Looking for the Worst MPEG Decoder! 350 EOF madness!

[byopvr]

I'm looking for the "worst" software decoder, evah! Well, let me restate that... I'm looking for an mpeg decoder that uses the least amount of cpu possible, and don't care how artifacty/crappily it displays the content =)

Background: in order to get around the dreaded pvr350 end of file bug the "work around" is to disable "hardware decoding only", which means that even if you aren't watching the software decoded output (because you are most likely watching the hardware decoding via the pvr350's tv out) you are burning precious CPU cycles redunandtly playing back the same mpeg via software... Which if you are using a lower power EPIA VIA M10k mobo/chip those wasted CPU cycles are important. You want those CPU cycles for UI refreshes or uh... what have you =)

Even better if there was some kind of faux-decoder, that sorta acted like decode but didn't bother doing any heavy lifting.. just "touching" the file/stream enough to get around the dreaded PVR350 EOF issue . know what I mean, vern?

I'm open to other suggestions, like ways to tweak existing decoders like hauppauge's/intervideo's non-css one for minimal cpu usage...

rampy

[stanger89]

Have you tried the Intervideo NonCSS ones with the registry trick?

[byopvr]

Originally Posted by stanger89

Have you tried the Intervideo NonCSS ones with the registry trick?

yup... I've done the registry trick and the mpeg "accellerator" on the m10k/cl266 helps a little bit (using the intervideo non-css decoder).

If there were other registry hacks to make it use even less cpu, even at the expense of visual quality, I'd be open to those too!

Thanks for the suggestion though...

rampy

[byopvr]

I've got to think *someone* out there tried an awful decoder in their pursuit of the "best" decoder...

I assume the EOF pvr350 issue effects more than just me *cue crickets chirping* and would like a more efficient work around while waiting for a more permanent fix.

*shrug*

rampy

[Crashless]

I've tried what you're talking about - disabling h/w only, and I still got crashes. I believe there are two types of crashes, one that just crashes sage, and one that crashes the system. Mine only recently started crashing the system. I can't remember which version brought the behavior on, but it's exceedingly annoying.

Though, OTOH, it's better from a user POV because the system self-corrects, IE: rather than having to kill the sage process, and restart it manually, the system just resets and is usable again in about 5 minutes. Still - VERY ANNOYING.

I haven't really looked into s/w decoders because I've always had the 350. I'll take a look around, but I don't think there's such a thing as a dummy decoder today...but that doesn't mean someone couldn't write a false codec that hooked on to the out pins of the stream, then does nothing with it. I only know how the stream works, I can't code for it, sorry.

I've tried working with some of the STV writers on this problem, Cayars even was loaned a 350 for testing, but ironically had no problems on his setup. It's hard to fix what you can't see, so we 350 users are at square one - trying every new driver rev, hoping it fixes it only to find it doesn't. I'm still crossing my fingers for 2.2.7 containing some undocumented stab at a fix...I'll let you know if I was dissapointed tomorrow.

I guess we can only rest easy knowing Frey IS looking at this problem, as it does effect a large number of it's users. It'll be fixed someday....