Netflix is sluggish when playing videos in HD.

Question

I am using Netflix desktop (https://launchpad.net/netflix-desktop) which is basically just an application for Ubuntu which uses Firefox running in/under Wine. Everything works phenomenal, but the HD playback. I understand that Wine slows down applications, but I am wondering what kinds of things I could do to possibly get more juice out of my Ubuntu 12.04.

So far, I've tried changing priority of the process in System Monitor, but that doesn't seem to work.

My processor is Intel® Core™ i5-3317U CPU @ 1.70GHz × 4

I have 4 Gb's of RAM (and as much for swap)

My best guess is that I am not taking advantage of my video card which is Intel HD Graphics 4000

My computer is HP Spectre XT 13-2050 (http://www.amazon.com/HP-Spectre-13-2050nr-13-3-Inch-Laptop/dp/B0085RUZFA)

Solution 1

Microsoft Silverlight is only compatible with Windows. I would suggest against using Wine because, as you said, it causes decreased performance. I would suggest using Pipelight, an open-sourced remake of Silverlight for Linux.

Make sure you have all browsers closed prior to installing.

Add the Pipelight repositories and update:

sudo apt-add-repository ppa:ehoover/compholio
sudo apt-add-repository ppa:mqchael/pipelight
sudo apt-get update

Install Pipelight from the repo:

sudo apt-get install pipelight-multi

Then enable the Silverlight plugin after installing:

sudo pipelight-plugin --enable silverlight

Pipelight can also be used to install the Windows version of Adobe Flash, although I recommend using the Linux version:

sudo pipelight-plugin --enable flash

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After installing, you'll need to configure your web browser.

If you have Mozilla Firefox, install the extension User Agent Overrider (https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/user-agent-overrider/)

In the settings, select User Agent "Mozilla/5.0 (Windows NT 6.1; WOW64; rv:15.0) Gecko/20120427 Firefox/15.0a1"

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If you have Google Chrome, install the extension User-Agent Switcher (https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/user-agent-switcher-for-c/djflhoibgkdhkhhcedjiklpkjnoahfmg)

In the settings, select Windows Firefox 15.

Solution 2

I have found the solution to the lagging/frame dropping playback of Netflix under Ubuntu 13.10 (using native Firefox under Ubuntu with pipeline enabled for Silverlight) with the help of the the following thread:

https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/PulseAudio#Realtime_scheduling

This seems to be a Pulseaudio issue. Following the thread, issue the following command:

sudo gedit /etc/pulse/default.pa

Search for the following line:

load-module module-udev-detect tsched=0

and replace it to:

load-module module-udev-detect tsched=1

Save the file in the editor.

Restart the Pulseaudio server with the following commands:

pulseaudio -k
pulseaudio --start

and playback will be perfect, even with full HD.

Comments

[coneyhelixlake]

Phenomenal answer! It works very well and the instructions were great. I wish I had enough rep to upvote your answer.

[coneyhelixlake]

Note, my computer is still sluggish when playing HD through Pipelight (but I think this might have something to do with my videocard because I also have the same problem on my Windows partition).

[popdog]

If you're having the same issue on Windows, you might want to experiment with your video card drivers, such as installing the beta version. If your video card is just too old, then you might need to just consider purchasing a new one. I would also suggest disconnecting your video card and trying out the performance of your integrated video if you have one.

[GnP]

Pipelight isn't an open-sourced remake of Silverlight for Linux. It simply runs silverlight under wine and pipes it through your browser using a plugin.