FYI (not just you but generally): one tool that is very useful in this situation is called "DXVA Checker", it checks the DirectX video acceleration modules that

FYI (not just you but generally): one tool that is very useful in this situation is called "DXVA Checker", it checks the DirectX video acceleration modules that are available for the current hardware/driver and then you can compare that against the file ("codec information" in VLC) and see what's going on. I would hazard a guess that your laptop probably doesn't have a hardware H265, or that the H265 file you're using doesn't match up to the decoder module (eg 8 vs 10 bit, or color space, etc). It is then falling back to software-decode or hybrid mode, and then it doesn't have enough oomph to do the file. https://bluesky-soft.com/en/DXVAChecker.html https://bluesky-soft.com/en/DXVAChecker.html