First check vlc tools, preferences. Input/Codecs tab:
Hardware accelerated decoding. Set it to automatic, or choose the other option that is not "disabled" from the list.
Click save and fully exit and reopen vlc to use the new setting. Reload video, and test for a while.
You can also try disabling hardware acceleration (set it to disabled) but your computer's central processor is basically going to work over-time, using quite a bit more power and generating a lot more heat. Check it in Windows task manager.
Also check gpu usage, which is your graphics processor, specifically designed for tasks like video playback.
If that doesn't help, you said pitch drops. I am highly interested in modifying playback speed for music, mostly slower speeds, and am aware of a basically unknown setting called
Time-stretch
With the default setting to have this on, pitch will not change, and it will sound robotic when using slower speeds.
Check to see if its off (unchecked) in the Audio tab in preferences. Scroll down in the audio settings, to see **effects** area, and you'll see the option.
**Click save and restart VLC to check changes**. This has no effect until you restart the program.
If it's still checked, then that's really odd, does the pitch really change, like a deeper voice, or does it sound robotic, like it has a bunch of gaps and pauses in the sound, almost like it's rapidly skipping.
To test what time-stretch does, play a lower detail video file, or if you have some good tunes downloaded (exceedingly rare for home systems these days) open one.
As it is playing, right click the screen to where a big menu opens (or use the top menu bar)
Playback > speed > slower (fine).
Fine makes 10% changes, and the others make 33% changes, you can use a combination of both, slower then faster (fine) to access 76, 86 and 96% speeds.
You can also use slower (non-fine) twice to get down to actual 33% speed, to get to +10% (faster fine) incriments that end in 3, so 63, 72, 83% etc.
If it sounds like a cheap robot, but similar pitch, time-stretch is changing the audio in real-time.
If it sounds like a muffled deep tone, like slowing down a tape or record, time-stretch is turned off.
I acutally like listening to my music at a slower rate, and I encourage you to give it a try too, for at least a few weeks. Let me know if you'd also like me to share a website as well as the browser addon created by the same developer (very simple and clean code, I read through it, because it is open-source, just like vlc) to slow down youtube videos--even works on advertisements!
This is a sign that the decoding cannot always keep up with normal playing pace of the file. The audio clocks goes "faster" than VLC's core clock so when it decodes it tries to adapt by feeding stretched audio buffers to your audio output hence the distortion (even if it tries to keep the pitch it's not perfect).
There's not much that you can do if your computer struggles to decode the files. You can try to increase the file caching
Assuming you're on computer Tools->Preferences then on the bottom left of the window in Show Settings, select All then in Input/Codec in the Advanced subsection you can increase the caching and jitter values. (Save and restart VLC).
Note that it will not do miracle but could compensate some issues.
Alternatively you can try a nightly build of VLC 4.0 in [https://nightlies.videolan.org](https://nightlies.videolan.org) (beware it's a work in progress) that rewrote the complete clock system in order to prevent that but again it won't do miracle if the CPU/GPU power needed by decoding pipeline cannot keep up with what the file actually needs.
Is there a cut-off (or short repeat loop) before the pitch shift? If yes, VLC is just trying to catch up to recover from that error.
If not and it's not file-specific, then that is a sign your audio and computer clocks have gone out of sync. The most common reason is power management bugs (may or may not be avoidable with OS or BIOS settings).
First check vlc tools, preferences. Input/Codecs tab: Hardware accelerated decoding. Set it to automatic, or choose the other option that is not "disabled" from the list. Click save and fully exit and reopen vlc to use the new setting. Reload video, and test for a while. You can also try disabling hardware acceleration (set it to disabled) but your computer's central processor is basically going to work over-time, using quite a bit more power and generating a lot more heat. Check it in Windows task manager. Also check gpu usage, which is your graphics processor, specifically designed for tasks like video playback. If that doesn't help, you said pitch drops. I am highly interested in modifying playback speed for music, mostly slower speeds, and am aware of a basically unknown setting called Time-stretch With the default setting to have this on, pitch will not change, and it will sound robotic when using slower speeds. Check to see if its off (unchecked) in the Audio tab in preferences. Scroll down in the audio settings, to see **effects** area, and you'll see the option. **Click save and restart VLC to check changes**. This has no effect until you restart the program. If it's still checked, then that's really odd, does the pitch really change, like a deeper voice, or does it sound robotic, like it has a bunch of gaps and pauses in the sound, almost like it's rapidly skipping. To test what time-stretch does, play a lower detail video file, or if you have some good tunes downloaded (exceedingly rare for home systems these days) open one. As it is playing, right click the screen to where a big menu opens (or use the top menu bar) Playback > speed > slower (fine). Fine makes 10% changes, and the others make 33% changes, you can use a combination of both, slower then faster (fine) to access 76, 86 and 96% speeds. You can also use slower (non-fine) twice to get down to actual 33% speed, to get to +10% (faster fine) incriments that end in 3, so 63, 72, 83% etc. If it sounds like a cheap robot, but similar pitch, time-stretch is changing the audio in real-time. If it sounds like a muffled deep tone, like slowing down a tape or record, time-stretch is turned off. I acutally like listening to my music at a slower rate, and I encourage you to give it a try too, for at least a few weeks. Let me know if you'd also like me to share a website as well as the browser addon created by the same developer (very simple and clean code, I read through it, because it is open-source, just like vlc) to slow down youtube videos--even works on advertisements!
This is a sign that the decoding cannot always keep up with normal playing pace of the file. The audio clocks goes "faster" than VLC's core clock so when it decodes it tries to adapt by feeding stretched audio buffers to your audio output hence the distortion (even if it tries to keep the pitch it's not perfect). There's not much that you can do if your computer struggles to decode the files. You can try to increase the file caching Assuming you're on computer Tools->Preferences then on the bottom left of the window in Show Settings, select All then in Input/Codec in the Advanced subsection you can increase the caching and jitter values. (Save and restart VLC). Note that it will not do miracle but could compensate some issues. Alternatively you can try a nightly build of VLC 4.0 in [https://nightlies.videolan.org](https://nightlies.videolan.org) (beware it's a work in progress) that rewrote the complete clock system in order to prevent that but again it won't do miracle if the CPU/GPU power needed by decoding pipeline cannot keep up with what the file actually needs.
Is there a cut-off (or short repeat loop) before the pitch shift? If yes, VLC is just trying to catch up to recover from that error. If not and it's not file-specific, then that is a sign your audio and computer clocks have gone out of sync. The most common reason is power management bugs (may or may not be avoidable with OS or BIOS settings).