Block artifacts on video playback when IMFVideoDisplayControl::GetCurrentImage is called

WallpaperEngine_Tim · ‎03-07-2022

Hey, I am one of the developers of an app called Wallpaper Engine. If you are not familiar with the app: It allows you to create and use animated wallpapers on Windows systems.

Among more complex wallpapers, the app also supports using simple video files (usually .mp4 with H.264 encoding) to be used as an animated wallpaper.

After the release of the Intel 10000 series processors, we started getting reports of users experiencing block artifacts on video-based wallpapers in our app.

We debugged this issue extensively and we now know that this issue is related to us calling IMFVideoDisplayControl::GetCurrentImage in regular intervals for the purpose of further processing the image data of the video. More infos about this can be found on the Microsoft developer website:

https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/win32/api/evr/nf-evr-imfvideodisplaycontrol-getcurrentimage

We also noticed that the app tends to crash on resize events in the Windows library "d9to12.dll". This also exclusively happens on affected Intel GPUs.

We reproduced this problem on 12th Gen Intel Core i5-12600K and its Intel UHD Graphics 770 but this issue seems to happen for all Intel integrated GPUs starting the Intel 10000 series.

This problem does not affect older Intel GPUs and it also does not affect systems with dedicated Nvidia or AMD GPUs.

Since this issue only seems to affect newer GPUs, we currently assume that this must be a driver issue rather than a hardware bottleneck, since the issue does not occur on older and weaker GPUs from Intel.

If anything is unclear, please let me know, we are happy to provide more technical details or products keys to verified Intel employees that would help to resolve this issue.

David_G_Intel · ‎03-08-2022

Hello @WallpaperEngine_Tim

Thank you for posting on the Intel️® communities. Please share with us the following information to investigate:

To confirm, this happens with 10th gen processors and newer models, correct?
Does this happen with all drivers or with a specific version?
Wallpaper Engine is available on Steam, correct?
Do you have any pictures/video examples of the artifacts?

Regards,

David G

Intel Customer Support Technician

WallpaperEngine_Tim · ‎03-08-2022

Hey @David_G_Intel ,

thank you for your response. I had actually uploaded a video showcasing this issue, plus the graphics bug report form, plus the SSU.txt and a report generated from the Intel Graphics Command Center but it looks like the files have not been attached here for some reason, apologies about that.

To confirm, this happens with 10th gen processors and newer models, correct?

Yes, this happens only on 10th gen, 11th gen and 12th gen Intel processors and their respective integrated graphics solution.

Does this happen with all drivers or with a specific version?

It happens with all drivers as far as we know. We first got reports about this in 2020 and driver updates did not help back then. We replicated the issue just this week on the aforementioned Intel Core i5-12600K test system with the latest Intel graphics card drivers on Windows 11. Windows 10 is definitely also affected.

Wallpaper Engine is available on Steam, correct?

That is correct, we can provide Steam keys for Intel staff if that helps.

Do you have any pictures/video examples of the artifacts?

I went through our support requests and attached a video file that a user emailed to us (IMG_9130.MOV), it shows the problem exactly the way we reproduced it on our systems and the way that numerous other users have reported it.

Unfortunately I am at home now and will be on vacation starting tomorrow, so I cannot access the files I generated anymore (specifically SSU.txt and the Intel Graphics Command Center log). If needed, I can supply those after my vacation, apologies for the inconvenience.

David_G_Intel · ‎03-09-2022

Thank you for the update WallpaperEngine_Tim. We will start the investigation, if we need the Steam Key we will let you know. We will also wait for the files when you go back.

Regards,

David G

Intel Customer Support Technician

David_G_Intel · ‎03-10-2022

Hello @WallpaperEngine_Tim

Let us know once you get the SSU results. Also, let us know how many systems are affected and if this happens also on HVEC 265?

Regards,

David G

Intel Customer Support Technician

David_G_Intel · ‎03-16-2022

Were you able to check the previous post?

Let us know if you still need assistance.

Best regards,

David G.

Intel Customer Support Technician

WallpaperEngine_Tim · ‎03-16-2022

Hello @David_G_Intel, I am still on vacation, I will get back to you with all the details next week, thank you for your patience.

David_G_Intel · ‎03-22-2022

@WallpaperEngine_Tim let us know when you come back to continue support.

Best regards,

David G.

Intel Customer Support Technician

WallpaperEngine_Tim · ‎03-23-2022

Hey @David_G_Intel,

please find the files that I intended to upload initially attached to this post.

I am unable to reproduce this issue with any H265-encoded files on our test system, so it seems like this problem only occurs with H264-encoded files. I also do not recall any users mentioning issues with H265 encoded files, though I cannot with absolute certainty say that it might occur on some other Intel-based systems.

Let me know if you need any additional infos or if I can be of help here.

Regards,

Tim

David_G_Intel · ‎03-23-2022

@WallpaperEngine_Tim based on the SSU provided it seems that the BIOS and driver are not up to date. You can contact the motherboard manufacturer for the BIOS update process and please test a Clean Installation of Intel® Graphics Drivers in Windows* using the latest driver 30.0.101.1631

Please also confirm if this happens with MSI drivers and how many systems are affected, we will be waiting for your response.

Regards,

David G.

Intel Customer Support Technician

WallpaperEngine_Tim · ‎03-23-2022

Hello @David_G_Intel, I forgot one important point in all of my previous messages and I have updated the graphics bug report accordingly, see the update PDF attached to this post and please disregard the previous PDF.

What I forgot to mention was that Wallpaper Engine will only call IMFVideoDisplayControl::GetCurrentImage when a supported LED peripheral is connected, which is why the affected user base is comparatively small when compared to the total Intel graphics card user base. Wallpaper Engine supports all LED devices that connect via Corsair iCUE or Razer Chroma. These devices are fairly popular among our main target group (people who play video games on their PC), so it's still a frequent issue.

In the updated graphics bug report PDF, I have outlined how to install the Razer Chroma emulator that allows you to set it all up without having to own supported LED hardware so that Wallpaper Engine will call IMFVideoDisplayControl::GetCurrentImage. It should be fairly straight-forward to set this up but if you run into any issue or it does not work for you, we might also be able build a basic test video player of some sorts for you that will always call this function, that way you should have a simplified use-case of this problem. In that case, an engineer might reach out to us directly so that we can share a sample .exe for this.

Please also confirm if this happens with MSI drivers and how many systems are affected, we will be waiting for your response.

Since we keep European data protection laws very seriously and do not collect or quantify any user data at all, I cannot give you any exact statistics on this issue, as we delete our email correspondence with our users after a short while. However, it is still a frequent issue that we are confronted with since around late 2019.

Again, I cannot quantify this issue with an exact number of affected users, however, this issue does affect all Intel 10 series and newer GPUs, it does not affect older GPUs for sure and does not affect GPUs from competitors. I also dug through some files I still had lying around related to this problem and I found two DXDiag files from users who had this exact same issue, though we regularly get emails about this and might ask the next few users for SSU files if that helps. Please find the two DXDiag files attaches for reference. Please keep in mind that they are older files and happen to be notebook GPUs but again, it is irrelevant if the Intel GPU is in a notebook and what driver version is being used.

@WallpaperEngine_Tim based on the SSU provided it seems that the BIOS and driver are not up to date.

I understand that this is somewhat of a standard response, but this is exactly what we initially told affected users and it never helped anyone in the past 2 1/2 years. The driver and BIOS versions are with almost absolute certainty irrelevant here, the issue first appeared with the release of the mobile 10th generation processors. This was before we figured out that this is related to IMFVideoDisplayControl::GetCurrentImage which is why I am here now.

I can still try and update the BIOS for you and try a different set of drivers when I find the time in the coming week, but I am almost certain this will not help because we obviously tried all of these steps with affected users numerous times. I will keep you updated, if you need any additional information from users that report this issue to us, please let me know and I will ask them to collect data for you and ask for permission to forward it to you.

WallpaperEngine_Tim · ‎03-23-2022

I just found another DXDiag file from just a few days ago, just adding it here for additional reference. The user fixed this issue by manually changing the GPU from the Intel-based one to the AMD one, which is a common workaround we suggest at this point but it's rather frustrating and confusing for ordinary users.

David_G_Intel · ‎03-24-2022

We will continue testing, thank you for the information.

Regards,

David G

Intel Customer Support Technician

WallpaperEngine_Tim · ‎03-30-2022

Hey @David_G_Intel, I found the time to update the Intel drivers and flash the BIOS of this system and the issue still persists without any improvements. See the SSU log file attached for reference.

David_G_Intel · ‎04-21-2022

Hello @WallpaperEngine_Tim

We finished the testing on our side, and we were able to replicate the issue with driver 30.0.101.1660. We can observe artifacts at random times on the lower left-hand corner when the h.264 videos play in the Wallpaper Engine's window.

New code in newer drivers now include the fix. Once we tested the app using that internal driver build, this issue is no longer visible. The best option right now is to wait for the next 2-3 driver releases that will contain the new code, but we cannot provide a specific timeframe of when they will be released.

Here is a recording of the test with the latest internal driver (unable to reproduce the issue):

https://youtu.be/8Npn-UPV0XI

Let us know if you have any questions or if we can close this thread.

Regards,

David G

Intel Customer Support Technician

WallpaperEngine_Tim · ‎04-21-2022

Hey @David_G_Intel,

Thank you for looking into this, that's great news. I'll be sure to keep an eye on future Intel graphics drivers. Should there be any issues in the future, I'll be sure to circle back to this conversation and let you know.

Thanks again,

Tim

David_G_Intel · ‎04-22-2022

We're glad to know the information helped. Hopefully, it will help other community members. Since the thread is now solved, we will close it. If you need any additional information, please submit a new question as this thread will no longer be monitored.

Best regards,

David G

Intel Customer Support Technician