AVC/XAVC-S issues in VP15/16? Try disabling so4compoundplug.dll!

NickHope wrote on 8/29/2017, 12:58 AM

VEGAS Pro 15 has a new decoder, so4compoundplug.dll that reads AVC and XAVC-S files. I think the intention is that it will also handle m2ts and perhaps other formats in the future.

The benefits of this new decoder include:

  • Decodes Panasonic GH5 10-bit 422 AVC footage
  • Decodes JVC YUV 4:2:2 AVC footage
  • Decodes iPhone/iPad AVC footage (without requiring Quicktime)
  • (I guess) Scope for improved performance
     

However some negative issues are attributed to this new decoder. In particular:

If you experience any such issues, or any other issues with AVC behavior in VP15 that you did not experience in VP14, then first check which decoder plugin is being used by looking at the "Plug-In" section at the bottom of the VEGAS file Properties window (accessed by right-clicking on a file in the VEGAS Explorer window then choosing "Properties", or right-clicking on a video stream on the VEGAS timeline then choosing "Properties" then "General" tab):

If the troublesome files are getting decoded by so4compoundplug.dll then you can try disabling it as follows:

  1. Hold down the SHIFT key while opening Options > Preferences
  2. Click the Internal tab
  3. In the field "Show only pref containing:" file type "So4" without the quotes
  4. Set "Enable So4 Compound Reader for AVC/M2TS" to FALSE.
  5. OK > Restart
     



With luck, VEGAS will now instead attempt to use an alternative decoder such as compoundplug.dll to decode your files, which may solve the issue.

Bear in mind:

  • This may break some of the new format support such as iPhone and 10-bit 422 GH5 files, and that the bugs with so4compoundplug will probably be fixed in future updates, so don't forget that you've set this because you'll probably want to un-set it in the future!
  • Your audio waveform previews (stored in .sfk files) will be rebuilt when the codec is disabled or re-enabled, which may make it appear that your projects are opening more slowly. But once the waveforms are re-built, projects will open more quickly.
     

Note that in VEGAS Pro 15 builds before 261, more formats were decoded by so4compoundplug, and this caused the following issues:

  • Much lower fps playback of some AVC files including some GoPro, DJI & Xiaomi Yi files
  • Slow rendering of video event thumbnails for those files
  • Garbled audio decoding (also here)
  • Slower opening of large projects containing many AVC files (Largely fixed in VP15 build 216)
     

Edit 1st December 2017: In VEGAS Pro 15 build 261, troublesome GoPro, DJI and Xiaomi Yi formats have been put on a new "blacklist" that makes them fall back by default to opening with the compoundplug decoder, which generally works very well with these formats. Read the thread for the full story...

Edit 6th June 2018: In VEGAS Pro 15 build 361, the blacklist was made into a separate, editable xml file. In this build the file needs to be moved in order for it to work. Other formats such as XAVC-S can also be added to the blacklist if necessary by editing the file (with great care). Full details in this post.

Edit 3rd September 2018: From VEGAS Pro 15 build 384, so4_blacklist_vp15.xml is placed by default in C:\Program Files\VEGAS\VEGAS Pro 1X.0\ where it can be read, so there is no longer any need to move it.

Edit April 2024: The default reader for AVC files in VEGAS Pro 21 build 300 onwards is the new mxcompoundplug, and the So4 blacklist feature was removed. The feature is available in versions 15 to 20. The so4compoundplug reader can still be disabled by renaming the C:\Program Files\VEGAS\VEGAS Pro 21.0\FileIO Plug-Ins\so4compoundplug folder.

Comments

Kinvermark wrote on 8/29/2017, 11:55 AM

Excellent tip. Thanks!

I was having poor playback performance through transitions and other composite elements. This has brought It back to Vegas 14 levels.

 

NickHope wrote on 8/29/2017, 12:42 PM

Don't forget you've done it! You will probably want to set it back in the future!

Robert Johnston wrote on 8/31/2017, 12:19 AM

Thank you, Nick. That fixed a problem I was having with variable frame rate files from an LG smartphone. In Properties, Vegas showed constant frame rates of 29.97 when actually they were variable at approx. 30.65 fps. Smart resampling would not work correctly. After disabling the so4compoundplug.dll, I'm in business again.

Rob J.

Last changed by Robert Johnston on 8/31/2017, 11:07 PM, changed a total of 1 times.

Intel Core i7 10700K CPU @ 3.80GHz (to 4.65GHz), NVIDIA GeForce RTX 2060 SUPER 8GBytes. Memory 32 GBytes DDR4. Also Intel UHD Graphics 630. Mainboard: Dell Inc. PCI-Express 3.0 (8.0 GT/s) Comet Lake. Bench CPU Multi Thread: 5500.5 per CPU-Z.

Vegas Pro 21.0 (Build 108) with Mocha Vegas

Windows 11 not pro

mark-rosenzweig wrote on 9/2/2017, 9:24 PM

Thank you Mr. Hope. This new "feature" in fact resulted in no audio at all from H264 video clips that played fine on the timeline in Vegas Pro 14. I find it incredible that this was not checked before release, that a bug report was not sent out after release, and that this was not fixed immediately (since it is obviously known) in a new build. I wasted many hours trying to fix this. It is bad enough that there is a scant number of new features in 15 over 14, but to have a major bug due to one of the major ones is more than incompetence. I am going to post my experience in all the forums I contribute to. Magix needs to step up. They are going to lose many users with this kind of greed (high price for very little advances), lack of support, and plain stupidity.

Kinvermark wrote on 9/2/2017, 11:05 PM

@mark-rosenzweig

Totally understand your frustration, but please remember this is a user forum, and most people don't enjoy reading lengthy BOLDTYPE posts that are obviously quite angry and aggressive. Your anger needs to be directed elsewhere. Thanks.

 

 

wilri001 wrote on 9/3/2017, 9:04 PM

Going back to the previous .dll solved my transition low frame rate, too.

But it also made opening the pan/crop tool and moving the crop window around very slow. And playback frame rates are lower (in multicam). So I turned this back on and will live with the lessor evil of slow frame rates on transitions (the default crossfade).

Wolfgang S. wrote on 9/4/2017, 2:51 AM

Thank you Mr. Hope. This new "feature" in fact resulted in no audio at all from H264 video clips that played fine on the timeline in Vegas Pro 14. I find it incredible that this was not checked before release

I have here MVC files from my Z10000, what is H.264 - and audio is decoded without an issue.

I have here XAVC I files from my FS7, what is H.264 - and audio is decoded without an issue.

I have also some H.264 files from my Samsung - and Audio is decoed without an issue.

 

So not every footage Shows that issue - but some file Format do. Your footage is the footage that you have reported here?

https://www.vegascreativesoftware.info/us/forum/vp-v15-audio-messed-up--108339/

 

Last changed by Wolfgang S. on 9/4/2017, 3:11 AM, changed a total of 1 times.

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Boabab17 wrote on 9/4/2017, 10:58 AM

V15 AVC render is 35% slower than V12 AVC after disabling so4compoundplug.dll, and does not read GH5 10 bit files. I hope Magix will fix this soon.

Kinvermark wrote on 9/4/2017, 11:18 AM

The so4 dll that you disabled is what is needed for gh5 10 bit files, etc. I am pretty sure fixing this major component is very high on the list.

shb wrote on 9/9/2017, 4:54 AM

Nick, thank you for this excellent tip! I was about to report this to Magix support but saw your message just in time.

Opening an existing project (AVC files) in VP 15 took about 15 minutes (!) whereas the same project opened in 10 seconds in VP 14...  I also got a low memory warning whereas I still had 13.6/32 GB RAM available.

Now the same project opens as fast as in VP14. 

 

Robert Johnston wrote on 9/9/2017, 1:22 PM

I had disabled the so4compoundplug.dll because of problems I was having with variable rate video taken with a smartphone. After trying a few different camera apps, I found one that works very well with so4compounding enabled. The results are better than with the so4compounding disabled, so now I  have enabled it again.  I guess it depends on a combination of camera, app, shooting conditions.

Intel Core i7 10700K CPU @ 3.80GHz (to 4.65GHz), NVIDIA GeForce RTX 2060 SUPER 8GBytes. Memory 32 GBytes DDR4. Also Intel UHD Graphics 630. Mainboard: Dell Inc. PCI-Express 3.0 (8.0 GT/s) Comet Lake. Bench CPU Multi Thread: 5500.5 per CPU-Z.

Vegas Pro 21.0 (Build 108) with Mocha Vegas

Windows 11 not pro

peter-ilyk wrote on 9/10/2017, 12:52 AM

Nick Thanks for the suggestion. I tried this and it works for the most part. However, the timeline still won't play smoothly on a still photo which has zooming/burns effect applied. Is there any way of fixing this?

NickHope wrote on 9/13/2017, 5:36 AM

...After trying a few different camera apps, I found one that works very well with so4compounding enabled...

Which app?

Robert Johnston wrote on 9/13/2017, 1:18 PM

...After trying a few different camera apps, I found one that works very well with so4compounding enabled...

Which app?


Nick, The app I thought did the trick was Open Camera or Cinema FV-5. The caveat is there must be really good light when taking video, so that the frames-per-second will mostly be the same throughout. There are cases where the frames-per-second has ranged from 10 to 30 fps in the same clip when light is less than optimum. That causes problems for just about any video editor I have. I'm now using the Feiyu On app with a Vimble C 3-axis stabilizer and have again disabled so4. But every once in a while I enable it to see if that improves troublesome video. I also use the script for quantitizing to frames, but I make the undersampling rate 1.000. That works better for my video.

Intel Core i7 10700K CPU @ 3.80GHz (to 4.65GHz), NVIDIA GeForce RTX 2060 SUPER 8GBytes. Memory 32 GBytes DDR4. Also Intel UHD Graphics 630. Mainboard: Dell Inc. PCI-Express 3.0 (8.0 GT/s) Comet Lake. Bench CPU Multi Thread: 5500.5 per CPU-Z.

Vegas Pro 21.0 (Build 108) with Mocha Vegas

Windows 11 not pro

set wrote on 9/20/2017, 4:57 AM

Depends on the codec and media you are working with.

When your media not needing so4compound, I guess, it won't be an issue. but, if your media depends a lot with so4compound, I can feel VP15 quickly becoming slower. Well, hopefully this issue fixed in the first update.

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* I don't work for VEGAS Creative Software Team. I'm just Voluntary Moderator in this forum.

Robert Johnston wrote on 9/20/2017, 1:13 PM

Regarding variable frame rates from my smartphone mp4 files, I took drastic action and used a hex editor to modify copies of the mp4 files so the durations in the 'stts' box are all the same (0xBB8), which equates to a constant 30 fps. When I load this in to Vegas with so4compound, I stretch the audio to match the video, and disable resampling. The video plays back very smoothly with or without so4compound.

Intel Core i7 10700K CPU @ 3.80GHz (to 4.65GHz), NVIDIA GeForce RTX 2060 SUPER 8GBytes. Memory 32 GBytes DDR4. Also Intel UHD Graphics 630. Mainboard: Dell Inc. PCI-Express 3.0 (8.0 GT/s) Comet Lake. Bench CPU Multi Thread: 5500.5 per CPU-Z.

Vegas Pro 21.0 (Build 108) with Mocha Vegas

Windows 11 not pro

mickhardy wrote on 9/26/2017, 9:12 PM

I've had a completely unrelated problem for two full days and disabling "so4compoundplug.dll" has finally fixed my issue. Thanks for this sage piece of awesome advice. This new decoder locks media in the oddest way I've ever seen even after a project is closed.

As soon as I try to delete a media file from within a Vegas script, the file is locked, all permissions disappear, the file has no read access and can't even be deleted externally. The lock is only cleared by closing Vegas.

For two full days, I've been tearing my hair out trying to find a workaround. Everything works fine in Vegas 8 through 14 but this new version has caused me grief.

I've simplified the process to reproduce the issue for any Vegas developers following this.

  1. Create a new project.
  2. Insert a video track.
  3. Insert a media file. ("My Documents/Test/Test.MP4")
  4. Close the project. (no need to save or render)
  5. Run the script below to delete the media file.
  6. The file is not deleted but is locked with all permissions removed. No exceptions are generated.
  7. The file will be deleted when Vegas is closed.
  8. Follow the instructions by Nick to disable "so4compoundplug.dll" to fix the issue.

using System;
using System.IO;
using ScriptPortal.Vegas;

public class EntryPoint
{
  public void FromVegas(Vegas vegas)
  {
    var testFolder = Path.Combine(Environment.GetFolderPath(Environment.SpecialFolder.MyDocuments), "Test");
    var testMedia = Path.Combine(testFolder, "Test.MP4");
    File.Delete(testMedia);
  }
}

 

NickHope wrote on 9/26/2017, 9:30 PM

I've had a completely unrelated problem for two full days and disabling "so4compoundplug.dll" has finally fixed my issue...

Tested here and confirmed in VP15 build 177 on Windows 10 version 1511.

@mickhardy Could you please report this at https://support2.magix.com/customer/en/vegas/form , giving as much information about the problem as possible, including this step-by-step procedure? That's the best way to draw the developers' attention to bugs and get them into their backlog. I would do it myself but you probably have a fuller grasp of the issue then me.

mickhardy wrote on 9/26/2017, 10:27 PM

I've submitted a support request although it seems like an odd place for a bug report. Thanks for confirming the issue. I tested on two machines reset to defaults with cache cleared before posting.

marcel-vossen wrote on 9/27/2017, 3:19 AM

Could this also cause:

1. Slow overall performance of Vegas 15, popup windows for FXs for example take several seconds to open and build up every time, making the workflow very slow.

2. AVC files not having the correct name after rendering, but instead have names like Myvideo.MP4.TMP ? This only happens with Sony AVC output, but it also has been happening in vegas 14 the last few months I used it.

PS: Which format is easier to handle by Vegas 15 in general, AVCHD or the MP4 format from a Lumix GH5? They look the same quality to me, and the files sizes are also the same, so I'm unsure which one to pick.

Thanks

set wrote on 9/27/2017, 3:28 AM

Could this also cause:

1. Slow overall performance of Vegas 15, popup windows for FXs for example take several seconds to open and build up every time, making the workflow very slow.

I didn't try disabling the so4compoundplug.dll, but I experience this...

2. AVC files not having the correct name after rendering, but instead have names like Myvideo.MP4.TMP ? This only happens with Sony AVC output, but it also has been happening in vegas 14 the last few months I used it.

Thanks

 

Try using MagixAVC output rather than SonyAVC output.

Last changed by set on 9/27/2017, 3:29 AM, changed a total of 1 times.

Setiawan Kartawidjaja
Bandung, West Java, Indonesia (UTC+7 Time Area)

Personal FB | Personal IG | Personal YT Channel
Chungs Video FB | Chungs Video IG | Chungs Video YT Channel
Personal Portfolios YouTube Playlist
Pond5 page: My Stock Footage of Bandung city

 

System 5-2021:
Processor: Intel(R) Core(TM) i7-10700 CPU @ 2.90GHz   2.90 GHz
Video Card1: Intel UHD Graphics 630 (Driver 31.0.101.2127 (Feb 1 2024 Release date))
Video Card2: NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3060 Ti 8GB GDDR6 (Driver Version 551.23 Studio Driver (Jan 24 2024 Release Date))
RAM: 32.0 GB
OS: Windows 10 Pro Version 22H2 OS Build 19045.3693
Drive OS: SSD 240GB
Drive Working: NVMe 1TB
Drive Storage: 4TB+2TB

 

System 2-2018:
ASUS ROG Strix Hero II GL504GM Gaming Laptop
Processor: Intel(R) Core(TM) i7 8750H CPU @2.20GHz 2.21 GHz
Video Card 1: Intel(R) UHD Graphics 630 (Driver 31.0.101.2111)
Video Card 2: NVIDIA GeForce GTX 1060 6GB GDDR5 VRAM (Driver Version 537.58)
RAM: 16GB
OS: Win11 Home 64-bit Version 22H2 OS Build 22621.2428
Storage: M.2 NVMe PCIe 256GB SSD & 2.5" 5400rpm 1TB SSHD

 

* I don't work for VEGAS Creative Software Team. I'm just Voluntary Moderator in this forum.

NickHope wrote on 10/4/2017, 10:08 AM

Here's are my findings related to so4compoundplug.dll in VEGAS Pro 15 Update 1 (build 216):

  • The serious slow-project-opening problem with AVC in VP15 build 177 is more or less solved. In my tests, large projects opened as fast as VP13/14 (or VP15 build 177 with so4compoundplug disabled), or almost as fast (no more than a couple of seconds slower).
  • Playback of my Panasonic GH4 8-bit UHD footage (and FFMPEG-trimmed GH4 footage) footage is much improved and now as smooth with so4compoundplug as with compoundplug.
  • Playback with so4compoundplug is still very poor for these formats (and presumably more):
    • GoPro (tested with HERO5 Black 8-bit UHD 29.97p and 2.7k 60p)
    • DJI (tested with OSMO 8-bit UHD 29.97p and 4K 29.97p)
    • Xiaomi Yi (tested with UHD 59.94p and 2.7k 50p)
  • Video event thumbnails for the "problem" formats listed above take about 6x longer to render with so4compoundplug as compoundplug.
  • Garbled audio decoding (also here) - Issue still exists
  • Stereo audio decodes as dual mono - Issue still exists


I'm told the developers are working hard to resolve these issues.

The OP has been updated with the latest info.

mickhardy wrote on 10/4/2017, 7:00 PM

VEGAS Pro 15 Update 1 (build 216) has not fixed the file locking issue when "so4compoundplug" is enabled.

Magix did reply to me saying this was a known issue.

Edit: The new version triggers a Vegas Pro has stopped working error on exit after running my test scenario with "so4compoundplug" disabled. The file is deleted fine but Vegas crashes when you exit.

karma17 wrote on 10/18/2017, 2:25 AM

I am having problems with garbled /crackling audio played back on the timeline from Sony A7S XAVC-S codec.

Is it still recommended to disable the so4 decoder? I can see where to do that, but don't see "Show only pref containing:" file type "So4" under the Internal Preferences tab.

The problem is not consistent, sometimes it is not garbled, then sometimes it is. But for the most part, it is.