A Guide to Encoded HD Video Playback

l3ender said:
I just tried the renaming trick and it didn't work. I couldn't tell how serious/sarcastic you were being, CrimandEvil.
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For almost all my MKV's that are H264/AVC with AC3orAAC it works perfectly. I used to use it to test with, but it should be used as a temporary thing to avoid confusion later on with the container type.
 
I followed the guide and can get MKV playback and OGM in media center but i cannot for the life of me get audio switching or subtitle switching to work.

Hard subs work fine but i cannot get soft subtitles to work did i miss something or did i just not configure it right? Kind of aggravating having a file with multiple audio streams or subtitles and not being able to select them in media center and have them work.

If i alt tab out of media center i can attempt to switch audio using vob sub or the hali splitter but it does not work (in media center, works fine in media player classic.) I feel like i have almost configured it right but am either just missing a setting or some magic trick to get it working. The default audio stream plays fine. Basically it makes the Victory of OGM or MKV playback in media center a hollow one.
 
Theres a VMC plug in, not sure of the name, that lets you switch audio streams and the only way I've gotten soft subs working is with the CCCP codec pack.
 
What I typically do is just re-mux the mkv's to only include the sub/audio that I want. I also set the default languages so that I don't have to switch and it just works.
 
Use VSfilter and have it autoload with Haali. It will allow you to change audio tracks and subtitles.
 
w1retap said:
Use VSfilter and have it autoload with Haali. It will allow you to change audio tracks and subtitles.
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How do i do that. would it be similar to the guide in setting up the external filters? I had some issues with subs flashing in and out following the instructions. i installed cccp and it fixed the flashing issue but i cant seem to get the switching to work in mce. Is there a interface in media center i can use? i think that the switching will only work if i get mce to recognize a addin that allows it. The problem seems to be relying on the hali splitter or vs filter to split the streams in mce. its like i only works when the file is not in use by mce.

edit:

the audio switching seems to work now some of the time by alt tabbing out of the media center and switching it using the hali splitter. it still does not display soft subs. I can switch them but as soon as i start playing the file it does not display the subs
 
I had some problems with it, such as whenever i made a switch between audio streams or even basically just skipped forward/backward the audio would become out of sync, my system was fine up until this point and when i removed it, it all went back to being fine.

Give it a try i guess, if it doesnt work out for you, you can uninstall it.
 
W!reT@p

So i have just imaged a new machine that i will be putting in a bedroom with Vista Ultimate x64
I have Installed FFdshow 2322
Haali Splitter
Ive done the mkv Registry Fix
But for some reason Media Center does not want to play my mkv files on my server.

So I'm a little confused, do you have any suggestions?

TIA
 
See the bottom of post 2 in this thread. I linked to an alternate setup guide for Vista x64. No guarantees it will work, so good luck. Vista x64 is not the preferred platform for HTPC use with HD codec integration.
 
I think my biggest problem with all of this is that when I go to play back an mkv and I want it to use the optical out SPDIF to my receiver, I only get stereo sound. I've changed settings and tried different programs. The closest I got was VLC player and it would send the signal out to the receiver in 5.1, but it would stutter.

Anyone have any ideas?
 
Yeah, I tried a ton of different ways and finally got it working somehow. lol
 
Thank you so much for putting this guide together, it was a major help. Was using VLC with the default codecs to play hd movies and well...they just didnt play haha. Now the onboard video on my crappy 610i motherboard plays 1080p like a champ.
 
wiretap - thanks for the guide, it has worked (mostly) well for me. So far I followed the guide pretty much exactly. I just have a few problems and questions. If FFDshow has a H.264/x264/AVCHD (whatever you want to call it) decoder, why install CoreAVC? I have coreAVC installed on my 780g/4850e HTPC and Cyberlink, but I did not try out the FFDshow decoder. Does it really make a difference? So far, PowerDVD's decoder has the best results for me, even w/o GPU acceleration enabled.

Now my problem:
I am trying to get Media Player Classic to use Cyberlink PowerDVD's H264 decoder, and it works, except that it doesn't use GPU acceleration on the same files that are in PowerDVD. I need some help making this work, because th 4850e is IMHO not an appropriate HD HTPC processor as so many believe it to be, something I found out after the purchase. I DO have Vista Ultimate x64 but that has not caused any problems with codec's for me, following all your previous instructions. I just use the x86 versions of those programs.

-darkmatter08
 
CoreAVC provides much more efficient playback with less CPU usage than FFDshow.. but at a slight loss of quality. It's good for files that can't take advantage of hardware decoding because of being improperly encoded, or they were encoded before L4.1.

If you use FFDshow only, you have to have a pretty beefy processor for 1080p. Even some of your overclocked high end Core2's will struggle with some of the higher bitrate 1080p scenes.

For MPC + Cyberlink H.264 acceleration, just follow the guide I have posted. You should unregister CoreAVC with the regsrv command, then register the Cyberlink H.264 ax file. Then you put the Cyberlink H.264 in the list of external filters and give it priority.

Just make note, if your x264/h264 files you are trying to play back aren't L4.1 or better encoded, you'll have problems with hardware acceleration and it may or may not work properly to offload the CPU.
 
I followed that part of the guide, but I am still facing problems during the playback. When I use PDVD the player itself, GPU acceleration works fine because the CPU usage is pretty low - maybe 10%. Then after following your guide with the registry edits, deregistering CoreAVC, and registering the Cyberlink x264 codec. But when I use MPC to play back that same file, then my CPU usage is significantly higher, as if the GPU acceleration checkbox in Cyberlink PDVD was not checked. While the file will then mostly play back well, the audio sometimes becomes out of sync, and some frames seemed to be dropped, causing jerkiness. I don't know why it is not working correctly with MPC and the Cyberlink codec but it is working in PDVD. Can you help me out with this? Thanks

-darkmatter08
 
I haven't been gone, I just don't know what direction to point you. I've configured over a dozen computers with the same methods I told you and put in my tutorial, as well as many other people have successfully done on this forum. I'm unsure of how to solve the problem you are experiencing. Maybe someone else can help out or has some idea.
 
Exactly, that is the weird part of it - the GPU acceleration seems to work great while using PDVD, the CPU usage is extremely low once I adjust the settings to use ATI avivio, but in MPC, it works as if the option was disabled - around 50% and higher CPU usage. It's on Vista Ultimate x64, but considering everything else worked, I don't see that as the issue.
 
Hmm, only thing I can think of is the 64bit OS. The other people on this forum and possibly the dozen or so PCs that wiretap configured were using 32bit Vista or XP.
 
Danny Bui said:
Hmm, only thing I can think of is the 64bit OS. The other people on this forum and possibly the dozen or so PCs that wiretap configured were using 32bit Vista or XP.
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Wow, I'd say bingo! since, in my experience with HTPCs, Vista 64 isn't worth a damn for an HTPC due to too many issues that crop up.
 
ditto, I'm done diagnosing x64 problems. That's why I put a strong advisory against using it when I wrote the tutorial.
 
Yea ive been diagnosing 64bit issues for a while and its just a PITA
 
Whatever, I will just have to open my x264 videos in PDVD then, because I am not moving from x64 - everything else on it is perfect, and 8GB RAM is awesome.
I really don't see how it would be any different though, as the x86 applications run in a compatibility mode for x64, and they all run perfectly. Somehow I am lead to think the problem is my PDVD installation. I have PDVD 8, and I heard there were some changes between 7 and 8, that is the only thing I am uncertain about. You didn't mention which version to use in the guide, could you at least tell me that?

-darkmatter08
 
PowerDVD 7 Ultra and PowerDVD 8 can both be installed at the same time on the same machine. I have both installed on my HTPC, and everything is working fine. The problem is most likely with x64. Compatibility with regards to x86 seems like it's working fine, but that isn't always the case.
 
w1retap said:
PowerDVD 7 Ultra and PowerDVD 8 can both be installed at the same time on the same machine. I have both installed on my HTPC, and everything is working fine. The problem is most likely with x64. Compatibility with regards to x86 seems like it's working fine, but that isn't always the case.
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Anand has some articles up on the differences between Vista 64 and Vista 32 and he mentions how backwards compatibility is broken in 64 because it's missing some much needed binaries for full 32 bit compatibility.
 
ok, im in the process of doing some reading on all this codec/player stuff, but can someone give me a simple answer as to what the difference is between using this method, or just using VLC player? quality in picture?
 
VLC player isn't quite as customizable, it uses more CPU overhead, and some rare cases, it conflicts/errors with certain encodes depending on the codec. You're free to use it if you want though.
 
w1retap said:
VLC player isn't quite as customizable, it uses more CPU overhead, and some rare cases, it conflicts/errors with certain encodes depending on the codec. You're free to use it if you want though.
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VLC doesn't support hardware acceleration for H264 content so it'll eat your CPU.
 
That and it has flawed multi-core processor support that likes to cause random glitches during playback.
 
You can get it done in MPC-HC but I have not gotten it to work. A while back I found a guide to doing it but never truly got it to work.

The guide happens to be on an anime BT site, which I am unsure about legality. "boxtorrents" is the name of the site and it is in the forum section under the 'help' section. I have actually never used the site, I just got the guide from there. If you want the link, I can email you it...
 
In Media Player Classic I cannot seem to play VC-1 encoded files.

WMP11 plays them just fine, buy MPC skips, stutters and is not watchable. I tried adding the PDVD7 VC1 decoder to the external filters list but I get the same result.

Any suggestions
 
For VC-1 in Media Player Classic use the WVC1 decoder via ffdshow. You have to enable it in the ffdshow config.

Or, you can use the new version of MPC.. which is Media Player Classic HC (home cinema) that has VC-1 DXVA support included.
http://mpc-hc.sourceforge.net/
 
I cannot install the reg edit. I copy and paste into notepad save a MKV.reg to my desktop, double click and get an error message...
The specified file is not a registry script. You can only import binary registry files from within the registry editor.....
Any ideas?
Vista Ultimate.
thanks.

never mind just worked..go figure.
 
Set up everything according to the instructions and its working great...I love it . Thanks
 
so do i need to install powerdvd DXVA at all with MPC-HC? do I get extra support for other formats with it?
 
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