Kodi 20.5 on RPie5 - Videos won't play and CPU utilisation 100%

Troubleshooting
1

Fresh install of DietPi_RPi-ARMv8-Bookworm.img onto a new RPie 5 to SD card. I’m seeing the CPU utiisation go over 100% and the video freeze after about 5 seconds when I play a video file. Have tried multiple videos both on external USB HD and directly on the SD card so issue doesn’t see to be where the file is located.

Is anyone successfully playing videos on Kodi 20.5 (installed directly from Dietpi Software)?

I posted on the Kodi forum (https://forum.kodi.tv/showthread.php?tid=381250) but they just suggested I install LibreELEC. Would like to get it running on dietpi if I can.

  • DietPi version |
    Core=9
    Sub=11
    RC=2
    GITBRANCH=‘master’
    G_GITOWNER= ‘MichaIng’

  • Distro version
    Bookworm 0

  • Kernel version
    Linux Dietpi 6.6.74+rpt-rpi-2712 #1 SMP PREEMPT Debian 1:6.6.74-1+rpt1 (2025-01-27) aarch64 GNU/Linux

  • Architecture
    ARM64

  • SBC model
    RPie5

  • Power supply used - Genuine Rpie power supply

  • SD card used
    SanDisk ultra 256GB

Steps to reproduce

  1. Install image to SD card and boot
  2. Connect to wifi and update
  3. Install Kodi from dietpi software
  4. Open Kodi and scan for media
  5. Turn on debug log
  6. Play video file

Actual behaviour

Video freeze after around 5 seconds and CPU goes to > 100%

2

Did you try different files? Does it only appear with one specific file?

3

Rpi5 has very poor multimedia capabilities, it only has a HEVC decoder. H264 is decoded on the CPU. Can you paste your mediainfo?

4

Seems to be all files. Ive not yet found one that works and have tried avi, mpg, mkv. All behave the same.

5

Here are some that I have tried

6

Files 1 and 4 should be decoded with hardware acceleration and files 2 and 3 should be decoded on the CPU (software) with no problem.
Only the x265 files will be accelerated. So something is wrong. Can you change some output kodi options, for example enabled DRM PRIME?

And you are running over HDMI, right?

1 Like
7

Sorry for the delay - had some hardware isuses.

Yes, running over HDMI.

Allow using “DRM PRIME” decoder is enabled.
Ive tried switching “PRIME Render Method” between “Direct to Plane” and “EGL” but I still get the same behaviour.
Have tried “Use display HDR capabilities” enabled and disabled but behaviour is the same.

8

Anything else that I can try on this? Happy to spend a bit of time - just not real sure where to go and the Kodi forum post didn’t surface much.

I’m also interested if someone else can confirm they are seeing the same thing with the RPie5.

Or is the solution to just stick with the trusty RPie4? (Which is currently doing the job perfectly well)

9

I had the same issue after the latest version. Check and verify you have an audio device listed in Kodi.
I went back to my backup (previous release) temporarily and things are working. I’ll dig deeper later, right now the wife wants to watch a movie. :grin:

10

Probably more related to rpi kernel and not DietPi version

1 Like
11

Thanks for the reply. In system - audio the audio output device is displaying "error - no device found’. There is nothing to select - definately seems to be similar to your experience…

Unsure how to go about fixing this though…

12

OK - got this working finally. There was no audio device installed. I installed somerthing else that I was hoping would test the sound - I chose “DXX-Rebirth: Descent” and while it didn’t start successfully the act of installing it seemed to fix the sound issue. The skin sounds in kodi were noticable again at launch the audio device was now listed rather than showing “error - no device found”. Now playback is working fine!

Thanks for the lead @ QBurris64!

1 Like