MP2 for everyone (1 Viewer)

[cruse]

I've been using MP for what seems to be like a decade, consider myself a lifelong computer enthusiast as well as a daily and experienced MP user for everything media, tweaking and testing between stable releases.

I'd like to put some ideas or principles out there which imho would give MP2 the mainstream breakthrough MP1 already deserves, not just for experienced users - for everyone.

This is in no way meant as criticism of the current product, I love MP(1). It's more like a nerd's wishlist.

1) Establish a hardware baseline
MP's hardware hungry departments are of course regular video and live TV, both depending on GPU and/or CPU capabilities. There are also quality levels inbetween like progressive SD/HD video play, video postprocessing, interlaced SD/HD video.
Use the community as a large testing bed to establish the minimum hardware requirements for those quality levels and implement according checks within MP2, automatically choosing the best settings for (novice) users that still offer a smooth watching experience.
You can change those settings afterwards but will get a warning "Sorry first-gen ION (e.g.) won't cut it for smooth interlaced HD playback. You have been warned."

2) The (nowadays unnecessary) codec dilemma
When you browse through the support forums of MP1 one topic is always up there - codecs. There's no need for commercial codecs nowadays. There I said it.
Win 7 offers a free codec with hardware acceleration and the LAV Filters blow commercial codecs out of the water, for free.
Build your product around those codecs, they'll play about everything the best way possible. Users shouldn't even care about codecs anymore.

3) Modularity and regular updates
From what I've read MP2 follows an "everything's a plugin" approach. I don't know whether plugins within other plugins are possible, but the more granularity there is, the more you are able to fix and short term update parts without influencing others.
Don't let confirmed bugs scare away potential users because the next stable release is six months away. single out the responsible module, squash the bug, and set the fix to live. MP should do the rest. Like an MPEI on ecstasy.

4) Collaborate with community skinners on next standard skin

That came out more like idealistic blabbering, but it's out there

Thanks for a superb past and future product. You guys are the best.

 

[Lehmden]

Hi.
Good thoughts. Some comments.
@2... This is no problem as LAVF is available as MPE1 package and will be included in next release of MP1 as default. But I never want to leave codec choice totally up to MP (like in XBMC, the main reason why I would never swap over to XBMC...) as every system is different and needs other codecs to get the maximum out of the hardware. Win7 plus LAVF is a really great way to start and is able to playback everything, that's true. But sometimes other codecs delivers better results on special content. Personally I would prefer a much finer Codec choice e.G. on 720P HD TV LAVF gives best Result on my system but on 1080i HDTV MS Codec is the better solution. As both are h264 I can't choose what I like but only what's the best compromise (here it's the MS Codec)...

@1 could be a good thing but... there are soo many different hardware platforms getting more every day so this seems to be simply impossible to handle...

@4 Did you ever get a look at the three default MP2 skins with all their possible themes? There should be something for everybody available there.

 

[cruse]

Thanks

But I never want to leave codec choice totally up to MP

Agreed, I wouldn't sacrifice ANY bit of MP's current flexibility, which is one of its main selling points right now imo. I just wanted to propose more "automatism" in the beginning (default LAV in upcoming revisions is a great starting point) and a shift of option tinkering to the expert side of things.

Personally I would prefer a much finer Codec choice

ffdshow does handle this quite well with its profiles, might be something useful for MP2 indeed (the profiles).

@1 could be a good thing but... there are soo many different hardware platforms getting more every day so this seems to be simply impossible to handle...

Depends from where you are looking. If you approach this from the minimum requirement side you won't have to cover every future option.

@4 Did you ever get a look at the three default MP2 skins with all their possible themes? There should be something for everybody available there.

Not yet, but talking from experience I would certainly put the community skinner's skill to good use. I'm still a bit baffled the team didn't jump on Maya as standard for MP1, but agreed the skin is all about personal preference.

LAVF gives best Result on my system but on 1080i HDTV MS Codec is the better solution.

Have you tried with DXVA2 native yet? I was under the impression both codecs do essentially the same in that mode.

 

[Lehmden]

Hi.

Have you tried with DXVA2 native yet? I was under the impression both codecs do essentially the same in that mode

I've tried DXVA Native and CUVID, Both did not the same as MS on 1080i You can see this clearly by pressing F1 in playback mode.
FFDshow did no good job on my setup so I won't use this.

 

[SiLenTYL]

Some great points there
@1, @2 - hardware - cpu requirements are not that much if you intend to use a proper graphics card. I think that an integrated graphics option isnt really the way to go for HD content at this time. Perhaps Ivy bridge or later CPU's could handle HD content.. but they simply dont have the performance, quality and stability to compare with a proper graphics card. I simply love my nvidia gt 430. Hands down the best performance ive ever had in a card. It uses CUDA, so i enable CUVID in LAV video decoder. Id recommend any nvidia card (it does however require you manually enable CUVID.. perhaps that could be an option on install of MP2?)

@4 - Step up skinners! Id love to see customizable backgrounds for each page/plugin in the basic skin, something that the StreamedMP skin has had for a while!

 

[cruse]

Yours as well.

I agree, it mostly falls on the shoulders of the GPU today. They seem to make good progress with LAV for Sandybridge and upwards but I also tend to invest in a GT 430 next, I look forward to the point where the cheapest low budget card can do everything an HTPC enthusiast wants in the 1080p era.

Lehmden
I wasn't recommending ffdshow as a codec. ffdshow implements a profile system which allows for your finer codec choice, which might be interesting as an MP option in general and a nice side product for basic hardware checks. You can chain conditions like FPS, resolution, aspect ratio etc. there and choose decoders to use in each situation.

Something like this in your case (720P HD TV LAVF gives best Result on my system but on 1080i HDTV MS Codec is the better solution.):
If resolution width is < 1920 AND >= 1280 AND codec is H264 AND is interlaced USE decoder LAVF
If resolution width is = 1920 AND codec is H264 AND is interlaced USE decoder MS DTV

I'm using the current experimental directshowhelper.dll and TSReader.ax from the development forum which gave me around 10 drops on my most demanding channel Sky Sport HD over a span of 4 hours (it must have been like 10 in ~700000) with LAV DXVA Native. I would grade my hardware way worse than yours, so might be worth a try.

 

[jonm]

Funny one, graphics choice. Never had any success with nvidia, yet the integrated Intel graphics on my main HTPC just works, as does the integrated ATI on my two clients. Thankfully one can always sell kit on ebay!

 

[rocklander]

@ point 1:
I'm not going to pretend I have any idea what I'm talking about, but from personal experience with (in particular 1080i processing) hardware vs software vs codec issues it seems that mp being a global product may well make it tough to establish a standard baseline. one of the issues I had wasn't so much hardware based as requiring a different tsreader rewrite, but hardware was being pushed harder than necessary because of the way a particular channel broadcast (something to do with the way the audio and video delay lines up? this is the bit I really have no idea about, heh). there's DVB-T, S.. there's HD and SD.. and probably a plethora of other curve balls to consider.. it'd almost need to be a matrix/wiki/database (enter in your country, signal type, screen size and deinterlace requirements to get a minimum spec recommendation).
happy to be corrected on any of the assumptions I've made there.