[solved] 24fps playback and occasionally dropping to 1fps

as the title says, playback speed is dropping every minute or so. Sometimes more often per minute. It happens on two systems that used to work fine with playback speed. After dropping to 1fps, playback resumes to 24fps and is very responsive to Speed Editor inputs. One computer is running Windows 10, the other Windows 11.

The source material can be anything. BRAW, Prores, h265 mov, mp4. Also, the resolution can be anything, from 5.7k to 240p. Files that play back fine with a media player. All files are on external or internal SSD's. Blackmagic Disk Speed Test show good read results, from 480 Mb/s (external) to over 5100 Mb/s.

The problem are not the SSD's, the cables, ports, etc. The problem is DaVinci Resolve that occasionally slows down the playback speed. I updated the Nvidia drivers, and Resolve to v.20 beta.

Thank you for any input.

Not enough info to speculate, but if its on every clip, new project and new timeline etc. Than something else outside of resolve is probably causing issues on your systems. Or a bug in the beta specific to your system. Either way, best post diagnostic log and all that developers need to look into it. FAQ section on the forum can provide info how if you don't know already.

thank you for the reply. On the Windows 10 PC I created a new project with the same BRAW 4k material, and it plays back at 24fps without hiccups. Apparently the problem is with the old project (Resolve 17 possibly) brought to Resolve 19 and 20. That's already a clue.

The Windows 11 laptop still struggles with low resolution video clips. It appears that I have not one single problem, but several, which have to be viewed and dealt with separately.

Further testing is required. I will update this thread when new observations are made.

the Windows 11 laptop/Resolve may have problems with Bluetooth. After disconnecting both Speed Editor and Micro Color Panel playback speed was almost without interruptions (speed dropping to 1fps then back to 24fps). It took a while to reconnect both panels, but now playback performance it is at least usable again. Once Resolve crashed in a 4k timeline project with 5.7k Prores footage.

For a test I created a similar 4k timeline project with the same 5.7k Prores footage, same SSD, same USB cable, on an iPad Pro 2024. The Speed Editor is more responsive, Resolve playback is more fluid.

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On the Windows 10 PC Resolve playback is better than before, although I didn't change anything. Only few hiccups every few minutes, mostly 24fps throughout. Maybe this PC is just too old for the recent version of Resolve. It used to perform flawlessly some years ago.

Anyway, while still not quite happy with the performance of my two Windows machines (and very happy with the iPad performance), I consider this thread as resolved.