Experience: 'older' AVR yamaha rx-v661 + WASAPI setup. (1 Viewer)

gibman

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  • October 4, 2006
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    Since a few days ago I finally upgraded to an older AVR from around 2007 - the yamaha rx-v661.

    Got it really cheap too since it doesn't do the new HD codecs (DTS MA, True HD) - but who cares rite ? as long as we have full 7.1 LPCM support :)
    It also only have 2 x hdmi 1.2a inputs. More than enuff :)

    I wanted a setup that gave me true multichannel PCM option (LPCM) as I've been using spdif for ages and the only viable option was an AVR with proper HDMI LPCM support.

    So if you are looking for a secondhand bargain please be aware of any old AVR with HDMI needs to officially support 5.1/7.1 LPCM.
    Having a HDMI enabled AVR does not automatically give you LPCM support - so before forking over your hard earned cash do your google research.

    What I really love about this new setup is how well it works for playing games in clean digital multi channel audio. Say 'bye bye' to those analogue soundcard outputs for multichannel gaming :)
    I just set the speaker configuration for the HDMI audio device to 7.1 speakers in windows.

    Back to MP.
    I quickly realized that playing back any media containing audio (video file, dvd, bluray etc) would have the most benefit using an audio renderer with full wasapi support, such as the 'mediaportal audio renderer' :)
    Obviously wasapi doesn't care what speaker configuration you have defined in windows.
    If the audio source is 2 channels, then you will see 2 channel PCM in the AVR's display.
    If the source is 5/1 you will see LPCM 5/1 in AVR, same for 7.1.
    So this is all nice for any audio source being output to the 'MP AR' especially when you have configured windows for a multichannel surround setup like eg. 7.1
    So in other words wasapi will auto adapt its output speaker configuration based on the audio source.
    wonderful.

    In the heat of battle I then forgot all about TV, as this uses the default directsound device (in my setup atleast).
    In this case the AVR would light up with LPCM 7/1 everytime - even for normal AAC 2.0 tracks. Not optimal at all :/
    A real bummer, as I would have liked to have it come out as 2 channels PCM on the AVR and then have the AVR apply proglogic2 to it.
    Instead I only have sound in left and right speakers (basic stereo).

    So as an experiment I tried using MP AR (with WASAPI support enabled ofc.) for TV usage.
    It sort of worked. It did want I wanted. AAC 2.0 came out as 2 ch. PCM, and DD 5.1 or AAC 5.1 came out as 5.1 LPCM. niice indeed :)
    but a few channel changes later and i quickly realized that I was suffering from lipsynch issues.

    Since I use MP AR for it's time stretching capabilities mainly for static video material, it would seem foolish to permanently disable it.
    Disabling it would no doubt cure the lipsynch issues I have with live TV.

    But to my knowledge there is not way to have MP AR enable/disable time stretching in a dynamic way.

    I then downloaded reclock, as this supports wasapi aswell (you will have to enable it in reclock config).
    I also disabled it's time stretching feature of reclock.
    In MP config I re-configured audio output for the TV codec section to use reclock.

    Result ?
    nice wasapi audio output for TV usage in 2 pcm as well as lpcm 5.1/7.1
    and better yet, the audio lipsynch issues were gone.

    although I think it would be better if we could have MP AR adapt it's time stretching feature to the content.
    meaning, we could move some of the MP AR settings into MP config. and then let MP player code decide what to do (it would communicate with the MP AR directly).

    I now have a HTPC which handles games in 7.1, it also correctly handles the audio for MP related media playback, all using bitperfect wasapi.
    And better yet I don't have to constantly change the windows speaker config. between 2.0 and 7.1 when going from a gaming session and then back to MP.

    Regarding the yamaha rx-v661.
    I know a lot of peple have issues with AVR's in general.
    And I was a bit scared as well. Introducing a new HDMI unit to the fray would seem like asking for trouble.
    Well, so far it plays ball with my ATI HD5750 card.
    Constantly changing resolutions within MP using dynamic refresh changer does not cause any HDMI issues.
    I can turn the TV on/off with live TV running without playback stopping etc.

    HDMI audio device seems to be present when resuming standby as long as I dont use those dreaded CCC 12.4 drivers.

    Back to the topic of wether or not to get an AVR with full bitstreaming support for DTS MA/ True DD.
    In my case I use MP AR, and this works by resampling the audio on the fly. And since it only offers LPCM or realtime encode to dolby digital, I obviously opted for LPCM :)
    So when using MP AR, there really is no use for those bistreaming capabilities I would say.

    /gibman
     

    tourettes

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    So as an experiment I tried using MP AR (with WASAPI support enabled ofc.) for TV usage.
    It sort of worked. It did want I wanted. AAC 2.0 came out as 2 ch. PCM, and DD 5.1 or AAC 5.1 came out as 5.1 LPCM. niice indeed :)
    but a few channel changes later and i quickly realized that I was suffering from lipsynch issues.

    Since I use MP AR for it's time stretching capabilities mainly for static video material, it would seem foolish to permanently disable it.
    Disabling it would no doubt cure the lipsynch issues I have with live TV.

    Currently there is no other reports about the lip sync getting off when zapping - in past there was such issue(s) but they should be sorted out. Please make sure that the TsReader is same as used in 1.3.0 alpha test branch. If that wont help then we need to find a way for me to reproduce the issue (I have been using MPAR for a month with live tv and haven't noticed the lip sync getting off).

    But to my knowledge there is not way to have MP AR enable/disable time stretching in a dynamic way.

    Although I think it would be better if we could have MP AR adapt it's time stretching feature to the content.
    meaning, we could move some of the MP AR settings into MP config. and then let MP player code decide what to do (it would communicate with the MP AR directly).

    Timestretching functionality is required for the audio & video HW clock drifting correcttion so it is useful to have for curing systematically appearing doubled / dropped frames that the clock drifting is introducing. So disabling it for 25fps material on 50hz display will have side effect (well, not worser than DS audio renderer has but it would cut one of it's main features of for live tv).

    It is already possible to toggle the TS off - C# code could just write some registry keys before loading the MPAR .ax. Or we could add some interface that the C# player code could use to tell if we are in live tv or just to tell to disable the TS. But better to fix the lip sync issue that shouldn't be there in the first place...
     

    gibman

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  • October 4, 2006
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    thx for replying.

    I'll try the new 1.3.0 tsreader tonight and let you know of the outcome.
    Also I was under the impression that time stretching had no business when watching live TV.

    /gibman
     

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