Codec Comparison divx h264 dxva and powerdvd 10 (1 Viewer)

[midasxxl]

Has anyone already tried powerdvd 10 h.264 codec ? I am now using divx h.264 with hardware acceleration and i am very happy with it, it has in my opinion same qualitty as powetrdvd 8 or 9 and a nice side effect.
When i play a mkv file which has too many ref frames so it can't decoded by ati dxva, i don't need to change the codec,
divx h264 plays it automaticaly with software acceleration.

I have looked everywhere for a picture quality comparison between these two decoders but haven't found anything.






MediaPortal Version: 1.2
MediaPortal Skin: blue wide retro
Windows Version: Windows XP Prof. 32 SP3
CPU Type: AMD XP 4200+ 45WATT
HDD: Seagate Barracuda 400GB
Memory: 4GB
Motherboard: GA-MA78GM-S2H
Video Card: ATI HD3200
Video Card Driver: Catalyst 9.12
Sound Card: SB Audigy
Sound Card AC3: no
Sound Card Driver:
1. TV Card: Skystar 2
1. TV Card Type: DVB-S
1. TV Card Driver: 4.5.2
2. TV Card: Technotrend Skystar 2
2. TV Card Type:
2. TV Card Driver:
3. TV Card:
3. TV Card Type:
3. TV Card Driver:
4. TV Card:
4. TV Card Type:
4. TV Card Driver:
MPEG2 Video Codec: POWERDVD 9 deluxe+ ffdshow upscaling to 1920x1080
MPEG2 Audio Codec: ac3filter
h.264 Video Codec: POWERDVD 9 deluxe
Satelite/CableTV Provider: 19.2E
HTPC Case: Antec Fusion
Cooling: Scythe ninja
Power Supply: Seasonic 400Watt
Remote: Windows MCE remote
TV: Benq HD2400
TV - HTPC Connection: DVI-D

 

[fitto]

This is indeed a very interesting topic!

I've just got a new ATI HD5450, and waiting for a new 50" plasma. Now I'm rebuilding my HTPC from scratch and I'd like to get the best PQ possible with a codec that allows DXVA for ATI in HD.

I hope somebody has mre info, I couldn't find much up-to-date stuff googling around....

 

[Paranoid Delusion]

I am now using divx h.264 with hardware acceleration

Using this as video codec in Win7 caused crash when changing file playing 3-4 times quickly, MPC or M$ would not do this, have no knowledge of PDVD10 h.264 quality.

Could be down to my nvidia card, but CoreAVC with cuda also worked fine, just did not think the quality was any better for me than either of the above.

 

[lqpl]

Divx h264 decoder as TV decoder gave me fast channel swiching, but I got some audio out of sync.
Will try it again later.

 

[midasxxl]

AW: Codec Comparison divx h264 dxva and powerdvd 10

As Tv decoder I use powerdvd 9 mpeg decoder and ffdshow porstprocessing and upscaling to 1920x1080 (lanzcos and luma and chroma sparpening). This gives me a crystal clear picture, better than powerdvd codec alone. I am planning to do a picture by picture comparison between divx h264 and powerdvd 9. But i dont't blelieve that the difference will be very much.

I am looking foeward to rc2 release my htpc is ready for upgrading.

 

[Paranoid Delusion]

To me if your using ffdshow for post processing then you might as well drop the PDVD9 h.264 codec as no dxva and just use ffdshow, or are you getting bad results with ffdshow only for tv, ie no picture etc.

 

[disaster123]

AW: Codec Comparison divx h264 dxva and powerdvd 10

when i use ffdshow for livetv - audio and picture are heavily out of sync all the time...

 

[midasxxl]

AW: Codec Comparison divx h264 dxva and powerdvd 10

Yes, that's the reason for me too why i use that combination. It' in my opinion the best combination available for SD TV.
Gives me fast zapping and no out of sync... it'a a known problem of ffdahow getting out of sync if you are stopping and restarting to often, also with normal videos.

 

[disaster123]

AW: Codec Comparison divx h264 dxva and powerdvd 10

midasxxl
could you perhaps tell me your exact settings and tell me how to use ffdshow with pdvd?

 

[midasxxl]

AW: Codec Comparison divx h264 dxva and powerdvd 10

Yes of course,

in the codec settings in mediaportal configuration menu i am selecting the power dvd 9 codec as mpeg 2 tv decoder, then under postprocessing i choose raw ffdshow decoder and go to ffdshow settings. In ffdshow settings i go to resize and fill in 1920 as horizontal size. As resize Method i choose lanzcos and set tabs to 2 (4 if you've got a quadcore cpu).
Luminanz and croma to 1.2 each. You have to click twice the interlace checkbox so it's greyed out. There you go, it uses the powerdvd 9 codec to decode the tv mpeg signal and resizes it to fulhd with ffdshow. You can alos try to sharpen th image in ffdshow with msharpen. This is to your own taste.