Dropped frames with Dynamic Refresh Rare (1 Viewer)

[mironto]

Hello,

I was running MP 1.3 on WinXP and Panasonic plasma with DRR for years just fine. I upgraded to SSD so I decided to switch to Win7 and I upgraded MP to 1.6. But now I have a problem with 23.976/24fps movies dropping lot of frames (playing at ~10fps). I have the default DRR settings using internal switcher (cinema 23.976fps => 23Hz, cinema24 24fps => 24Hz, PAL 25fps => 50Hz, etc.) with default refresh rate 60Hz (Windows started with 60Hz desktop). If I play 23.976/24fps video, the rate is switched to 23.976/24 (reported on Panasonic plasma), but I get huge amount of dropped frames. 25 or 29.970/30fps videos play fine and I get a really flat red line with SHIFT+1.

If I change the default rate in MP to 23.976, change desktop to 23.976Hz and restart windows, after starting MP, I get smooth playback of 23.976/24fps video, but 25 and 29.970/30fps is also played at ~24fps with dropped frames.

All this is with AERO enabled. If I disable AERO, I get perfectly smooth playback/red lines in all refresh rates, but get tearing in the picture due to missing Vsync. Is there something I can change to get the perfect playback in all refresh rates without tearing? Attached are the logs for first test with 60Hz desktop (logs_started_60.zip) and with 23.976Hz desktop (logs_started_23.zip).

 

[Owlsroost]

Do you have multiple displays connected ?

 

[mironto]

No, just one Panasonic ST60 via HDMI.

 

[Owlsroost]

With the desktop set to 50 Hz (and MP restarted), does 50 fps video play OK ?
With the desktop set to 60 Hz (and MP restarted), does 60 fps video play OK ?

(Trying to work out if it is a GPU performance issue or a refresh rate changing problem)

 

[mironto]

I do not have 50 or 60 fps video to try with, but I could try to download some. However, I have no issues with the setup on WinXP (or Win7 without AERO except the tearing because of missing vsync) so the GPU performance is sufficient.

 

[Owlsroost]

However, I have no issues with the setup on WinXP (or Win7 without AERO except the tearing because of missing vsync) so the GPU performance is sufficien

Aero needs more GPU performance, that's why I asked.

I *think* this is refresh-rate changing problem, but hopefully someone else with experience with AMD GPUs can help - I use nVidia and Intel, so I don't know if there is something specific that needs to happen for AMD. What I suspect is happening is that the display refresh rate is changing, but Windows DWM (Aero) isn't seeing the change, so it's trying to match to a different frame rate. (The Windows DWM - Desktop Window Manager - is between MP and the display, when Aero is disabled it's turned off).

 

[mironto]

I've got a 6.1 windows experience score so it should be sufficient? I will try to play some 50/60fps video today.

 

[mironto]

Here are the screenshots from 1080p50 and 1080p59.97 videos. Smooth playback.

 

[mironto]

I've managed to "fix" the issue by installing Windows 8.1. Now I get smooth playback with any refresh rate.

Btw. in Win7 it was some global drivers issue with Aero I guess, since I got the same choppy playback with xbmc + refresh rate change. Luckily in XBMC you can enable true full screen (which disables Aero) and since it has it's own v-syncing implemented so I do not get any tearing as with MP + Aero disabled. Would be cool if MP could get it's own v-sync implemented so we could turn off Aero in Win7/8.

 

[Sebastiii]

For sure MP on win8/8.1 with multi screen + aero enable works good when screen are with different refresh rate