MPA Decoder and SPDIF (1 Viewer)

[HTPCSourcer]

Hi,

Tried to change the MPA audio settings to SPDIF for both AC3 and DTS to have the amplifier decode the incoming signal. Unfortunately with this setting all you get is an ear-paining static noise.

Things works nicely in the Windows Mediaplayer though, hence I would assume an incompatibility in the MPA Decoder. I read about similar observations in another thread

To the issue, ever since the SP3 Windows update, all I get via my SPDIF output through mediaportal is nothing but static.

Remedy suggestions included the use of ffdshow, however, I wanted to first understand if this is a known issue in MPA or rather something specific to my particular hardware.

Regards, HTPC_Sourcer

 

[Janosch]

Hi HTPC_Sourcer,
I'll think we have the nearly the same Hardware and the MPA with the BASS-Engine is the only Decoder that works for me without Problems for AC3 and DTS over SPDIF.
Regards Christian

 

[HTPCSourcer]

I'll think we have the nearly the same Hardware and the MPA with the BASS-Engine is the only Decoder that works for me without Problems for AC3 and DTS over SPDIF.

Well, nearly - but definitely not the same. The P5B has an ADI-1988 soundchip while my P5K is equipped with a Realtek. Hence different hardware and therefore different drivers. The latest available driver from the Asus website is installed.

Unfortunately I have no idea if AC3 would work under SP2 (which would track the problem somehow down to XP) , and I have no intention to roll back from SP3. Anybody out there using the same mainboard I do?

Best regards,
HTPC_Sourcer

 

[edterbak]

Well.. I think there might be something else going here.

your receiver can receive probably AC3 + DTS in 44.1 and 48khz (probably also 32/96khz). The soundcard of the PC is theoretically capable of sending 44.1/48khz audio signals. But the thing is with the standard drivers the output signal is fixed on 48khz. This is the cause of the white-noise you mention. If you play a videofile with 44.1khz 6ch AC3/DTS audio in it, the output signal will still be the 48khz signal. This will result in some incorrect upmixing and the bit-perfect audiosignal is then also be messed up. The receiver doesnt know what to do with it and you hear white noise... You can test this by trying a couple of sample files with AC3/DTS @ 44.1 and 48 khz. (google for em)

There is already a lot of information out there about this. Bit-perfect audio.

Maybe you have a good use for these audio drivers.. Check if your realtek is supported. This is a altered driver which has an auto-switching between 44.1/48 khz. [edit] <<< Forget these drivers. They are for C-Media Chipsets.

Also THIS thread might be helpful.

Regards,
Ed

[edit2]
I think going to Realtek and download their drivers will probably solve your problems. Atleast thats what I read somewhere in How to get bit perfect PCM and DD/DTS Audio in MCE2005 [Text View] - Page 2 - AVS Forum .

 

[HTPCSourcer]

Well, nearly - but definitely not the same. The P5B has an ADI-1988 soundchip while my P5K is equipped with a Realtek.

My bad, I have looked in the wrong manual. Janosch is right, we do indeed have the same hardware (ADI-1988B in my case). So if it works for Janosch, it should work for me too.

But the thing is with the standard drivers the output signal is fixed on 48khz. This is the cause of the white-noise you mention. If you play a videofile with 44.1khz 6ch AC3/DTS audio in it, the output signal will still be the 48khz signal.

When I chose DTS in the DVD's sound menu I get the receiver to display DTS, unfortunately no sound can be heard, which is some improvement compared to the AC3 static. Dolby Digital plays nicely. Ed may be right about the 48/44.1 kHz switching.

Regards,
HTPC_Sourcer - confused

 

[HTPCSourcer]

Some new results: I tried to play with the settings to get bit-perfect audio signals on the S/PDIF output, however, the MPA decoder settings and behavior are real weird.

1. Setting DTS to S/PDIF has absolutely no effect on how DVDs are played on my system. Although the receiver shows "Dolby Digital" when playing trailers and "DTS" for the movie, I get absolutely no sound. --> TV sound is OK with these settings
2. Additionally setting AC3 to S/PDIF surprisingly gives the expected DVD behavior, DD and DTS are shown and sound is played nicely in both cases. --> AC3 sound from TV is no longer played, all I get is hissing.
3. I can get TV sound to behave properly by using the 3rd Party "AC3Filter" in the TV settings as the audio codec. Punching sound through directly to S/PDIF then works.

Although I am sure that there is some good explanation for all these phenomena, it still appears a little bit alchemistic to me. At least I seem to have a way of getting the bit-perfect result, although it is not the originally desired one. I will certainly need to do more testing and to reconfigure the remote to control the receiver volume rather than MP/Windows.

Regards, HTPC_Sourcer

 

[Herr R aus B]

Hello,

maybe the follwing gives some hints to identiy the problem with ADI 1988 HD audio - as I really would like to have some hints to solve the problem..

My configuration:

- ASUS M2N with ADI 1988 controller (SoundMax) and Driver 5.12 (the latest available at ASUS' support site)
- Windows XP (SP2 - i never se up SP3 due to that WLAN issue)
- MP 0.2.3.0 no SVNs or anything
- .NET framework 3.5
- HTPC connected to HiFi amp through analog audio out
- HTPC connected to LCD TV through Gainward GF 9400 GT via HDMI (HD audio from mainboard connector to graphics adapter)

The phenomenon:

- movies or TV recordings being shown using Windows Media Player or other programs like VLC etc without any problem. as well analog as HD audio is transmitted without any problem

- in MediaPortal everything works fine as long as there is no movie or TV channel started, playing MP3s is no problem at all - sound is transmitted to analog and HDMI in parallel as expected

- as soon as any movie, TV recording, or TV channel is started, the HDMI sound is gone whereas analog sound still is available

- after stopping, also in Windows Media Player and all other programs outside MP, the digital sound (HDMI) is gone

Rebooting the system or sending it to standby and waking it up again brings back digital sound. Starting movies and TV and DVD outside MP again is no problem at all, doing the same inside MP kills the digital sound again.

And even worse - once it really worked for some recorded TV shows inside MP, but then after starting a different recorded TV show the digital sound was gone again.

I am a little bit desperate - especially as I found out, that generally HD audio will also be available in MP - but obviously it is not stable and it worked for only one recorded TV show... And once I also got this terrible hissing and noising - that was when I selected that full range option in DScaler or MPA decoder - I can't remember.

I tried everything (at least I think so) - using all kind of decoders (MPA, DScaler, AC3Filter, ffdshow, the decoder that came with my cinergy TV card), I went through all these configurations forcing AC3 and DTS to SPDIF (as well in MP configuration as in ffdshow audio codec configuration) and tested all output devices (audio renderes).

Maybe this description is helpful to get closer to determine the problem, which might then result in a solution of the problem. Find attached a log excerpt that shows what happens when starting and stopping a movie, that runs in Microsoft Media Player without any problems and in MP without HD sound - especially there obviously is no error logged... :-(

Slightly sad and somewhat annoyed greetings

Axel

2008-12-11 18:53:50.515625 [Info.][MPMain]: VideoPlayerlay E:\video\anfahrt.mpg
2008-12-11 18:53:50.562500 [Info.][MPMain]: vmr9:ctor()
2008-12-11 18:53:50.562500 [Info.][MPMain]: vmr9:ctor() done:True
2008-12-11 18:53:50.562500 [Info.][MPMain]: VideoPlayerVMR9: Enabling DX9 exclusive mode
2008-12-11 18:53:50.562500 [Info.][MPMain]: Main: DX exclusive mode: True
2008-12-11 18:53:50.562500 [Info.][MPMain]: Main: Goto fullscreen: True
2008-12-11 18:53:50.562500 [Info.][MPMain]: D3D: BuildPresentParamsFromSettings using 60Hz as RefreshRate
2008-12-11 18:53:50.625000 [Info.][MPMain]: fonts.SetDevice()
2008-12-11 18:53:50.625000 [Info.][MPMain]: vmr9:addvmr9
2008-12-11 18:53:50.625000 [Info.][MPMain]: EVR-Flag is set to False
2008-12-11 18:53:50.781250 [Info.][MPMain]: VMR9Helper: enabled YUV mixing - No DX Error
2008-12-11 18:53:50.781250 [Info.][MPMain]: VRM9Helper: Turning on nonsquare mixing - No DX Error
2008-12-11 18:53:50.781250 [Info.][MPMain]: VMR9: now active
2008-12-11 18:53:50.781250 [Info.][MPMain]: VMR9Helper:Vmr9 Added
2008-12-11 18:53:50.781250 [Info.][MPMain]: added filter:MPV Decoder Filter to graph
2008-12-11 18:53:50.796875 [Info.][MPMain]: added filter:MPA Decoder Filter to graph
2008-12-11 18:53:50.796875 [Info.][MPMain]: add filterefault DirectSound Device to graph clock:False
2008-12-11 18:53:50.796875 [Info.][MPMain]: DirectShowUtils: found renderer - Default DirectSound Device
2008-12-11 18:53:50.812500 [Info.][MPMain]: DirectShowUtils: Passed removing audio renderer
2008-12-11 18:53:50.812500 [Info.][MPMain]: DirectShowUtils: Passed finding Audio Renderer
2008-12-11 18:53:50.828125 [Info.][MPMain]: added filterefault DirectSound Device to graph
2008-12-11 18:53:50.828125 [Info.][MPMain]: planescene: PresentImage()
2008-12-11 18:53:50.843750 [Info.][MPMain]: PlaneScene: PresentImage() dispose surfaces
2008-12-11 18:53:50.843750 [Info.][MPMain]: planescene: PresentImage()
2008-12-11 18:53:50.843750 [Info.][MPMain]: PlaneScene: PresentImage() dispose surfaces
2008-12-11 18:53:50.843750 [Info.][MPMain]: planescene: PresentImage()
2008-12-11 18:53:50.843750 [Info.][MPMain]: PlaneScene: PresentImage() dispose surfaces
2008-12-11 18:53:50.843750 [Info.][MPMain]: planescene: PresentImage()
2008-12-11 18:53:50.843750 [Info.][MPMain]: PlaneScene: PresentImage() dispose surfaces
2008-12-11 18:53:50.859375 [Info.][MPMain]: planescene: PresentImage()
2008-12-11 18:53:50.859375 [Info.][MPMain]: PlaneScene: PresentImage() dispose surfaces
2008-12-11 18:53:50.875000 [Info.][MPMain]: planescene: PresentImage()
2008-12-11 18:53:50.875000 [Info.][MPMain]: PlaneScene: PresentImage() dispose surfaces
2008-12-11 18:53:50.890625 [Info.][MPMain]: VideoPlayeruration:497,237609863281
2008-12-11 18:53:50.906250 [Info.][MPMain]: g_Player.OnStarted() E:\video\anfahrt.mpg media:Video
2008-12-11 18:53:50.921875 [Info.][MPMain]: g_Player: ShowFullScreenWindow switching to fullscreen video
2008-12-11 18:53:50.984375 [Info.][MPMain]: xml:C:\Programme\Team MediaPortal\MediaPortal\Skin\Monochrome\videoOSD.xml image id:350 width:0 height:0 gfx:-
2008-12-11 18:53:51.046875 [Info.][MPMain]: VMR9Helper: playing->repaint 50
2008-12-11 18:53:51.062500 [Info.][EQ_Update]: VLSYS_Mplay.DisplayOff(): completed

2008-12-11 18:53:51.062500 [Info.][EQ_Update]: VLSYS_Mplay.DisplayOff(): Turning display OFF
2008-12-11 18:53:51.062500 [Info.][EQ_Update]: VLSYS_Mplay.Clear() called
2008-12-11 18:53:51.062500 [Info.][EQ_Update]: VLSYS_Mplay.Clear() completed
2008-12-11 18:53:51.093750 [Info.][7]: planescene: PresentSurface() frame:50 enabled:True allowed:False 720x576
2008-12-11 18:53:51.109375 [Info.][7]: planescene: PresentSurface() frame:51 enabled:True allowed:False 720x576
2008-12-11 18:53:51.125000 [Info.][EQ_Update]: VLSYS_Mplay.DisplayOff(): completed
2008-12-11 18:53:51.125000 [Info.][MPMain]: VMR9Helper: repaint->playing 52
2008-12-11 18:53:51.140625 [Info.][7]: PlaneScene: crop T, B : 0, 0
2008-12-11 18:53:51.140625 [Info.][7]: PlaneScene: crop L, R : 0, 0
2008-12-11 18:53:51.140625 [Info.][7]: PlaneScene: video WxH : 720x576
2008-12-11 18:53:51.140625 [Info.][7]: PlaneScene: video AR : 768:576
2008-12-11 18:53:51.140625 [Info.][7]: PlaneScene: screen WxH : 1218x719
2008-12-11 18:53:51.140625 [Info.][7]: PlaneScene: AR type : Normal
2008-12-11 18:53:51.140625 [Info.][7]: PlaneScene: PixelRatio : 1,0599
2008-12-11 18:53:51.140625 [Info.][7]: PlaneScene: src : (0,0)-(720,576)
2008-12-11 18:53:51.140625 [Info.][7]: PlaneScene: dst : (187,1)-(1091,720)
2008-12-11 18:53:59.156250 [Info.][MPMain]: GUIVideoFullscreen:stop
2008-12-11 18:53:59.156250 [Info.][MPMain]: g_Player.Stop() keepTimeShifting = False
2008-12-11 18:53:59.156250 [Info.][MPMain]: g_Player.OnStopped()
2008-12-11 18:53:59.156250 [Info.][MPMain]: GUIVideoFiles: OnPlayBackStopped idFile=1322 timeMovieStopped=8 resumeData=
2008-12-11 18:53:59.156250 [Info.][MPMain]: VideoPlayer:ended E:\video\anfahrt.mpg
2008-12-11 18:53:59.156250 [Info.][MPMain]: VideoPlayer9:cleanup DShow graph
2008-12-11 18:53:59.171875 [Info.][MPMain]: statetopped 0
2008-12-11 18:53:59.171875 [Info.][MPMain]: vmr9ispose
2008-12-11 18:53:59.171875 [Info.][MPMain]: VMR9: not active