EVR Under XP SP2 (1 Viewer)

[kingnubian]

Firstly I have to commend the Mediaportal Developers for an excellent job.

My Setup:

Intel E4300 CPU (Clocked at 2.6ghz)
Asus P5L-MX Micro Atx motherboard
2gig (2x 1gig) DDR2 PC2-6400 Memory
Seagate 7200.12 32meg Cache 500gig Hard Drive
Inwin Mt. Jade (BK623) Micro Atx Case
HIS HD3450 256mb PCIe Video Card


Having got all the hardware pieces together for my dedicated HTPC I have been weighing the pros & cons of using Vista or XPSP2 for the OS that this machine will be based on. I have installed both seperately and have been testing like crazy.

So far, and briefly, I have found that while XP requires a longer setup time with respect to setup, drivers & updates it has proven to be noticeably faster & smoother when running Mediaportal than Vista with my hardware.

One feature that is enable in Vista that lacks on "most" XP machines is EVR (Enhanced Video renderer). It is my understanding that this feature can be enabled in XP by installing Net Framework 3, but even after having one this the following situation happens.

Trying to play any video leads to black screen with EVR enabled, under XP with Net Framework 3 installed, while they play without issue under Vista. Disabling EVR while in XP returnes video playback to normal.

Can EVR be used while using XPSP2 as the base OS? What advantages does EVR bring anyways and are they significant?

 

[tourettes]

EVR in XP is possible, but MS doesn't support it officially and it also disabled hardware acceleration so it's not adviced to be used in XP.

 

[kingnubian]

What are the "Advantages" of EVR?

 

[Spragleknas]

*) The main reason to use EVR+Vista is better picture quality (in theory, but many users are confirming this)

https://forum.team-mediaportal.com/...est-here-48/vista-evr-support-part-2-a-30845/

 

[Njaal[NOR]]

*) The main reason to use EVR+Vista is better picture quality (in theory, but many users are confirming this)

https://forum.team-mediaportal.com/...est-here-48/vista-evr-support-part-2-a-30845/

I can confirm this. I'm running a dualboot on my HTPC one with Vista(MC) and the other XP(MP). And the picture quality is _alot_ better with Vista with the vista mepg2 decoder. I have tried both PowerDVD's decoder and nVidia's PureVideo on XP.

My spec:
nVidia 8500GT
AMD X2 4800+
2GB RAM.

 

[kingnubian]

*) The main reason to use EVR+Vista is better picture quality (in theory, but many users are confirming this)

https://forum.team-mediaportal.com/...est-here-48/vista-evr-support-part-2-a-30845/

I can confirm this. I'm running a dualboot on my HTPC one with Vista(MC) and the other XP(MP). And the picture quality is _alot_ better with Vista with the vista mepg2 decoder. I have tried both PowerDVD's decoder and nVidia's PureVideo on XP.

My spec:
nVidia 8500GT
AMD X2 4800+
2GB RAM.

While this may be so in your case, a comparison using MP on both platforms with the same decoder & EVR enabled in Vista would be a more direct comparison. I use neither of those two decoders you mentioned prefering FFDshow. I will setup a dual boot scenario probably tis weekend to see.

 

[Njaal[NOR]]

Well I have to admit that I no longer think EVR is "alot" better.
Because I now have changed my grafic card from 8500GT to a ATI HD 3650. And now I can't see any diffrence between Vista and XP in picture quality.

 

[kingnubian]

Well I have to admit that I no longer think EVR is "alot" better.
Because I now have changed my grafic card from 8500GT to a ATI HD 3650. And now I can't see any diffrence between Vista and XP in picture quality.

What have you observed?

 

[Spragleknas]

My guess: ATi HD-series reg tweaks: Makes colourspacing correct etc. ATI HD Registry Tweaks

 

[Njaal[NOR]]

Well I have to admit that I no longer think EVR is "alot" better.
Because I now have changed my grafic card from 8500GT to a ATI HD 3650. And now I can't see any diffrence between Vista and XP in picture quality.

What have you observed?

Well, first I have not used the ATI HD reg tweaks.

When using Vista/8500GT: (latest drivers)
-With Media Center using the Vista mpeg2 decoder:
No problems: good picture under "all" conditions.

When using XP/8500GT: (latest dirvers)
-With Media Portal using nVidia Pure Video dekoder:
Whit "stand still" pictures(video) no problems.
Whit "pan shot" pictures(video) I got alot of tearing. Typical soccer/fotbal.

When using Vista/HD 3650: (latest drivers)
-With Media Center Vista mpeg2 decoder:
No problems: good picture under "all" conditions.

When using XP/HD 3650: (latest drivers)
-Whit Media Portal using nVidia Pure Video:
No problems: good picture under "all" conditions.

Njaal