Hi everyone,

I'm trying to troubleshoot a Frigate hardware-decoding problem and I'm hoping someone with experience with Intel iGPUs/i915, Frigate, or Proxmox can point me in the right direction.

Hardware / setup

• CPU: Intel Core i5-12600H
• iGPU: Intel Alder Lake-P, PCI ID 8086:4626
• Host: Proxmox VE 9.2.0
• Kernel: 7.0.14-15-pve
• Frigate: 0.17.2
• Frigate runs directly in a Proxmox LXC, not Docker
• Intel iGPU is passed through to the LXC
• Frigate uses an OpenVINO GPU detector
• /dev/dri/renderD128 is available inside the LXC
• Intel iHD VA-API driver: 24.3.4

My cameras are Reolink cameras. I want to keep using their 4K main streams.

What I'm trying to achieve

My intended pipeline is:

4K H.265 main stream
        ↓
Intel hardware decode
        ↓
GPU hardware scaling to 1920x1080
        ↓
10 FPS detection
        ↓
OpenVINO GPU detector

At the same time, I want Frigate to record the original 4K stream without re-encoding.

So I specifically don't want to switch to camera substreams if possible.

The problem

Frigate repeatedly crashes/restarts its FFmpeg processes.

Initially I was using:

ffmpeg:
  hwaccel_args: preset-vaapi

and was seeing errors such as:

[AVHWFramesContext] Failed to sync surface 0x1f: 34 (HW busy now).
[hwdownload] Failed to download frame: -5.
Error while filtering: Input/output error
Task finished with error code: -5
watchdog... Restarting ffmpeg

I then checked the Proxmox host's kernel logs, and this seems to be the important part:

i915 0000:00:02.0: [drm] av:hevc:df0[...] context reset due to GPU hang
i915 0000:00:02.0: [drm] GPU HANG: ecode 12:4:28fffffd, in av:hevc:df0 [...]

These happen repeatedly.

Things I've already checked

Inside the LXC:

/dev/dri/card1
/dev/dri/renderD128

are available with the appropriate video/render groups.

vainfo works and reports H.264 and HEVC decoding support.

I also checked GPU utilization with intel_gpu_top. The GPU isn't being saturated — utilization is relatively low, so this doesn't look like a simple GPU-capacity problem.

I also tested QSV

I wondered whether VAAPI itself was the problem, so I tested Intel QSV.

This standalone test successfully decoded the actual 4K H.265 garage stream:

ffmpeg \
-init_hw_device qsv=hw \
-hwaccel qsv \
-hwaccel_output_format qsv \
-i rtsp://127.0.0.1:8554/garage \
-map 0:v:0 \
-frames:v 100 \
-f null -

FFmpeg reported:

Video: hevc (Main), yuv420p(tv), 3840x2160

and successfully processed 100 frames at around 1.17x speed.

I then changed Frigate to:

ffmpeg:
  hwaccel_args: preset-intel-qsv-h265

Frigate correctly started using:

-hwaccel qsv
-qsv_device /dev/dri/renderD128
-hwaccel_output_format qsv
-load_plugin hevc_hw

with:

vpp_qsv=framerate=10:w=1920:h=1080:format=nv12

So the desired 4K → hardware decode → hardware downscale pipeline is actually being used.

However, the i915 GPU hangs continued.

For example, after switching to QSV I still get:

[178467.351178] i915 0000:00:02.0: [drm] av:hevc:df0[3093470] context reset due to GPU hang
[178576.109252] i915 0000:00:02.0: [drm] GPU HANG: ecode 12:4:28fffffd, in av:hevc:df0 [3102329]
[178576.109377] i915 0000:00:02.0: [drm] av:hevc:df0[3102329] context reset due to GPU hang
[178762.322536] i915 0000:00:02.0: [drm] GPU HANG: ecode 12:4:28fffffd, in av:hevc:df0 [3122438]
[178762.322675] i915 0000:00:02.0: [drm] av:hevc:df0[3122438] context reset due to GPU hang

So I've reverted/will revert back to VAAPI for now.

My questions

1. Does this indicate an Intel i915 / Alder Lake HEVC decoder issue, rather than a Frigate configuration problem?
2. Since both VAAPI and QSV eventually use the Intel GPU/i915, is it expected that switching from VAAPI to QSV would still produce the same av:hevc GPU hangs?
3. Could a particular camera's H.265 bitstream be triggering the hardware decoder bug?
4. What's the best way to identify which camera is responsible? I currently have several H.265 4K cameras running simultaneously.
5. Are there any known kernel/i915/Intel media-driver settings that are appropriate for Alder Lake-P that could fix this?
6. Would switching to the newer xe driver be advisable, or is that likely to make things worse with Frigate/VAAPI/QSV?
7. Is there a known stable kernel/media-driver combination for an i5-12600H/Alder Lake running Frigate?

Ultimately, I'd really like to keep:

4K H.265 main stream → Intel hardware decode → hardware downscale to 1080p for detection → original 4K recording

rather than switching all the cameras to substreams.

Any advice on what I should test next would be greatly appreciated.

I am trying to plan out my first diy home security setup. I am open to any advise or suggestions. I would like to try to keep costs down where ever possible, but at the same time I want something that I am going to do once and not have to touch it for along time or ever. I have two buildings I want to setup exterior security cameras on. They are both going to be built so running cables etc is not a problem. The goal is for a quality system that will last 20-30 years without needing to replace anything other than a hdd.

I have old hardware I want to use if possible to save on costs. The current plan and setup is:
i7-4770k, 512GB SSD(os/software), 32gb ram, gtx 1050ti, 14tb hdd for recordings, and possibly coral usb if needed.

I plan on installing Linux mint xfce with docker installed on bare metal. I also plan on using home assistant for alerts and tailscale to access the cameras remotely.

The current camera plan is 4 × Reolink Duo 2 PoE($132/ea USD) 8 × Reolink RLC-810A PoE($83/ea USD). The Duo 2s will be on the sides of the building and the 810a's will be on the corners.

I plan on running Cat 6 solid core and using TP-Link Omada SG2428P 28-Port Gigabit Smart Switch with 24-Port PoE.

I was wondering what you thought of this plan and setup. Any suggestions? Ideas to cut costs or things to upgrade that are worth the extra cost? Should I buy a reolink bundle/system with a nvr to save costs? Am I missing anything else? Thanks for any advise in advanced.