Arch Linux

el8765

Member

Registered: 2019-12-07

Posts: 3

VLC won't play audio codec (mp4a)

[UPDATED COMMAND]

Reproducing the problem:

Download this file in particular (1.3 mins, 4 M.B.):

youtube-dl --no-playlist -i -f hls-akfire_interconnect_quic-319 https://vimeo.com/374740133

My VLC can play the video but there is no sound.

If I go: VLC -> Tools -> Codec Information; it shows that the audio is AAC audio (mp4a)

What should I do?

Last edited by el8765 (2019-12-08 10:02:57)

waitnsea

Member

From: France

Registered: 2013-02-10

Posts: 57

Re: VLC won't play audio codec (mp4a)

[UPDATED COMMAND]

Reproducing the problem:

Download this file in particular (1.3 mins, 4 M.B.):

        youtube-dl --no-playlist -i -f hls-akfire_interconnect_quic-319 https://vimeo.com/374740133

My VLC can play the video but there is no sound.

If I go: VLC -> Tools -> Codec Information; it shows that the audio is AAC audio (mp4a)

What should I do?

Hi,
I reproduce your problem downloading this .mp4 with your command : sound with mpv, not with vlc
However, downloading with my usual command it works fine : In fact, for a long time I added at the end of my update script a command to download youtube-dl last version, as user, in .local/bin/ with

wget https://yt-dl.org/latest/youtube-dl -O youtube-dl 

(and of course)

$ chmod u+x 

My function - added in .zsh_functions - for downloading a video after copy its url is

 yvi () {
        ~/.local/bin/youtube-dl $(xclip -o)
}
 

Edit : here my ~/.config/youtube-dl/config

# quality
-f best

# video dir
-o ~/Downloads/%(title)s.%(ext)s

#  keep Youtube data
--youtube-skip-dash-manifest  

Last edited by waitnsea (2019-12-08 06:18:06)

el8765

Member

Registered: 2019-12-07

Posts: 3

Re: VLC won't play audio codec (mp4a)

Yes, no doubt, you're using the [-f best] parameter, it would work because it is encoded differently.

However I have a lot of files downloaded in low resolution which don't work. I can play them fine on mpv, but not VLC. I would like VLC to do the job and I don't know what's missing. I have downloaded all the necessary stuff (good,bad..etc codecs). But they won't cut it.

Only FYI:

I use aliases to download different videos with different resolutions, the two I use the most are:

alias d360='youtube-dl --no-playlist --no-mtime -i -f 18   --output "%(upload_date)s - %(title)s - %(id)s.%(ext)s"'
alias d720='youtube-dl --no-playlist --no-mtime -i -f 22   --output "%(upload_date)s - %(title)s - %(id)s.%(ext)s"'

i.e. there is no need to download the full resolution when you only want to store a reference. Big sizes will accumulate over the years and they will eventually become unnecessary weight. Most of the things I download I never watch again, I only keep them for reference. I'm certain most people are like that.

Note this is an important parameter, it saves the video name as:

20191208 - Video Title - Zpiz7OlOi14.mp4

--output "%(upload_date)s - %(title)s - %(id)s.%(ext)s"'

The upload date and video ID parameters are very important in case you want to archive something and keep a record when it was uploaded with the reference. You can always go back and find the video with the full resolution later.

Last edited by el8765 (2019-12-08 10:02:15)

waitnsea

Member

From: France

Registered: 2013-02-10

Posts: 57

Re: VLC won't play audio codec (mp4a)

OK.
I also tried your command booting lts, gave same mute result with vlc

el8765

Member

Registered: 2019-12-07

Posts: 3

Re: VLC won't play audio codec (mp4a)

Thank you. Note that the same video works on both ubuntu and Manjaro.

So something is definitely missing from Arch.