MP4 playback issues in Powerpoint - Iris Xe driver incompatibility?

[bobzwik]

Hello, I've been running into an issue with embedded .mp4 videos in Powerpoint slides. When I scrub/click through the video's media playback bar, it will crash Powerpoint. It can happen after 10 clicks in the video's payback bar, or just after 2 clicks. This happens both in slide editing mode and Slideshow mode. I'm using a 2 week old Dell XPS 9520 (i5-12500H, Iris Xe iGPU, 16 GB RAM) (been debugging for 5 days now). At first, I thought this is an Intel Iris Xe driver issue. Why? Because when selecting "Disable Slide Show hardware graphics acceleration" (Options, Advanced, Display), the problem stopped happening, but only in SlideShow mode. The issue would still occur in slide editing mode. Contrary to what I could find online, there was no "Disable hardware graphics acceleration" option (maybe due to the fact I was using Microsoft Office 365 for Enterprise (license obtained through my university). I tried uninstalling the "normal" Microsoft Office 365 that came pre-installed with the laptop, but that didn't change anything. At the time of these issues, I had the Intel Iris Xe 30.0.101.3301 driver installed. I managed to install the 30.0.101.3413 driver, but that didn't work. Then Windows Update installed the 30.0.101.1631 driver, yet the issue still persisted. Today, I factory reset my laptop to remove all apps and start fresh to see if I had installed anything that had corrupted Powerpoint or something. After login for the first time, I connected a USB flash drive and opened a Powerpoint file into the free trial of Powerpoint that came with the laptop. And to my surprise, everything was working correctly! I could skip in the video playback bar as many times as I wanted without crashing Powerpoint. Also, both "Disable Slide Show hardware graphics acceleration" and "Disable hardware graphics acceleration" options were available (and not checked). This was Office 365 version 16.0.15128.20246. The 30.0.101.3301 Iris Xe driver was installed. And I was on Windows 11 Home, 22H2, build 22621.521 . I uninstalled Office through the "Apps, Installed apps" menu in Windows Settings, then installed Office Enterprise with my university's license (downloaded from portal.office.com/account after login in with my university account). And now the problem started occurring again. The Office 365 version was now 16.0.15601.20148. I had not installed anything else before installing Office 365 Enterprise, nor have I installed any Windows updates nor any "Dell" updates. So that is my issue. With the build of Office provided by my university's license, Powerpoint is unusable (since I import videos daily to Powerpoint), probably due to an incompatibility between that specific Office build and the Intel Iris Xe driver. Has this issue been previously spotted? Any help would be greatly appreciated.

[ntl_rnd]

I can confirm that issue with at least 4 different computer configurations where an embedded .mp4 movie in a PowerPoint presentation crashes when scrubbing in the playback bar. The problem only occurs in PowerPoint's edit mode. There is no problem in full screen mode (after pressing F5). PowerPoint version is the latest (Microsoft PowerPoint for Microsoft 365 MSO (Version 2210 Build 16.0.15726.20188) 64-bit).

The biggest commonality between these machines seems to be the Intel Iris Xe integrated graphics unit.
It occurs regardless of the operating system (both Windows 10 and 11, latest updates). Dell updates are also the latest.
The problem does not occur when the integrated GPU is disabled via Device Manager on a laptop with an additional dedicated GPU.

These are the different computer configurations:
Dell XPS 15 9520, Intel Core i7-12700H, NVIDIA RTX 3050 Ti/Intel Iris Xe
Dell Vostro 15 7510, Intel Core i7-11800H, NVIDIA RTX 3050 Ti/Intel UHD 11th Gen
Dell Inspiron 14 7420, Intel Core i7-1255U, Intel Iris Xe
Dell XPS 13 9305, i7-1165G7, Intel Iris Xe

Since this is a big problem for us when editing presentations, is there any way for an updated driver or workaround?

Any help is appreciated.

I have found another thread with the same problem: https://community.intel.com/t5/Graphics/Powerpoint-mp4-trouble-with-Intel-Iris-Xe-graphics-card/m-p/1327715/thread-id/102535

[AL79]

I'm having the same problem with all our 50 units of Dell Latitude 7430. We need this to fixed urgently as it's affecting our trainer who use MP4 a lot in PowerPoint. 

[AL79]

Where can I upload the SSU log for your further investigation?

[AL79]

Hi Support,

Appreciate if you could help to investigate this urgently as this is something affecting our operation.

Regards,

AL

[n_scott_pearson]

You can attach the log file to a response post here. From File Manager, simply drag the file into the Drag and drop here or browse files to attach window below the edit box.

Personally, I am very unhappy with the fact that the SSU tool is exposing serial numbers in the report. These are totally unnecessary to the debug process. If you feel the same way, you should edit the log file and remove them before uploading/attaching.

Hope this helps,

...S

P.S. The Upload capability built into the SSU tool does not work - in fact has never worked -  and cannot be used.

[AL79]

Thanks Scott! Yes i was a bit concern with all the event logs information too. I have since masked out the host name and the serial number and some of the event logs information related to our domain.