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v2.1.1 — B-frame H.264 decodes correctly

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@defcom5-rockchip defcom5-rockchip released this 05 Sep 17:15
· 45 commits to main since this release
v2.1.1
bf4b9cd

Patch release. If you play H.264 with B-frames — which is most real-world H.264 — this is the one to have.

Fixed: B-frame H.264 no longer decodes to a corrupted picture

Through v2.1.0, H.264 streams using B-frames came out ghosted, with occasional solid-green frames, whenever they took the hardware path. Cause: decoded pictures were routed into the wrong surfaces whenever the decoder's output order differed from submission order — which is exactly what B-frames do. Pictures are now routed by identity, and B-frame H.264 decodes in hardware pixel-identical to software decode from the start of playback (verified objectively: frame-by-frame comparison against a software reference, repeated runs).

Known issue, narrowed and documented

After seeking in open-GOP content (broadcast-style streams whose seek points are not true keyframes), the picture can be wrong until the next real keyframe — the decoder resumes against stale reference state, and it cannot be safely reset mid-stream without a true IDR to restart from. Typical movie files are closed-GOP and seek correctly in hardware. Mechanism, evidence, and the six remedies already ruled out are documented in KNOWN-ISSUES (KI-1). A fix is in development.

Also in this release

  • vaDeriveImage is implemented against the decoded surface (previously returned an empty image; VLC's GL interop and ffmpeg's hwframe transfer both call it)
  • Per-file copyright and attribution recorded properly (debian/copyright, SPDX identifiers, README lineage section) — LGPL-2.1-or-later throughout, crediting the original author Eduardo García-Mádico Portabella, truongsinh's upstream fixes, and this fork's additions

Verification

Release binary checked with the in-tree tooling (tools/hevc-ladder.sh, pixel comparison vs software reference): H.264 with B-frames 0.00/255 from start ×3 runs; H.264 without B-frames, HEVC 8-bit — hardware, matching. Advertised profile list unchanged from v2.1.0.

Install

sudo apt install ./rockchip-vaapi-driver_2.1.1_arm64.deb
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