ffdshow Upscaling on Lower Resolution Movies Only (1 Viewer)

[1gkar]

My goals for ffdshow were to upscale only my DVD-transcoded collection (to *mkv format) with a resolution less than an HD format of 1280x720.

I wanted to upscale to my LCDTV's resolution of 1360x768 so as to minimise the CPU load, on my C2D4600 HTPC, for better use of effects within the ffdshow app: eg. sharpen, blur & NR, etc.

I found no way to avoid ffdshow activating on ALL media file types if I set the Raw Filter inside postprocessing as stated in the WIKI. The ONLY filter I have activated in 'MP Config>movies>Movie Post Processing' is Direct Vobsub for subtitles.

These are my settings:

I installed ffdshow pretty much with the default settings, and enabled the raw video to 'all supported' in the 'codec' area. Most of my research was off this thread.

I will not go into my tweak settings for ffdshow, as this thread is about getting upscaling to work with specific media files, & I am still working on them

As you can see, I only have a single "default" profile set.

As all of my lower res. movies use XVid or DivX encoders, I used a FourCC match with these filters.

My resize setup is as follows:

These settings are still experimental & just an example of how to set the profile up.

Here is proof, using Graphedit, that only my lower resolution rips activate ffdshow:

If anyone has any ideas on how to order specific ffdshow activation with PAL SD TV channels (we have one non-FreeviewHD channel that has a pretty good programme selection), it would be greatly appreciated. This channel uses an MPEG2 @ 720x576 as opposed to the MPEG4, H.264 @ 1280x720p & 1980x1080i codec of FreeviewHD in New Zealand.

 

[frenzy]

You will put a preset autoload condition on fourcc from previous filter match MPEG2, AND size lower than 720 horizontal, on a different profile than the xvid one you have now.
On the other settings I suggest you use less sharpening than 1.50 and more luma blur to prevent ringing

And Deinterlace goes before resizing

 

[1gkar]

Thanks for the reply. I tried setting a FourCCmatch to MPEG2 with a lower horizontal resize resolution to a different profile & it activated on all TV channels. Maybe I didn't go low enough with my horizontal res. Will try again. Thanks. Cheers for the other tips, too.

 

[frenzy]

Post a graph (or just describe it)while watching the channel you want and we can configure it further for similar channels only. Remember the conditions must be set to "AND" not "OR"

 

[1gkar]

I have attempted a good number of different settings within ffdshow & just cannot get it to activate when watching any recorded TV programme, let alone LiveTV, unless I activate it within the television post-processing area of MP>config. Then, it just activates all the time.

One thing I forgot to mention: my TV records are MPEG2 embedded in a ts container, so I can't seem to set it to that decoder. Also, there is one channel, on Freeview (so it is digital), but not in HD, that I require, so setting the recording options of the cards to MPEG inside TVServer>config isn't viable. Thanks.

It might just not be doable with ffdshow's present setup

 

[frenzy]

You must be doing something wrong, it's actually simple, I use it all the time.
Please describe the graph: You said you have raw video decoder set to "all supported" in ffdshow. Which decoder do you use for the actual MPEG2?

OK I just saw where is your problem: You have to make a second or third profile, other than "default". The default one is to be left unharmed so that you have one profile to default to when none of the conditions match.

The .ts container doesn't bother you. It's just a container, it's still mpeg2

 

[1gkar]

I appreciate your assistance here.

To recap:
-I have set ffdshow raw video to 'all supported'
-I set up two profiles from the 'default' one which is left untouched (making three in total)
1) The first profile is for designed to resize my lower resolution DVD rips (this is the one highlighted in the 'profiles' section of ffdshow
*the resize is set to 1360x768
* 'resize if...' is set to 'x<1200 and y<800'
won't worry about filter settings!
*Preset Autoload Conditions:
-only condition = 'FourCC Match' with XVid;DivX

2) Second profile is for Television resize
*resize is set to 1360x768
*'resize if...' is set to ?????? (I have at present: x<800 or y<700)
*Preset Autoload Conditions:
-On All Conditions Match (AND)
-On Movies Dimension Match:
576 <=width <= 576 or
720 <=height <= 720
'On FourCC from previous filter match' with MPG2

ffdshow is NOT set in either 'Mediaportal>config>videos>post processing area' or 'Mediaportal>config>television>post processing area'

Have I missed anything? Or are any of the settings incorrect

Here are the filter chains (I will just describe in text):

Live5-1.ts.tsbuffer video>Cyberlink Video/SP Decoder>VMR9
Live5-1.ts.tsbuffer audio>MPA decoder>Reclock renderer

Prerecorded TV Programme -as above

HD Channel:
Live1-0.ts.tsbuffer video>Cyberlink H.264/AVC Decoder>VMR9
Live1-0.ts.tsbuffer audio>MPA decoder>Reclock renderer

Prerecorded TV Programme -as above

 

[frenzy]

Ok, the problem was probably the dimensions you set in the profile conditions. Try it like in the pic and let me know.
Also DO NOT set "resize if" in the resize filter settings. Leave it to "resize always". Another thing to be careful is the spelling of the cyberlink decoder. If you right click on the ffdshow icon while playing tv, you will see the name exactly as you want it. copy it from there.

 

[1gkar]

OK. Tried the supplied settings -thanks- they didn't work

Here are the screenshots:

As you can see, if I activate ffdshow inside the post processing area, then it will load the profile: however, it loads on ALL the channels, which is no good, as I need to use the GPU's hardware acceleration on the hi-res channels because I suffer from stutter & audio sync issues. The first is my SD channel & the second is from FreeviewHD.

The last shows, even though I have set the profile according to your setup, then ffdshow doesn't activate, so no upscaling on my SD channel

I even tried setting MP up with ffdshow as the MPEG2 codec in the config>Television section: but no-go.

Hang on: I missed the capital L in CyberLink, so I'll go back in & retry. It was late at night

Sorry: still no-go. Dang!

 

[frenzy]

Ok ffdshow is probably blocked by cyberlink to achieve acceleration. So even if you set it as an MPEG2 decoder in MP config, having set cyberlink's codec for H.264, it is still being blocked because cyberlink is loaded in the graph (even if not used). The only option you have is to use another H.264 codec (Coreavc 1.9.5 will give you CUDA acceleration with your 8500GT and you will still be able to load ffdshow).