Gettinging smoother playback of video/tv/dvd

[kkendall]

Originally Posted by KRA

De-interlacing is done by the codec, and if you use the right codec the gfx card help. If you have a nvidia card then nvidia purevideo decoder is recommended. I you have a ATi card Powerdvd codecs are good.

Ok, so the quality of the codec determines the quality of the de-interlacing. I have a NVidia EN7300 card so I should use the purevideo decoder, but can't ffdshow do the job right? I try to minimize the amount of codecs on my system...
And you say that a good decoder, like purevideo, turns on HW accelleration, right? ...Spragleknas wants to avoid this to prevent IRQ conflicts... I have a Dual Core E6750 so my processor could handle the toughest 1080p movies single handedly without any "extra help".
So what is probeably the better solution in this case?

[KRA]

I'm not 100% sure, but unless you tweak ffdshow a lot, you will probably get better result with purevideo decoder. IRQ conflict is a thing of the past, it shouldn't be a problem on new computers, although there may be latency problems. You just have to test and see what works best.

I tried using ffdshow for upscaling etc. with MP a couple of years ago, but didn't have much luck.

But do you really have a problem, or just looking for the best solution ?

EDIT, I just notice, this is a old thread, and much of what I've written has been written before

[kkendall]

Well, not a problem really, I've installed Vista and MP 3 days ago and are just looking for the best setup, so when in the future I do have problems, I know what I did in the past. So it's more a try to understand all this. And again, THANK YOU for all your help!

But I do have a slight problem.
After watching tv for quite a while with channelchanges and timebuffering on, sound and video start to stutter. I can click the right mousebutton once to show the menu, but that's it, no response anymore (or hardly any) from my pc and I have to restart. And I have no HD channels in 0.2.3.0 RC1, I don't know if that's supported by MP in that version, but thats not a problem for this thread.

And another thing...On some forums you can read that the Hw-acceleration of PureVideo is not needed anymore...but I guess you still need a codec for H.264, WMV, and MPEG-2 to play, so why avoid it, right?
So I guess I will install Purevideo for H264, WMV and MPEG2 decoding. AC3/DTS will be spdiffed and ffdshow will do the rest. I think I have found a pretty decent setup! Right? :p

[KRA]

Don't know about your stutter problem, you should start a new thread about that.

Regarding hw-acceleration of purevideo, I would like to know why it's not needed. You might have a powerfull cpu that can handle the decoding on it's own, but why not use a GPU that is made to handle it and enhance it (better quality).

nvidia likes to tell you that purevideo gives much better quality. And there is no doubt if you compare purevideo to the mpv codec (included in MP) you'll see the difference in a few seconds.

EDIT: When I was using a nvidia card (6600gt) I used the windvd codec for live tv, because purevideo sometimes messed up the deinterlace, that problem may have been fixed now. But currently I'm using a ATi card and combine that with PowerDVD codec to get the avivo magic.

[Spragleknas]

It does not matter if you use WinDVD, PowerDVD etc - they all use DXVA and are based on PureVideo for usage with nVidia PV-caple GFX-cards.

Read: http://www.nzone.com/object/nzone_pu...uirements.html

EDIT: Off-topic: KRA: How do you like AVIVO compared w/PureVideo? I read that there were som issues w/AVIVO and MP (MP breaking de-interlace settings in registry).

[KRA]

AVIVO vs. Purevideo,

I think I changed cards early this year so things may have changed. I've never had any issues with deinterlace. My first impression when changing was that video was smoother with ATi (but still not as good as I'd like).

I'm still using catalys 7.1 I think, and they had a bug in them related to decoding PAL signal, there was some smearing effect (leftovers from previous image), I don't know if this has been fixed in new drivers, but there was a registry setting to fix it.

At the time I changed I read some test about Purevideo vs. AVIVO, and although Purevideo had a headstart and _was_ the preferred choice AVIVO was now more advanced and clearly the better choice. This may have changed again now.

EDIT

Originally Posted by Spragleknas

It does not matter if you use WinDVD, PowerDVD etc - they all use DXVA and are based on PureVideo for usage with nVidia PV-caple GFX-cards.

when I used it it was clearly different the way purevideo decoder and windvd7 codec handled de-interlace. This may have changed now.

[kkendall]

Dammit...actually I have tons of problems now...
Channels without sound, but with sound outside MP, MP-recordings that can play in MP but not in other programs, MP-recordings that also can play in WMP but not in MPC. MP-Recordings without sound but with sound in WMP...it's just one big mess...
I don't know if it is bugs in 0.2.3.0RC1, Vista's crappy OS or unstable behaviour of codecs (I only have Haali Media Splitter, ffdshow, Purevideo and MPV/MPA installed).

Edit:
it turns out all of the problems are caused by the Mediaportal MPV video and MPA audio decoders! Now I have selected the Purevideo codecs in Mediaportal everything works like a charm!

[Marcusb]

@kkendal - for the choppiness that you see after watching for a while, remember too that .ts files are pretty large and fragment badly. Run disk defragmenter to see how badly fragmented your recording directory is.
It's best to defrag the recording folder every week or so as a scheduled task, especially if you don't have a lot of space left.

[kkendall]

OK, thanks Marcus! I'll keep this in mind in the future.
Just for info: I have 2x 500GB Samsung Spinpoints, a clean Vista Ultimate installation for 4 days now, no recordings yet, no other programs installed other than MP and her preferred 'helpers' (ffdshow, haalimediasplitter, deamontools, winrar, purevideo, RealAlternative, MPC). Imho it's quite an optimal setup in my opinion so I hope it doesn't get worse...