Video Playback and HD-PVR

[tdanco]

Hello all,

I have just made the switch to Sage from VMC, thanks to the hdpvr.

I have only spent about an hour trying to set up the hdpvr in sage. I might have an overheating issue, but for the moment I have it on its side and a fan in front of it.

I get video but it looks pretty crappy. I have chosen the Arcsoft decoder using the deccheck tool. While setting up the pvr I try to choose advanced playback but I get no video. Under standard I get video but again it looks crappy. I must be doing something wrong.

I am using the beta Sage and the beta driver for the pvr. I have read that you can choose the decoder in Sage, is that my problem or is using the deccheck tool sufficient for choosing a decoder?

Any help would be much appreciated. I hope to be a long time Sage user now. I'm just getting started but I need a little kickstart.

Thanks,

[DOS64K]

If you've had multiple codecs installed on your PC over time, Sage can get a little confused on what to use.

You can force Sage to use the Arcsoft decoder for HDPVR recordings by placing a new line in sage.properties. The correct line info can be found on Brent Evans blog http://brentevans.blogspot.com, in his HD PVR post.

[Jesse]

Hello tdanco,

I am hoping that when you get this working you can tell me if sage is enabling DXVA when playing back HD-PVR recordings. You mentioned that you had switched from VMC, so I am assuming you are using a vista based machine. The reason I ask is that I have two vista based pc clients and sage will not enable DXVA on either of them when playing back HD-PVR recordings. When I use the ArcSoft app included with the HD-PVR I do get DXVA.

TIA

Jesse

[Brent]

Originally Posted by DOS64K

If you've had multiple codecs installed on your PC over time, Sage can get a little confused on what to use.

You can force Sage to use the Arcsoft decoder for HDPVR recordings by placing a new line in sage.properties. The correct line info can be found on Brent Evans blog http://brentevans.blogspot.com, in his HD PVR post.

The actual post link is this one and as dos64k said choose the Arcsoft one.
tdanco,
Are you getting good HD playback from non- HD-PVR sources also? Just wanting to know if it's just a problem getting the HD-PVR setup with Sage or more of an overall SageTV setup issue.

[DOS64K]

Sorry Brent. I was at work when I wrote that and couldn't actually surf to your site as our highly efficient firewall filters blogs (yes, even yours).

[Brent]

Originally Posted by DOS64K

Sorry Brent. I was at work when I wrote that and couldn't actually surf to your site as our highly efficient firewall filters blogs (yes, even yours).

No need to be sorry for sure. You might be able to get to it through the firewall filters if you use www.geektonic.com instead of the blogspot address. I'm moving over to geektonic.com as the address this summer and it works now either way.

[tdanco]

Ok, so I put the Arcsoft decoders into the property files and the video quality seems to have improved.

My x2 5000+ is sitting at around 65% and my 2600xt 256MB is at 6%. So, I am pretty sure sage is not using dxva.

I am not able to use vmr9, only overlay. Is that what you guys are using?

Also, I get no sound in sage when watching the hdpvr. I know that it is aac, and I downloaded monograms decoder but I'm not even sure if I installed it properly; I put the ax file into system32 folder and entered regsvr32 mmaacd.ax or whatever it is called. I'm not sure how to force the decoder into the properties file because I'm not sure what to call it, like I know from this post
that you put videoframe/aac_audio_decoder_filter= in there but what to call it I'm not sure.

I'm getting somewhere, which is nice. Now I only need sound.

[tdanco]

Can anyone tell me if their Totalmedia Theatre that cam with the hd-pvr plays Bluray movies?

Mine will play dvds and that, just not blurays or hddvds!?

[Jesse]

Originally Posted by tdanco

Ok, so I put the Arcsoft decoders into the property files and the video quality seems to have improved.

My x2 5000+ is sitting at around 65% and my 2600xt 256MB is at 6%. So, I am pretty sure sage is not using dxva.

I am not able to use vmr9, only overlay. Is that what you guys are using?

Also, I get no sound in sage when watching the hdpvr. I know that it is aac, and I downloaded monograms decoder but I'm not even sure if I installed it properly; I put the ax file into system32 folder and entered regsvr32 mmaacd.ax or whatever it is called. I'm not sure how to force the decoder into the properties file because I'm not sure what to call it, like I know from this post
that you put videoframe/aac_audio_decoder_filter= in there but what to call it I'm not sure.

I'm getting somewhere, which is nice. Now I only need sound.

videoframe/aac_audio_decoder_filter=ArcSoft Audio Decoder

or

videoframe/aac_audio_decoder_filter=ArcSoft Audio Decoder HD

Thanks for posting your results. Looks like I am not the only one who cannot get DXVA with Vista. Could you try playing a recording using TME only and check your cpu usage? When I use TME or WMP (ie not sage) I see @10% cpu usage for hdpvr recordings.

BTW, VMR9 works for me in vista. What happens when you try and use it?

Can anyone tell me if their Totalmedia Theatre that cam with the hd-pvr plays Bluray movies?

I have an HDDVD/BD ROM drive in my family room client, but I have a paid version of Total Media Theater, so it works with HDDVD and BD. Sage user bialio reports that the TME version on the hauppauge driver disc does not recognize his HDDVD/BD drive.

Jesse

[tdanco]

When I choose vmr9 in sage the error coming up says:

There was a Playback Error in playback. Details:
sage.PlaybackException:ERROR(-4,0x80040217): There
was a problem rendering the video portion of the content
for playback.

I tried recording a show to see if dxva is working with TME, but does Sage require you to record a whole show? Can it not just record a portion? The only options I see are record this show, and cancel recording. There's only 5 minutes left in this one show so I'll record it and get back to you.

[tdanco]

TME plays at 5% cpu, but the gpu is still only 6%? So, dxva is working for tme but not for sage. Music does not work either. Just skips to the end.

[Jesse]

Originally Posted by tdanco

TME plays at 5% cpu, but the gpu is still only 6%? So, dxva is working for tme but not for sage. Music does not work either. Just skips to the end.

As far as cpu use, I see the same thing. Very low (~10%) with WMP or TME and very high (65%-75%) with sage. I have not tried to check gpu usage nor have I tried music.

This certainly seems to be a "Vista" issue. I have confirmation from a few other sage users that DXVA is working in XP.

Jesse

[Jesse]

I filed a bug report on this issue. The response I got was that the ArcSoft decoder does not support DXVA in Vista with VMR9. I guess the other way to look at it would be that there is no DXVA because sage does not support EVR.

Jesse