A decoder for the new track could not be found. track type: SRT/UTF8

[kkendall]

Hmm, sadly the solution I found elsewhere to delete the subs with mkvtoolnix doesn't seem to work in MP (don't know if it works in other programs)

I don't have vsfilter installed atm. The message "A decoder for the new track could not be found. track type: SRT/UTF8 " is gone. But mkv files with embedded subs still don't play.

If I install vsfilter and set it to autoload in haalisplitter, does autoload mean "always load vsfilter when haalisplitter is used" or "only use vsfilter when needed". I hope it's the last one, so I can watch files without subs with hw acc and files with subs without hw acc. For now this would be acceptable...

I still hope there will be a solution soon to always use hw acc with embedded subs.

[pilehave]

This problem has not yet been fixed, but I got it working good enough for me; when there are subtitles in the MKV-file they display and the movie plays without HW-accelleration, and when there are no subtitles, the movie plays with HW-accelleration.

I am using newest version of Haali media Splitter and newest VobSub filter. I have set autoload vsfilter to yes and the error message is gone. I would like it to be fixed somehow, cause even though my CPU can handle 720p just fine, i'm not so sure about 1080p...

[kkendall]

Originally Posted by pilehave

This problem has not yet been fixed, but I got it working good enough for me; when there are subtitles in the MKV-file they display and the movie plays without HW-accelleration, and when there are no subtitles, the movie plays with HW-accelleration.

I am using newest version of Haali media Splitter and newest VobSub filter. I have set autoload vsfilter to yes and the error message is gone. I would like it to be fixed somehow, cause even though my CPU can handle 720p just fine, i'm not so sure about 1080p...

??? Are you saying you now have a setup that plays MKV files with subtitles, without hw. acc. and MKV files without subtitles, with hw. acc. ???

This would mean that the latest Haali splitter can detect subtitles in mkv-files and when 'autoload vsfilter' is set to 'yes', it will only activate vsfilter when subs are detected.
In other words: This way Haali will keep hw.acc. as long as subs are not detected and thus vsfilter is not used.
I'm gonna try it as soon as get back home!

The fact that MP can't use hw.acc. when using vsfilter, is a problem of vsfilter, not MP.
No player can show subtitles with hw.acc. as far as I know.

[pilehave]

I think that is how things are at the moment.

The version of Haali Media Splitter is 1.8.122.18
The version of PowerDVD is 8.0.2021.50

[damaster]

I am on RC2 using MPCVideoDecoder for hardware acceleration and still getting this pop-up nag (see attached) with some MKV files.

I'd like to clarify the issue here: first of all, hardware acceleration can only work if the video decoder is directly connected to the renderer. For example, if you're using Vista and EVR is your renderer, then your video chain must be as follows: video decoder -> EVR. If you load DirectVobSub (aka VsFilter), then you're inserting an additional filter in the chain and thus breaking hardware acceleration, i.e. video decoder -> DirectVobSub -> EVR = NO HARDWARE ACCELERATION.

That's the first requirement for hardware acceleration to work. The second requirement is for the encoding to be within acceptable standards and supported by the video drivers. Some 720p/1080p encodings unnecessarily use the High@L5.1 encoding profile with too many reference frames which leads to breaking hardware acceleration entirely. The right encodings should use either the High@L3.1 profile or High@L4.1 profile with 3-5 reference frames, and thus will be handled correctly by the video driver (Nvidia/ATI) and leverage hardware acceleration.

As for my recommended video decoders that support H.264/AVC/VC-1 hardware acceleration: MPCVideoDecoder, PowerDVD 7/8. From my personal experience, I have found that MPCVideoDecoder is a lot more lenient than PowerDVD and still plays videos in software decoding mode when they don't conform to the necessary standards supported by the video drivers for hardware acceleration. The PowerDVD decoder tends to lock up when hardware acceleration can't work. When hardware acceleration does indeed work with either MPCVideoDecoder or PowerDVD, video quality is identical.

Now, on to the issue at hand. So, if you want hardware acceleration to work, you should all have set your Haali Media Splitter to NOT auto-load DirectVobSub (aka VsFilter). You must also ensure that ffdshow post-processing is NOT enabled in your MP configuration. This will ensure that nothing will end up between the video decoder and the video renderer, ensuring you don't break hardware acceleration.

This particular problem occurs only for some MKV videos with UTF-8 encoded subtitles (see update below). I have several MKVs that do indeed have subtitles for which hardware acceleration works just fine without this error message. Even some of the videos that cause this error message to get generated still run with hardware acceleration just fine. In other words, this error message DOES NOT break hardware acceleration, i.e. subtitles inside an MKV file DO NOT break hardware acceleration unless you load DirectVobSub (VsFilter) in the video chain. Furthermore, this pop-up message only occurs for some movies with subtitles, i.e. likely when one of the subtitle streams uses UTF-8 character encoding (see update below).

To summarize:
- Hardware acceleration BREAKS when there is a filter between the video decoder and the video renderer.
- Hardware acceleration BREAKS when the video encoding does not conform to the DXVA standards supported by the video driver (and video decoder), e.g. encoding done in High@L5.1 profile which has no benefit to video quality whatsoever!
- Hardware acceleration DOES NOT BREAK with subtitles in the MKV container, unless you are loading DirectVobSub (aka VsFilter) in the filter chain.
- This error message only gets generated for some videos with a subtitle stream that uses UTF-8 character encoding, but does not have any impact on hardware acceleration. And this error message only occurs if you have set Haali Media Splitter NOT to auto-load DirectVobSub (correct setting to ensure hardware acceleration) or you do not have DirectVobSub installed whatsoever.

Finally, I don't even think this error message gets generated by MediaPortal itself. The pop-up says "Mkx" as the title. See screenshot.

I'm looking into a possible fix for this issue (i.e. not a work-around) only because this pop-up is an annoying nag.

UPDATE 1
Here is the media info for the 2 files I am comparing. This first one does not generate the pop-up error message, has a single subtitle stream and runs with hardware acceleration:

[ About file ]

Name: street.kings.2008.720p.bluray.x264.sample-sinners.mkv
Date: 26/08/2008 18:55:09
Size: 42,878,540 bytes (40.892 MB)

[ Generic infos ]

Play duration: 00:01:08 (68.067 s)
Container type: matroska
Creation time: 22/08/2008 23:47:55 UTC
Number of streams: 3
Type of stream nr. 1: video (V_MPEG4/ISO/AVC)
Type of stream nr. 2: audio (A_DTS)
Type of stream nr. 3: subtitle (S_TEXT/UTF8)
Audio streams: 1
Muxing Application: libebml v0.7.7 + libmatroska v0.8.1
Writing Application: mkvmerge v2.2.0 ('Turn It On Again') built on Mar  4 2008 12:58:26

[ Relevant data ]

Resolution: 1280 x 528
Width: multiple of 32
Height: multiple of 16

[ Video track ]

Codec ID: V_MPEG4/ISO/AVC
Resolution: 1280 x 528
Frame aspect ratio: 80:33 = 2.424242
Pixel aspect ratio: 1:1 = 1
Display aspect ratio: 80:33 = 2.424242
Framerate: 23.976043 fps

[ Audio track ]

Codec ID: A_DTS
Channels (container): 6
Sample rate: 48000 Hz

[ About H.264 encoding ]

SPS id: 0
  Profile: High@L3.1
  Num ref frames: 5
  Chroma format idc: YUV 4:2:0
PPS id: 0 (SPS: 0)
  Entropy coding type: CABAC
  Weighted prediction: No
  Weighted bipred idc: B slices - implicit weighted prediction
  8x8dct: Yes

This second file generates the pop-up message, has a single subtitle stream, and runs fine with hardware acceleration as well:

[ About file ]

Name: next.avengers.heroes.of.tomorrow.2008.720p.bluray.x264.sample-cinefile.mkv
Date: 5/09/2008 21:48:15
Size: 52,869,027 bytes (50.42 MB)

[ Generic infos ]

Play duration: 00:01:24 (83.5 s)
Container type: matroska
Creation time: 4/09/2008 14:01:09 UTC
Number of streams: 3
Type of stream nr. 1: video (V_MPEG4/ISO/AVC)
Type of stream nr. 2: audio (A_DTS)
Type of stream nr. 3: subtitle (S_TEXT/UTF8)
Audio streams: 1
Muxing Application: libebml v0.7.7 + libmatroska v0.8.1
Writing Application: mkvmerge v2.2.0 ('Turn It On Again') built on Mar  4 2008 12:58:26

[ Relevant data ]

Resolution: 1280 x 720
Width: multiple of 32
Height: multiple of 16

[ Video track ]

Codec ID: V_MPEG4/ISO/AVC
Resolution: 1280 x 720
Frame aspect ratio: 16:9 = 1.777777
Pixel aspect ratio: 1:1 = 1
Display aspect ratio: 16:9 = 1.777777
Framerate: 23.975986 fps

[ Audio track ]

Codec ID: A_DTS
Channels (container): 6
Sample rate: 48000 Hz

[ About H.264 encoding ]

SPS id: 0
  Profile: High@L3.1
  Num ref frames: 5
  Chroma format idc: YUV 4:2:0
PPS id: 0 (SPS: 0)
  Entropy coding type: CABAC
  Weighted prediction: No
  Weighted bipred idc: B slices - implicit weighted prediction
  8x8dct: Yes

Both video files have UTF-8 subtitle streams, so my original theory that this error message is due to UTF-8 character encodings is wrong. I'm still digging deeper into the problem and will report back with updates.

UPDATE 2
Attached here is a fix for this pop-up error message for RC2 (rev 19706). It is a patch to Core.dll to not attempt enabling the subtitle stream. This eliminates the pop-up error message entirely if DirectVobSub (VsFilter) is not installed nor auto-loaded.

This does not break subtitles, because subtitles will still work if Haali Media Splitter is set to auto-load DirectVobSub (VsFilter). But remember what I said above: if you auto-load DirectVobSub then hardware acceleration will not work.

Bug report and patch also submitted here: Pop-up error message generated for certain MKV files with UTF-8 subtitles

Enjoy!

[RDHoworth]

Thanks very much for this information. I will try it out ASAP.

One question though, is there an easy way to determine whether Hardware acceleration is being used?

Regards, Richard

[damaster]

Originally Posted by RDHoworth

Thanks very much for this information. I will try it out ASAP.

One question though, is there an easy way to determine whether Hardware acceleration is being used?

Regards, Richard

Indeed: if you have a way to bring up the MPC Video Decoder properties panel while playing a video, then it will either say "Not using DXVA" (no hardware acceleration) or it will say something along the lines of "ATI bitstream" or "Nvidia bitstream" depending on the model of your video card. The easiest way I know how of bringing up the properties panel during playback is to use ffdshow as my audio decoder, and then right-clicking the ffdshow audio icon in my system tray during playback, and then clicking on "MPC Video Decoder" in the list of decoders at the top of the right-click menu.

Another not-so-obvious way is to monitor CPU usage for just MediaPortal.exe or using RivaTuner to verify your GPU usage. If you have hardware acceleration working successfully, then your CPU usage should definitely be 15% or a lot lower.

[Kian]

hi damaster,
thanks for the great post on hardware acceleration. i just tried everything out you said including your most recent post on how to check whether HA is working. first i checked CPU usage by running mkv files in mp in window mode (so not in fullscreen). the cpus usage was as usual (above 50%)

then i checked the MPC Video Decoder properties panel using the approach you described. Unfortunately it said "Not using DXVA". so i checked the other tab with the file types and found that everything wa checked except H264. so i checked it, and now, each time i run attempt to run any mkv file in MP, i get a bluescreen (i never saw a bluescreen on win vista before).

what did i do wrong? should the h264 box be left unchecked? why am i getting this bluescreen? hope you can help me out.

fyi:
in MP i selected the MPC Video Decoder for h264 video decoder, unchecked the box beside ffdshow in post processing, checked EVR, and set Autoload VSfilter to No in the Haali settings.

btw, how can i edit the MPC Video Decoder settings in order to get it working again (just need to uncheck that H264 box)?

[damaster]

Originally Posted by Kian

hi damaster,
thanks for the great post on hardware acceleration. i just tried everything out you said including your most recent post on how to check whether HA is working. first i checked CPU usage by running mkv files in mp in window mode (so not in fullscreen). the cpus usage was as usual (above 50%)

then i checked the MPC Video Decoder properties panel using the approach you described. Unfortunately it said "Not using DXVA". so i checked the other tab with the file types and found that everything wa checked except H264. so i checked it, and now, each time i run attempt to run any mkv file in MP, i get a bluescreen (i never saw a bluescreen on win vista before).

what did i do wrong? should the h264 box be left unchecked? why am i getting this bluescreen? hope you can help me out.

fyi:
in MP i selected the MPC Video Decoder for h264 video decoder, unchecked the box beside ffdshow in post processing, checked EVR, and set Autoload VSfilter to No in the Haali settings.

btw, how can i edit the MPC Video Decoder settings in order to get it working again (just need to uncheck that H264 box)?

Do you have more information from the blue screen? Do you know which DLL or system file caused the blue screen? Sounds like it might be a DXVA issue with EVR on your system. Check your MediaPortal logs for potential errors about EVR. Do you have SP1?

I set this up the same way on 2 Vista systems and it worked perfectly, both with ATI GPUs running Catalyst 8.7 and 8.8 drivers. One Vista was SP1 and the other is without SP1 but is using the SP1 version of EVR (I patched it).

[Kian]

hi,
the blue screen tells me that there is a problem with atikmdag.sys. it only happens when I use the MPC video decoder oder cyberlinkdvd to play x264/h264 content. it is not a MP issue as cyberlink powerdvd itself also generates the bluescreen when running hd content. the only hd video encoder working with evr is coreavc, bt this doesnt solve the hardware acceleration issue . so my first step would be to get rid of the bluescreen, but how?

the system crashed so often that i cannot run MP anymore, only the mp config runs...HELP