PowerDVD Ultra (HD-DVD and Blu-Ray)

[overclkr]

I'm not sure that we are talking apples to apples here. I have h.264 files that work fine in PowerDVD (version 6.5 and version 7.1), and avivo seems to work, with CPU utilisation numbers only a little higher than you are claiming, but HD DVD files played back using the Xbox360 add on are problematic. Perhaps even authoring the files as a HD DVD disk is not perceived the same by PowerDVD Ultra.
Have you played a copy of (say) King Kong, and if so, do you still see appropriate behavior?

I will tonight when I get back from drinking lots of alcohol (pre new years practice). :D

On the PC I tested on now, my monitors (samsung 204B) are not HDCP compliant so I can only playback non protected content (have them hooked up DVI).

In my theater, I've got analog going to my G90 from my HTPC so I will try again tonight......

Cliff

[Gump28]

Ok, AVIVO DEFINITELY working on my PC. I have a .TS movie of City of Angels authored to HD DVD for playback in my Toshiba player.

With AVIVO (hardware acceleration) OFF, my CPU usage is approximately 19-26% on a Athlon X2 4800@2.6Ghz. With it ON my CPU usage stays UNDER 5% and ALL AVIVO sliders in CCC work with visible changes to the picture while playing.

Cliff

AVIVO (hardware acceleration) is not working with PD Ultra. I just finished some testing and CPU usage does not change. I did notice that when enable hardware acceleration in PD Ultra it disables the CLEV function, but as soon as you are playing a HD DVD and AVIVO (hardware acceleration) becomes unchecked or disabled the CLEV function is enabled. I tested with King Kong and every setting I could change in ATI CCC and PD Ultra .

[NorthernPaladin]

I just installed 7.1 Ultra and watched a bit of King Kong.

Without any overclocking and no Hardware acceleration CPU utilization was about 75-80%

With overclocking everything about 10% and enabling hardware acceleration CPU utilization dropped to about 55-60%

I was able to use menus to turn subs off without any problems and playback seemed smooth.

I am using VGA output

System:
----------
Amd X2 3800@2.2 (overclocked 10%)
1 Gig Ram DDR 400 (overclocked 10%)
Sapphire Radeon X1600XT (GPU Core @ 655 Mhz / Memory @752 Mhz which is overclocked approx 10%)
X-Box HD-DVD

[overclkr]

AVIVO (hardware acceleration) is not working with PD Ultra. I just finished some testing and CPU usage does not change. I did notice that when enable hardware acceleration in PD Ultra it disables the CLEV function, but as soon as you are playing a HD DVD and AVIVO (hardware acceleration) becomes unchecked or disabled the CLEV function is enabled. I tested with King Kong and every setting I could change in ATI CCC and PD Ultra .

Gump,

CLEV is SOFTWARE driven not hardware. You cannot use CLEV when in hardware mode.

Cliff

[overclkr]

I was able to use menus to turn subs off without any problems and playback seemed smooth.


Ah yes..... but how to turn it off by default for all movies without having to use the crappy mouse all the time to navigate through the menus for every single gosh darn movie?????? :mad:

Cliff

[NV5655]

Well, for those wondering about their own refunds, we are having a little trouble getting mine done. So far, after having found my order number, they appear to have found my purchase of Power DVD 6, and the upgrade to Power DVD 7, but not the full purchase of Power DVD 7.0 that I made a month after that.

All you have to do is contact element 5 with your order number and just say you would like a refund. If you mention anything else, for some reason they think of it as a tech support issue and will refer you back to cyberlink.

Good luck :). Here's hoping no one else gets confused by the mention of 'Hi Def Audio and Video' and accidentally purchases 7 instead of ultra..

[jji666]

Guys-

How can you tell if PowerDVD Ultra is downscaling HD DVDs to 540p? How can one tell if it's full res 1080p?

[Gump28]

Gump,

CLEV is SOFTWARE driven not hardware. You cannot use CLEV when in hardware mode.

Cliff

When using an ATI X1950pro agp video card PD Ultra disables hardware mode ( hardware acceleration ) when playing HD DVDs and allows the user to use CLEV. I was stating this to prove that Avivo was not working with PD Ultra.

[Gump28]

Guys-

How can you tell if PowerDVD Ultra is downscaling HD DVDs to 540p? How can one tell if it's full res 1080p?

I cant say for sure, but HD DVDs look better going from my pc at 1080p than they do going from my XBOX 360 at 1080i to my T.V.

[wynpalmer]

I just installed 7.1 Ultra and watched a bit of King Kong.

Without any overclocking and no Hardware acceleration CPU utilization was about 75-80%

With overclocking everything about 10% and enabling hardware acceleration CPU utilization dropped to about 55-60%

I was able to use menus to turn subs off without any problems and playback seemed smooth.

I am using VGA output

System:
----------
Amd X2 3800@2.2 (overclocked 10%)
1 Gig Ram DDR 400 (overclocked 10%)
Sapphire Radeon X1600XT (GPU Core @ 655 Mhz / Memory @752 Mhz which is overclocked approx 10%)
X-Box HD-DVD

Is your GPU HDCP compliant? I will try a non-HDCP X1600 pro instead of the X1600 PRO HDMI and see what happens over vga. Perhaps the problem is related to the DRM enforcement area somehow.
:(

[NorthernPaladin]

Is your GPU HDCP compliant? I will try a non-HDCP X1600 pro instead of the X1600 PRO HDMI and see what happens over vga. Perhaps the problem is related to the DRM enforcement area somehow.
:(


My X1600XT is not HDCP compliant as far as I know (it does not mention it anywhere on the box or website and I was not looking for HDCP card when I picked this up used as its final destination will be to Canon SX50 projector which is not HDCP compliant)

This is the card I have:
http://www.sapphiretech.com/en/products/graphics_specifications.php?gpid=134

Out of curiosity I decided to check what Cyberlink Advisor would report, and to my suprise the only thing not ready is the software! see results below:
Check Item HD DVD Ready?
Processor : AMD Athlon(tm) 64 X2 Dual Core Processor 3800+ Yes
System Memory : 1024 MB Yes
Operating System : Windows XP Service Pack 2 Yes
Graphics Card : Sapphire RADEON X1600 XT Yes
Graphics Card Driver : 8.321.0.0 Yes
HD DVD Drive : [J:] TOSHIBA DVD/HD X807616 Yes
Software Player : PowerDVD 7.1.2411.0 No
Display connection type : Analog Yes


I don't have a compliant HDCP device to test it out but if I get a chance I will see what happens if I connect it to non HDCP compliant CRT monitor via DVI (but expect it should not work or else there is a serious whole in security lol)

[NorthernPaladin]

Quick question to the AV experts.
Anyone know if PowerDVD cam be configured to play .MKV files (as in the Hi def clips you can download that are x264)
I normally play these with Media Player Classic / and CoreAVC codec but I heard that the new PowerDVD is actually better at H264 that CoreAVC now that PowerDVD uses hardware acceleration. I would love to have just one player for all my media types (dreams on....)

[wynpalmer]

My X1600XT is not HDCP compliant as far as I know (it does not mention it anywhere on the box or website and I was not looking for HDCP card when I picked this up used as its final destination will be to Canon SX50 projector which is not HDCP compliant)

This is the card I have:
http://www.sapphiretech.com/en/products/graphics_specifications.php?gpid=134

Out of curiosity I decided to check what Cyberlink Advisor would report, and to my suprise the only thing not ready is the software! see results below:
Check Item HD DVD Ready?
Processor : AMD Athlon(tm) 64 X2 Dual Core Processor 3800+ Yes
System Memory : 1024 MB Yes
Operating System : Windows XP Service Pack 2 Yes
Graphics Card : Sapphire RADEON X1600 XT Yes
Graphics Card Driver : 8.321.0.0 Yes
HD DVD Drive : [J:] TOSHIBA DVD/HD X807616 Yes
Software Player : PowerDVD 7.1.2411.0 No
Display connection type : Analog Yes


I don't have a compliant HDCP device to test it out but if I get a chance I will see what happens if I connect it to non HDCP compliant CRT monitor via DVI (but expect it should not work or else there is a serious whole in security lol)


Well, I swapped the Sapphire x1600pro HDMI for a HIS X1600 pro, and using a VGA connection the results are identical in terms of hardware acceleration and CPU utilisation when playing King Kong. So it's not an HDCP artifact.
The hardware acceleration is ticked until the first HD-DVD non black frame at which point it is unticked by the software. :(

[overclkr]

When using an ATI X1950pro agp video card PD Ultra disables hardware mode ( hardware acceleration ) when playing HD DVDs and allows the user to use CLEV. I was stating this to prove that Avivo was not working with PD Ultra.

Ok, I did my test tonight and my cpu usage was through the roof on Mission Impossible III. Weird though and I'm not having any playback issues and my
AVIVO functions work in CCC.

Explain that to me? I'm confused now.

Cliff

[wynpalmer]

Ok, I did my test tonight and my cpu usage was through the roof on Mission Impossible III. Weird though and I'm not having any playback issues and my
AVIVO functions work in CCC.

Explain that to me? I'm confused now.

Cliff

So, we still do not have any proof that Avivo is really being enabled in PD Ultra during HD DVD playback for at least the x1950 and x1600 cards.
The x1800 card that seems to work is anomalous.
Does anyone out there have an X1800 card that has the hardware acceleration box ticked during playback of HD DVD disks?

I will communicate to Cyberlink the results of this exchange.
Hopefully they can do something fast. :rolleyes:

[JohnHWman]

Well, I swapped the Sapphire x1600pro HDMI for a HIS X1600 pro, and using a VGA connection the results are identical in terms of hardware acceleration and CPU utilisation when playing King Kong. So it's not an HDCP artifact.
The hardware acceleration is ticked until the first HD-DVD non black frame at which point it is unticked by the software. :(
It would has been strange that HDCP issue would reacts on "H/W acceleration" issue but not worth to tried it (thanks wynpalmer :) )

Same behaviour with my Sapphire X1600Pro HDMI card :
The hardware acceleration is ticked (previously done) until the first HD-DVD non black frame at which point it is unticked by the software and greyed so you can't tick it back on until stops playing the HD-DVD movie.

I'm quite sure that hardware acceleration is NOT working on X1600 cards (and maybe on others as well) :(

Hope Cyberlink will do their best to solve this issue :rolleyes:

John

[jji666]

Sorry to beat this dead horse of a question, but I haven't seen a definitive answer: is there any report, window, screen, or statistic that will definitely determine whether PDVD Ultra is playing at 540p or 1080p other than just eyeballing? While the difference may be perceptibly apparent, I don't want my optimistic nature to lead me astray...

If I were actually getting 1080p I might want to buy me some of those HD DVDs.

The question arises due to a weird event on my brand new HTPC. While importing some music video media into TVedia on the PC (just indexing and doing a frame cap of the video to use as an icon) my HTPC froze up. After reboot I could no longer get any EDID information over the Sapphire x1600 Pro HDMI, via DVI cable, about my Westinhouse 47" LCD. I was forced to plug in both the VGA and DVI cables to get the EDID info over the VGA and the signal over DVI. Now HD/BD ADvisor shows the connection as analog but I am watching PDVD over the DVI connection. The image looks great. So somehow HDCP is being bypassed by the fact of its reporting the signal as analog, but it's still outputting via the DVI. (I assume that it is cloning the VGA image but it looks fine). Weird. But perhaps this is somehow a "hack" that gets you full res over 1080p on the Sapphire. Not that I could reproduce it...

[MidnightWatcher]

Yes, it is full resolution, not 960x540p like the Japanese version of WinDVD8 does.

[MidnightWatcher]

Ok, I did my test tonight and my cpu usage was through the roof on Mission Impossible III. Weird though and I'm not having any playback issues and my
AVIVO functions work in CCC.

Explain that to me? I'm confused now.

Cliff
You know I'm now getting a software issue. No matter what disc I try to play I get constant stuttering even if the CPU usage is not maxed. There is the occasional couple seconds of smooth playback, but then it drops frames/stutters.

I have an Asus X1950 Pro 256MB HDCP
E6600 w/ 2GB DDR2
Creative X-Fi
Samsung 46" DLP and 940BW (both HDCP Compliant)

Hardware acceleration will not stay on no matter what I try. It use to be smooth, but now this? Has anybody had this issue and know of a fix?

[Rathbone]

Does this stuttering occur on SPDIF-Out? If yes, I had the same problem with my Soundblaster Live!. Tried all sorts of drivers (also youp-pax and kx), but nothing helped.

Replaced that Creative crap (their drivers are terrible) with a cheap Hercules Fortissimo 4 and problems were gone. Looks like Creative cards have problems with downmixed HD-Sound.

[hdmi4ever]

The question arises due to a weird event on my brand new HTPC. While importing some music video media into TVedia on the PC (just indexing and doing a frame cap of the video to use as an icon) my HTPC froze up. After reboot I could no longer get any EDID information over the Sapphire x1600 Pro HDMI, via DVI cable, about my Westinhouse 47" LCD. I was forced to plug in both the VGA and DVI cables to get the EDID info over the VGA and the signal over DVI. Now HD/BD ADvisor shows the connection as analog but I am watching PDVD over the DVI connection. The image looks great. So somehow HDCP is being bypassed by the fact of its reporting the signal as analog, but it's still outputting via the DVI. (I assume that it is cloning the VGA image but it looks fine). Weird. But perhaps this is somehow a "hack" that gets you full res over 1080p on the Sapphire. Not that I could reproduce it...DVI (DVI-I, to be specific) can also carry an analog signal (which allows conversion to VGA via a simple adapter). Maybe that is what was happening.

[MidnightWatcher]

You know I'm now getting a software issue. No matter what disc I try to play I get constant stuttering even if the CPU usage is not maxed. There is the occasional couple seconds of smooth playback, but then it drops frames/stutters.

I have an Asus X1950 Pro 256MB HDCP
E6600 w/ 2GB DDR2
Creative X-Fi
Samsung 46" DLP and 940BW (both HDCP Compliant)

Hardware acceleration will not stay on no matter what I try. It use to be smooth, but now this? Has anybody had this issue and know of a fix?
I figured out what the problem was. I went into the BIOS and it turns out that my CPU was underclocked for some reason and was running at 1.6 Ghz instead of 2.4 Ghz (multiplier was at 6 instead of 9 x 266). Needless to say everything plays PERFECTLY now, and even without ATI hardware acceleration I'm only getting between 30 and 40% CPU usage consistently with King Kong on the E6600.

[jji666]

DVI (DVI-I, to be specific) can also carry an analog signal (which allows conversion to VGA via a simple adapter). Maybe that is what was happening.

I don't think so. It is going into the DVI port on my television and I also can tell the visual difference with the digital connection -- a little less signal noise -- so I think it is just broken, and therefore working.

I think what happened is that Cyberlink rushed this software out for x-mas and there are some significant bugs as well as this BD-HD duality, which is also a pain in the butt. That is not to let Sapphire/ATI off the hook; I suspect that their driver implementation is also problematic and that they had never tried this with any software application that would require an HDCP handshake.

I'm going the Invidia route, MSI NX7600GT DIAMOND PLUS, and hopefully this one will just work over digital, no HDCP problems, and no weird driver issues afflicting the HDMI output on this like with the Sapphire.

[Tinker]

I'm going the Invidia route, MSI NX7600GT DIAMOND PLUS, and hopefully this one will just work over digital, no HDCP problems, and no weird driver issues afflicting the HDMI output on this like with the Sapphire.

Good move. The MSI's has worked for me with no issues. Just couldnt figure why so many pple are so stuck on trying to get the X1600 to work since its so prob-matic. The MSI cards are not that expensive in the US (a lot more in Canada tho).

[hdmi4ever]

I don't think so. It is going into the DVI port on my television and I also can tell the visual difference with the digital connection -- a little less signal noise -- so I think it is just broken, and therefore working.It doesn't mean anything that it's going to the DVI port on your TV, unless your TV's port is strictly DVI-D rather than DVI-I. DVI to DVI can still be analog.

Sometimes the digital connection can look worse than the analog, depending on various settings on the TV and graphics card, so appearance isn't a reliable indicator. You'll have to use other indicators to be sure that the TV is receiving a digital signal.

[bowser15]

I seem to have a hardware acceleration issue as well....

I have:

- PowerDVD BD edition 7.2

-Asus 7600GT nvidia card (the one with HDMI and HDCP) with latest drivers

-Pentium 830 Processor (dual core 3.0ghz)

-1.0gb ram

-X-Fi Fatality Sound Card

-Sony BWU-100A Blu-Ray Drive



Here lies the rub...

With Blu-Ray movies that seem to use older video/audio compression such as T-2 Judgment Day, The Mission Impossible Trilogy, etc. PowerDVD seems to do a good job of using hardware acceleration (CPU usage of about 20-50%), however, on Behind Enemy Lines which states it uses AVC at 18mbps, the Cpu Usages jumps to 80-100% and when it reaches this level it stutters and frames are dropped.

Does anyone else notice this with there blu-ray setup? I realize the processor is just below specs according to Cyberlink but it hasn't had problems on the previous said blu-ray movies.

[arfster]

With Blu-Ray movies that seem to use older video/audio compression such as T-2 Judgment Day, The Mission Impossible Trilogy, etc. PowerDVD seems to do a good job of using hardware acceleration (CPU usage of about 20-50%), however, on Behind Enemy Lines which states it uses AVC at 18mbps, the Cpu Usages jumps to 80-100% and when it reaches this level it stutters and frames are dropped.


That sounds about right. The Cyberlink recommended stats are really to cover AVC, while VC1 doesn't need as much CPU power and MPEG2 is even less than that. Thus, you can run most discs fine, but the AVC one trips you up. Unfortunately, the 7600GT only helps a little bit with AVC acceleration, despite its speed. Most of the work is done by your processor.

Can you overclock a bit? It's really the only way I can see for you, as your machine is likely having to deal with video peaks quite a bit higher than that 18mbit average. Unfortunately, a 3ghz pentium D is not going to be able to handle 25-30mbit AVC, it's just too much of a load.

[bowser15]

Can you overclock a bit? It's really the only way I can see for you, as your machine is likely having to deal with video peaks quite a bit higher than that 18mbit average.

I thought about overclocking, I'll look into that more. Maybe faster processors have come down a bit too. I'm also hoping some updates will come along that will help. Thanks for the help.

[bowser15]

I can't hardly change anything in the bios let alone overclock, thanks sony. Anyone else have any ideas?

[SpHeRe31459]

Hate to say it, what about ditching the CPU for a faster model? The Penitum D 830 is a bit slower then recommended.Cyberlink recommends a 3.4Ghz or faster Pentium D family CPU. A Pentium D 945 is ~$170. Too bad the system isn't newer and thus Core2Duo capable.

[bowser15]

Hate to say it, what about ditching the CPU for a faster model? The Penitum D 830 is a bit slower then recommended.Cyberlink recommends a 3.4Ghz or faster Pentium D family CPU. A Pentium D 945 is ~$170. Too bad the system isn't newer and thus Core2Duo capable.

I'm thinking the same thing

[kmj0577]

The new version of PowerDVD seems to be doing well for me. Played King Kong today with no chopiness whatsoever on a X2 4400+ socket 939 with 2GB of RAM on XP with hardware acceleration on a GeForce 7950GT. It also plays titles I couldn't before like Superman II.

[benjaidafufukil]

Happy NY everyone,

Since I still haven t found out why the combo 7950GX2 and forceware 93.71 (or 92.91 or 93.81) don t work with PDVD Ultra 7.1, I am going to borrow a 7950 GT and a 7600 GT from a friend.
I m just gouing to plug the card in without reinstalling WinXP, and we ll see if the advisor gives me a green light for the drivers.

kmj0577
The new version of PowerDVD seems to be doing well for me. Played King Kong today with no chopiness whatsoever on a X2 4400+ socket 939 with 2GB of RAM on XP with hardware acceleration on a GeForce 7950GT. It also plays titles I couldn't before like Superman II.
What new version? Pdvd Ultra 7.3?

Thx,

Ben

[kmj0577]

Happy NY everyone,

Since I still haven t found out why the combo 7950GX2 and forceware 93.71 (or 92.91 or 93.81) don t work with PDVD Ultra 7.1, I am going to borrow a 7950 GT and a 7600 GT from a friend.
I m just gouing to plug the card in without reinstalling WinXP, and we ll see if the advisor gives me a green light for the drivers.


What new version? Pdvd Ultra 7.3?

Thx,

Ben
Nope, 7.1, the version that a few people seem to be having problems with.

[Don_S]

I am also getting smooth playback with PowerDVD Ultra 7.1 on an x2 4600+ CPU, 1 gb system memory and EVGA 7950GT video card with 512 mb video memory. Using 93.71 forceware drivers.

[ShagMan]

After I installed reclock, I'm getting 100% smooth playback.

For some reason, I'm getting two instances of reclock in my system tray, is that normal?

[clehner]

After I installed reclock, I'm getting 100% smooth playback.

For some reason, I'm getting two instances of reclock in my system tray, is that normal?

Yes, there are two instances active but only one is working (either the one for the digital output or for the analog output, just click on both, you'll see, what I mean).

Do you have HDCP working as well?

[ShagMan]

No, I have a 7950gx2 and HDCP isn't working for me... I'm using DVI-I to VGA. I'm on the pre-order list for a HC5000 front projector, and I'll be doing more testing at that time... in the end, the HC5000 has 1080x1920 over VGA, so I'll probably just be doing that anyway.

[capitano]

After I installed reclock, I'm getting 100% smooth playback.


which refresh rate do you use?

[benjaidafufukil]

Hi,

Shagman
No, I have a 7950gx2 and HDCP isn't working for me... I'm using DVI-I to VGA. I'm on the pre-order list for a HC5000 front projector, and I'll be doing more testing at that time... in the end, the HC5000 has 1080x1920 over VGA, so I'll probably just be doing that anyway.

That s funny, mine has a green light in the advisor for HDCP but not for the drivers even after clean XP install and drivers 93.71

I m trying new cards tonight to see f the prob comes from the gfx card. I ll post an answer tomorrow.

Ben

[benjaidafufukil]

Laugh all you want, I dont find this funny....

http://boss.csteam.free.fr/MDR.JPG

http://boss.csteam.free.fr/MDR2.JPG

Thx,

Ben

[talon95]

Ben,

My fresh install of XP has the same problem, but PDVD Ultra works anyway. I can't explain it. My old install that I still have on another partition does not have this problem (Advisor showing red for the driver).

That probably doesn't help much, but the point is that PDVD can work even when the advisor says otherwise.

I'm connected DVI-->HDMI BTW.

[scoombs]

This happens to me (universal logo plays for abut 2 seconds, then snow) when I forget to disable my clone display. The round multi-pin connector on my X1950 pro is for a component breakout cable and I believe going with component you would make HDCP a non issue since it is analog.

I get this exact behavior in two instances as well when running PowerDVD BD edition:

1.) I pass the HDMI output through my AV receiver, rather than directly to the display (Toshiba HD-A1 through receiver works fine)

2.) If Powerstrip software is running when I try to play a BD disk

[ShagMan]

which refresh rate do you use?

I have to use 60Hz... the VGA input on my PLV-Z3 only does 60, if I try 72Hz or 120Hz, it gets a little weird looking, and isn't quite 1:1 pixel mapping.

[JohnHWman]

2.) If Powerstrip software is running when I try to play a BD disk
What do you mean exactly ? Do you mean that having PS running in the taskbar prevent the PDVD from playing protected material ?

John

[deandob]

Just received my HD-DVD Xbox drive yesterday and its working fine on the Xbox, however as expected when using PowerDVD over a DVI cable as my projector is not HDCP compliant the picture shows for 1 second then I get an invalid hardware error on PowerDVD.

Now as I have a DVI-I cable and my projector can switch between DVI-Digital and DVI-Analog, I thought I could just select the analog input on my projector's DVI input, however I can't get that to work. I use a Gigabyte 6600GT which should also support DVI-I.

Does anyone know how to get the DVI-Analog signal to work on Nvidia cards? Is there a software switch that has to be set or do NVidia cards output both digital and analog on the DVI port? There is very little information on the net about DVI-Analog that I can find. As I have a 30 foot DVI cable I'd prefer not to purchase another VGA cable due to the expense, although it is possible a DVI to VGA adaptor will work but the DVI-Analog option should also.

I have also read that if you have a VGA monitor connected then PowerDVD will also output over DVI - is this true?

Any help appreciated.

Regards,
Dean.

[DaveFi]

Instead of me going back and rereading this whole thread, I gather that just buying the HD-DVD drive w/PowerDVD Ultra wouldn't be enough to get HD-DVD playback?
I'd still need to buy a HDMI enabled videocard on top of that?

[stanger89]

Well you need a card (and display) with HDCP if you're using DVI (it doesn't have to be HDMI).

If you're using analog, you should be OK without an HDCP card.

[bowser15]

Does anyone know how to get the DVI-Analog signal to work on Nvidia cards?

It's not a software switch. The Analog signal comes from the actual analog port on your video card. You can carry this signal through the dvi cable by using an analog to dvi adaptor on your video card's vga port. So VGA out -> VGA-DVI Adaptor -> DVI port on your projector.

[NV5655]

After a bunch of confusion getting it setup, I was finally able to hook up Power DVD Ultra today.

It looks pretty clear over VGA. Does it look any sharper over DVI or HDMI?

[deandob]

Thanks Bowser,

I think I have worked it out. My 40' DVI cable is DVI-D not DVI-I (it is missing the 4 small pins around the single flat pin) so I have no hope doing analog over this cable without additional cost. I have found an old thread here about long runs of VGA cable using cat5, so I'm off to the electronics shop and will fire up the soldering iron for a cheap temporary DIY cable. I want to eventually swap my projector out for a HDCP model but not at this stage.

Trying PowerDVD and King Kong, PowerDVD crashes after the opening HD DVD trailor (which now work fine over VGA). So I have a software problem I have to debug on my AMD 3800+ with 6600GT card. For some reason the HD advisor gives me a red light on the 6600GT yet it a supported card on the Cyberlink site for using it over VGA.

Regards,
Dean

[benjaidafufukil]

TALON95
Ben,

My fresh install of XP has the same problem, but PDVD Ultra works anyway. I can't explain it. My old install that I still have on another partition does not have this problem (Advisor showing red for the driver).

That probably doesn't help much, but the point is that PDVD can work even when the advisor says otherwise.

I'm connected DVI-->HDMI BTW.


Thx for the answer. The problem is that the driver shows red in the advisor, and when I read a movie, it starts fine and after 2-3 seconds I get an error 0103 saying that I m not following the HDCP chain and I should check the advisor.

This is really pissing me off! I have KK 2K5, V for Vendetta, Kiss Kiss Bang Bang, The Fugitive, and MI 1,2,3 waiting for me. I should be receiving my Sony Pearl this week and I can t watch a damn thing except dvds.

I tried another gfx card yesterday night (Asus 7600 GT) and got the exact same problem. Is there anyway to avoid this.

I also have a DVI -> HDMI adapter for my current Mitsu HC3000 but I don t think that has anything to do with the prob. I don t use clone display, and I have reinstalled fresh XP Pro SP2s for each test during the past days.

I m going mad!

Thx,

Ben

[Rathbone]

I have to use 60Hz... the VGA input on my PLV-Z3 only does 60, if I try 72Hz or 120Hz, it gets a little weird looking, and isn't quite 1:1 pixel mapping.

Which settings in Reclock do you use, especially which fps setting? Reclock item is yellow cause it can't detect correct speed.

[Don_S]

Thx for the answer. The problem is that the driver shows red in the advisor, and when I read a movie, it starts fine and after 2-3 seconds I get an error 0103 saying that I m not following the HDCP chain and I should check the advisor.

This is really pissing me off! I have KK 2K5, V for Vendetta, Kiss Kiss Bang Bang, The Fugitive, and MI 1,2,3 waiting for me. I should be receiving my Sony Pearl this week and I can t watch a damn thing except dvds.

I tried another gfx card yesterday night (Asus 7600 GT) and got the exact same problem. Is there anyway to avoid this.

I also have a DVI -> HDMI adapter for my current Mitsu HC3000 but I don t think that has anything to do with the prob. I don t use clone display, and I have reinstalled fresh XP Pro SP2s for each test during the past days.

I m going mad!

Thx,

Ben

Have you tried playing back again immediately after you get that message? I too get that message when I first try to play a movie, but I cancel out of the dialog box and hit play again and it plays just fine...

[benjaidafufukil]

Nope Don, doesn t work for me. I tied cancelling running same thing, movie starts and then the message pops up.. :(

[ShagMan]

Which settings in Reclock do you use, especially which fps setting? Reclock item is yellow cause it can't detect correct speed.

I use 23.9xx in the two settings boxes for the types it can't detect.

And yes, it's yellow on both instances.

[wynpalmer]

The latest on PowerDVD Ultra and Avivo- direct from Cyberlink.

Thank you for contacting CyberLink Online Support.

Please note that we have sent your concern to our product development team and according to them Some ATI driver don't support MPEG-4 and VC-1 hardware acceleration. If HD/BD title use MPEG-4 or VC-1, the function (hardware acceleration) will be gray out.


I have left a support ticket with ATI telling them what Cyberlink has reported and asking if any of their drivers do support these playback standards.
I have also asked Cyberlink which drivers do support this capability. The phrase "some driivers" seems dubious and may be just a delaying tactic by them (again!).

[jji666]

Just a quick rant about Cyberlink and their lazy support team: I opened a ticket with a VERY
specific question about the Sapphire x1600 HDMI Pro and driver version etc., as specific as the questions on this forum. Their response? A link to their precious "systems requirements" page for PowerDVD Ultra. I sure am glad I waited over a week for them to point me to a page that says I need an ATI x1600! If you are going to sell HD playback software for $100 and not get the HDCP implementation correctly, you need to do more than that! They had better get their act together, and that includes getting HDCP to work with ATI drivers AND getting a version of the software that plays both Blu Ray and HD DVD without having reinstalls or dual boot systems! (OK Sapphire isn't any better. All they did was give me a different email address at Sapphire tech support to email, and that query has not received a response). No one wants to touch this. Go Nvidia and Intervideo if you can...

[mmace]

Just a quick rant about Cyberlink and their lazy support team: I opened a ticket with a VERY
specific question about the Sapphire x1600 HDMI Pro and driver version etc., as specific as the questions on this forum. Their response? A link to their precious "systems requirements" page for PowerDVD Ultra. I sure am glad I waited over a week for them to point me to a page that says I need an ATI x1600! If you are going to sell HD playback software for $100 and not get the HDCP implementation correctly, you need to do more than that! They had better get their act together, and that includes getting HDCP to work with ATI drivers AND getting a version of the software that plays both Blu Ray and HD DVD without having reinstalls or dual boot systems! (OK Sapphire isn't any better. All they did was give me a different email address at Sapphire tech support to email, and that query has not received a response). No one wants to touch this. Go Nvidia and Intervideo if you can...I have 2 support tickets with cyberlink, once has never been answered as they give me a generic answer everytime and I reply asking them to answer my actual question which they never have (3 months and still waiting!)

the 2nd one was about PowerDVD Ultra and the fact that their site says Blu-ray AND hd-dvd (not "or" giving the impression you can play both), the 1st reply was generic as usual, then I complained and got a real answer (posted earlier in this thread: http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?p=9273858&&#post9273858)

[NV5655]

I've been rather lucky so far in that I have not received a generic response, and they wrote me back three times so far. Now I have completed the refund proccess and will wait three more days to see if element 5 delivers. If I didn't like the Power DVD Software so much for it's simplicity, I would have gone with Intervideo, who's product I have never tried before..

[Rathbone]

specific question about the Sapphire x1600 HDMI Pro and driver version etc., as specific as the questions on this forum. Their response? A link to their precious "systems requirements" page for PowerDVD Ultra. I sure am glad I waited over a week for them to point me to a page that says I need an ATI x1600! If you are going to sell HD playback software for $100 and not get the HDCP implementation correctly, you need to do more than that! They had better get their act together, and that includes getting HDCP to work with ATI drivers ....

On my recommendation some of my friends bought X1600 HDMI Pro cards (PCIe and AGP), use the Sapphire HDMI driver and no one has a problem with the PowerDVD HDCP chain. TVs are various LG and Toshiba models. I don't think that PowerDVD is the faulty element in your HDCP chain.

But you are right about Cyberlink support: It just baaaad! :mad:

[jji666]

On my recommendation some of my friends bought X1600 HDMI Pro cards (PCIe and AGP), use the Sapphire HDMI driver and no one has a problem with the PowerDVD HDCP chain. TVs are various LG and Toshiba models. I don't think that PowerDVD is the faulty element in your HDCP chain.

But you are right about Cyberlink support: It just baaaad! :mad:

I'm skeptical. Are you saying that people have the PCIe version of the Sapphire x16500 Pro HDMI running with PowerDVD over HDMI or DVI digitally at 1080p and watching HD DVDs? Are you sure it is a digital connection?

I think these Sapphire cards are flaky.

[Rathbone]

They have HDMI connections. Every package had the big HDCP ready sticker (no sticker -> no HDCP!) on it. But the TVs are only 720p models. No one has FullHD! We watch HD-DVDs on 1366x768 resolution. But I cannot believe that it makes a difference, if you have 720p or 1080p. Did you actually try to play the HD-DVD with 720p resolution?

I personally have to set 720p60 resolution on my LG to activate the HDCP chain (-> Advisor gives green connection) and then go to 1366x768 (->Advisor green). If I directly choose the higher resolution, HDCP is not active, PowerDVD denies playback and Advisor is red. Weird but true!

[scoombs]

What do you mean exactly ? Do you mean that having PS running in the taskbar prevent the PDVD from playing protected material ?

John

Yes, if PowerStrip is running in the taskbar and I initiate a playback in PowerDVD 6.6 BD edition (patched OEM ver that came with Sony drive), it will play for 1-2 seconds and then the screen will turn to snow and I need to reboot.

[JasonATL]

Does anyone have this problem with PowerDVD?

Every blu-ray disc that I try to play, the image is zoomed in (about 4x or so) regardless of whether I use full screen or have it resized in a window. I cannot get a complete image on the screen. I only see about 1/4 of the image. It worked for a few times on two blu-ray discs. But, after that, now I can't even get the same discs to play properly -- always get the zoomed in image.

I got a generic reply from Cyberlink instructing me to uninstall and then reinstall the software. I've now done that more than 5 times as well as updating video drivers, etc. If anyone has had this issue and resolved it, please let me know.

Thanks.

[duhonedd]

Thx for the answer. The problem is that the driver shows red in the advisor, and when I read a movie, it starts fine and after 2-3 seconds I get an error 0103 saying that I m not following the HDCP chain and I should check the advisor.

This is really pissing me off! I have KK 2K5, V for Vendetta, Kiss Kiss Bang Bang, The Fugitive, and MI 1,2,3 waiting for me. I should be receiving my Sony Pearl this week and I can t watch a damn thing except dvds.

I tried another gfx card yesterday night (Asus 7600 GT) and got the exact same problem. Is there anyway to avoid this.

I also have a DVI -> HDMI adapter for my current Mitsu HC3000 but I don t think that has anything to do with the prob. I don t use clone display, and I have reinstalled fresh XP Pro SP2s for each test during the past days.

I m going mad!

Thx,

Ben

I had similar trouble. I would get a red mark for the driver and display in hd adviser. And I would get the trouble with it stopping after 2 seconds or so with the error using either dvi or vga. Ended up being caused by a quartz.dll hack I had done a long time ago to fix 1080i stuttering issues with ota hdtv. put the latest quartz.dll back and all my issues went away. Works perfectly using a dvi to hdmi cable to a samsung 720p dlp set now.

athlon 64 x2 4400
visiontek x1950 pro agp hdcp
power dvd ultra
2g ram

[wynpalmer]

Latest on the PowerDVD Avivo issue. Cyberlink had previously claimed that "some" ATI drivers do not support mpeg-4 and vc-1 playback with avivo, and I asked which ones do.
Their response is to defer to another department and say that if I don't get an answer back in two weeks that I should query them again. Unbelievable!
So, all you xbox360 add-on users out there trying to get good playback on non-mpeg2 disks using avivo, well you can just forget about it for now.

[MidnightWatcher]

Latest on the PowerDVD Avivo issue. Cyberlink had previously claimed that "some" ATI drivers do not support mpeg-4 and vc-1 playback with avivo, and I asked which ones do.
Their response is to defer to another department and say that if I don't get an answer back in two weeks that I should query them again. Unbelievable!
So, all you xbox360 add-on users out there trying to get good playback on non-mpeg2 disks using avivo, well you can just forget about it for now.
I have an X1950Pro and cannot enable hardware acceleration, but my HD DVD discs play perfectly fine. I get on average between 30 - 40% CPU usage with my E6600. At this point, hardware acceleration means nothing to me right now since the picture quality is superb and stutter-free.

[tubesguy]

Hi folks -

I've been tearing what little hair I have left out for the last several days trying to get up and running. C2D 6300, 7600GT, 1 gig ram, analog out to a 1024x768 lcd, 7.1. All green lights (except for the processor, it recommends an upgrade, but it's not red) in the Advisor.

I get no warnings, no messages of any kind, but it appears that 32 seconds into King Kong, it just stops, and the display is black (the whole time, no video of any type has been displayed). Hitting play doesn't advance it, and I can't display the title menu or the root menu. No matter what I try, every time, it's 32 seconds in, and nothing.

Any suggestions would be appreciated. TIA - Pat

[Nayr2]

Just to throw in, I just bought a Sapphire X1650 XT and am having no problems playing video at 1080P through DVI to my Westinghouse 42". It was one of the cheapest HDCP cards I could get, and it has a nice copper heatsync that is quite quiet in my HTPC.

[wynpalmer]

I have an X1950Pro and cannot enable hardware acceleration, but my HD DVD discs play perfectly fine. I get on average between 30 - 40% CPU usage with my E6600. At this point, hardware acceleration means nothing to me right now since the picture quality is superb and stutter-free.

I can get 40-50% CPU utilisation with "normal" video quality using my x1600pro HDMI and an overclocked Athlon 64 X2 4400+. Going to "best" quality causes problems- at least with mpeg-4 and VC-1 disks (like batman begins and King Kong).
The picture quality is superb in all cases, but I think that it's better in "best".
So, I too can play HD -DVD without stuttering etc, but surely it's not unreasonable to expect that ATI and Cyberlink could actually do what they advertise that they do?
I'll order a 1950pro and see if it's any better. :D

[SpHeRe31459]

I wouldn't bother ordering a 1950Pro, ATI's acceleration doesn't seem to be doing much and bearly varries from model to model:
http://www.anandtech.com/video/showdoc.aspx?i=2886&p=4

[MidnightWatcher]

I wouldn't bother ordering a 1950Pro, ATI's acceleration doesn't seem to be doing much and bearly varries from model to model:
http://www.anandtech.com/video/showdoc.aspx?i=2886&p=4
My guess is that the drivers need to be tweaked. I just wish they would add sharpening.

[Pino72]

I can get 40-50% CPU utilisation with "normal" video quality using my x1600pro HDMI and an overclocked Athlon 64 X2 4400+. Going to "best" quality causes problems- at least with mpeg-4 and VC-1 disks (like batman begins and King Kong).
The picture quality is superb in all cases, but I think that it's better in "best".
So, I too can play HD -DVD without stuttering etc, but surely it's not unreasonable to expect that ATI and Cyberlink could actually do what they advertise that they do?
I'll order a 1950pro and see if it's any better. :D

Just a general note on the video quality settings: This makes quite a difference!
As a reference please download one of the new simpsons trailers, take a look at the yellow "simpsons movie" Logo just after the poor little bunny gets hit. You can clearly notice how smooth the borders of the typo are with "best" settings and how bad it gets when using good, normal etc.! This clearly makes a difference (and a huge difference in cpu use too!), remains to be seen if you notice that in a "not animated" movie with real shots!? Maybe some screenshots from a trailer with the different settings and a poll which is which might help :confused: !?

[mmace]

they need to update this software.

With todays announcements of HD-DVD writers and LG's Blu-ray burner with HD-DVD reader then people are going to need to play BOTH formats and not have to choose one or the other like you currently do!

[tfboy]

they need to update this software.

With todays announcements of HD-DVD writers and LG's Blu-ray burner with HD-DVD reader then people are going to need to play BOTH formats and not have to choose one or the other like you currently do!
Can you actually buy an HD-DVD standalone drive with IDE / SATA interface for a PC ?!? You can already buy a variety of BD burners, but I've yet to see an HD-DVD drive available as a PC component. :mad:

The NEC HR-1100A (in the Tosh HD-DVD player) disappeared from the market as a component before it was made available. :mad:

It's incredibly frustrating that you can't yet buy a dedicated transport for HD-DVD despite the format being out for well over a year (apart from the xbox 360 addon drive). :rolleyes:

Is anyone aware of such a drive commercially available or is the xbox USB2 drive the only option at the moment :confused:

[mmace]

LG's Blu-ray burner & HD-DVD drive:
http://www.engadgethd.com/2007/01/05/lgs-super-multi-blue-ggw-h10n-a-blu-ray-writer-and-hd-dvd-r/

Toshiba's HD-DVD writer:
http://www.engadgethd.com/2007/01/05/toshiba-unveils-sd-h903a-hd-dvd-burner-for-pcs/

both to be unveiled at CES next week

[Tinker]

LG's Blu-ray burner & HD-DVD drive:
http://www.engadgethd.com/2007/01/05/lgs-super-multi-blue-ggw-h10n-a-blu-ray-writer-and-hd-dvd-r/

Toshiba's HD-DVD writer:
http://www.engadgethd.com/2007/01/05/toshiba-unveils-sd-h903a-hd-dvd-burner-for-pcs/

both to be unveiled at CES next week
Lets hope that the Toshi is a lot cheaper then the price quessimate for the LG unit. Too bad the LG will only write BD. It will be intresting to see these units reviewed.

[scoombs]

Lets hope that the Toshi is a lot cheaper then the price quessimate for the LG unit. Too bad the LG will only write BD. It will be intresting to see these units reviewed.

My guess is the Toshiba will go for $250.

[tubesguy]

Well, my black screen problem described in post #319 was resolved very simply: I just had to have my USB audio device installed.

My remaining problem is that with my C2D 6300 and 1 gig memory, my CPU usage on KK is fairly steadily 100%. This is with a 7600GT, 92.91 or 93.71 drivers, and hardware acceleration off. Checking acceleration "on" causes PowerDVD to crash. This has been consistent with the former 6600 vid card and the new one, and both before and after a fresh install of the drivers and of PDVD. The playback is basically unwatchable, with constant stuttering. Again, any suggestions? TIA - Pat

[NV5655]

Got my full refund!

Took a while, but element 5 came through for me. Now I don't feel so ripped off after purchasing 7.0 :).

[Ned Nederlander]

Does anyone have this problem with PowerDVD?

Every blu-ray disc that I try to play, the image is zoomed in (about 4x or so) regardless of whether I use full screen or have it resized in a window. I cannot get a complete image on the screen. I only see about 1/4 of the image. It worked for a few times on two blu-ray discs. But, after that, now I can't even get the same discs to play properly -- always get the zoomed in image.

I got a generic reply from Cyberlink instructing me to uninstall and then reinstall the software. I've now done that more than 5 times as well as updating video drivers, etc. If anyone has had this issue and resolved it, please let me know.

Thanks.

Jason if you have an Nvidia card try changing your 3D setting in the Nvidia control panel to "faster" rather than "quality", I don't know why but it worked for me.

[SpHeRe31459]

Well, my black screen problem described in post #319 was resolved very simply: I just had to have my USB audio device installed.

My remaining problem is that with my C2D 6300 and 1 gig memory, my CPU usage on KK is fairly steadily 100%. This is with a 7600GT, 92.91 or 93.71 drivers, and hardware acceleration off. Checking acceleration "on" causes PowerDVD to crash. This has been consistent with the former 6600 vid card and the new one, and both before and after a fresh install of the drivers and of PDVD. The playback is basically unwatchable, with constant stuttering. Again, any suggestions? TIA - Pat
Hate to say it but you may have to do a clean install of Windows, since it sounds like it isn't just the video card and/or drivers. I don't have Cyberlink Ultra installed currently, but when I was doing acceleration testing with the PowerDVD 6 + H.264 pack I found it to be really finicky.

Does other video playback properly in PowerDVD? ie: standard DVD or perhaps downloaded H.264 video clips, etc.

[Vern Dias]

I would second the clean install.

Also, based on my experience getting both HD DVD and BD running, I would use a vanilla XP SP2 install. Don't use MCE 2005.

No patches, no updates. However, make sure you use the latest mobo drivers, video drivers, audio drivers, LAN drivers, etc.

When you get it working, take a Ghost image at this point!!!!! Then you can play with updates/patches all you want.

PowerDVD is very fragile when it comes to the environment you are running it on.

Vern

[jerrytdss]

AMD 3800 X2 (Dual Core)
1 gig memory
ATI x1600 AGP
Xbox 360 drive
Powerdvd 7.1
VGA to 1080P display

Plugged the drive in, windows found the drive and loaded drivers.
Installed Powerdvd, inserted King Kong. Works perfect not a studder or flicker.
CPU runs between 60% and 80%

Cyberlink has done very well with PowerDVD 7.1

[tubesguy]

Thanks guys, I've got all day today to work on these suggestions, and I'll get it going, I'm sure. - Pat

[jji666]

Guys-

Everyone here has been so helpful I will try to return the favor. I finally got the Xbox-360 add on drive / PowerDVD Ultra combo working like a charm over a digital HDMI connection. What did I do? I spent hours and days rebooting and reconfiguring trying to get my Sapphire x1600 pro HDMI card working. Not only did it have HDCP problems but it eventually stopped recognizing my display over any digital connection. It wouldn't even output over DVI much less play HD DVD movies over DVI. So I ditched that piece of dookie and got myself an Nvidia NX7600GT Diamond Plus. Not only does this card actually advertise as HDCP compliant, it is! Everything works amazingly well now. And other system instabilities seem to have disappeared. So that Sapphire card simply is CHEAP, for a reason. Anyway, realize that an extra $80 is a good bargain at the hourly rate it takes to fiddle with a Sapphire card, and go get an Nvidia card with properly implemented drivers!

Good luck. I will no longer need to compulsively check this forum for updates on how to get the ATI junk running.

For those who have the ATI running (Rathbone), no insult intended. Kudos for getting it going. I just want anyone who is still struggling with it to know that there is a solution, if you still got an RMA period left...

Oh, and the Nvidia card is not loud as long as you aren't 3D gaming.

[JasonATL]

Jason if you have an Nvidia card try changing your 3D setting in the Nvidia control panel to "faster" rather than "quality", I don't know why but it worked for me.
That fixed it Ned! Thanks! I thought I had tried it all, but this is the one thing that I had not tried. Amazing that no one at Cyberlink could come up with that. They had told me that they would refund my money. Now I won't asked them to. Seems to work fine.

[tubesguy]

No luck here. Did everything suggested and everything I could think of, including updating the BIOS of the motherboard, a clean install of XP, many more installs, removals, and reinstalls of the drivers, both 92.91 and 93.71, and of PDVD, and it still pegs at 100% CPU usage.

I give up. If anyone wants to buy the XBox drive for (relatively cheap) please PM me. I'll RMA the new video card and try to get a refund on the useless (for me) software. - Pat

[Vern Dias]

You did install the chipset drivers after you reinstalled XP, right? XP with SP2? Do you have onboard audio you can try? Have you downloaded all the latest drivers for the onboard IO from the mobo manufacturers web site? King Kong is not a good disc to be testing with. PDVD has known problems with it. Try a Warners HD DVD.

Vern

[Vern Dias]

There is a new NVidia WHQL driver version (97.92) out there http://downloads.guru3d.com/downloadget.php?id=1547&file=7&evp=d64ee59e8e8164db276152ba55c128fa for those with 8800 cards.

Downloading now, I haven't tested with them yet.

Vern

[MidnightWatcher]

No luck here. Did everything suggested and everything I could think of, including updating the BIOS of the motherboard, a clean install of XP, many more installs, removals, and reinstalls of the drivers, both 92.91 and 93.71, and of PDVD, and it still pegs at 100% CPU usage.

I give up. If anyone wants to buy the XBox drive for (relatively cheap) please PM me. I'll RMA the new video card and try to get a refund on the useless (for me) software. - Pat
Are you using the official non-beta drivers for all of your hardware released by the manufacturer? (Sound, video, motherboard)? Run CPU-ID and post a screenshot for us also. This is where I discovered that my CPU somehow was underclocked (E6600). Have you also tried hardware acceleration after the clean XP install (and I presume that you did a reformat and not just install over the current installation?)

[tubesguy]

Appreciate the suggestions and encouragement guys, but ...

Vern: I've installed the chipset drivers, with no effect. Yes, XP w/SP2. No onboard audio that I'm aware of or have enabled. (I get a black screen after 32 seconds if the M-Audio Transit is not installed, so not too sure I can screw around with audio.) In answer to an earlier question, regular DVDs work fine, with about 7-11% CPU utilization.

If I can rent another HD-DVD I will, but throwing any more money down this particular rathole is a no-go at this point.

MidnightWatcher: Yes, all non-beta drivers. No question about the CPU, it's at 1.86, and doesn't work stock or mildly OC'd to 2.00. Hardware acceleration still caused PDVD to crash.

Rather astonishly, I seem to be the only guy in the world that can't get this to work. I'm thinking at this point that there is just some major incompatibility regarding the mobo, the AGP video, and PDVD. Thanks again - Pat

[Alpha10]

I am getting concerned now, having read this entire thread. I recently bought a Powercolor X1950 pro specifically for it's HDCP to work with my Optoma HD72, just been to the Cyberlink advisor and get a RED for my 'non-HDCP' digital link (DVI). I have an Xbox 360 drive arriving tomorrow and was going to buy PowerDVD Ultra to go with it, what do you think the chances of it working are?

Cheers

[Xylon]

I am getting concerned now, having read this entire thread. I recently bought a Powercolor X1950 pro specifically for it's HDCP to work with my Optoma HD72, just been to the Cyberlink advisor and get a RED for my 'non-HDCP' digital link (DVI). I have an Xbox 360 drive arriving tomorrow and was going to buy PowerDVD Ultra to go with it, what do you think the chances of it working are?

Cheers

Just use the component output or vga. You dont lose any rez.

And use the latest drivers.

[Alpha10]

Thanks, but the trouble with that is I will need to run more cables through the ceiling to my projector, which I would really rather not do, especially when I have HDCP compliant components.....

Any rumours over whether these issues might be fixed soon?

Cheers

[Vern Dias]

OK, more discoveries here:

First for tubeguy, make sure you have video acceleration turned off in PowerDVD.

For all running XP SP2 who have not applied any hotfixes:

After doing some sleuthing, I have found that most of my hangs were related to kmixer.sys and NT kernel calls. After doing some research, I have found that applying the hotfix for an XP SP2 kernal mixer bug (WindowsXP-KB920872-x86-ENU.exe) fixed a large percentage of the hangs for me.

After applying this fix, I can now navigate and play the Universal KK disc. Overall stability also appears to be improved.



Vern

[Rathbone]

Thanks, but the trouble with that is I will need to run more cables through the ceiling to my projector, which I would really rather not do, especially when I have HDCP compliant components.....

Any rumours over whether these issues might be fixed soon?

Cheers

Are you sure your card is HDCP compliant? Is there a sticker or some other note on the package which says your card does HDCP?

[Alpha10]

There are no stickers on the box, but the Powercolor is on the 100% HDCP ready list, supposedly on both DVI outputs. Anyone know differently?

Cheers

[Rathbone]

There are no stickers on the box, but the Powercolor is on the 100% HDCP ready list, supposedly on both DVI outputs. Anyone know differently?

Cheers

Check if there is a sign of HDCP directly on the card. On my Sapphire board the HDCP chip is marked by a small sticker with the individual HDCP code of the card.

You cannot trust this 100% HDCP compliant list. By model is listed there too, but there are revisions of that card which are not HDCP ready.

[Alpha10]

Hmm, nothing obvious on the card that I can see. The problem is that it has a massive cooler which covers up most of the top of the card, making it very difficult to see anything.

I remember reading somewhere that all 'retail' X1950 pros had to be HDCP?

Is there any other way to find out/check other than Cyberlinks advisor?

Cheers

[curtis104]

The Sapphire ATI Radeon X1900GT works really well and is HDCP compliant through the primary DVI port. I got it for a very reasonable price at newegg.com.

[Rathbone]

I have a problem with Superman returns.

I have watched a couple of HD-DVDs now without problems but when I just popped in Superman returns, I got quite strong stutters, which I do not have with other titles. Anyone the same problem?

CPU usage is about 50%, I listened to the DD+ track over SPDIF, not TrueHD.

[Vern Dias]

Yet another gotcha:

I installed the 97.92 drivers for my NVidia 8800 today. After rebooting, I got a warning message that my Video card was not receiving enough power through the on-card connector and would automatically be throttled back to run at a lower speed.

This was with a 550W power supply, however one without the 6 pin connector, so I was feeding the video card power receptacle through an adapter that only supplied 3 pins instead of 6.

Interestingly, none of the earlier drivers gave me this warning.

Replacing the power supply with a 500W ATX style with a dedicated 6 pin connector cured the issues and also, interestingly, cured the jerkyness I was seeing on pans.

So anyone having jerky pans, I believe we have two (more) possible causes:

1. Insufficient power to the video card.
2. A video card without adequate CPU and memory speed.

I have found that outputting 1080 does seem to always require a high end video card to produce fluid motion. Lower output resolutions seem to be less demanding.

Vern

[GlenF]

I dunno if this has been mentioned before, but renaming the HD-DVD folder in the PDVD install to have the same name as the bluray folder gives you a default install of HD-DVD instead of Bluray.

Can anyone confirm that the VGA output on a standard card is true full resolution?
And that you can get either 48P or 72P out of it for judder free playback? (I hate 60Hz playback)

[deandob]

Glen,

I run it with VGA and I get full resolution at 60Hz at least with my 1050x1400 projector, the rolling movie credits are very sharp (usually a good indicator of resolution). I can't test 48Hz as my projector wont do 48Hz with 1:1 pixel mapping.

Regards,
Dean

[trueimage]

I just got and am testing out this software. I have King Kong and Training Day HD DVDs and the Xbox 360 drive.

A couple things I noticed:

No menu: Title nor Root take me to any menu. When starting KK, the menu animation just loops and the U-Control menu never appears. ESC, and many other keys do nothing. Training Day, same thing no menu, just goes into the movie for this one.

Subtitles: always on. I can change between them using the button on the PowerDVD menu, or the U key, but no off. (and without a menu, there is no off option anyway)

FPS: If I turn "show Information" on, I see the bitrate and fps for the video and audio. There are two numbers, I believe L: XX.XX and S: XX.XX. What do these mean? They are near the same on HD DVD playback, around 23.XX for both, but are varying. However, for example I tried playing an h264 .ts and the numbers are more worrysome: L:9.XX S:19.XX ??? (I read somewhere that this handles h264 better than CoreAVC, so that would be nice.

Also, is there any way to see the video resolution? I have a 720p native DLP but I'd like to make sure it is running at 1080p. My Windows XP resolution is at 720p too, but 1080p is probably better in any case than the 540p we got from previous software...


A prelim setup guide and tips and tricks guide for this should be pinned in the first post as we go along, so it becomes and easy to use resource for newbies.

[corrnd]

I am getting concerned now, having read this entire thread. I recently bought a Powercolor X1950 pro specifically for it's HDCP to work with my Optoma HD72, just been to the Cyberlink advisor and get a RED for my 'non-HDCP' digital link (DVI). I have an Xbox 360 drive arriving tomorrow and was going to buy PowerDVD Ultra to go with it, what do you think the chances of it working are?

Cheers
Alpha10, I have the Sapphire x1600 Pro HDMI and had problems with 'non-HDCP' with my HDTV until I turned my desktop res down to 1280x720 and restarted. Once I did that, Cyberlink advisor cleared my display, although I assume I'm only getting 720p. Going down to 720p may not make you happy, but at least it's something to try. I'm only running a 30" HDTV, so 720p still looks pretty damn good for me.

Also, as Rathbone said, my Sapphire card has a small HDCP sticker on it. It's on the back of the card, so you should see it regardless of the size of your card's cooler.

[Rathbone]

Alpha10, I have the Sapphire x1600 Pro HDMI and had problems with 'non-HDCP' with my HDTV until I turned my desktop res down to 1280x720 and restarted. Once I did that, Cyberlink advisor cleared my display, although I assume I'm only getting 720p. Going down to 720p may not make you happy, but at least it's something to try. I'm only running a 30" HDTV, so 720p still looks pretty damn good for me.


I can confirm that. A little example what works for me as I use a resolution of 1360x768 to watch HD-DVD.

1. If I select 1368x768 directly, Advisor gives me a big fat red NO for HDCP!
2. If I select 720p, Advisor is green.
3. NOW I go from 720p to 1368x768 and ... oh wonder ... suddely it's also green!

It seems you have to choose 720p to "activate" HDCP. Then you can choose whatever resolution you want.

[corrnd]

I can confirm that. A little example what works for me as I use a resolution of 1360x768 to watch HD-DVD.

1. If I select 1368x768 directly, Advisor gives me a big fat red NO for HDCP!
2. If I select 720p, Advisor is green.
3. NOW I go from 720p to 1368x768 and ... oh wonder ... suddely it's also green!

It seems you have to choose 720p to "activate" HDCP. Then you can choose whatever resolution you want.
Interesting! I didn't know you could go back up once it "activated" at 720p. I'll have to try that tonight.

[Alpha10]

Cheers for that, I thought I had tried but I will try again with re-boots at 720p on both outputs etc.

I have contacted Powercolor with my serial number to try and get it verified.

Cheers

[Alpha10]

Sorry guys one more thing, I already have powerDVD 7 and will upgrade to PowerDVD Ultra if I can get my HDCP problems working, did you remove the old version prior to install or just install over the top???

cheers

[Rathbone]

Sorry guys one more thing, I already have powerDVD 7 and will upgrade to PowerDVD Ultra if I can get my HDCP problems working, did you remove the old version prior to install or just install over the top???

cheers

I am not sure but I think PDVD 7 detected PDVD 6.5 and uninstalled it automatically before main installation process.

[Alpha10]

I am not sure but I think PDVD 7 detected PDVD 6.5 and uninstalled it automatically before main installation process.


Many thanks for all your help.

Cheers

[Alpha10]

Tried everything and still not working, I am sending all the logs to Cyberlink to see if they can find anything.

This is getting really annoying now :mad:

Cheers

[rdewey]

Rathbone:

I am RMA-ing my Sapphire X1600 pro HDMI card due to defective processing of HDCP material. Do you mind checking your board version number and firmware version on your card? This should appear on a white sticker on the surface of the card. In particular, if you can ask your friend with the functioning pci-e version to check his board version and firmware that would be super. I know this is a lot to ask; if you have a chance I'd appreciate it, but if not, no big deal.

I am hoping I initially had an early revision of the card, and when I get my new one, I'll have a later revision that will actually handle HDCP protected material. I'll certainly post here once I have tested the new card with PowerDVD ultra...

Thanks.

[trueimage]

I just got and am testing out this software. I have King Kong and Training Day HD DVDs and the Xbox 360 drive.

A couple things I noticed:

No menu: Title nor Root take me to any menu. When starting KK, the menu animation just loops and the U-Control menu never appears. ESC, and many other keys do nothing. Training Day, same thing no menu, just goes into the movie for this one.

Subtitles: always on. I can change between them using the button on the PowerDVD menu, or the U key, but no off. (and without a menu, there is no off option anyway)

FPS: If I turn "show Information" on, I see the bitrate and fps for the video and audio. There are two numbers, I believe L: XX.XX and S: XX.XX. What do these mean? They are near the same on HD DVD playback, around 23.XX for both, but are varying. However, for example I tried playing an h264 .ts and the numbers are more worrysome: L:9.XX S:19.XX ??? (I read somewhere that this handles h264 better than CoreAVC, so that would be nice.

Also, is there any way to see the video resolution? I have a 720p native DLP but I'd like to make sure it is running at 1080p. My Windows XP resolution is at 720p too, but 1080p is probably better in any case than the 540p we got from previous software...


A prelim setup guide and tips and tricks guide for this should be pinned in the first post as we go along, so it becomes and easy to use resource for newbies.

Anyone with any insight on any of these problems?

[alienvenom]

Anyone with any insight on any of these problems?

I can attest that I have exactly the same problems, using the latest version available on Cyberlink's website. Their response: "We're working on it!"

[corrnd]

Anyone with any insight on any of these problems?
As for menus, I remember the very first time I ran the software it had a question about enabling "mouse menus" or something like that. Apparently you can't operate the menus on HD-DVDs from a mouse in the same way as you can with normal DVDs (which are normal point-and-click). The Cyberlink interface for dealing with menus on HD-DVDs is horrible. You have to click-hold and then drag L/R/up/down to operate the menus. It's terrible and very cumbersome, but it works.

As for subtitles, they appear to be turned on by default for all HD-DVDs. However, if you can get to the menus, you can turn them off. The exception is King Kong, which can't be turned off at all (afaik) and is a known bug.

Sorry, don't know anything about your other issues.

[skibum5000]

As for menus, I remember the very first time I ran the software it had a question about enabling "mouse menus" or something like that. Apparently you can't operate the menus on HD-DVDs from a mouse in the same way as you can with normal DVDs (which are normal point-and-click). The Cyberlink interface for dealing with menus on HD-DVDs is horrible. You have to click-hold and then drag L/R/up/down to operate the menus. It's terrible and very cumbersome, but it works.

As for subtitles, they appear to be turned on by default for all HD-DVDs. However, if you can get to the menus, you can turn them off. The exception is King Kong, which can't be turned off at all (afaik) and is a known bug.

Sorry, don't know anything about your other issues.

once you actualy manage to get a pciture with (Jackson) King Kong, just bring up title menu, go to setup, go to no subtitles, hit return and they are off.

I can't get them to go away with some of the deleted scenes type stuff on certain other discs though, the ones where you can not bring up the title menu.

[SpHeRe31459]

Rathbone:

I am RMA-ing my Sapphire X1600 pro HDMI card due to defective processing of HDCP material. Do you mind checking your board version number and firmware version on your card? This should appear on a white sticker on the surface of the card. In particular, if you can ask your friend with the functioning pci-e version to check his board version and firmware that would be super. I know this is a lot to ask; if you have a chance I'd appreciate it, but if not, no big deal.

I am hoping I initially had an early revision of the card, and when I get my new one, I'll have a later revision that will actually handle HDCP protected material. I'll certainly post here once I have tested the new card with PowerDVD ultra...

Thanks.
Sounds like you're not alone:
http://www.anandtech.com/video/showdoc.aspx?i=2874&p=2

If the graphics card itself didn't properly support HDCP the result was a bit more in your face. For instance, we had a X1600 Pro sample with an HDMI port from Sapphire which was listed as being HDCP compatible, but we tried to play our Blu-ray movie we were greeted with a screen full of static.
Sounds like Sapphire blew it with their X1600HDMI cards. I find it hard to believe that a card that supports HDMI (which is supposed to include HDCP) is having so many issues. Jeers to Sapphire.

[Gary McCoy]

Actually, HDMI (an electical and mechanical interface design) is entirely different from and not associated with HDCP (a copy protection scheme).

Many many folks made the same error in the past couple of years, assuming that all they needed was to purchase a display or video source with the correct interface, and they were golden. In fact you need to always confirm BOTH the digital interface (HDMI, DVI, etc.) and that the HDCP feature is present.

Even today, manufacturers continue to produce video boards and displays for PCs (a class of product that is very price-sensitive) while deliberately omitting to populate the $4 encryption chip that enables HDCP on a video port that would otherwise support the feature. What this means is that one can NEVER assume the HDCP feature on any PC video board or display, one must ALWAYS check explicitly for HDCP. Believe me there are very expensive projectors (intended for presentation use not home theater) that have digital interfaces but not HDCP, and the owners are still steamed over this.

By contrast any A/V display or standalone A/V component like an HD-DVD player that does not support HDCP would be brain-dead. However most PCs are not used for entertainment and one must always check for HDCP support.

Gary

[jpconard]

Yes, but didn't ATI advertise all the video cards as of the last few years to able to support HDCP? I have an X700 and I know that is how it was mentioned on the box.

Wasn't there a lawsuit against ATI for this?

[joudbren]

I have the Xbox drive hooked up to my HTPC and working perfectly with PowerDVD Ultra 7.1 (HD-DVD version). The compatibity tool from Cyberlink green lights me on everything except for a yellow light on my CPU which is an Athlon64 X2 3800+. Slightly less than the recommended minimum of 4200+ but it seems to work fine anyways and average CPU usage is around 55% while playing King Kong HD-DVD. Video card is the MSI 7600GT Diamond Plus which has a native HDMI port and supports HDCP over both the DVI and HDMI ports.

One pleasant surprise is that my Microsoft MCE remote is working to control PowerDVD for at least the basic stuff like pause, play, skip, etc. My only issue at this point is probably very simple but for the life of me I can't figure it out. When I pause the King Kong movie after about 15 seconds or so it seems to load a screen saver file from the HD-DVD disk itself and it keeps looping it over and over. I have been completely stumped as to how to get it back to the original movie once this screensaver file starts running without stopping the whole player and restarting it again. Anybody have some insight on this? Thanks!

James

[jji666]

Sapphire blew it bigtime. What is even more stupid is that they have non-HDCP and HDCP cards out there with the same exact model number. (That is, I am just assuming that some of the x1600 Pro HDMI cards must support HDCP since a few folks have it all running). In my case I can confirm that my Sapphire x1600 HDMI Pro definitely did not support HDCP after much effort and all I had to do was plug in the MSI NX7600GT Diamond Plus, find the latest version of the PureHD drivers, and I was able to watch HD DVDs over HDMI.

Also, I was able to turn off the subtitles in King Kong. However, you do have to get to the movie menu to do it. Access to a keyboard helps!

[corrnd]

Sapphire blew it bigtime. What is even more stupid is that they have non-HDCP and HDCP cards out there with the same exact model number. (That is, I am just assuming that some of the x1600 Pro HDMI cards must support HDCP since a few folks have it all running). In my case I can confirm that my Sapphire x1600 HDMI Pro definitely did not support HDCP after much effort and all I had to do was plug in the MSI NX7600GT Diamond Plus, find the latest version of the PureHD drivers, and I was able to watch HD DVDs over HDMI.

Also, I was able to turn off the subtitles in King Kong. However, you do have to get to the movie menu to do it. Access to a keyboard helps!
I've tried about a two dozen times going to the menu to turn off subtitles for King Kong and it's never worked for me. When I get to the subtitles menu, it already says subtitles are off. If I confirm that by clicking on 'off', they don't go away. If I click to english subtitles, close the menu, then go back in and click them off, they still don't go away. I've read other people having similar problems.

I have no problem turning off subtitles for the rest of my HD-DVDs, so I know it's possible to turn them off.

As long as I'm writing, does anybody know a way to make subtitles off by default? I don't understand why it's set to on by default.

[benjaidafufukil]

Hey everyone,

Stil doesn t work at home. After many clean XP SP2 installs + forceware 92.91 or 93.71 or 93.81 still the same crap. The advisor gives me a ****** red light dor the grafx driver.
http://boss.csteam.free.fr/MDR.JPG
http://boss.csteam.free.fr/MDR2.JPG

I ve tried PDVD 7.1 ultra after updating WinXP, before ... still the same.
The movie pops up for 5 seconds then I get the crappy 0103 error message.

7950 GX2 is HDCP compliant and I m running 1 display only Mitsu HC3000.
To activate multidisplay you have to de activate mutliGPU. I ve also tried that, forcing the card to use only one GPU on one display but I get the same ****.

Even when I run a normal dvd the software tends to be unstable.
I got pissed and installed WinDvd 8 Platinium and was able to watch movies peacefully.

It seems that nothing can run my hddvds.... I m pissed.

Getting a new rig next week C2D, 8800GTX, with a little luck the advisor will give all green, but I doubt it!

Ben

[jerrytdss]

I've tried about a two dozen times going to the menu to turn off subtitles for King Kong and it's never worked for me. When I get to the subtitles menu, it already says subtitles are off. If I confirm that by clicking on 'off', they don't go away. If I click to english subtitles, close the menu, then go back in and click them off, they still don't go away. I've read other people having similar problems.

You are trying to turn off the subtitles in King Kong while the movie is playing, aren't you? That was the trick for me, had to access the menus while the movie was playing and switch off subtitles (again) without stopping the movie.

Movie playing, Mouse right click, select title menu (or is it root?) with mouse, then use the arrow keys ONLY (no mouse) to move through the menu. Use enter key to select no subtitle and again arrow keys to close menu (no mouse). All with out stopping the movie.

[Nike-Air]

Is anyone using a Pentium D 820 (overclocked or not) to run PowerDVD, and if so how well does it work? I will also be using 1GB Ram and a 7900GTX to run this. I wanted to get other opinions on this before I replace the current processor with a 820D. My X2 3800+(oc'd to 2.65gh) that I have on a different machine is smooth, not sure on the 820 though.

[Arkania]

Nike,

I've got a Pentium D 820 and am running HD DVD with no issues.... (not overclocked)...

[Nike-Air]

Nike,

I've got a Pentium D 820 and am running HD DVD with no issues.... (not overclocked)...

Thanks...appreciate the response! I'll be purchasing this week and will let everyone know how it goes after I get it all together.

[Fatawan]

Hey everyone,

Stil doesn t work at home. After many clean XP SP2 installs + forceware 92.91 or 93.71 or 93.81 still the same crap. The advisor gives me a ****** red light dor the grafx driver.
Ben

Might try the newest 8XXX series drivers modified by the folks at www.tweaksrus.com I think its 97.91 or something in the 97.9X range. They tweak them and make them able to run on 7-series cards. Worth a shot.

[corrnd]

Is anyone using a Pentium D 820 (overclocked or not) to run PowerDVD, and if so how well does it work? I will also be using 1GB Ram and a 7900GTX to run this. I wanted to get other opinions on this before I replace the current processor with a 820D. My X2 3800+(oc'd to 2.65gh) that I have on a different machine is smooth, not sure on the 820 though.
As Arkania confirmed, I'm sure you'd have no problem with VC-1 HD-DVDs (which are pretty much all HD-DVDs currently sold in the US). But if you ever try to watch H.264 movies in the future, you might run into problems, even with acceleration from the 7900GTX.

[Gary McCoy]

Has anybody tried the Cyberlink software bundled with the HP HD100?

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16827140022

...it's probably an OEM version versus the retail software, but the HP drive (which admittedly costs 1/3rd more than the Xbox drive plus the Cyberlink player) is rated for 2.4X speed. (1X = 4560KB/sec for HD-DVD)

Gary

[wynpalmer]

Latest on the PowerDVD Avivo issue. Cyberlink had previously claimed that "some" ATI drivers do not support mpeg-4 and vc-1 playback with avivo, and I asked which ones do.
Their response is to defer to another department and say that if I don't get an answer back in two weeks that I should query them again. Unbelievable!
So, all you xbox360 add-on users out there trying to get good playback on non-mpeg2 disks using avivo, well you can just forget about it for now.



ATI have new catalyst drivers that they "think" might have resolved some of our problems. From ATI/AMD;

AMD released CATALYST 7.1 including new display drivers and WDM capture drivers on January 10th, 2007. This release applies to RADEON 9500 series and higher cards running in Windows XP, and Windows XP Media Center Edition 2005.

We ask that you try this new release in the hope that it will correct the issue that you are currently experiencing. To obtain this update, please visit http://ati.amd.com/support/driver.html and choose your Operating System, then series, then model and click Go. Please ensure that you read the release notes for driver information and supported graphics cards before downloading.

[tahustvedt]

I just tried installing the Cat 7.1 drivers and PowerDVD will play HD-DVDs on my AGP X800 XT system, but the picture is completely garbled. It wouldn't even start playing with 6.12 but instead presented me with the incompatible driver error.

[wynpalmer]

I just tried installing the Cat 7.1 drivers and PowerDVD will play HD-DVDs on my AGP X800 XT system, but the picture is completely garbled. It wouldn't even start playing with 6.12 but instead presented me with the incompatible driver error.


So, it's improved over 6.12. What's your problem with that? Some people are never happy. ;)
Seriously though, I'll try the new drivers out tonight and report the results. Wish me luck!

[tahustvedt]

Hehe. Good luck! I just wish I could actually see what was going on. :)

I hope I won't have to get a new video card.

[tahustvedt]

Just for kicks I tried it on my other PC which is slower and has a Radeon 9700 PRO in it. I got the same results as I got in the HTPC. Playback, but garbled picture.

This PC has two displays, one connected via DVI-D (non HDCP of course) and the other via VGA. when I tried on the DVI monitor I got the non-compliant display error, so I just stopped playback and dragged the PDVD window over to the other monitor and there it would play back without complaining about HDCP (obviously). lol

[Thursd4y]

Hey everyone,

Stil doesn t work at home. After many clean XP SP2 installs + forceware 92.91 or 93.71 or 93.81 still the same crap. The advisor gives me a ****** red light dor the grafx driver.

I ve tried PDVD 7.1 ultra after updating WinXP, before ... still the same.
The movie pops up for 5 seconds then I get the crappy 0103 error message.

7950 GX2 is HDCP compliant and I m running 1 display only Mitsu HC3000.
To activate multidisplay you have to de activate mutliGPU. I ve also tried that, forcing the card to use only one GPU on one display but I get the same ****.

Even when I run a normal dvd the software tends to be unstable.
I got pissed and installed WinDvd 8 Platinium and was able to watch movies peacefully.

It seems that nothing can run my hddvds.... I m pissed.

Getting a new rig next week C2D, 8800GTX, with a little luck the advisor will give all green, but I doubt it!

Ben

Hmm, I've got the same card, and I also get that error. No one seems to know what causes it, and it's pretty annoying...

[scoombs]

With the Catalyst 7.1 installed and my X1950Pro, the acceleration box now remains checked during playback in ver 6.6 BD edition (Sony OEM). I did not think to do cpu usage comparisons before and after, so I cannot shed any light there.

[Willie]

So, all you xbox360 add-on users out there trying to get good playback on non-mpeg2 disks using avivo, well you can just forget about it for now.

I am using CCC1.2.2405.3055 w/driver v8.2.2 with a Saphire X1600 and an A64 X2 3800+.

I get perfect XBOX 360 HD-DVD playback on VC-1 titles.

Willie

[corrnd]

I'm running Catalyst 7.1 now and my Sapphire x1600PRO HDMI seems to have auto-negotiated 1080i with HDCP on my HDTV now (I was only able to get HDCP at 720p before). I haven't checked for avivo acceletation yet, but if it's working now, I'll post performance numbers w/ and w/o.

[MidnightWatcher]

I'm running Catalyst 7.1 now and my Sapphire x1600PRO HDMI seems to have auto-negotiated 1080i with HDCP on my HDTV now (I was only able to get HDCP at 720p before). I haven't checked for avivo acceletation yet, but if it's working now, I'll post performance numbers w/ and w/o.
Catalyst 7.1 here as well, and now I can view HD DVD on my Samsung 940bw monitor. Before it would turn to snow after a second or two, even if the HD Advisor gave it a green light.

[bowser15]

Is anyone using a Pentium D 820 (overclocked or not) to run PowerDVD, and if so how well does it work? I will also be using 1GB Ram and a 7900GTX to run this. I wanted to get other opinions on this before I replace the current processor with a 820D. My X2 3800+(oc'd to 2.65gh) that I have on a different machine is smooth, not sure on the 820 though.

I'm using a pentium d 830 (3ghz). It does fine on mpeg2 encoded bluray movies, but it stutters on avc movies (behind enemy lines, xmen 3). For reference I'm using a 7600gt card with hardware acceleration turned on.

[Jim HTPC]

Hey everyone,

I ve tried PDVD 7.1 ultra after updating WinXP, before ... still the same.
The movie pops up for 5 seconds then I get the crappy 0103 error message.


I received the same error message.

Gear:
6700 Core 2 Duo
2GB Corsair 8500 DDR2
EVGA 8800GTS 97.44 drivers
EVGA N68 Motherboard
XBOX 360 HD DVD
PowerDVD 7.1
Mitsubishi WT-46807 using Component Video

I received the same 03 error message. Everthing in the envisor is green except for the graphics card. It is gray. It might be too new for it to register???

Has anyone found a work-around for this?

Thanks

[MidnightWatcher]

Latest on the PowerDVD Avivo issue. Cyberlink had previously claimed that "some" ATI drivers do not support mpeg-4 and vc-1 playback with avivo, and I asked which ones do.
Their response is to defer to another department and say that if I don't get an answer back in two weeks that I should query them again. Unbelievable!
So, all you xbox360 add-on users out there trying to get good playback on non-mpeg2 disks using avivo, well you can just forget about it for now.
I haven't gotten hardware acceleration working yet, but my CPU usage is only 30 - 40% on VC-1 titles.

[Jim HTPC]

I'm all fixed. nVidia just released new 97.92 drivers today on their website for the 8800 series.


Partial list of fixes/changes:

New PureVideo technology features allows GeForce 8800 GTX/GTS to achieve a score of 128 in the HQV video quality benchmark:

Improved inverse telecine algorithms (2:2 & 3:2 Pull-down Correction) for standard and high definition content.
Improved spatial-temporal de-interlacing algorithm (for standard and high definition content).

Includes the new NVIDIA Control Panel. Please visit the NVIDIA Control



I'm not sure if it was re-installing the drivers or the new ones. All I know is it's working and WOW.. Nice picture. Just wish King Kong would allow me to turn off the subtitles.

[corrnd]

I haven't gotten hardware acceleration working yet, but my CPU usage is only 30 - 40% on VC-1 titles.
Confirmed -- 7.1 hasn't done anything for Avivo acceleration. The check box is still greyed-out during playback.

[rdewey]

Corrnd and Willie:

You have the Sapphire X1600 PRO HDMI working with PowerDVD and xbox 360 HD DVD drive? Are you using the pci-e or AGP version of this card? Are you connected via VGA or HDMI to your displays? If you are using the pci-e version and are connected via HDMI, that means you have the HDCP version of the card. Would you mind checking the white sticker on the card and tell me what the board revision and firmware version of your cards is???

Thanks.

[galileo2000]

I'm all fixed. nVidia just released new 97.92 drivers today on their website for the 8800 series.


Partial list of fixes/changes:

New PureVideo technology features allows GeForce 8800 GTX/GTS to achieve a score of 128 in the HQV video quality benchmark:

Improved inverse telecine algorithms (2:2 & 3:2 Pull-down Correction) for standard and high definition content.
Improved spatial-temporal de-interlacing algorithm (for standard and high definition content).

Includes the new NVIDIA Control Panel. Please visit the NVIDIA Control



I'm not sure if it was re-installing the drivers or the new ones. All I know is it's working and WOW.. Nice picture. Just wish King Kong would allow me to turn off the subtitles.

Jim,

turning off the subtitles in KK is quite simple.

After the Actual movie starts, right-click, go to the Title menu, goto setup, use arrows to set subtitles off and left arrow to get rid of setup.

Good luck.

[MidnightWatcher]

Just wish King Kong would allow me to turn off the subtitles.
Once the movie starts playing, press the right arrow key to bring up the menu, then go into setup and turn off subtitles. Done. :)

Edit: Galileo beat me to it.

[trueimage]

howcome everyone else can simply choose the menu or hit the right arrow for the menu...

I can't get the menu AT ALL

even when i just start the disc, it doesnt go to the menu, it play the menu bg anim, but no menu comes up

[MidnightWatcher]

howcome everyone else can simply choose the menu or hit the right arrow for the menu...

I can't get the menu AT ALL

even when i just start the disc, it doesnt go to the menu, it play the menu bg anim, but no menu comes up
Try right-clicking with the mouse and then go to Title Menu. That will bring it up too.

[Rathbone]

I'm running Catalyst 7.1 now and my Sapphire x1600PRO HDMI seems to have auto-negotiated 1080i with HDCP on my HDTV now (I was only able to get HDCP at 720p before). I haven't checked for avivo acceletation yet, but if it's working now, I'll post performance numbers w/ and w/o.

I still cannot use HDMI with Cat. 7.1, had to go back to the Sapphire HDMI driver. :mad:

Does your card work with Cat. 7.1 over HDMI?

[Alpha10]

Unfortunately I still can't get my HDCP going with 7.1 (Powercolor X1950pro + Optoma HD72)

Cyberlink sent me an update today saying that they are getting in contact with Powercolor, so still I wait.

(I must say Cyberlink's support has been excellent..)

Cheers

[corrnd]

I still cannot use HDMI with Cat. 7.1, had to go back to the Sapphire HDMI driver. :mad:

Does your card work with Cat. 7.1 over HDMI?
Yes, HDMI is working with Cat. 7.1 for me. I was previously using 6.12. Did that version work for you?

rdewey -- I have the AGP version of the Sapphire card. Here's my playback chain:

xbox 360 HD-DVD --> PowerDVD Ultra --> Sapphire X1600Pro HDMI (Cat. 7.1) --> HDMI cable (came with X1600) --> LG 30FS4D (30" CRT HDTV)

I'll have to check the board revision and firmware version when I go home tonight.

[Rathbone]

Yes, HDMI is working with Cat. 7.1 for me. I was previously using 6.12. Did that version work for you?


6.12. did not work either. Still had the blinking problem. Only the Saphhire driver works. Is there a tool that removes any driver settings and entries. I do not want to install WinXP again (did this just 2 months ago).

[tubesguy]

I've hit on what I believe is my ongoing problem with 100% CPU usage. Thanks to uo7, who posted in one of the other 75 threads on this topic, and who, by the way, is running HD-DVD just fine with a 6300 C2D and a 6600GT AGP card, I've discovered that I'm only using one core of my C2D, so I've got, in effect, a Core2Uno. I haven't, however, been able to rectify the problem as yet, what with the HAL forcing and the new (again) install of Windows, but it looks like it's a problem susceptible to correction. Thanks again for the many suggestions, and I hope that the problem is now on its way to resolution. - Pat

[scoombs]

Confirmed -- 7.1 hasn't done anything for Avivo acceleration. The check box is still greyed-out during playback.

I believe it is greyed out because it is in playback mode, and can only be changed while stopped. I think what is new is that the greyed-out box stays checked during playback, instead of being un-checked like before.

[corrnd]

I believe it is greyed out because it is in playback mode, and can only be changed while stopped. I think what is new is that the greyed-out box stays checked during playback, instead of being un-checked like before.
Hmmm....I'm pretty sure mine was greyed-out AND unchecked, but I'm not in front of that computer to check right now. I'll verify later. The real confirmation will be performance numbers.

anandtech.com posted some performance numbers for Blu-ray playback a month ago that showed about a 10% drop in CPU usage for Avivo acceleration, so we should see something similar:

http://www.anandtech.com/video/showdoc.aspx?i=2886&p=4

(they also posted an article about HD-DVD, but obviously had no avivo acceleration)

[tahustvedt]

Here's a picture of what PowerDVD shows when I play a HD-DVD with the new 7.1 drivers:
http://www.enrarot.net/images/pdvd01.jpg

There's no real picture, just a screen full of horizontal artifacts. It wouldn't even start playing with the 6.xx drivers.

I drove all the way to town today to buy a HDCP-compatible video card but the selection was horrible. All anyone had was a non-HDPC Geforce 7600GS. Right now I'm trying to figure out wether I should wait for a possible solution by Cyberlink or ATI, or buy a Radeon X1950 Pro HDCP.

[wynpalmer]

I believe it is greyed out because it is in playback mode, and can only be changed while stopped. I think what is new is that the greyed-out box stays checked during playback, instead of being un-checked like before.


Well, once again the results are inconsistent. In my system the hardware acceleration box in PowerDVD Ultra still unchecks itself with catalyst 7.1.
My CPU activity remains at peak values of 60% with KK in the normal video quality mode, peaking very occasionally to 100% with good quality and often to 100% with best.
I've sent a problem report to ATI.
Has anyone using catalyst 7.1, Powerdvd ultra, and an x1600 or x1950 HDCP card been able to get the box enabled during HD DVD playback.
What CPU activity level with an X2 4400+ or so has anyone seen using PowerDVD ultra? Please note the video quality level and whether the display really is in HD mode as set within the PowerDVD menus.
This information would be very useful for Cyberlink and ATI.

[corrnd]

Corrnd and Willie:

You have the Sapphire X1600 PRO HDMI working with PowerDVD and xbox 360 HD DVD drive? Are you using the pci-e or AGP version of this card? Are you connected via VGA or HDMI to your displays? If you are using the pci-e version and are connected via HDMI, that means you have the HDCP version of the card. Would you mind checking the white sticker on the card and tell me what the board revision and firmware version of your cards is???

Thanks.
rdewey -- the white sticker on my board says:

Board rev. 0.0
FW ver.