Things I have learnt from using MP that might help others (client setup) (1 Viewer)

[Neild7744]

Hello (again)

Just another few things I have learned aswell when setting up a client PC and connecting it to the TV server...

1) MP client seems to work better with a clean install of win7. I disabled all updates etc and only installed bang up to date drivers. Basically this consisted of MP 1.5 package, dvbs, dvbt & Nvidia driver.

2) Setup Nvidia display adaptor and MP configuration to display 1080 with a 50Hz refresh rate. This smoothed video playback for me.

2) All my drives are setup as read / write shared...movies, recorded tv, timeshift buffer.

3) My timeshift buffer file is shared on the same drive as a recorded tv (2TB HDD)...although i did try out some performance testing and transferring timeshiftbuffer and recorded TV onto a SSD did improve things slightly...the compromise being the physical drive size.

4) Additional testing I did was to try out a standard network switch (Mbit) connecting my server and client, and then using a crossover cable (Gbit). This made no difference to performance.

My bedroom client is purely a MP client. Ive since updated and running this setup...

Installed windows embedded as a 'set top box' configuration & disabled Windows Media Centre and installed Mediaportal. Now my client PC boots very quick straight into MP and simply use an MCE remote to control everything. All other tweaking & file sorting etc is carried out by the TV server as my 'Lounge PC'. It works well.

 

[radical]

2) In my opinion this shouldn't be the way to go. GUI is way smoother with 60hz and for videoplayback you should use the DRR to switch to needed refreshrate.

Installed windows embedded

Which version? As far as I know, Windows Embedded has no AERO included out of the box. So there maybe tearing on playback.

 

[Neild7744]

Wes7...works fine, playback is fine.

As for refresh rates...I set everything at 50hz to match. Works well!

 

[kiwijunglist]

AFAIK - Aero is not needing to prevent tearing, it just enables double buffering (which reduces tearing).
Vertical sync prevents tearing and can be enabled in your display adapter settings, I'm not sure if aero also forces vertical sync or not, however vertical sync can be enabled independently of aero.

setting display to 50hz will smooth playback of PAL sources, and will slightly improve 24fps videos (when compared to 60hz), however if your display supports multiple refresh rates, then dynamic refresh rate changer is better than a static refresh rate and will give smoother video. For even smoother video you should use MediaPortal Audio Renderer (MPAR). There is a link in my signiture for recommended settings.

 

[Neild7744]

Ok that sounds good.

MP audio renderer though...seems to have a couple if issues where the volume on the mce remote stops working.