No pure black color in WinXP (1 Viewer)

[rivera]

In case of WinXP-SP3 (+ .Net 3.5) & selected VMR9 renderer I do not see pure black color in video.
Black color looks like dark grey.

I am using CRT-monitor Iiyama accepting RGB(0-255).

I checked the following setups:
1. Outside MediaPortal in MPC-HC player - both the following variants give the pure black color:
a) without ffdshow raw video filter:
- any decoder
- in Nvidia driver - selected mode "RGB(0-255)"
- VMR9 renderless
b) with ffdshow raw video filter with adjusted YCbCr->RGB(0-255) transform:
- any decoder
- VMR9 renderless
- in Nvidia driver - selected mode doesn't matter

2. Inside MediaPortal - the following settings give dark grey color:
- Cyberlink Video\SP decoder (PDVD9) - for MPEG
- Cyberlink H264 decoder (PDVD7) - for H264
- MPC decoder - for VC-1
- VMR9
- ffdshow raw video filter with adjusted YCbCr->RGB(0-255) transform
- in Nvidia driver - selected mode "RGB(0-255)"

I tried to use EVR renderer but after starting a video I see blank screen without possibility to leave to MediaPortal: ESC & STOP buttond don't work, but I can exit MediaPortal by pressing Alt-F4.
By the way, in MPC-HC I also cannot use EVR - same blank screen (probably it's a problem of Nvidia + WinXP)

So, are there any solutions to see pure black color in MediaPortal in WinXP ?


I attached two pics for black & dark grey colors as examples.
"Black" - from the case 1-b (see above)
"Dark grey" - from MediaPortal
In both cases I use the same MPEG decoder (Cyberlink Video\SP decoder).
In both cases GraphEdit gives the same graph, only renderers are different: both are called "Video mixer renderer 9", but in case of MediaPortal it has 4 input pins (not 1).

MediaPortal Version: 1.1 Beta
MediaPortal Skin: Blue-3, X-Factor
Windows Version: WinXP-SP3
CPU Type: Intel Core 2 Duo E8400 3.0GHz
Motherboard: ASUS P5K premium
Video Card: ASUS EN9600GT Silent/HTDI 512

 

[vevs]

I confirm the problem - any suggestions, MPTeam?

 

[hirscho]

If you use an HDMI/digital cable, please try to change the digital output format to "YCbCr444" in the nvidia settings.

 

[rivera]

If you use an HDMI/digital cable, please try to change the digital output format to "YCbCr444" in the nvidia settings.

1. I do not have such a choice in Nvidia Control Panel

2. So, you think that in case of "YCbCr444" I will see a pure black?
As I understood, standart VMR9 renderer converts YCbCr420 (used in video content) to RGB.
By using ffdshow (or CoreAVC - but for H264 only) I can convert YCbCr->RGB as a part of post-processing.
So, this convert seems to be an obligatory - whether it is done by renderer or by ffdshow (or CoreAVC).
If video driver outputs YCbCr into display that means that RGB agan will be back-converted to YCbCr - with accumulated errors

 

[rivera]

I got similar pics in the following conditions:
а) МРС-НС, brightness=64, contrast=62
а) MediaPortal, brightness=50, contrast=50

Brightness & contrast - in Nvidia Control panel (driver 191.07 for WinXP-SP3).
MediaPortal & MPC-HC are using same decoders (mentioned in the 1st post).

I compared pics in Photoshop (taking into account that in MediaPortal there is no possibility to pause player at some particular frame ias it is possible in MPC-HC).
Pics are ALMOST the same.
Probably I can make them same by adjusting contrast (not brightness - because increasing brightness by 1 % causes an appearance of border between frame picture and bottom & top margings).
But I am not sure that this adjustment will not cause spoiling of something else