Is support for Blu-ray disc playback anywhere on the list?

[Striker:WG]

Originally Posted by Deacon Crusher

For extender tests did you try switching to a local drive letter instead of a UNC path?

Also, you do have anydvdhd correct?

I am running Any DVD HD 6.6.6.0 (latest version).

I have always been using local drive letters, the UNC paths just don't work for me.

I also tried ripping one of my discs to BDMV folder format and I get the same playback problems so I know its nothing to do with the disc or the optical drive (I was already pretty confident in them as they work with PowerDVD).

The three titles I have been testing with are Batman: The Dark Knight, Batman Begins, and Quantum of Solace. I believe all three are VC1 discs which I've seen some posts around are a more difficult older format to work with?

-Striker-

[Striker:WG]

Does anyone know what this line in the properties file does?

media_player_plugin_class/bluray=

Is there something I can put in this line that might help my BD playback woes?

-Striker-

[stanger89]

Nothing if you haven't written a playback class to handle Blu-ray.

[Olias]

Originally Posted by Striker:WG

I also tried ripping one of my discs to BDMV folder format and I get the same playback problems
-Striker-

...what exact problems are you experiencing? If it's skipping/stuttering from the extenders, I had the issue with my setup. As mentioned previously, the HD200's are very picky with the switches that they are connected to. I have an Intel Gb nic on the server going to a nice, managed Dell Gb switch. When playing BD's I get skips and hiccups all the time. No manner of forcing simplex/duplex, hard coding speeds, modifying Sage properties, replacing cables or even swapping nics on the server could fix it. Right now whenever we watch a BD, I just pop a crossover cable from the server to the particular HD200 patch port and it works fine. Not an ideal solution, but it does work for now.

[Striker:WG]

well, after switching back to service mode and rebooting everything the playback on the extender appears to be working properly!

Playback on the main Sage box still remains an issue.

I looked at the log files and it looks like everything is processing just fine and then it says that it detected a hang and at that point I have a black screen with a spinning circle and I have to CTRL+ALT+DEL to end Sage and try again...

Sun 7/4 15:36:12.901 [FinalRender-SAGETV_PROCESS_LOCAL_UI@beb946] Loading RawImage of size 86x86 for images/tvicon_anim4.png
Sun 7/4 15:36:12.902 [FinalRender-SAGETV_PROCESS_LOCAL_UI@beb946] Loading 86x86 image from file C:\DOCUME~1\ADMIN-~1\LOCALS~1\Temp\stv6119849804725663725.img
Sun 7/4 15:36:12.936 [FinalRender-SAGETV_PROCESS_LOCAL_UI@beb946] Creating DirectX9 Texture from nio buffer w=86 h=86
Sun 7/4 15:36:13.241 [AWTThreadWatcher-SAGETV_PROCESS_LOCAL_UI@11ee18e] EventThread-SAGETV_PROCESS_LOCAL_UI Hang Detected - hang time = 2249
Sun 7/4 15:36:13.991 [AWTThreadWatcher-SAGETV_PROCESS_LOCAL_UI@11ee18e] EventThread-SAGETV_PROCESS_LOCAL_UI Hang Detected - hang time = 2999

Don't know if anyone has seen this before, but I've tried Arcsoft, Cyberlink, and every available audio renderer on my machine and it never works.

Does Sage offer an "approved" list of hardware and codecs that they have tested their features with?

-Striker-

[Striker:WG]

Here's an update for those of you who are interested or may benefit in some way.

I have tried ditching Cyberlink codecs and using AC3Filter and FFDShow as alternatives.

In both cases the experience has improved to the point that a Blu Ray will start playing, but I just get scratching on the audio playback and the video is EXTREMELY choppy.

I'll be doing more playing around to see if I can find a combination that works, but its starting to get to be pretty frustrating

-Striker-

[Rico66]

Originally Posted by Striker:WG

Here's an update for those of you who are interested or may benefit in some way.

I have tried ditching Cyberlink codecs and using AC3Filter and FFDShow as alternatives.

In both cases the experience has improved to the point that a Blu Ray will start playing, but I just get scratching on the audio playback and the video is EXTREMELY choppy.

I'll be doing more playing around to see if I can find a combination that works, but its starting to get to be pretty frustrating

-Striker-

So you can playback VC1, even though it's not great? I played around with various codecs (Arcsoft, MPC, Cyberlink), and I also used a custom splitter (from Arcsoft), but the result is always the same -> Exception. The logs show that it tries to use whatever I've defined as VC1 codec / splitter, but it doesn't seem to change the outcome.

[Striker:WG]

Originally Posted by Rico66

So you can playback VC1, even though it's not great? I played around with various codecs (Arcsoft, MPC, Cyberlink), and I also used a custom splitter (from Arcsoft), but the result is always the same -> Exception. The logs show that it tries to use whatever I've defined as VC1 codec / splitter, but it doesn't seem to change the outcome.

to say I can play back VC1 is an over statement. I can get it to render a picture slide show of the video and there is no audio except scratching noises.

my results also tend to vary based on the movie I try to playback. The Dark Knight is as above while Quantum of Solace results in a spinning black circle that I have to CTRL + ALT + DEL on Sage to get out of.

-Striker-

[Rico66]

Originally Posted by Striker:WG

to say I can play back VC1 is an over statement. I can get it to render a picture slide show of the video and there is no audio except scratching noises.

my results also tend to vary based on the movie I try to playback. The Dark Knight is as above while Quantum of Solace results in a spinning black circle that I have to CTRL + ALT + DEL on Sage to get out of.

-Striker-

What codecs/splitters are you using?

[Striker:WG]

i've been trying varying combinations of FFDShow for H264 video and Audio, AC3Filter for Audio, Cyberlink PowerDVD8 for H264 video and Audio, and Arcsoft for h264 video.

The results posted above were achieved with

Video Renderer: VMR9
H264 Video Decoder: Cyberlink PowerDVD8
Audio Renderer: ATI HD Rear Output
Audio Decoder: AC3Filter

I thought I'd experiement some more and see what kind of results I could achieve if I installed Sage on one of my other PC's. I've now tried it on two different windows 7 boxes and while my BD ISO mounting seems to work fine on the other PC's, I still can't get proper BDMV playback going. There are always errors, spinning circles, Sage crashes, or just plain choppy playback without audio.

I'd like to know, does anyone have BDMV playback working on the PC version Sage 7.0.11, and if so what codecs/renderers are they using?

-Striker-

[Striker:WG]

as a further follow up, now that my BD ISO's are working in Sage I was able to test my config with more movies from within Sage.

In trying Saw VI the playback is flawless using the config listed in the post above.

I still have the same persistent issues with other movies though.

Batman The Dark Knight = Choppy playback

Quatum of Solace = Spinning Circle, forced to End-Task on Sage.

Is it possible its not the codecs, but its the MPEG Demuxer or some other component of Sage at fault? Can anyone verify that The Dark Knight plays back properly on their system through Sage?

-Striker-

[babgvant]

Do you have ffdshow installed for HD audio decoding?

Check the lines below in the client properties file.

videoframe/dolbytruehd_audio_decoder_filter=ffdshow Audio Decoder
videoframe/dts-ma_audio_decoder_filter=ffdshow Audio Decoder

Add them if they don't exist.

[Striker:WG]

Originally Posted by babgvant

Do you have ffdshow installed for HD audio decoding?

Check the lines below in the client properties file.

videoframe/dolbytruehd_audio_decoder_filter=ffdshow Audio Decoder
videoframe/dts-ma_audio_decoder_filter=ffdshow Audio Decoder

Add them if they don't exist.

I do have ffdshow installed, but I do all my decoding on my amp, I just do SPIDF passthrough over the HDMI line to the amp for audio.

I did not have those lines in my config file, but I have added them. Sadly this did not improve my results at all.

Thanks for the suggestion though!

-Striker-

[farfromuman]

The biggest issue for me is that the DTS-MA tracks will not work, I can choose them but whatever was playing last stays.

I was able on few occasions to get the DTS-MA track to work but it required lots of switching between the audio tracks and then randomly it would play the right one. This alone tells me that something besides the codec is the problem. I am actually watching Bangkok Dangerous right now with the DTS-MA 7.1 ENG (down mixed to 5.1) even though the info screen shows AC3 5.1 French - I submitted a bug to Sage along with logs.

Video Renderer: EVR
H264 Video Decoder: Cyberlink H264
Audio Renderer: Default (SPDIF)
Audio Decoder: ffdshow

[Striker:WG]

Originally Posted by Striker:WG

as a further follow up, now that my BD ISO's are working in Sage I was able to test my config with more movies from within Sage.

In trying Saw VI the playback is flawless using the config listed in the post above.

I still have the same persistent issues with other movies though.

Batman The Dark Knight = Choppy playback

Quatum of Solace = Spinning Circle, forced to End-Task on Sage.

Is it possible its not the codecs, but its the MPEG Demuxer or some other component of Sage at fault? Can anyone verify that The Dark Knight plays back properly on their system through Sage?

-Striker-

Just thought I should revise my comment above here. Saw VI works flawlessly for a couple minutes, then it starts to skip

-Striker-

[Rico66]

I'm still puzzled how you managed the VC1 playback at all. I still get only exceptions.

And for the records, I can reproduce the Quantum of Solace issue. This is actually not a VC1 disc, it's AVC/H.264. But Sage seems to choke while identifying the main title of the disc.

So at least for now bdmv playback is more miss than hit, but hopefully these problems get addressed during the beta.

[Fuzzy]

Originally Posted by Rico66

I'm still puzzled how you managed the VC1 playback at all. I still get only exceptions.

And for the records, I can reproduce the Quantum of Solace issue. This is actually not a VC1 disc, it's AVC/H.264. But Sage seems to choke while identifying the main title of the disc.

So at least for now bdmv playback is more miss than hit, but hopefully these problems get addressed during the beta.

Just make sure you submit bug reports for those problems.

[Rico66]

Originally Posted by Fuzzy

Just make sure you submit bug reports for those problems.

Sure, I reported the vc1 problem already a couple of weeks ago. And I also reported the QoS issue a couple of minutes ago.