Videos tear only in MediaPortal, tried all settings/decoders (1 Viewer)

[pcguru]

I have a major problem with video tearing here.
When the camera is panning up/down a clearly visible horizontal tear appears. Easily seen in the credits at the end of the movie as well for testing purposes.

I do have vsync enabled in the nvidia graphics card settings, forced.
(Actually it shouldn't matter since I don't want to use exclusive directx mode but overlay)

If I play the same movies in Media Player Classic or the DVD:s in PowerDVD 6 all is fine, no tearing at all.

If I use PowerDVD decoders in Media Portal tearing is again visible.
So the codec is not to blame.

Media Portal seams to ignore vsync entirely independent of graphics mode and codecs used.

Tried to use Reclock, but that doesn't work. Says it's incompatible, no matter what settings I use (tried all combinations...)


Area: Media Portal Program - Movies/DVD
MP Version: 0.2.0.0 RC4
Skin: Blue
Windows Version: Windows XP Home SP2
CPU Type: AMD A64 3000+
Memory: 2x512 DDR
Motherboard Chipset: Nforce 4
Video Card: XFX Nvidia 6600LE
Video Card Driver: 82.12
Video Card Resolution: 1280x720@60 Hz (projector doesn't support 50 Hz)
Video Render Type: Tried with and without DX
Video Codec Type & Version: tried all, including purchased PowerDVD
Audio Codec Type & Version: Tried all
TV Card: none

 

[Jetboy]

Have you tried ticking "Enable DirectX exclusive mode" (or something like that, I'm at work right now) in the configuration? It's under the general settings if I'm not mistaken. And AFAIK, MP doesn't support overlay anymore, so you have to use VRM9.

 

[pcguru]

Yes I've tried with the setting both enabled and disabled.

With the setting enabled tearing is still visible and MP crashes every 5 minutes as well so it's not really usable for me. (actully it doesn't crash, it just stops updating the directx surface? And it is on top of everything so I have to reset the computer. "Always on top" is not enabled...)

I'm not the only one, found this now: https://forum.team-mediaportal.com/viewtopic.php?t=14881

 

[aaronjb]

I have the same problem too - hugely annoying isn't it..

Anyway, for sake of completeness:

Area: Media Portal Program
MediaPortal Version: 0.2.0.0 RC3 (2006-03-18)
MediaPortal Skin: Razor
Windows Version: Windows XP (SP2)
.NET CLR Version: 2.0.50727
DirectX Version: 4.09.00.0904 (9.0c)
Audio Codec: MPEG/AC3/DTS/LPCM Audio Decoder
Video Codec: Mpeg2Dec Filter
CPU Type: AMD Athlon XP 2500+
Memory: 1 GB
Motherboard: FX43 (SHUTTLE INC)
Video Card Model: Nvidia Geforce FX 5200 (64 MB)
Video Card Driver: 84.21 Nvidia reference
Video Card Resolution: 1024x768
Video Render Type: VMR9
Audio Card Model: Realtek AC'97 Audio for VIA (R) Audio Controller

I've tried all the video codecs and they all behaved the same - but VLC can play the same video files just fine, fullscreen, with no tearing..

Sadly I've now toggled some option that causes MP to crash when I try to play a video file - so I'm about to try a clean install, plus temporarily throw the video card from my main machine (a much newer AGP Nvidia, rather than the PCI effort above) in to the HTPC and see how that performs.

Update later..

[edit] Incidentally, I'm sure RC2 used to work fine - RC3 seems to have been when VMR7 support was removed, perhaps the video code got a rework that's introduced this oddness?

[edit again]

Well that's quite odd indeed.. I shut down to try the other video card (only to discover that it won't fit into the HTPC case as it's a double-thickness card, d'oh!), restarted and installed a fresh copy of RC4, ffdshow, VobSub, vsfilter, Haali's Media Splitter.. and now it plays perfectly in MP!

Weird - the only thing I can think is that reinstalling the video drivers unhooked the VNC video driver hooks from the system (at least, that's what VNC reports -- and it's now very sluggish), which sorted the DX9 playback out... I could have sworn I'd rebooted after installing those drivers - but perhaps I hadn't actually tried playback yet :?

 

[jcee]

Yes I've tried with the setting both enabled and disabled.

With the setting enabled tearing is still visible and MP crashes every 5 minutes as well so it's not really usable for me. (actully it doesn't crash, it just stops updating the directx surface? And it is on top of everything so I have to reset the computer. "Always on top" is not enabled...)

I'm not the only one, found this now: https://forum.team-mediaportal.com/viewtopic.php?t=14881

I have exactly the same problem and these freezing of the directx surface. I can still go back to the nenu and exit MP. But the frozen video screen stays on top. The only way is to restart the HTPC..

Have you found out what is causing this? I reinstalled several times to no luck .
I have FX5200 on a Gigabyte VIA chipset board with 1GB Ram and different TV cards evaluated...

First I thought about a driver issue, than heat, than hardware.. but I did not find out in the end..

Any news on your issue?

Maybe it is VNC running in background?

 

[keith2045]

I'm having the same problem. Any idea when this is going to get fixed? It's been happening looks like for months now.

I've tried enabling exclusive directx mode, but i cant view my movies, i only see black, i can hear them.

The only thing that i found to work is using a different player. Dont want to do that though.

 

[HappyTalk]

I also have this problem on an NVidia GeForce 6800 GT. I was testing a hidef clip of Lord Of the Rings, it plays perfectly tear free in Windows Media Player 10 but in mediaportal in the fast action scenes it tears the place up! I'm not using DX Exclusive mode as that seemed to slow the U.I down too much to be useable. Maybe someone can advise the key nvidia settings they have if it works ok? that said if it's playing A-OK in WMP then I guess they're currently fine.

I'm presuming it is to do with the hardware overlay as when I play back via WMP in clone mode the secondary monitor shows the WMP U.I etc but is just black where the video would normally be. In MP both screen show the video so presumably hardware overlay is not being used in MP. I did once work out a way with some nvidia driver tyo get dual screen to monitor+TV so both played and there was no tearing but I cannot remember where/what setting or what driver it was with. I'm currently running forceware 81.98 video drivers

I could maybe consider the post 0.2release patch, but I don't wanna wipe all my settings/plugs out, at least not if there's no gain.

I think MediaPortal is 'THE' HTPC to use so HAVE no choice but to persevere. Having spent months configuring MythTV to recently abandon it due the stoneage U.I / general instability / directionless bloating, I'm prepared for the long haul...

NE1 ?

 

[Bookman]

I have also had this problem. I think it is a driver -specifically Nvidia- related issue.

Since the end of last year, when I first installed MP RC2, I have always had to put up with this annoying tearing. I tried all the advice listed in these forums, enabling v-synch, enabling exclusive Direct x mode, changing video drivers, re-installing MP..., but all to no avail. The problem was clearly highlighted by pressing the ! key. The scan line was horribly jagged. In the end I gave up and decided to live with it as I enjoyed other aspects of MP.

Then about a month ago I suddenly realised I no longer had the problem. A miraculous cure which I could only ascribe to the installation or Nvidia's latest driver (91.31). Why this had made a difference when all the others hadn't I've no idea, perhaps I'd cleaned out the old drivers more thoroughly. Who knows. Fortunately when I installed the most recent release of MP the problem did not return.

This may not be of much consolation to those of you still suffering, but at least it shows there is a cure out there even if I'm not entirely sure what it is.

To all those involved with the development of MP, many thanks. keep up the good work.

 

[HappyTalk]

I realise that you need to use exclusive directx mode to avoid tearing but that seems to increase cpu useage a lot, particularly on hidef stuff. I installed nvidia 91.31 drivers, I think it improved things, not sure though. I have experimented for days but cannot get as smooth a picture from MediaPortal as other apps like WMP10 or mplayer. The MPV decoder seems to give smoother results than nvidia purevideo which I don't understand given it's running on a 6800gt.

 

[blackburn_]

HappyTalk: I have the same problem as you, I can't get a smooth picture in MP 0.2 (on a 7600GT using VMR9. MP 0.2 RC2 using VMR7 works perfect) but it works like a charm in other programs like dvbviewer and Zoomplayer both using VMR9. Since I don't have a problem with tearing I started a new thread here which describes the problem. Could you please post your details like described at the end in that thread? Thanks a lot