stream? or does the
> encoder switch to some higher level automatically if you use it?).

I was wrong about va.h having a switch, it was something different.

gst-inspect-1.0 vaapih264enc shows it has one - I don't what if anything
it actually does.

I am not trying to say here that flagging as constrained baseline and
using CABAC is in any way correct/legal. It just seems a shame to loose
CABAC = 10-20% less bitrate "for ever".

Looking at phone vids and vce from windows they get to use CABAC while
not using b-frames by flagging as main/high. It would be good if there
were a way to allow Linux vce to be the same.

I don't know how - if you can only advertise baseline, other than user
apps quirking their behavior depending on driver name, which I guess
some do any way.


>
> Regards, Christian.
>
>>
>>
>>>
>>>> Christian.
>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>>> Signed-off-by: Boyuan Zhang <boyuan.zhang at amd.com> ---
>>>>>> src/gallium/state_trackers/va/picture.c | 1 - 1 file
>>>>>> changed, 1 deletion(-)
>>>>>>
>>>>>> diff --git a/src/gallium/state_trackers/va/picture.c
>>>>>> b/src/gallium/state_trackers/va/picture.c index
>>>>>> eae5dc4..db08a3c 100644 ---
>>>>>> a/src/gallium/state_trackers/va/picture.c +++
>>>>>> b/src/gallium/state_trackers/va/picture.c @@ -110,7 +110,6
>>>>>> @@ getEncParamPreset(vlVaContext *context)
>>>>>> context->desc.h264enc.motion_est.enc_ime2_search_range_y =
>>>>>> 0x00000004;
>>>>>>
>>>>>> //pic control preset -
>>>>>> context->desc.h264enc.pic_ctrl.enc_cabac_enable =
>>>>>> 0x00000001;
>>>>>> context->desc.h264enc.pic_ctrl.enc_constraint_set_flags =
>>>>>> 0x00000040;
>>>>>>
>>>>>> //rate control
>>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>> _______________________________________________ mesa-dev
>>>>> mailing list mesa-dev at lists.freedesktop.org
>>>>> https://lists.freedesktop.org/mailman/listinfo/mesa-dev
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>
>>>
>>
>
>