Intervideo Non CSS Decoder Looks better than everything else

[tangfj]

Okay, so last night I decided to give the Intervideo decoders a shot just to see what they were like. I wanted to give something else a try after exhausting the sonic decoder and the elecard decoder. I didn't think that the Intervideo decoder would look good, but to my surprise it ended up looking better than either of the 2 I mentioned above!

Even though, it is not a 100% clear picture (not as good as playing a recorded show through another media player, some reason I can only play my recorded files with the elecard player. oh well), it is good enough to be able to watch basketball games and other sports. In any case, with the latest Intervideo Non CSS decoders, I have Sage looking as good as ever.

I think this topic seems to be very hardware related though, because with the Sonic decoders I would get a really choppy playback and with the elecard decoder I would get a lot of tearing all over the place. This would happen regardless of whether I used VMR9, Overlay, or VMR7. With the Intervideo codecs I get smooth playback and the video is much sharper and clearer than with the other 2 decoders. Does anyone know if Sage was designed with the intervideo decoder in mind or maybe the intervideo decoder just works with the pvr-250mce better because they were designed to work with the 250?

It seems like there is a lot of information on this forum about the decoder. Anyway, if any of you know of any registry tweaks for the other 2 decoders I mentioned above, please share with the rest of us!

By the way, I'm using a FX5200 for my video card, and 2 pvr-250MCE's for my tuners in case anyone wanted to know what hardware I was using to get my results. I also used the registry tweaks recommended somewhere on this forum for the intervideo decoder.

[mlbdude]

What you are seeing is hardware deinterlacing with the Intervideo. Elecard does not support that and is best used with DScaler. Sonic does support it though and you should be able to get the same results. I have DXVA enabled via TT though and don't know how to do it outside of that.

I actually like the Hauppauge Intervideo ones myself. I don't use them as my first choice but don't bash them as much as other people do.

[tangfj]

I have TT as well. Is this the only way to make changes to the sonic decoder if all I have is TT? I don't think I have DXVA enabled in TT because I follwed a ffdshow guide on htpcnews. If I enable it do you think I'd get smoother and clearer playback with the sonic decoder enabled? The sonic decoders make dvd's on my computer look great, which is why I was wondering why it looked so bad with the sonic decoder in Sage, especially when the same recorded file played outside of Sage looked awesome.

[mlbdude]

Originally posted by tangfj
I have TT as well. Is this the only way to make changes to the sonic decoder if all I have is TT? I don't think I have DXVA enabled in TT because I follwed a ffdshow guide on htpcnews. If I enable it do you think I'd get smoother and clearer playback with the sonic decoder enabled? The sonic decoders make dvd's on my computer look great, which is why I was wondering why it looked so bad with the sonic decoder in Sage, especially when the same recorded file played outside of Sage looked awesome.

Yes same boat here. With DVD's since they are progressive they don't get deinterlaced so not running DXVA is not big deal. If you enable DXVA in TT you should now get great video playback with Sage, but you will loose ffdshow in TT.

Other than DXVA only DScaler does a good job deinterlacing. The methods available to the decoders by themselves are not so hot.

[kny3twalker]

there a registry key in Sonic video that says use DXVA and is set to one in mine

[tangfj]

Do you know what the registry key is? and will this only work with the sonic decoder bought from sonic? or will it work with the decoder included with theatertek?

[stanger89]

With TT, there's also a Control Panel applet that lets you adjust the Sonic decoder options.

[kny3twalker]

mine's the one with TT