1st HTPC build - questions about BD playback and H264 HW acceleration (1 Viewer)

[metagrobolis]

Folks,

I'm planning my first ever HTPC build around MediaPortal, XP Pro SP2 and one of the new IGP's with UVD/PureVideo2 (AMD 780G, or nVidia 8200) for HD acceleration. My Harmony 880 in MCE emulation will be the remote, with HDMI out to a 720p HDTV for video and S/PDIF out to my Onkyo AVR for audio. My main requirements are playing back DivX/Xvid/H264 content off a NAS as well as Blu-Ray disc playback ... no need for PVR features or TV tuners.

I've scoured the forums here and elsewhere, but remain a little confused about a few issues around BD playback integration in Mediaportal, and getting UVD/PV2 acceleration to work for the H264 content off the NAS. So, without much further ado, here are the questions that have me bent out of shape:

Blu-Ray Playback: I gather pretty much the only path to HW accelerated BD playback at this time is Cyberlink's PowerDVD Ultra.

1. How well does PDVD integrate with MediaPortal? Are we limited to designating it as an 'external' player in MediaPortal config? Or is there a way to integrate it seamlessly (like regular DVD playback in MediaPortal)?
2. If PDVD must be launched using the 'external player' setting, how MCE remote friendly is it? Can all the player functions (play/pause/FF/RW/eject/etc) be controlled easily with an MCE remote? Is the shift to and from PDVD from within MediaPortal seamless for someone using just a remote?

Accelerated MPEG2/Xvid/VC-1/H264 content playback: I'm operating under the assumption that, under XP, "if it plays under WMP, it'll play in MediaPortal." Given this,

1. I understand that neither nVidia nor ATI provide DirecShow filters to drive PV2 or Avivo/UVD respectively; however, I hear Cyberlink ships a hardware accelerated H264/AVC filter with PDVD. Is this filter usable outside the PDVD application? In other words, with PDVD installed, can one playback accelerated H264 content in WMP (and, by implication, MediaPortal)?
2. If the answer to the last question is 'yes', do Cyberlink's filters co-exist peacefully with ffdshow? (I'm planning to use ffdshow/Haali splitter for handling Matroska containers and other non HD content).
3. If the answer to (1) is 'no', and we are limited to software decoding only, will ffdshow/CoreAVC interfere with PDVD's BD playback capabilities? ... in other words, will one have to deal with the infamous 'codec hell', hand tweaking 'merits', etc.?

All in all, I'm sure my needs are not atypical, and that others have run into --- and answered --- these questions for their deployments. So, please forgive me if these questions have been answered somewhere that I've missed in my search.

cheers.

 

[kingnubian]

I would look into CoreAVC for HD streams. It has been shown to be a much more efficient (Faster) codec than Cyberlinks offering and consequently more forgiving of "Slower" cpu's when it comes the h.264 & VC-1 HD playback . Here is a link to a greta test showing what I'm talking about.

My New HTPC Sucks! - AVS Forum

Look aroung a third down the page. A very well informed & respected user compares CoreAVC, Cyberlink & PowerDVD's performance on a demanding 1080p video at different cpu speeds.

 

[gemx]

BUT that's only true if you don't have a graphics cards which supports H.264 in hardware.
If you have such a card, then the Cyberlink filter should be your choice because it uses the graphics card. CoreAVC uses software decoding only.
Just an example:
My system: Athlon x64 3500+ NVidia GForce 8500 GT
- using CoreAVC -> stuttering as hell - CPU usage 100 %
- using Cyberlink -> absolutely smooth - CPU usage ~ 17%

That's only because of the GForce which is supported by the Cyberlink filter

 

[kingnubian]

BUT that's only true if you don't have a graphics cards which supports H.264 in hardware.
If you have such a card, then the Cyberlink filter should be your choice because it uses the graphics card. CoreAVC uses software decoding only.
Just an example:
My system: Athlon x64 3500+ NVidia GForce 8500 GT
- using CoreAVC -> stuttering as hell - CPU usage 100 %
- using Cyberlink -> absolutely smooth - CPU usage ~ 17%

That's only because of the GForce which is supported by the Cyberlink filter

Agreed, Very true.

This would depend on the users' choice of platform. With the 780G, or a number of discreet graphic cards with supported hardware video acceleration features, it's full steam ahead using Cyberlink, but for Intel based igp chipsets (Not nvidia or Ati discrete graphics cards) than CoreAvc makes more sense.

The Nvidia 7xxx igp chipset used in the link I posted is a very good example of the advantages of CoreAVC given the setup used without the aid of a supported discreet graphics card.

 

[robyf]

BUT that's only true if you don't have a graphics cards which supports H.264 in hardware.
If you have such a card, then the Cyberlink filter should be your choice because it uses the graphics card. CoreAVC uses software decoding only.
Just an example:
My system: Athlon x64 3500+ NVidia GForce 8500 GT
- using CoreAVC -> stuttering as hell - CPU usage 100 %
- using Cyberlink -> absolutely smooth - CPU usage ~ 17%

That's only because of the GForce which is supported by the Cyberlink filter

This is true but, at least with my ATI HD 2400, mkv files containing h.264 are not playable in hardware with mediaportal (latest SVNs) at the moment. What I get is heavy stuttering and instability of the image.

If I go with software or with MPC in hardware I have no problem so it must be a problem with mediaportal..

Roby

 

[kingnubian]

BUT that's only true if you don't have a graphics cards which supports H.264 in hardware.
If you have such a card, then the Cyberlink filter should be your choice because it uses the graphics card. CoreAVC uses software decoding only.
Just an example:
My system: Athlon x64 3500+ NVidia GForce 8500 GT
- using CoreAVC -> stuttering as hell - CPU usage 100 %
- using Cyberlink -> absolutely smooth - CPU usage ~ 17%

That's only because of the GForce which is supported by the Cyberlink filter

This is true but, at least with my ATI HD 2400, mkv files containing h.264 are not playable in hardware with mediaportal (latest SVNs) at the moment. What I get is heavy stuttering and instability of the image.

If I go with software or with MPC in hardware I have no problem so it must be a problem with mediaportal..

Roby

HHHmmm, I remember reading a few posts about issues with HD mkv files and hardware decoding features. The author , If I remember, linked to a discussion about creating mkv files that supported UVD as it is now. Check out these discussions. The issue may actually be how mkv files are encoded and support for such using the popular codecs such as Cyberlink & CoreAVC.

MKV and ATI HD2X00 GPU Acceleration - AVS Forum

Whats the deal with the 2400,2600,8500,8600 with MKV and Using Hardware Acceleration? - AVS Forum

 

[metagrobolis]

Guys, this is great info. It certainly looks like having HW decode available is a big boon. I have high hopes for the AMD 780G I have planned.

Back to one of my original questions for a moment ... how well can one implement seamless BD playback using MP today? Assuming one has already set up Cyberlink's H.264/BD codecs successfully under the "My DVD" section, what would one do for BD Navigation? I'm assumiing the default "DVD Navigator" won't work for BD menus etc.

Is anyone using the MP + Cyberlink (or equivalent) + BD playback? If so, how have you configured MP?

 

[robyf]

This is true but, at least with my ATI HD 2400, mkv files containing h.264 are not playable in hardware with mediaportal (latest SVNs) at the moment. What I get is heavy stuttering and instability of the image.

If I go with software or with MPC in hardware I have no problem so it must be a problem with mediaportal..

Roby

HHHmmm, I remember reading a few posts about issues with HD mkv files and hardware decoding features. The author , If I remember, linked to a discussion about creating mkv files that supported UVD as it is now. Check out these discussions. The issue may actually be how mkv files are encoded and support for such using the popular codecs such as Cyberlink & CoreAVC.

MKV and ATI HD2X00 GPU Acceleration - AVS Forum

Whats the deal with the 2400,2600,8500,8600 with MKV and Using Hardware Acceleration? - AVS Forum

This is not the case, first because I fixed the files with IDC Changer, second because the files do work perfectly in MPC but not in mediaportal using the same codec PowerDVD with HA.

Roby

 

[MoPhat]

metagrobolis

... how well can one implement seamless BD playback using MP today? Assuming one has already set up Cyberlink's H.264/BD codecs successfully under the "My DVD" section, what would one do for BD Navigation? I'm assumiing the default "DVD Navigator" won't work for BD menus etc.

You can try this: Blu-Ray / HD-DVD Player with PowerDVD (a working solution) - MediaPortal Forum

MoPhat

 

[KevL]

BUT that's only true if you don't have a graphics cards which supports H.264 in hardware.
If you have such a card, then the Cyberlink filter should be your choice because it uses the graphics card. CoreAVC uses software decoding only.
Just an example:
My system: Athlon x64 3500+ NVidia GForce 8500 GT
- using CoreAVC -> stuttering as hell - CPU usage 100 %
- using Cyberlink -> absolutely smooth - CPU usage ~ 17%

That's only because of the GForce which is supported by the Cyberlink filter

Hardware decode ought to be faster/better than software decode but ..............

As far as I can tell (though it might be an excess of incompetence on my part) some graphics cards dont work with hardware encoding enabled in the cyberlink 7.3 codecs.

I have a recent vintage gigabyte MB with onboard ATI Radeon HD3200 graphics. If I enable hardware encoding in the cyberlink codecs then I get full BSODs / stop errors in MP when I try to watch video. - The ultimate in poor PQ some would say

Also I read a comparison of HD playback on a number of platforms where all the popular codecs were compared.

Summary seemed to be that the picture quality of all the codecs was on a par (though some needed more adjustment on colour and brightness than others) but the strange thing was the CoreAVC codec actually used less processing power than some of the hardware assisted decoders. Presumably due to very clever software algorithms in the CoreAVC software.


Kev