Just letting you know, these hashes do not correspond to RTM of Vista SP1. MS released the RTM to MSDN subscribers, and luckily my bro in law is a subscriber, so he d/led it for me. Tha hash for the 64bit SP1 on MSDN is as follows:

eeafd59069b0dbb489f7b9ca63dbc678

I'm running it right now... seems alright, slower bootup, but faster response within the OS it seems, but only been working with it for about 15 mins now.

Obviously not going to tell you where to look, and you do so at your own risk, but the files you want are Windows6.0-KB936330-x64.exe (if you're running 64bit) or Windows6.0-KB936330-x86.exe (32bit). Once you have those files, download a MD5 hash checker (search google) and run it against them.

Here are the MD5 hashes from both x86 and x64 RTM SP1 that the editors at ZDNET received directly from Microsoft.

32-bit (434MB): d597866e93bc8f80ecca234c4e9ce5a2
64-bit (726MB): 983308426e8ee7649f53b41f4e5c42d4

Link with the info is here, for those who'd rather see for themselves - http://talkback.zdnet.com/5208-12354-0.htm...amp;start=-9978 (http://talkback.zdnet.com/5208-12354-0.html?forumID=1&threadID=44163&messageID=816195&start=-9978)

If the hash your file has matches the corresponding one above, you have a legit RTM SP1 file.

Mods - if this is something you don't want here, please feel free to delete it.

Has anyone figured out how to get cyberlink to launch directly from Media Center when you hit play DVD?

Okay, I'm going nuts.

How do I get the MCE remote to trigger keystrokes, like "Ctrl-X" or "B", when I hit a single key on the MCE remote?

Anyone have a primer they can point me to? I tried HIP, but it seems like a mess, and it screws up the few things that currently work with the MCE remote.

Help!

It's in the NVIDIA control panel, not PDVD.

Maybe I'm dumb and/or blind, but I can't find it. I just installed the lastest Forceware too.

Maybe I'm dumb and/or blind, but I can't find it. I just installed the lastest Forceware too.

you cant find the control panel or were to check the scaling, sometimes the driver does not include the right control panel i use this,http://www.nvidia.com/object/ntune_5.05.54.00.html

I thought I saw this asked before, but couldn't find it...

I have a BD with onlu TrueHD 5.1 on it. When I play it (retail 3730), it says TrueHD 2.0 (and I cycled through the audio tracks).

I'm playing over SPDIF, so why isn't it sending 5.1 over? And the option to SPDIF mix only lets me select DTS, and it doesn't actually change anything.

Thanks in advance for any advice!
-Mark

Cyberlink accept this is a bug which they promise will be resolved in a future patch. No firm release date unfortunately.

At the moment the only way to play discs with only a TrueHD track in 5.1 over s/pdif is if your audio codec supports Dolby Digital Live and/or DTS Connect. Then you can get PowerDVD to output 6-channel PCM and leave it to your audio codec to encodeinto DD/DTS.

Cyberlink accept this is a bug which they promise will be resolved in a future patch. No firm release date unfortunately.

At the moment the only way to play discs with only a TrueHD track in 5.1 over s/pdif is if your audio codec supports Dolby Digital Live and/or DTS Connect. Then you can get PowerDVD to output 6-channel PCM and leave it to your audio codec to encodeinto DD/DTS.

Or if you have a X-Plosion or X-Merdian audio card that does real time encoding for DTS Connect or Dolby Digital Live.

However it sounds much better using analog outs and no re-encoding, also TrueHD 5.1 will not display as TrueHD 5.1 it will instead display as MLP 5.1

Cyberlink accept this is a bug which they promise will be resolved in a future patch. No firm release date unfortunately.

At the moment the only way to play discs with only a TrueHD track in 5.1 over s/pdif is if your audio codec supports Dolby Digital Live and/or DTS Connect. Then you can get PowerDVD to output 6-channel PCM and leave it to your audio codec to encodeinto DD/DTS.

Actually there is another option if you're playing back movies from your hard drive.

Use the tool TSremux (search Doom9). Basically what this tool does is make a movie only backup of your disc (no menus, no trailers).
In TSremux's options you can choose to convert any tru-hd track to an AC3 (Dolby Digital) track.
The tool keeps the Blu-ray original file structure (must select this option). Therefore you don't lose any video quality when creating your 'remux'.

Did this with Spidey3 and Across the Universe. Now when playing these my receiver indicates it is decoding a "Dolby D" track. Sound is great.

I just purchased drive and having a hard time getting certain movies to play. If i bought the retail version of PD do I need to uninstall the OEM version first or just install over it? Has anyone also had any luck getting customer service to upgrade you free if you email them with issues?

Thanks

Am thinking about getting the new AMD Quad Core processors has anyone had any problems with playback? and what are the cpu usage like.

I just purchased drive and having a hard time getting certain movies to play. If i bought the retail version of PD do I need to uninstall the OEM version first or just install over it? Has anyone also had any luck getting customer service to upgrade you free if you email them with issues?
Thanks
I opened a case with cyberlink and got a patch 'CyberLink.3516_PF2_DVD071122-01.exe'.
It was no help for me with another problem (green display).

So the Simpsons BD isn't working again! Since I upgraded to 3730, that's the only disc that won't load.

I get the "Unsupported Format" error.

I reripping with AnyDVD 6.3.1.5, and ImgBurn 2.4.0.0. I have nothing in AnyDVD except to remove encryption. I load it on a separate machine that isn't running AnyDVD. I tested the same ISO with an older version of PDVD, and it works fine.

Any thoughts on this? Anyone got Simpsons BD ISO working with 3730?

The lastest PowerDVD versions refuse to play BD+ titles without AACS encryption. Disable AnyDVD and play from disc or use an older version like 3319a.

The lastest PowerDVD versions refuse to play BD+ titles without AACS encryption. Disable AnyDVD and play from disc or use an older version like 3319a.

Seriously? That's messed up. Maybe AnyDVD can make it look like there is AACS encryoption.

Is there any way to rip a BD to an ISO and keep the AACS encryption on it? I thought that was supposed to be a feature of BD, that you could copy one or two times for person use? ImgBurn tells me it can't rip unless I have AnyDVD running.

And by the way, this is a dumb limitation - if I need to put in the disc, I'll put it into a dedicated player. The only reason to use PDVD is because I want to rip to my computer for my library.

Simpsons BD works fine for me on the latest build of powerDVD with AnyDVD switched OFF.

Simpsons BD works fine for me on the latest build of powerDVD with AnyDVD switched OFF.

Latewst version of OEM or retail? What version specifically are you using?

Retail version 3730 worked fine in 3516 aswell.

Retail version 3730 worked fine in 3516 aswell.

Can you be specific how you ripped it? According to the above, it will only work when played in the drive, not ripped.

Sorry if i confused you. Am watching it direct from the disc.

Seriously? That's messed up. Maybe AnyDVD can make it look like there is AACS encryoption.

Is there any way to rip a BD to an ISO and keep the AACS encryption on it? I thought that was supposed to be a feature of BD, that you could copy one or two times for person use? ImgBurn tells me it can't rip unless I have AnyDVD running.

And by the way, this is a dumb limitation - if I need to put in the disc, I'll put it into a dedicated player. The only reason to use PDVD is because I want to rip to my computer for my library.

what version of image burn do you use because i can make a image in read mode WITHOUT anydvd running and the copy will still have the encryption on it

what version of image burn do you use because i can make a image in read mode WITHOUT anydvd running and the copy will still have the encryption on it

2.4.0.0, you?

Look at this, in the changelog for ImgBurn 2.4.0.0:

Added: Message saying 'Sorry, ImgBurn cannot copy protected discs.' if the user inserts a CSS/CPPM protected DVD or AACS protected HD DVD/Blu-ray disc - the 'Read' button also remains disabled so they can't click it.

Sheesh... Is no one safe from the damned DRM crap? This is rediculous, and I'm shocked that ImgBurn would crumble to the DRM forces...

Anyone know a way around this, or must I stay with ImgBurn 2.3.2.0?

I am sure some you here will be interested in this:

PowerDVD downsamples some (maybe all!) U-Control discs to SD!! (http://forum.slysoft.com/showthread.php?t=13678)

I opened a case with cyberlink and got a patch 'CyberLink.3516_PF2_DVD071122-01.exe'.
It was no help for me with another problem (green display).

@ SugoE,

Was your issue playing BD Profile 1.1 discs? If so, did that patch help?

BW

somehow there should be two threads.... people simply playing from a physical optical disk, and those trying to beat the system with playing rips...

:cool:

2.4.0.0, you?

Look at this, in the changelog for ImgBurn 2.4.0.0:



Sheesh... Is no one safe from the damned DRM crap? This is rediculous, and I'm shocked that ImgBurn would crumble to the DRM forces...

Anyone know a way around this, or must I stay with ImgBurn 2.3.2.0?

image burn 2.3.2 maybe something was changed in the new version. the last disk i copied with the DRM intact was "transformers" its been awhile ago i tried coping without anydvd running so i decided to give it another shot, so right now as i type this, image burn is coping my copy of the day after tommorow, Blu Ray in " READ" mode which is also BD+ . it seems to be working just fine

image burn 2.3.2 maybe something was changed in the new version. the last disk i copied with the DRM intact was "transformers" its been awhile ago i tried coping without anydvd running so i decided to give it another shot, so right now as i type this, image burn is coping my copy of the day after tommorow, Blu Ray in " READ" mode which is also BD+ . it seems to be working just fine

i can confirm that it works, i just mounted the iso and it played back perfectly its working with both versions of image burn at least for me it is

:confused:I just installed the LG GGW-H20L into my HTPC of course the first movie I purchased was Live free or Die Hard, groan that did not play, then I tried a HD-DVD movie that played no problem.
I then tried the Brave One on blu-ray it played no problem. Any way I was looking forward to We Own the Night, the playback sound and picture are choppy to painfull for me to watch. My version of Powerdvd Ultra is 3516; the support is quick but useless. Anybody having problems with this movie?
Any help is greatly appreciated
Thanks JD :mad:
My video card is EVGA 7950GT
duo core 6600 @ 2.4 Windows XP
dvi to hdmi connection
HP MD6580n TV

:confused:I just installed the LG GGW-H20L into my HTPC of course the first movie I purchased was Live free or Die Hard, groan that did not play, then I tried a HD-DVD movie that played no problem.
I then tried the Brave One on blu-ray it played no problem. Any way I was looking forward to We Own the Night, the playback sound and picture are choppy to painfull for me to watch. My version of Powerdvd Ultra is 3516; the support is quick but useless. Anybody having problems with this movie?
Any help is greatly appreciated
Thanks JD :mad:
My video card is EVGA 7950GT
duo core 6600 @ 2.4 Windows XP
dvi to hdmi connection
HP MD6580n TV

i have never really got hd dvd and blu ray to play back correctly in XP but in Vista it works perfectly

Hi all,

I have managed to enable hardware acceleration in Powerdvd using a radeon hd2600 pro agp. But I still have 100% cpu, and stuttering of audio and video, with or without hardware acceleration enabled.

I am racking my brain trying to think what it can be but I dont have a clue.

Could it be an audio driver? My motherboard is an asus a8v deluxe. I have an athlon 4200 x2.

Thank you,

Tonight my PDVD OEM 7.3 with latest updates started playing back HD DVD with DD+ soundtracks with lots of feedback and fluttering in the sound. This is via SPDIF 16 bit/44.1 over coax. Same disks I could play a few weeks ago don't play now. Video is fine.

DD and PCM sound fine. I notice that the SPDIF volume bar chart is pegged full on when this flutter occurs.

Any thoughts as to what might have caused this sudden problem?

I am using a ASUS PK5 VM HDMI mobo with the built in audio feature to a Denon preamp.

So i got a Problem with Powerdvd and the following Configuration

My Configuration:

Shuttle SD39P2(Intel975X + C2D E6300 + 2Gig DDR2-667)
Geforce 8600GT 256MB (PCI-Express Gigabyte) Driver Forceware 169.21
PowerDVD 7.3.3319a(The last one i know that plays Blurays and HDDVDs from Harddrive)
Output-Device is a Beamer Optoma EP1690 (its native Resolution over DVI-Input is 1280x720 and over VGA 1280x768) It is Connected Via DVI to my Graphicscard
OS is WinXP pro (with all the latest SPs and Patches)


If i set my Resolution to 1280x720 50hz and play a ripped Bluray or HDDVD-title from Harddrive (via the Powerdvd function "Open movie file on hard disk drive") everythings just runs smooth with Hardwaredecoding. It doesnt matter whether its h.264 , VC1 or Mpeg2-content the CPU utilization is aprox. at 5-15 percent even on titles like "Pirates of the Careebean II", "Casino Royale","Transformers" or "Die Hard 4".(All Titles areEuropean Releases so they all have 50frames per second and thats the Reason why i set the Refresh-rate of my Beamer to 50hz). So Playing "Transormers" US-HDDVD-release at 60hz also runs smooth as it shoud.

So far so good i was happy. Now i changed my Graphic Card for other Reasons (Watching HDTV from HDTV-Channels wasnt perfect but thats another story). Now i got the Exact Configuration like above only the Graphiccard is now a Ati HD2600 512MB(Saphire passive).

If i want to play all the Titles mentioned above in 1280x720 50hz i get the Sound but a black Screen (with sometimes for a sample of a second a flicker of a Picture) i tried all titles (15) but none of them gave me a video. So the funny thing is, if i set my refreshrate to 60hz everything runs fine(except that a Video at 50frames per second is unacceptable for me at 60hz refreshrate due to stuttering at long horizontal or vertical pan shots). So now the only Title i can play perfectly is the US-Release of Transformers at 60hz.

My Question is: Why deos 50hz refre work on the same configuration with a Geforce 8600GT but wont with a Ati HD2600pro?
And why does it work with an Ati HD2600 at 60hz but wont at 50hz refreshrate?

Since i got no output-device that can handel 50hz i cant test another one.
I also thought of HDCP, since the ati HD2600 can handle HDCP output but the 8600 wont. But why da heck does the video work at 60hz, since 720p60frames is a standard HDresolution also with can be HDCP-scrambled.

I hope all you Experts out there can Help me a little bit.

i have never really got hd dvd and blu ray to play back correctly in XP but in Vista it works perfectlyI once had them working fine in XP, but then I tried to play Resident Evil 3. That title is cursed!

PowerDVD now displays a green screen with Blu-ray content. Arcsoft will play content, but it is choppy even though CPU usage is under 50%.

Can anyone suggest anything? Or do I have to replace my mainboard, CPU and RAM? I have invested countless hours trying to get my ruined PowerDVD to work again.

Edit: I am not running AnyDVD or anything else that should interfere with normal operation.

For those that want to have both (3319a-3730) versions in one rig and be able to switch from one to the other realy easy and to have BOTH of them in their original form (not mule or something) here it is:
.

I can´t get his to work, my 3319vers becomes 3730 no matter what I do, what am I doing wrong

Edit: Got it to work now, the problem was that I am on a Swedish xp and there is no c:\program files, just c:\program so I edit the swither so now it´s work but not when I use the skins so I have to watch the vers manually

image burn 2.3.2 maybe something was changed in the new version. the last disk i copied with the DRM intact was "transformers" its been awhile ago i tried coping without anydvd running so i decided to give it another shot, so right now as i type this, image burn is coping my copy of the day after tommorow, Blu Ray in " READ" mode which is also BD+ . it seems to be working just fine

So here are my results:

- ImgBurn (any version) with PDVD pre-3730 let's me play BD+ discs, when I rip them with AnyDVD and remove encryption

- Old ImgBurn let's me rip BD+ discs without AnyDVD, however any pre-3730 version of PDVD won't play them, saying it needs an update to play them, and then hanging. PDVD will play them, pre-3730, if I remove encryption.

- PDVD 3730 won't play ripped BD+ discs when you remove the encryption

- PDVD 3730 won't play ripped BD+ when you keep the encryption (with old ImgBurn), saying "A disc with an unsupported format..."


So - I'm left with running an old PDVD (pre-3730) and ripping BD+ to remove the encryption.

Has anyone successfully ripped a BD+ disc, with or without encryption, and played it with PDVD 3730? Specifically The Simpsons Movie?

I can't help but feel like I'm shortly not going to be able to play anything, unless AnyDVD can remove the BD+ limitations.

(I should note that the only BD+ disc I have is The Simpsons Movie, I think, and it's the only one I'm having problems with.)

3730 will not play ripped BD+ discs, full stop. If you want to play them now and cannot just regress to an earlier version you need to use the tips/tools to install 2 versions of PDVD.

But the Slysoft team have suggested that first release of BD+ elimination is close to being ready. It's really just a question of waiting and seeing.

I once had them working fine in XP, but then I tried to play Resident Evil 3. That title is cursed!

PowerDVD now displays a green screen with Blu-ray content. Arcsoft will play content, but it is choppy even though CPU usage is under 50%.

Can anyone suggest anything? Or do I have to replace my mainboard, CPU and RAM? I have invested countless hours trying to get my ruined PowerDVD to work again.

Edit: I am not running AnyDVD or anything else that should interfere with normal operation.

Although my previous posts might give the impression I know bugger all about PCs, I am in fact a software engineer (more missile than PCs, that's my excuse). We constantly have muppets blaming every problem on earth on "the software", doesn't matter if its an unplugged cable, a bent pin, a subsystem turned off, heat problems, its always "the software needs fixing". After several years of this I have learnt that in my job theres is about a 90% probability that its the Hardware. Its almost always the hardware. If in doubt its the f***ing HARDWARE.

However....over the last few weeks I have been attempting to put together an HTPC, and after a seemingly endless supply of grief, hassle, errors, crashes, etc. I have determined one thing about HTPCs

Its the f***ing SOFTWARE. Unless you know your existing PC is lacking something specific in terms of functionality or performance, don't waste more money on Hardware that won't be used by the software, compatible with the software, or will sit there yawning whilst it does its job in a nanosecond, then the dodgy, half-written, undertested, overhyped, poorly-driven, generally incompatible, software goes and buggers it up.

If your cpu is at 50% I imagine you've got a perfectly tolerable CPU, and its probably on a reasonable mboard. My version of arcsoft never appeared to use my gfx card, so struggled with cpu usage, yours sounds ok. Dunno about your gfx, but I would guess that floggin out on whizzbang hardware is only going to leave you out of pocket and even more disappointed.

I could spend more money on my kit and hope the extra megahertz can make up for some of the bumbling code, but it'd cost more, it's hard to say what (if any) hardware would do the job, make more noise, and it too could be bypassed by the next patch of the sw.

I'm assuming that I'm just going to have to wait for some muppet to write some code that actually works. Don't bother on a hardware upgrade unless you know what it will do better, its not worth the cost and hassle on an (unlikely) off-chance.

MCE Integrated with MyMovies and PDVD 3730

All my BD ripped through AnyDVD, when i click on watch from MCE it plays perfect. No HD HDD Playback.

List
300
MI
MI II
MI III
CASINO ROYALE
OCEANS 13
RATATOUILLE ( NO AUDIO, not sure about the reason), Will give it a shot one more time
SHOOTER
TERMINATOR_3
STEALTH
REIGN OVER ME

PowerDVD Ultra DOES work for playing both BD and HD DVD discs directly from the disc. I have two systems installed that do this flawlessly. Note that every once in a while the BD camp tries something new for encoding a disc. "Across the Universe" is an example of this. Then you have to wait for Cyberlink to figure out what was done differently and release a patch to enable the disk to be played.

The keys:

A good 500w+ power supply
High quality DDR2 RAM
XP SP2 from a clean install on an Intel Core2 Duo Mobo (Asus P5B and P5KC)
Update for Windows XP (KB920872)
Mobo driver install
LG Combo BD HD DVD drive
ATI HD3780 video card w/ Catalyst 7.12 drivers
MS .Net Framework 2.0 SP1
Direct HDMI Connection to an HDMI compliant display.
8 channel sound card using analog out
PowerDVD Ultra with Patch level 3730
YXY, if you need AR control
Powerstrip, if you need custom video timings.
NO Other Software, codec packs, etc
Use the Cyberlink Advisor to verify all green.

Enjoy.

Vern

PowerDVD Ultra DOES work for playing both BD and HD DVD discs directly from the disc. I have two systems installed that do this flawlessly. Note that every once in a while the BD camp tries something new for encoding a disc. "Across the Universe" is an example of this. Then you have to wait for Cyberlink to figure out what was done differently and release a patch to enable the disk to be played.

The keys:

A good 500w+ power supply
High quality DDR2 RAM
XP SP2 from a clean install on an Intel Core2 Duo Mobo (Asus P5B and P5KC)
Update for Windows XP (KB920872)
Mobo driver install
LG Combo BD HD DVD drive
ATI HD3780 video card w/ Catalyst 7.12 drivers
MS .Net Framework 2.0 SP1
Direct HDMI Connection to an HDMI compliant display.
8 channel sound card using analog out
PowerDVD Ultra with Patch level 3730
YXY, if you need AR control
Powerstrip, if you need custom video timings.
NO Other Software, codec packs, etc
Use the Cyberlink Advisor to verify all green.

Enjoy.

Vern

Wow, talk about making blanket statements with one data point.

First, that is just one example of hardware that works. There are tons, and it's better to go look in the HTPC thread for what you should use for a HTPC.

Second, there are many BD discs that don't work when ripped to the HD, and they don't work for two main reasons:

1) PDVD can't play them yet
2) PDVD *won't* play them (mainly this is a BD+ issue, and PDVD won't play *any* BD+ discs when you rip them, no matter how you rip them)

In addition, there are specific issues with how you rip, and what version of PDVD you use. Rather than restate all that here, read the thread for more details.

Tonight my PDVD OEM 7.3 with latest updates started playing back HD DVD with DD+ soundtracks with lots of feedback and fluttering in the sound. This is via SPDIF 16 bit/44.1 over coax. Same disks I could play a few weeks ago don't play now. Video is fine.

DD and PCM sound fine. I notice that the SPDIF volume bar chart is pegged full on when this flutter occurs.

Any thoughts as to what might have caused this sudden problem?

I am using a ASUS PK5 VM HDMI mobo with the built in audio feature to a Denon preamp.


I unistalled PDVD and then reinstalled allowing it to install the patch. Tried it out and the HD-DVD disks work great. I did not install the update to 3516 (I had applied that before to get Spidey3 to play).

Then I updated to 3516 and the problems returned. Now back at just the patch level.

Second, there are many BD discs that don't work when ripped to the HD, and they don't work for two main reasons:

1) PDVD can't play them yet
2) PDVD *won't* play them (mainly this is a BD+ issue, and PDVD won't play *any* BD+ discs when you rip them, no matter how you rip them)

In addition, there are specific issues with how you rip, and what version of PDVD you use. Rather than restate all that here, read the thread for more details.

Vern specifically mentioned playing "directly from the disc" meaning from the original media, not ripped to your hard drive.

Vern specifically mentioned playing "directly from the disc" meaning from the original media, not ripped to your hard drive.

Huh, well, "directly from the disc" means directly from the hard drive to me. Given that the bulk of the posts here are about playing "directly from the (hard) disk", and he was responding to a long chain of issues relating to playing from the hard drive, it's not crazy to think he meant that.

And his implication on the hardware is just silly. Especially the XP part.

Huh, well, "directly from the disc" means directly from the hard drive to me. Given that the bulk of the posts here are about playing "directly from the (hard) disk", and he was responding to a long chain of issues relating to playing from the hard drive, it's not crazy to think he meant that.

And his implication on the hardware is just silly. Especially the XP part.

My understanding, from reading his post, is that "direct to disc" means directly from the optical disc, NOT from the hard disk.

Note that if we use the convention "disc" for optical discs, and "disk" for hard drive, confusions could have been avoided.

Im having a problem with PowerDVD not utilizing the SPDIF out everytime. Now and then the program will start using 2 speaker instead of SPDIF. Anyone having the same problem???

Closing and reopening PowerDVD usually fixes the problem. Its just anoying, especially when Im trying to show off my system. Who's impressed with a HTPC that cant even output 5.1??:mad:

Second, there are many BD discs that don't work when ripped to the HD
personally, I don't give a s**t... I'd like to see PDVD have all the bugs worked out playing optical discs in the drive first... THEN they should worry about rips...

:cool:

I've got a Q...

I've got an HIS X1650XT (AGP) (http://www.hisdigital.com/html/product_ov.php?id=276&view=yes) video card and it says that it'll do H.264 (same as MPEG-4?) decoding, however, my CPU usage is 70 - 95% when watching MPEG-4 movies. In PDVD, the box is checked to enable AVIVO, however, my high CPU usage and video card idle temps tell me that the video card is not doing any decoding. Is there something I am doing wrong, or will this card just not cut it?

I can´t get his to work, my 3319vers becomes 3730 no matter what I do, what am I doing wrong

Edit: Got it to work now, the problem was that I am on a Swedish xp and there is no c:\program files, just c:\program so I edit the swither so now it´s work but not when I use the skins so I have to watch the vers manually


can you tell me how to edit the switcher paths? I think the only issue with x64 is the paths. Thanks.

anyone having problems with BD isos created from HDD files using ImgBurn 2.4. I create a UDF 2.50 image file from a BD folder and it plays fine in 3319a, but in 3730 I just get a purple/black screen w/o audio or video.

mounting with virtual CD/DaemonTools Lite (current versions)
Vista Ultimate x64
E6750
2600XT
4GB RAM
HDCP compliant
same with or w/o AnyDVD HD running

HD DVD isos created the same way work perfectly


Thanks

personally, I don't give a s**t... I'd like to see PDVD have all the bugs worked out playing optical discs in the drive first... THEN they should worry about rips...

:cool:

You're definitely in the minority. Go get a dedicated player if you want to play optical discs.

anyone having problems with BD isos created from HDD files using ImgBurn 2.4. I create a UDF 2.50 image file from a BD folder and it plays fine in 3319a, but in 3730 I just get a purple/black screen w/o audio or video.

mounting with virtual CD/DaemonTools Lite (current versions)
Vista Ultimate x64
E6750
2600XT
4GB RAM
HDCP compliant
same with or w/o AnyDVD HD running

HD DVD isos created the same way work perfectly


Thanks


You really need to Read from the disc. Once you burn a directory, weird things seem to happen when trying to build an ISO.

I've got a Q...

I've got an HIS X1650XT (AGP) (http://www.hisdigital.com/html/product_ov.php?id=276&view=yes) video card and it says that it'll do H.264 (same as MPEG-4?) decoding, however, my CPU usage is 70 - 95% when watching MPEG-4 movies. In PDVD, the box is checked to enable AVIVO, however, my high CPU usage and video card idle temps tell me that the video card is not doing any decoding. Is there something I am doing wrong, or will this card just not cut it?

I have the same problem with both my 8500GT and my 2600XT. It seems as if there's little, if any, hardware acceleration. (Yes, the hardware acceleration box is checked.)

Can anyone suggest a reason? I'm using Vista x64 with the latest retail build of PowerDVD.

That's interesting... I was looking to just get a new motherboard, RAM, and video card (looking at 8600GT) to fix the problem. My other rig has an 8800GT SSC and with C1E enabled, my processor (E6750) generally stays at 2Ghz and averages somewhere between 10 - 15% usage while watching the most demanding of HD DVD or Blu-Ray.

I'd hate to get new stuff and have the same issue, but I don't want to spend the money on another 8800GT. I was considering and HIS 3650 (the one that comes with the passive Zalman cooler), but I'm not sure it'll fit in my NSK-2480.

Anyone have any ideas why "rdunnill" and I are having this issue?

So i got a Problem with Powerdvd and the following Configuration


So far so good i was happy. Now i changed my Graphic Card for other Reasons (Watching HDTV from HDTV-Channels wasnt perfect but thats another story). Now i got the Exact Configuration like above only the Graphiccard is now a Ati HD2600 512MB(Saphire passive).

If i want to play all the Titles mentioned above in 1280x720 50hz i get the Sound but a black Screen (with sometimes for a sample of a second a flicker of a Picture) i tried all titles (15) but none of them gave me a video. So the funny thing is, if i set my refreshrate to 60hz everything runs fine(except that a Video at 50frames per second is unacceptable for me at 60hz refreshrate due to stuttering at long horizontal or vertical pan shots).

My Question is: Why deos 50hz refre work on the same configuration with a Geforce 8600GT but wont with a Ati HD2600pro?

And why does it work with an Ati HD2600 at 60hz but wont at 50hz refreshrate?



Hi there, this problem is an ATI driver issue and has not been resolved as of yet (I pray with every new release), try playing back in 1080i 50hz...you will see that it will work flawlessly! I got exactely the same effects you described...but since hd-ready displays are 1080i compatible that should be no big deal.

This is clearly a hardware acceleration problem since without HA it also works with 720p 50hz.! Thanks ATI!

You really need to Read from the disc. Once you burn a directory, weird things seem to happen when trying to build an ISO.

Magically they started to work. I came home from work, took my PC out of sleep and tried one. Auto-magically all my BD isos from folder work now. WTF, but I'm happy.

can you tell me how to edit the switcher paths? I think the only issue with x64 is the paths. Thanks.


Only thing I did was removed "files in c:\program files" I only right click on the swither and click edit

Magically they started to work. I came home from work, took my PC out of sleep and tried one. Auto-magically all my BD isos from folder work now. WTF, but I'm happy.

WTF!!!
How??

I have the same problem with both my 8500GT and my 2600XT. It seems as if there's little, if any, hardware acceleration. (Yes, the hardware acceleration box is checked.)

Can anyone suggest a reason? I'm using Vista x64 with the latest retail build of PowerDVD.

Driver problems are far more likely than PDVD problems - acceleration is one of the few things that actually works properly with PDVD. However, it can't accelerate if the driver/card combo aren't co-operating.

Vista x264 does seem particularly troublesome for acceleration though, a lot of posts here with people having issues. Have you tried DXVA Checker? Here:

http://bluesky23.hp.infoseek.co.jp/index.html#DXVAChecker

This is the most useful tool for this - it'll tell you what acceleration modes the driver itself is reporting.

Driver problems are far more likely than PDVD problems - acceleration is one of the few things that actually works properly with PDVD. However, it can't accelerate if the driver/card combo aren't co-operating.

Vista x264 does seem particularly troublesome for acceleration though, a lot of posts here with people having issues. Have you tried DXVA Checker? Here:

http://bluesky23.hp.infoseek.co.jp/index.html#DXVAChecker

This is the most useful tool for this - it'll tell you what acceleration modes the driver itself is reporting.

Nice find arfster looks like my 2600XT is working right;

ATI Radeon HD 2600 XT AGP
ModeMPEG2_C: DXVA1, NV12, 720x480 / 1280x720 / 1920x1080
ModeMPEG2_D: DXVA1, NV12, 720x480 / 1280x720 / 1920x1080
ModeH264_VLD_NoFGT: DXVA1, NV12, 720x480 / 1280x720 / 1920x1080
ModeVC1_VLD: DXVA1, NV12, 720x480 / 1280x720 / 1920x1080
ModeWMV8_PostProc: DXVA1, NV12, 720x480 / 1280x720
ModeWMV9_PostProc: DXVA1, NV12, 720x480 / 1280x720

Huh, well, "directly from the disc" means directly from the hard drive to me. Given that the bulk of the posts here are about playing "directly from the (hard) disk", and he was responding to a long chain of issues relating to playing from the hard drive, it's not crazy to think he meant that.

Hmmm...I think the "bulk" of the posts are about getting PDVD to work properly. The limitations of BD+ and PDVD removing the option to even select movies off a hard drive have rendered much of that moot.

Also, these forums aren't truly threaded, so there's no "chain" he was specifically responding to AFAIK.

Hmmm...I think the "bulk" of the posts are about getting PDVD to work properly. The limitations of BD+ and PDVD removing the option to even select movies off a hard drive have rendered much of that moot.

Also, these forums aren't truly threaded, so there's no "chain" he was specifically responding to AFAIK.

Nothing is "moot". You can use the older version to run off directory structures, and any version to run off an ISO, which is what most of us are doing at this point.

The only issue is BD+ in ISO's, which AnyDVD should crack at some point.

We just want to be able to use media that we purchased legally, but not have to fumble with the discs.

We just want to be able to use media that we purchased legally, but not have to fumble with the discs.

Did you buy a license to create a copy of the media?

If not, then you have successfully entered the impossible to fully understand realm of copywrite laws.

PDVD simply did not want to be a party to potential lawsuits, so they removed the ability to potentially violate the law.

Don't like it? You have a few legal options open:

1. Don't buy it.
2. Move to a nation with different laws.
3. Get the laws in your home nation changed.

Don't like it? You have a few legal options open:

1. Don't buy it.
2. Move to a nation with different laws.
3. Get the laws in your home nation changed.

You forgot option 4. Use PDVD version 3319.0. :p

Did you buy a license to create a copy of the media?

If not, then you have successfully entered the impossible to fully understand realm of copywrite laws.

PDVD simply did not want to be a party to potential lawsuits, so they removed the ability to potentially violate the law.

Don't like it? You have a few legal options open:

1. Don't buy it.
2. Move to a nation with different laws.
3. Get the laws in your home nation changed.

i am far from a expert but i think copyright laws have for a long time sided with consumers right to backup purchased media.

Did you buy a license to create a copy of the media?

If not, then you have successfully entered the impossible to fully understand realm of copywrite laws.

PDVD simply did not want to be a party to potential lawsuits, so they removed the ability to potentially violate the law.

Don't like it? You have a few legal options open:

1. Don't buy it.
2. Move to a nation with different laws.
3. Get the laws in your home nation changed.

Wow, you sure don't know much about anything, do you?

personally, I don't give a s**t... I'd like to see PDVD have all the bugs worked out playing optical discs in the drive first... THEN they should worry about rips...

You're definitely in the minority. Go get a dedicated player if you want to play optical discs.

I'm pretty much with Jim on this. Playing from the hard drive is pretty much irrelevant if the software doesn't work well in the first place. This thread pretty much boils down to people asking over and over (and over and over and over) if PowerDVD can play from the hard drive (can't people do a search or read back a few pages???) AND basic fundamental issues with PowerDVD.

The fundamental issues are a lot more important than the nuances of playing back an ISO file. If PowerDVD won't play Bourne Ultimatum from the original HD DVD, then it probably won't play from an ISO either. I cite this particular sample because my brother and I tried to watch it last night and got stuck on the Loading Content popup. After fighting with it for a while, we ended up watching another movie instead - Pirates of the Caribbean: The Curse of the Black Pearl which neither of us had seen yet but enjoyed immensely. Or how about how PowerDVD uses different keyboard shortcuts for Bluray versus HD DVD (though the way HD DVD seems to be quickly fading away, this will probably become a moot point)?

Even though it isn't a priority for me (mostly due to how much HDD space is needed for each movie - it's just not very practical to have a large hidef movie collection ripped to HDD's at this point), I sympathise with those who want HDD playback, but I would think nearly everyone could agree that it's secondary to the software actually working...

Wow, you sure don't know much about anything, do you?

Is tact your middle name? :rolleyes:

i am far from a expert but i think copyright laws have for a long time sided with consumers right to backup purchased media.

Backup is for archival purposes. You do not use your backup as your primary media or it is no longer a backup.

You are correct about creating backups, though. Any court cases involving the creation of backups for the purpose of having a backup have seen the defendant (the person having the backup) win.

The problem is when the backup is used as the source instead of being used as a backup.

Of course, this varies from nation to nation. In the US, it is quite possible to be taken to court (and lose) if you merely have the backup on a shared drive...which most people would do...since it shows you have the intention of sharing the data (the primary purpose of a shared drive).

The shared drive case has not been tested yet, but the law is written such that it would potentially be used.

Wow, you sure don't know much about anything, do you?

You hurt my feelings. I am suddenly tossed into an abyss of darkness from which I will never recover.

Sorry, I got you confused with someone who matters. Your incomplete thought process failed to bother me in the slightest.

I recommend you read up on the copywrite laws of your nation. You will be surprised to find how little power you actually have.

You probably even think you actually OWN the movie you purchased. You do not, you only own the ability to view it via the media you purchased it upon.

You forgot option 4. Use PDVD version 3319.0. :p

:D

You are right about that!

Or how about how PowerDVD uses different keyboard shortcuts for Bluray versus HD DVD (though the way HD DVD seems to be quickly fading away, this will probably become a moot point)?

Nothing is "moot".

:D

I do agree with you, it is stupid they used different shortcuts.

I suspect there were two different "teams" working on the two different formats.

Backup is for archival purposes. You do not use your backup as your primary media or it is no longer a backup.

Of course, this varies from nation to nation. In the US, it is quite possible to be taken to court (and lose) if you merely have the backup on a shared drive...which most people would do...since it shows you have the intention of sharing the data (the primary purpose of a shared drive).

The shared drive case has not been tested yet, but the law is written such that it would potentially be used.



You hurt my feelings. I am suddenly tossed into an abyss of darkness from which I will never recover.

Sorry, I got you confused with someone who matters. Your incomplete thought process failed to bother me in the slightest.

I recommend you read up on the copywrite laws of your nation. You will be surprised to find how little power you actually have.

You probably even think you actually OWN the movie you purchased. You do not, you only own the ability to view it via the media you purchased it upon.

Thanks for the response! It's nice to see someone so relaxed and self-confident, as opposed to the many people who just pounce in and act all cocky, without knowing what they're talking about.

I suggest you read up on DMCA (which is not copyright law), and copyright law. And then go read about Fair Use. And then go read about BluRay (and HDDVD), and about their limited copying capabilities for consumers.

However, please keep it out of this thread.

Thanks for the response! It's nice to see someone so relaxed and self-confident, as opposed to the many people who just pounce in and act all cocky, without knowing what they're talking about.

I suggest you read up on DMCA (which is not copyright law), and copyright law. And then go read about Fair Use. And then go read about BluRay (and HDDVD), and about their limited copying capabilities for consumers.

However, please keep it out of this thread.

If copywrite law prevents it from happening (legally), then it does not matter if you feel it should be allowed.

But yes, the one thing you are correct about is keeping it out of this thread, so I suggest you follow your own advice...if you are able to do so, of course. If not, then feel free to continue the conversation.


EDIT: Just thought you should know, the DCMA IS copyright law:

H.R.2281
Digital Millennium Copyright Act (Enrolled as Agreed to or Passed by Both House and Senate)

http://thomas.loc.gov/cgi-bin/query/F?c105:1:./temp/~c105Menuuw:e730:

THE DIGITAL MILLENNIUM COPYRIGHT ACT OF 1998
U.S. Copyright Office Summary
December 1998

INTRODUCTION
The Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA)1 was signed into law by President Clinton on October 28, 1998. The legislation implements two 1996 World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO) treaties: the WIPO Copyright Treaty and the WIPO Performances and Phonograms Treaty. The DMCA also addresses a number of other significant copyright-related issues.
http://www.copyright.gov/legislation/dmca.pdf

But hey, what is a little issue like that when talking about copyright and laws, eh?

Here is fair use:

http://www.copyright.gov/fls/fl102.html
http://www.copyright.gov/title17/92chap1.html#107

Has anyone found a program or workaround for PowerDVD that allows you to play profile 1.1 discs ripped to the hard drive. I don't want to have to mount an iso. I can get profile 1.0 discs to play in PowerDVD 3319. Any help will be greatly appreciated.

Thanks!

Nothing is "moot". You can use the older version to run off directory structures, and any version to run off an ISO, which is what most of us are doing at this point.

The only issue is BD+ in ISO's, which AnyDVD should crack at some point.

We just want to be able to use media that we purchased legally, but not have to fumble with the discs.

Yeah, I understand what you want, I still have my old DVDs ripped to hard drives. Blu-Ray is a different animal, with the format war going on I was not going to buy too many right away so I've been renting from Netflix for the past year. What that taught me was there are so many new movies coming out all the time that I rarely watch any more than once. I'm certainly not going to hassle with ripping discs that I rent. And for those few that I have bought, it's just as easy to put in the disc (that's the BD disc, not a hard drive). Also, even though hard drives are cheap, a BD movie is still 20+ GB. Not to mention the protective coating on a BD works really well so they are far less susceptible to scratching compared to a DVD (or HD DVD).

At any rate, this thread is about a lot more than just "how to watch ripped HDM". That's been only one of a number of problems since the program has come out. We've had Reclock broken, AR control using YXY broken, problems with Profile 1.1, downsampled audio, etc, etc.

Can't be a video card limitation as I've got a 3850 and have no probs with BD/HD movies using PowerDVD. I've used Cats 7.12-8.2, all have been ok so far.

Thanks for the confirmation, though I had already made that assumption. I mean seriously, do they think that issue wouldn't raise a thousand redflags? I couldn't find more than one similar case, lol.

Typical Bangalore brush off (another assumption) but I made them provide more detail, and mentioned that I work for ATI/AMD and would be sure to pass on there accusation, but no luck regardless.

I stopped trying, they win. Even tried anyDvd, no luck.

WTF!!!
How??

wish I knew

This is the most useful tool for this - it'll tell you what acceleration modes the driver itself is reporting.Thanks -- what should I be looking for? There is *some* acceleration, as otherwise Blu-ray content devolves into a slide show. The particularly troublesome Blu-ray disc I've encountered is "Resident Evil 3," which pushed the CPU to 90-100%; I thought the 2600XT and the 8500GT should be able to accelerate this fully or nearly fully? BTW I get even worse performance under XP.

Hi there, this problem is an ATI driver issue and has not been resolved as of yet (I pray with every new release), try playing back in 1080i 50hz...you will see that it will work flawlessly! I got exactely the same effects you described...but since hd-ready displays are 1080i compatible that should be no big deal.

This is clearly a hardware acceleration problem since without HA it also works with 720p 50hz.! Thanks ATI!

Thanx for that i will try 1080i, but this wont look good i think since my Beamers native Res. is 1280x720. Anyway thanx. I will wait for a new ATI-Driver.:(

Thanks -- what should I be looking for? There is *some* acceleration, as otherwise Blu-ray content devolves into a slide show. The particularly troublesome Blu-ray disc I've encountered is "Resident Evil 3," which pushed the CPU to 90-100%; I thought the 2600XT and the 8500GT should be able to accelerate this fully or nearly fully? BTW I get even worse performance under XP.I think this is due to the TrueHD decoding. I can't remember for sure, but doesn't RE3 have a secondary audio track that is DD+ (spanish maybe). Does it play better if you select this track? I returned my RE3 rental before thinking to test this.

Has anyone figured a workaround or fix to the dts-mixing mode "tinny" "ringing" audio in BluRay movies? I have updated my audio drivers to the latest and it still isnt going away. It is really annoying so I end up just listening to the movie in stereo sound.

This question is about picture quality in PDVD-U.

I've searched the forum for things like disabling hardware acceleration and am still looking for clues on how to improve the image quality.

Setup includes C2D@2.33GHz, Vista32, NV8500GT and PDVD-U 7.3.3730.

I notice noise in 1080p images that surprises me (example: Spider-Man 3 on bD). [I also notice HUGE differences in standard DVD playback within Media Player 11 between fullscreen and windowed mode, and it seems to have something to do with Aero and overlay. In windowed mode, the image is usually good, while the same content looks horrible in fullscreen Media Player.] In PDVD, I use fullscreen mode, and know that Aero is disabled and hardware acceleration is auto-selected and greyed out for disabling.

Am I being too picky? Should I see noise on Blu-Rays like Spider-Man 3? Is there a way to improve the image quality from PDVD-U?

Ok, so I finally built my HTPC and just recently added the Xbox HD-DVD add-on after using it on my 360. I installed PowerDVD Ultra (I believe the latest version) and was able to play most of HD movies, except for Transformers, Bourne Ultimatum, Pan's Labyrinth, and Shrek 3. Here is my setup:

CPU: Q6600
GPU: 3870x2
OS: Vista Ultimate x64
Display: 18.1" LCD Monitor
Software: AnyDVD HD (latest version), PowerDVD Ultra

The drive was installed fine under Vista and these HD movies are able to be played through my 360, but for some reason they won't play. They load up fine and PDVD starts and shows the Black Loading screen, and it just stays black. I've cleared the memory in the HD-DVD player through the 360 but that didn't help. Anyone have any suggestions or seen the same issue that could help me fix this problem?

I just purchased PowerDVD Ultra 7.3.

I don't have the Blu-ray/HDDVD external drive yet (on order). However, I do have a lot of HD MPEG2 stuff recorded on my netwrok drive that was taken from my PVR. It all plays fine using a few other players, but when I try to play it with PowerDVD, all I get is a black screen, even though the time ticks forward as if it plays. What gives?

I have 3 machines, and all with the same results, a Core Duo 1.67Ghz Mac Mini, a brand new Core 2 Duo 2.0Ghz Macbook, and a 2.8Ghz Opteron Dual core desktop with Radeon x850.

This was an expensive piece of software and it seems to suck hard!

I just purchased PowerDVD 7.3.

I don't have the Blu-ray/HDDVD external drive yet (on order). However, I do have a lot of HD MPEG2 stuff recorded on my netwrok drive that was taken from my PVR. It all plays fine using a few other players, but when I try to play it with PowerDVD, all I get is a black screen, even though the time ticks forward as if it plays. What gives?

I have 3 machines, and all with the same results, a Core Duo 1.67Ghz Mac Mini, a brand new Core 2 Duo 2.0Ghz Macbook, and a 2.8Ghz Opteron Dual core desktop with Radeon x850.

This was an expensive piece of software and it seems to suck hard!

First you really need a video card that gives you HD acceleration, second you need AnyDVD HD to play HD DVD/BR on non-compliant machines like all three of yours.

First you really need a video card that gives you HD acceleration, second you need AnyDVD HD to play HD DVD/BR on non-compliant machines like all three of yours.

I have AnyDVD HD installed, but these are not Blu-ray/HD-DVD discs I'm trying to play. They're MPEG2 HD files that were captured from an HD PVR.

As I said, they play fine in other players on all machines, so processing/video power is not an issue. Yet, PowerDVD throws up.

Will PowerDVD not work with mainstream video cards, even thought the machine is powerful enough to handle the task?

Just bought an LG drive, came with PowerDVD 7.3, and it is THE WORST piece of **** program I've ever seen.

It does fill in the blanks so the "Advisor" gives my system all green dots, but it will not play ANYTHING. Ill have to try to uninstall and install again.

Even a standard DVD hangs forever.

Is it really worth it to buy the Ultra version? Why did this PoS even bother to get bundled if it simply wont work?

...and according to the PowerDVD web site, Intel 945/965 graphics is supported. That would make the Macbook Core 2 Duo 2.0Ghz fully compliant (since it has an internal video subsystem). What gives?

It wont let me "uninstall" it. Simply doesn't respond using either the link in startmenu or using control panel "add/remove".

Any ideas how to get this INFESTATION off my PC?

It wont let me "uninstall" it. Simply doesn't respond using either the link in startmenu or using control panel "add/remove".

Any ideas how to get this INFESTATION off my PC?

Apart from the obvious system restore, you could try installing the v3516 patch for the Retail varsion from the Cyberlink website. Bizarre though it sounds, whenever I tried to patch my semi-useless OEM version (with every patch I could get my grubby mits on, regardless of which version it was intended for), the patch v3516 (for retail) only ever succeeded in unistalling Power DVD altogether.

The 3516 for OEM did actually install properly (gasp), though you could try that, as sometimes successfully installing something over the top of an earlier version seems to sort out a dodgy uninstaller.

...or ruin your life completely.

Another masterstroke of programming by Cyberlink.

Ok, so I finally built my HTPC and just recently added the Xbox HD-DVD add-on after using it on my 360. I installed PowerDVD Ultra (I believe the latest version) and was able to play most of HD movies, except for Transformers, Bourne Ultimatum, Pan's Labyrinth, and Shrek 3. Here is my setup:

CPU: Q6600
GPU: 3870x2
OS: Vista Ultimate x64
Display: 18.1" LCD Monitor
Software: AnyDVD HD (latest version), PowerDVD Ultra

The drive was installed fine under Vista and these HD movies are able to be played through my 360, but for some reason they won't play. They load up fine and PDVD starts and shows the Black Loading screen, and it just stays black. I've cleared the memory in the HD-DVD player through the 360 but that didn't help. Anyone have any suggestions or seen the same issue that could help me fix this problem?

Anyone seen a similar issue to mine? I have tried to find this issue online, but I haven't been able to find a good fix to my issue. The only fix i've seen is the clearing hd-dvd memory, but that doesn't seem to help me at all.

Anyone seen a similar issue to mine? I have tried to find this issue online, but I haven't been able to find a good fix to my issue. The only fix i've seen is the clearing hd-dvd memory, but that doesn't seem to help me at all.

You should block the network port for PDVD. These are probably trying to phone-home to get some live content, which tends to bust PDVD. You can sometimes bypass it by clicking on the screen, or going to the menu, but the best way is to block it from calling at all.

You should block the network port for PDVD. These are probably trying to phone-home to get some live content, which tends to bust PDVD. You can sometimes bypass it by clicking on the screen, or going to the menu, but the best way is to block it from calling at all.

Is this something that I setup in my firewall or router? Where do I find what port is being used by PDVD to call home?

??Try it with one card if 3870x2 means sli setup.

Turn off the router for the movie and if you see a rectangle with cancel and a progress bar, hit enter quickly.

Anyone have any advice on the black screens on all my machines?

Use the cyberlink advisor to test your components, but from past posts and experience it's usually a driver issue.

??Try it with one card if 3870x2 means sli setup.

Turn off the router for the movie and if you see a rectangle with cancel and a progress bar, hit enter quickly.

3870x2 is the card that I own, it is only 1 video card with 2 3870s on 1 pcb. I'll just find a way to block the port from my router, cause I like to surf the web or do other stuff online while watching the movie.

That can use up resources-also fyi, PDVD does not like clone-it wants to only play on the primary display.

That can use up resources-also fyi, PDVD does not like clone-it wants to only play on the primary display.

What do you mean by clone? I am currently using this on 1 primary display. Once I get this to work, i'll move my htpc to connect it to my 46" lcd.

Is this something that I setup in my firewall or router? Where do I find what port is being used by PDVD to call home?

first try to shut down your network in the control panel to see if the helps and if thats your problem if it does you could try to shut it down via the firewall but i have found for some movies i need to disable the network during play back

i have also found it helpful to turn off DEP ( data execution prevention) for power dvd

first try to shut down your network in the control panel to see if the helps and if thats your problem if it does you could try to shut it down via the firewall but i have found for some movies i need to disable the network during play back

i have also found it helpful to turn off DEP ( data execution prevention) for power dvd

Alrighty, thanks for the info. I really wish there was a more direct way of playing HD-Dvds with PDVD than having to disable the network. I guess the software is not quite up to a good standard to where it plays HD content without having the user to make hacks or disable the default options.

What do you mean by clone?
I guess it's a NVIDIA term? Using two monitors to watch the same show. Someone may have a workaround, but for me PDVD is SO picky that it will refuse dragging to a second monitor. And then one day it will, and then...
So it works best on the primary display. PDVD is very particular with each persons computer, many things can affect its mood. Somebody said we were beta testers and it feels like it.

What do you mean by clone?
I guess it's a NVIDIA term? Using two monitors to watch the same show. Someone may have a workaround, but for me PDVD is SO picky that it will refuse dragging to a second monitor. And then one day it will, and then...
So it works best on the primary display. PDVD is very particular with each persons computer, many things can affect its mood. Somebody said we were beta testers and it feels like it.

Oh ok, I get you now, Yeah clone is an option on my video card (ATI) but I don't use it now, and probably won't use it in the future. I agree that PDVD seems like it is in beta. You would think that they would have all of the bugs worked out and be able to work flawlessly with the current HD formats, or format.

So I wonder what Cyberlink will do to us now that HD-DVD has been scuttled by Toshiba?

Will this be their opportunity to reduce the complexity of PDVD and there by stop the playback of HD-DVD's on the PC?

I just hope they warn us of the 'upgrade' that removes this functionality!!!!

They have not in the past...

So I wonder what Cyberlink will do to us now that HD-DVD has been scuttled by Toshiba?

Will this be their opportunity to reduce the complexity of PDVD and there by stop the playback of HD-DVD's on the PC?

I just hope they warn us of the 'upgrade' that removes this functionality!!!!

They have not in the past...

maybe they will now allow playback of hd dvd from latest versions off HD since will the studios care now?
probably foolish thinking but one can always hope.

I think this is due to the TrueHD decoding. I can't remember for sure, but doesn't RE3 have a secondary audio track that is DD+ (spanish maybe). Does it play better if you select this track? I returned my RE3 rental before thinking to test this.Thanks -- is there anything I can do to speed up TrueHD decoding?

Also, I can't get good quality DVD playback under Vista Home Premium; playback is choppy and beset with tearing. That does not hold true with Vista Enterprise, leading me to suspect that the latter's performance is due not to what it has but what it doesn't have, namely a free MPEG decoder. Is there any way I can disable the bundled decoders?

has anyone got 310 to yuma working yet? i am using both 3319a and 3370 and am getting the "unsupported format" message any ideas guys. thanks.

first try to shut down your network in the control panel to see if the helps and if thats your problem if it does you could try to shut it down via the firewall but i have found for some movies i need to disable the network during play back

i have also found it helpful to turn off DEP ( data execution prevention) for power dvd

I played around with this a bit tonight with Bourne Ultimatum. Enabling Windows Firewall (XP MCE 2005, latest service pack, etc.) and then disabling PowerDVD in it had no effect - PowerDVD still tried to retrieve web enabled content and just sat there. Probably by a fluke, I was able to get Bourne Ultimatum to play once - probably got lucky on retrieving the web enabled content or something.

Disabling the network seems to do the trick (after restarting PowerDVD multiple times, I could get to the menus and play the movie every time), but is definitely much more drastic than I would prefer to do as I obviously have other uses for the network connection.

Hopefully I can find a reasonable way to lock PowerDVD from using the network and keep the rest of my system usable.

For now, I've shut Windows Firewall back off since it didn't help solve the problem I was trying to solve.

Thanks -- is there anything I can do to speed up TrueHD decoding?Unfortunately I don't know of any way to do that. Just curious but was that the issue? As I said, I returned RE3 without testing that theory.

Also, I can't get good quality DVD playback under Vista Home Premium; playback is choppy and beset with tearing. That does not hold true with Vista Enterprise, leading me to suspect that the latter's performance is due not to what it has but what it doesn't have, namely a free MPEG decoder. Is there any way I can disable the bundled decoders?The following utilities can be used to check what video decoders are installed on your machine and to change the preferred decoders to use with MCE (XP utility referenced in case someone asks for it later):

XP/MCE2005: http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyID=de1491ac-0ab6-4990-943d-627e6ade9fcb&displaylang=en

Vista: http://mediacenterexpert.blogspot.com/2006/07/vista-media-center-decoder-utility.html

Note: This only changes the decoder used by MS Media Center.

XP/MCE2005: http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyID=de1491ac-0ab6-4990-943d-627e6ade9fcb&displaylang=en

Vista: http://mediacenterexpert.blogspot.com/2006/07/vista-media-center-decoder-utility.html

Note: This only changes the decoder used by MS Media Center.Thanks, but I'd found those and they don't seem to help.

Has *anyone* achieved smooth DVD playback under Vista Home Premium? Right now, the only way I can play DVDs is via a second boot partition with MCE 2005.

Hmmm. Sorry that didn't help. I don't use MS Media Center so I'm probably not going to be much help beyond that. You may want to start another thread and someone like ChrisL01 can probably give you better answers. (He may not see it buried in this thread.)

Edit: This may be of interest to you (last ditch effort to help): http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showpost.php?p=13151769&postcount=13

What a piece of garbage. I gave up and ordered the full PowerDVD Ultra, download with backup CD, $112. Downloaded it, and then.... INVALID KEY when trying to activate it.

That's about all I can handle from this company. Are there any alternatives to playing Bluray/HDDVD's on a PC? Or do I need to just buy a Bluray player and give up on using the PC at all?

How does Cyberlink stay in business, unreal.:mad:

What a piece of garbage. I gave up and ordered the full PowerDVD Ultra, download with backup CD, $112. Downloaded it, and then.... INVALID KEY when trying to activate it.

That's about all I can handle from this company. Are there any alternatives to playing Bluray/HDDVD's on a PC? Or do I need to just buy a Bluray player and give up on using the PC at all?

How does Cyberlink stay in business, unreal.:mad:
I managed to get the OEM version working, and had no problems until I rented the dreaded "Resident Evil 3."

Edit: This may be of interest to you (last ditch effort to help):
Thanks, but this is on a single-core CPU (4000+).

Sometimes I wish there were a way to downgrade to Vista Basic. Sometimes.

Hmmm. Sorry that didn't help. I don't use MS Media Center so I'm probably not going to be much help beyond that. You may want to start another thread and someone like ChrisL01 can probably give you better answers. (He may not see it buried in this thread.)

Edit: This may be of interest to you (last ditch effort to help): http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showpost.php?p=13151769&postcount=13
I don't know what I did, whether it was turning off UAC or running the VMCD utility, but DVD playback with PowerDVD Ultra under Vista x64 is now pristine. Thanks for the help!

Now I'm going to order me a copy of "Resident Evil 3" on Blu-ray and see if TrueHD is the cause of the CPU overload.

I just bought Transformers HD DVD (from local store´s HD DVD clearance sale) and then tried to watch it with XBOX360 drive/PowerDVD/Win XP Pro -combination. There was no picture at all after menus. Then I downloaded 3730 -patch. Movie started but it was really choppy, like a PowerPoint presentation. With every HD DVD movie I own it is now the same thing. Even "old" Poseidon -disc which played smoothly before is now unwatchable.

When I opened task manager it was clear the reason was CPU overload: 98-100%. It seems PowerDvd can no longer use my AGP-Ati Radeon HD2400 Pro´s hardware acceleration.

What PowerDVD version should I try next? It is quite clear that previous installed version (3120) can not play Transformers. Is there some kind of workaround solution even if there is no "permanent" fix?

This is not nice: I have legally bought software, equipment and disc but I can´t watch movie... It has not been easy with PowerDVD. Is buying a standalone player only "reasonable" way to watch HD DVD´s? BD has now won the war, I think it might be a good time to take a vacation from PowerDVD:mad:

I played around with this a bit tonight with Bourne Ultimatum. Enabling Windows Firewall (XP MCE 2005, latest service pack, etc.) and then disabling PowerDVD in it had no effect - PowerDVD still tried to retrieve web enabled content and just sat there. Probably by a fluke, I was able to get Bourne Ultimatum to play once - probably got lucky on retrieving the web enabled content or something.

Disabling the network seems to do the trick (after restarting PowerDVD multiple times, I could get to the menus and play the movie every time), but is definitely much more drastic than I would prefer to do as I obviously have other uses for the network connection.

Hopefully I can find a reasonable way to lock PowerDVD from using the network and keep the rest of my system usable.

For now, I've shut Windows Firewall back off since it didn't help solve the problem I was trying to solve.
If your version of PowerDVD can play HD-DVD from HDD, Bourne Ultimatum can be played via an edited XPL without PowerDVD trying to download first.

I always just hit enter on the keyboard and the it skips the web stuff for Transformers, Bourne Ultimatum and the others that have it.

I don't know what I did, whether it was turning off UAC or running the VMCD utility, but DVD playback with PowerDVD Ultra under Vista x64 is now pristine. Thanks for the help!Glad it's working. Let me know what you find out on RE3.

What a piece of garbage. I gave up and ordered the full PowerDVD Ultra, download with backup CD, $112. Downloaded it, and then.... INVALID KEY when trying to activate it.

That's about all I can handle from this company. Are there any alternatives to playing Bluray/HDDVD's on a PC? Or do I need to just buy a Bluray player and give up on using the PC at all?

How does Cyberlink stay in business, unreal.:mad:

The problems you are experiencing with basic function are not typical. I was able to play DVDs just fine in my OEM version of PowerDVD right out of the box. No noticeable startup times or hangs in performance. I am thinking you may have a conflict or bad dll of some sort. You may get lucky and your install of Ultra will just magically fix this.

I purchased and installed Ultra this weekend. I was able to uninstall the OEM version without a problem (again, I'm not sure what issue you are seeing here but I doubt it is the PowerDVD software). Note that when I tried to type in the registration key it refused to take it 3 times. I carefully visually verified that I had it correct. HOWEVER, when I just cut-and-pasted the exact same key out of the e-mail into the key fields (just selected the first one and it pasted across into all of them) it took the key successfully. I don't know what is going on with that, but it works now.

I hope you are able to get this going. PowerDVD is considered to be one of the better players out there. I believe there are other options (e.g. TheaterTek) but in general I am concerned that you have a configuration problem of some sort.

Now, here's a question from me:

This weekend using the OEM version of PowerDVD to play a regular DVD I was not able to successfully use my media center remote to control the transport functions (play, pause, etc.) of the player. I could, however, use the arrow keys to select options and use the select key to activate them.

I installed Ultra later but haven't verified if I still have a problem.

I believe from reading elsewhere that this remote integration is supposed to work out of the box. Does anyone have any insight into what may be going on here (e.g. an option that needs to be set, etc.)?

Thanks.

I played around with this a bit tonight with Bourne Ultimatum. Enabling Windows Firewall (XP MCE 2005, latest service pack, etc.) and then disabling PowerDVD in it had no effect - PowerDVD still tried to retrieve web enabled content and just sat there. Probably by a fluke, I was able to get Bourne Ultimatum to play once - probably got lucky on retrieving the web enabled content or something.

Disabling the network seems to do the trick (after restarting PowerDVD multiple times, I could get to the menus and play the movie every time), but is definitely much more drastic than I would prefer to do as I obviously have other uses for the network connection.

Hopefully I can find a reasonable way to lock PowerDVD from using the network and keep the rest of my system usable.

For now, I've shut Windows Firewall back off since it didn't help solve the problem I was trying to solve.

So I tried the same thing by disabling PDVD in the Windows Firewall and it the HD-DVD still wanted to connect to the web to the Web-Enabled content. I tried what others suggested and hit 'Enter' to cancel this download. After doing that it went straight to the menu and I was able to play the movies (Transformers, Bourne Ultimatum, Pan's Labyrinth, Shrek 3) without any problems. I hope a new patch comes out that works properly with this web-enabled content.

I've got a registered/purchased copy of PowerDVD Ultra that I've got patched up to 3730. So far, I am happy to say, I can actually throw anything at it from my 79 HD-DVD's or 7 Blu-ray's , and it all works just fine. All of my HTPC playback kinks got ironed out when I upgraded my system to a 2.4Ghz Quad Core. Now I can throw darn near anything at it.

I do have 3:10 to Yuma, and it plays fine.. menu behaves too.
I have Resident Evil 3, that plays back just fine as well.
Note, however, that this is all direct from the original media.. NOT hard drive rips.

In regards to Vista Media Center, I use it regularly for DVD playback and it works just fine. I do, however rely mostly on PowerDVD for regular DVD playback. Based upon this, I will admit that while I have gotten VMC to work I have not had to USE it in quite a few weeks.

Personal Opinion: While I will agree that PowerDVD Ultra can be buggy if not downright disobediant at times, I think it would be a massive mistake on Cyberlink's part to remove HD-DVD playback just because Toshiba has admitted defeat. Toshiba throwing in the towel does not magically convert all my HD-DVD's to Blu-rays.. and I still need something to play them back on. This was one of the primary driving philosophies behind my building a Purple HTPC to begin with. I also think that long term, as long as Cyberlink can keep their act relatively straight, PowerDVD could turn out to be the saving grace for people with HD-DVD collections. This may actually turn MORE people to HTPC usage.

I just bought Transformers HD DVD (from local store´s HD DVD clearance sale) and then tried to watch it with XBOX360 drive/PowerDVD/Win XP Pro -combination. There was no picture at all after menus. Then I downloaded 3730 -patch. Movie started but it was really choppy, like a PowerPoint presentation. With every HD DVD movie I own it is now the same thing. Even "old" Poseidon -disc which played smoothly before is now unwatchable.

When I opened task manager it was clear the reason was CPU overload: 98-100%. It seems PowerDvd can no longer use my AGP-Ati Radeon HD2400 Pro´s hardware acceleration.

What PowerDVD version should I try next? It is quite clear that previous installed version (3120) can not play Transformers. Is there some kind of workaround solution even if there is no "permanent" fix?

This is not nice: I have legally bought software, equipment and disc but I can´t watch movie... It has not been easy with PowerDVD. Is buying a standalone player only "reasonable" way to watch HD DVD´s? BD has now won the war, I think it might be a good time to take a vacation from PowerDVD:mad:


I seem to have the same issue in that my hardware acceleration is not being utilized as well. I've heard that when using ATI's Avivo hardware acceleration, the CPU usage should be minimal, but yet when playing HDs on PDVD my CPU usage is around 15-20%, while my GPU usages is at 1%. Does PDVD have something that disables this feature? I have the box checked to use the Avivo Hardware Acceleration in PDVD.

So I tried the same thing by disabling PDVD in the Windows Firewall and it the HD-DVD still wanted to connect to the web to the Web-Enabled content. I tried what others suggested and hit 'Enter' to cancel this download. After doing that it went straight to the menu and I was able to play the movies (Transformers, Bourne Ultimatum, Pan's Labyrinth, Shrek 3) without any problems. I hope a new patch comes out that works properly with this web-enabled content.

I hope so also but I wouldn't be surprised if they drop HD DVD development from this point going forward. :(

The reason I contacted tech support about my can't-play-Yuma problem is because I heard in some other posting that sometimes Cyberlink gives out 3730 to those who complain. Unfortunately I'm not one of those lucky ones. They initially told me that downloading 3516 would fix my problem. I told them I already had 3516. They finally replied again and get this... they asked me to send them the log file from the PDVD Advisor app (the Cyberlink app that tests system components to see if the hardware is HD disc ready); to send them the text file results from MS DXdiag; to tell them the brand and model of my video card and monitor. No mention of needing 3730! Well, I jumped through their silly hoops and sent them the info. Lets see what happens...Well it's been six days and no response. I just gave up and bought Ultra (Newegg!) so I can get the 3730 upgrade. (Too bad a company with a lousy product and lousy support ends up getting my money, but there doesn't seem to be a viable alternative at this point.)

So, what's the best method to install the new Ultra retail software? (Of course I will make an image of my system drive first, in case something goes horribly wrong.) Should I uninstall the OEM before installing the Retail version? Or can I skip the uninstall-OEM step?

For those wondering about RE3, TrueHD audio on blu-ray is indeed the reason. There is a thread on that (by me and others) on the AnyDVD HD forums as well. People found that TrueHD was the reason, although for some reason RE3 seems to be even higher than normal (but all other tested movies also spike CPU with TrueHD enabled). With HD-DVD, there was no such spike, and a curious fact is that for HD-DVD, PowerDVD reads the TrueHD track as "MLP" on the info window while with blu-ray it reads TrueHD. It could be that blu-ray and hd-dvd use a different "flavor" of TrueHD, or that PowerDVD just reads the tracks in a different way.

I purchased and installed Ultra this weekend. I was able to uninstall the OEM version without a problem.

Why would you purchase the retail Ultra when you already have the OEM Ultra.

I have the OEM version and so far it seems to play absolutely everything I throw at it. Image quality is top notch as is the audio.

I do hate the fact that it clearly isn't written to work well in a dedicated home theater setup (no overscan compensation for GUI, awkward remote control limitations (info brings up a screen you can't control, etc.), effectively no integration with typical HTPC software, can't play from HD, lack of ability to switch resolutions when using full screen, etc.). As far as I'm aware none of these issues are any better with the retail version.

Is there something I'm missing? I can't understand why I keep reading about people paying extra for the retail version.

Why would you purchase the retail Ultra when you already have the OEM Ultra.

I have the OEM version and so far it seems to play absolutely everything I throw at it. Image quality is top notch as is the audio.

Presently you cannot update the OEM version to 3730, which means (I believe) no Blu-Ray Profile 1.2 support.. among other things. So Blu-ray movies like 3:10 to Yuma won't play properly.

There is an actual list of fixes and changes with the 3730 version floating around here, it shows what things you get with that patch version.

has anyone got 310 to yuma working yet? i am using both 3319a and 3370 and am getting the "unsupported format" message any ideas guys. thanks.

Worked fine for me using 3730.

Presently you cannot update the OEM version to 3730, which means (I believe) no Blu-Ray Profile 1.2 support.. among other things. So Blu-ray movies like 3:10 to Yuma won't play properly.

There is an actual list of fixes and changes with the 3730 version floating around here, it shows what things you get with that patch version.

Yes, that's my reason. Cyberlink for some reason appears eager to support and upgrade Ultra while leaving OEM users out in the cold. You would think this would be an issue for drive vendors such as LG, since I expect they would start getting complaints that "X new movie doesn't work in your drive".

However, in other respects this kind of thing is not unusual. You typically get an "LE" version for free with cameras, for example. I guess the difference is that in that case you are just missing features rather than not being able to view or edit pictures taken after a certain date :).

Worked fine for me using 3730.
Did you run the 3730 patch to update an older build, or did you actually have the full installation file for 3730 and install it from scratch? On the Cyberlink forum, people seem to think that that may make a difference.

Did you run the 3730 patch to update an older build, or did you actually have the full installation file for 3730 and install it from scratch? On the Cyberlink forum, people seem to think that that may make a difference.

If it helps, everything runs fine for me so far with the 3730 Patch.. and I did an install from scratch.

Originally Posted by ZED72
I just bought Transformers HD DVD (from local store´s HD DVD clearance sale) and then tried to watch it with XBOX360 drive/PowerDVD/Win XP Pro -combination. There was no picture at all after menus. Then I downloaded 3730 -patch. Movie started but it was really choppy, like a PowerPoint presentation. With every HD DVD movie I own it is now the same thing. Even "old" Poseidon -disc which played smoothly before is now unwatchable.

When I opened task manager it was clear the reason was CPU overload: 98-100%. It seems PowerDvd can no longer use my AGP-Ati Radeon HD2400 Pro´s hardware acceleration.

What PowerDVD version should I try next? It is quite clear that previous installed version (3120) can not play Transformers. Is there some kind of workaround solution even if there is no "permanent" fix?

This is not nice: I have legally bought software, equipment and disc but I can´t watch movie... It has not been easy with PowerDVD. Is buying a standalone player only "reasonable" way to watch HD DVD´s? BD has now won the war, I think it might be a good time to take a vacation from PowerDVD


I seem to have the same issue in that my hardware acceleration is not being utilized as well. I've heard that when using ATI's Avivo hardware acceleration, the CPU usage should be minimal, but yet when playing HDs on PDVD my CPU usage is around 15-20%, while my GPU usages is at 1%. Does PDVD have something that disables this feature? I have the box checked to use the Avivo Hardware Acceleration in PDVD. .



There are versions of the ATI drivers that do not 'keep' the hardware acceleration box checked, those below 7.7 ( I have 7.7 and it works), and I know 7.8-7.10 gave me trouble as well.

I have not tested any of the newest ATI drivers, "if ain't broke don't fix it"

Maybe somebody can post which versions of the ATI driver keep the hardware acceleration checked? :D

Yes, that's my reason. Cyberlink for some reason appears eager to support and upgrade Ultra while leaving OEM users out in the cold. You would think this would be an issue for drive vendors such as LG, since I expect they would start getting complaints that "X new movie doesn't work in your drive".
I returned my LG drive for exactly that reason. I bought a Playstation3 for my BD movies instead. It turned out to be both cheaper and much more reliable.

I returned my LG drive for exactly that reason. I bought a Playstation3 for my BD movies instead. It turned out to be both cheaper and much more reliable.

But the PS3 is soooooo noisy.

I've got a registered/purchased copy of PowerDVD Ultra that I've got patched up to 3730. So far, I am happy to say, I can actually throw anything at it from my 79 HD-DVD's or 7 Blu-ray's , and it all works just fine. All of my HTPC playback kinks got ironed out when I upgraded my system to a 2.4Ghz Quad Core. Now I can throw darn near anything at it. [/I]
Can I ask what your system mb/graphics are? :confused:

:cool:

But the PS3 is soooooo noisy.
I think that's another urban legend.... I bought a refurbed 60gb PS3 and it's barely audible during movie play.... it does get noticed during quiet points of PS3 Games, though.... :p

:cool:

I think that's another urban legend.... I bought a refurbed 60gb PS3 and it's barely audible during movie play.... it does get noticed during quiet points of PS3 Games, though.... :p

:cool:

Not a legend, I have one. The fan on the thing is the noisiest item in my HT. My projector runs at about 20db, and the PS3 is like a noisy PC fan and drowns out all other ambient noise in my HT.

You either live in NYC with your windows open, or you are not very sensitive to fan noise.

Latest Cyberlink response to query about 3:10 to Yuma not working with OEM PowerDvd Ultra patched to v3516:

We wish to inform you that this issue is already been escalated to the Product Development Department regarding the non playback of Blu-Ray disk "3:10
to Yuma" and the concern department has issued this problem as an bug in the software and will release a patch to resolve this issue. We will further update you as soon as we get any response from them.

So I'll keep checking the site but won't hold me breath (response was quick though, to be fair).

You either live in NYC with your windows open, or you are not very sensitive to fan noise
well, I can assure you that Treasure Island, FL is not in NYC :D

and my hearing is sensitive enough to "hear" the fan noise on my HTPC warning me that the metal-weave grills in front of them are clogged with dust :D

in all fairness, maybe the factory refurbs have quieter fans installed :confused: :eek:

:cool:

On a fresh XPpro install I tried again to install the PowerDVD Ultra I bought for $112 last night. This time it installed and took the KEY. But it comes up before and after the 3730 update as.... PowerDVD DELUXE. Sigh.

I registered after activating, and the email generated back to me says Thanks... for registering your new copy of PowerDVD Ultra.

Guess they think that's funny.

So Deluxe does NOT play at HD resolution. It will at least play the disks but wont allow me to increase window size to beyond a very low resolution. If I do, it causes this nasty stretching/blurring of the bottom line of the movie stretched to fill the area larger than the low resolution size allowed.

Everything I touch from this company is like electronic cancer.

So something in my main install is preventing PowerDVD from accepting the KEY. But on the naked fresh install... SP2 up to date and no other applications installed.... at least it takes the key and runs.

How do you activate reclock in power dvd do you have to force it to load or can you select it....I use digital out only from htpc.

But the PS3 is soooooo noisy.Not mine, I can't even hear its fan unless I get within a foot of it. But I understand that the older models had more heat issues, and therefore more fan issues. Mine is the 40GB model which uses the new smaller chipset (which generates far less heat). Anyway, it's VERY quiet.

There are versions of the ATI drivers that do not 'keep' the hardware acceleration box checked, those below 7.7 ( I have 7.7 and it works), and I know 7.8-7.10 gave me trouble as well.

I have not tested any of the newest ATI drivers, "if ain't broke don't fix it"

Maybe somebody can post which versions of the ATI driver keep the hardware acceleration checked? :D

Do you know the % of CPU usage that you have during an HD/BD movie playback? Also what is your GPU % usage during this time as well? What type of video card are you using?

On a fresh XPpro install I tried again to install the PowerDVD Ultra I bought for $112 last night. This time it installed and took the KEY. But it comes up before and after the 3730 update as.... PowerDVD DELUXE. Sigh.

I registered after activating, and the email generated back to me says Thanks... for registering your new copy of PowerDVD Ultra.

Guess they think that's funny.

So Deluxe does NOT play at HD resolution. It will at least play the disks but wont allow me to increase window size to beyond a very low resolution. If I do, it causes this nasty stretching/blurring of the bottom line of the movie stretched to fill the area larger than the low resolution size allowed.

Everything I touch from this company is like electronic cancer.

So something in my main install is preventing PowerDVD from accepting the KEY. But on the naked fresh install... SP2 up to date and no other applications installed.... at least it takes the key and runs.

your issue with the activation saying deluxe is normal but to be sure, check what version you are running. when you start pw dvd click on cyberlink on the upper left of the skins page than click on the area just under were it says (this product licensed to) to see what version you are running

although some people are not having problems running pw dvd under win xp I just cant get it to work right, but atleast for me under Vista, pwr dvd is a completely different program

On a fresh XPpro install I tried again to install the PowerDVD Ultra I bought for $112 last night. This time it installed and took the KEY. But it comes up before and after the 3730 update as.... PowerDVD DELUXE. Sigh.

I registered after activating, and the email generated back to me says Thanks... for registering your new copy of PowerDVD Ultra.

Guess they think that's funny.

So Deluxe does NOT play at HD resolution. It will at least play the disks but wont allow me to increase window size to beyond a very low resolution. If I do, it causes this nasty stretching/blurring of the bottom line of the movie stretched to fill the area larger than the low resolution size allowed.

Everything I touch from this company is like electronic cancer.

So something in my main install is preventing PowerDVD from accepting the KEY. But on the naked fresh install... SP2 up to date and no other applications installed.... at least it takes the key and runs.

And if your picture looks like post1152 it's usually a driver:
http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?t=927751&page=39

Can I ask what your system mb/graphics are? :confused:

Nvidia Nforce 650i SLI Motherboard
2gb DDR2 RAM (533 i think)
Quad-Core 2.4 Ghz 1066 Intel CPU
Nvidia Geforce 8500 GT
Windows Vista Home Premium

Yes, I need to upgrade the memory to full FSB 1066 speed.. but I haven't gotten around to it yet, and I honestly don't think it will make a difference.

For those wondering about RE3, TrueHD audio on blu-ray is indeed the reason. There is a thread on that (by me and others) on the AnyDVD HD forums as well. People found that TrueHD was the reason, although for some reason RE3 seems to be even higher than normal (but all other tested movies also spike CPU with TrueHD enabled). With HD-DVD, there was no such spike, and a curious fact is that for HD-DVD, PowerDVD reads the TrueHD track as "MLP" on the info window while with blu-ray it reads TrueHD. It could be that blu-ray and hd-dvd use a different "flavor" of TrueHD, or that PowerDVD just reads the tracks in a different way.

Is there a way I can turn off TrueHD?

BK, thanks a bunch, never could find where the version number was hidden.

it says PowerDVD Version 7.3(Ultra)

and in the area that pops up.... DVD Version 7.3.3730.0 with a bunch of bibble babble that has "Ultra" in a couple places.

So saying "Deluxe" in the scroll display is normal... cough. :confused:

Davin, yes it looks like that post, so I'll uninstall clean and reinstall my NVidia video drivers and hope that does it.

Thanks a million both of you.

Latest Cyberlink response to query about 3:10 to Yuma not working with OEM PowerDvd Ultra patched to v3516:

We wish to inform you that this issue is already been escalated to the Product Development Department regarding the non playback of Blu-Ray disk "3:10
to Yuma" and the concern department has issued this problem as an bug in the software and will release a patch to resolve this issue. We will further update you as soon as we get any response from them.

So I'll keep checking the site but won't hold me breath (response was quick though, to be fair).

Funny... That's the same response, word for word, that I got when I asked about Resident Evil: Extinction playing on my OEM PowerDVD Ultra... I've heard of canned responses, but that smacks of pure automated response.

BW

how do i add the extension (mkv) to powerdvd so i can play mkv movies ?

Presently you cannot update the OEM version to 3730, which means (I believe) no Blu-Ray Profile 1.2 support.. among other things. So Blu-ray movies like 3:10 to Yuma won't play properly.

There is an actual list of fixes and changes with the 3730 version floating around here, it shows what things you get with that patch version.

I've been told 3:10 to Yuma does play on the current OEM version though (with some hardware).

We'll probably rent it in a few days and find out for ourselves.

Thanks, but I'd found those and they don't seem to help.

Has *anyone* achieved smooth DVD playback under Vista Home Premium? Right now, the only way I can play DVDs is via a second boot partition with MCE 2005.

Yes,
I was actually having issues with HD/BD in XP Pro so I upgraded to Vista Ultimate (Dunno the difference between that and Home Premium) but all my formats play back silky smooth now DVD/HD/BD. I have a 8800GT, 4GB ram, Creative PCI-E audio card decoding to analog.

Sam

Andy o, thanks for confirming.

This question probably has been asked and answered before... however, I tried to use the search function but it won't let me search for BD+ (the effect is like searching only for BD).

Will PowerDVD Ultra play Blu-Ray discs that have BD+ protection? If yes, will it also do it on a non-HDCP graphics card if AnyDVD HD is used? I don't really care about ripping, I just want it to play.

This question probably has been asked and answered before... however, I tried to use the search function but it won't let me search for BD+ (the effect is like searching only for BD).

Will PowerDVD Ultra play Blu-Ray discs that have BD+ protection? If yes, will it also do it on a non-HDCP graphics card if AnyDVD HD is used? I don't really care about ripping, I just want it to play.

Yes, and no.

3730 - will only play BD+ discs with encryption still on them (meaning HDCP is needed, and you can't rip them to your HDD)

Pre-3730 - will play BD+ discs with or without encryption (from HDD or player), but doesn't support the BD 1.1+ features.

And if your picture looks like post1152 it's usually a driver:
http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?t=927751&page=39
I had the same problerm --the smearing--I needed to roll back the nvidia xp version driver to 163.71 from lastest 169.21--that fixed my problem. Reinstalling the latest version didn't fix it for me. Vid card is 8600 gt with the latest version of PDVD.

Have you noticed that 169.21 was crushing blacks as well? I rebuilt my Vista and used 169.21 initially and played Transformers. Wow. it was too dark for my tastes and every else seemed to bloom. I have a 163.xx version which I believe was the last one I had before the rebuild.

Yes, well documented problem (all over this thread) with either PDVD or NVidia drivers or the combination. Just back down to a previous driver version, like you did, and you're fine.

Sorry if this has been covered before (man, I HATE it when somebody starts a post like that :)
NVIDIA 6600, XP PRO, P4 3.4 -
VERY different results with BD movies (that I own) ripped to HD. On some of them playback is flawless with CPU utilization around 20%. On other movies, it pegs at 100% and the movie is completely unwatchable. Simple solution? Do I just need a newer/better video card? Anything better than PowerDvd available that might fix this?

I had the same problerm --the smearing--I needed to roll back the nvidia xp version driver to 163.71 from lastest 169.21--that fixed my problem. Reinstalling the latest version didn't fix it for me. Vid card is 8600 gt with the latest version of PDVD.

Have you noticed that 169.21 was crushing blacks as well? I rebuilt my Vista and used 169.21 initially and played Transformers. Wow. it was too dark for my tastes and every else seemed to bloom. I have a 163.xx version which I believe was the last one I had before the rebuild.

I'm not sure if this was posted before, but it seems HW-Acceleration using the Cyberlink H.264 produces some additional blocky artifacts in the H.264 picture quality (using a 7950GT). Is this suppose to happen with PureVideo?

Did you run the 3730 patch to update an older build, or did you actually have the full installation file for 3730 and install it from scratch? On the Cyberlink forum, people seem to think that that may make a difference.I just bought the retail Ultra yesterday (from Newegg) and the install file available for me to download is 3319f. So there's an actual 3730 install out there? If so I guess you only get it if you buy directly from Cyberlink. :(

Latest Cyberlink response to query about 3:10 to Yuma not working with OEM PowerDvd Ultra patched to v3516:
We wish to inform you that this issue is already been escalated to the Product Development Department regarding the non playback of Blu-Ray disk "3:10 to Yuma" and the concern department has issued this problem as an bug in the software and will release a patch to resolve this issue. We will further update you as soon as we get any response from them.That's ridiculous. Either they're deliberately lying or it's a case of 'one hand not knowing what the other is doing' within the company. Several others in this thread have reported that build 3730 solves the can't-play-Yuma problem. I can't believe Cyberlink doesn't know that Cyberlink themselves have already released a patch - just for retail versions. :rolleyes:

I just bought the retail Ultra yesterday (from Newegg) and the install file available for me to download is 3319f. So there's an actual 3730 install out there? If so I guess you only get it if you buy directly from Cyberlink. :(

I believe you are correct. I purchased Ultra this weekend directly from Cyberlink and got 3730.

I believe you are correct. I purchased Ultra this weekend directly from Cyberlink and got 3730.

You should be able to get the 3730 Patch install version from the DOWNLOADS section of Cyberlink's website. That is where I got it, I never spoke with their support department (mostly because they are usually useless.)

You should be able to get the 3730 Patch install version from the DOWNLOADS section of Cyberlink's website. That is where I got it, I never spoke with their support department (mostly because they are usually useless.)

And playing a very new BD disk might prompt an update.
Maybe here http://www.cyberlink.com/multi/patch/enu/index.jsp

That's ridiculous. Either they're deliberately lying or it's a case of 'one hand not knowing what the other is doing' within the company. Several others in this thread have reported that build 3730 solves the can't-play-Yuma problem. I can't believe Cyberlink doesn't know that Cyberlink themselves have already released a patch - just for retail versions. :rolleyes:

Well that's it, there's a difference between OEM and Retail versions of PowerDvd (great idea, support 2 products for 1 job, duuuh), so the 3730 patch does not work with the OEM version, only the retail. They know 3730 works, but as they've gone down the two-different-products-for-the-same-job path, they can't be arsed to get both versions working. There are also two different 3516 patches for OEM and Retail.

Unfortunately, I have the OEM.

Ho Hum.

Well that's it, there's a difference between OEM and Retail versions of PowerDvd (great idea, support 2 products for 1 job, duuuh), so the 3730 patch does not work with the OEM version, only the retail. They know 3730 works, but as they've gone down the two-different-products-for-the-same-job path, they can't be arsed to get both versions working. There are also two different 3516 patches for OEM and Retail.

Unfortunately, I have the OEM.

Ho Hum.

The OEM is limited in the sound it can output. It comes free with many drives.

They make money by having you decide you want better sound. You then buy their full on retail version.

It is a great idea for them. Get you to find out their product exists for free, then have you pay to get the full monty.

Maybe u thing I am an idiot now but I have seen that u all writes about oem retail etc, what is the different between OEM and Retail

Maybe u thing I am an idiot now but I have seen that u all writes about oem retail etc, what is the different between OEM and Retail

The OEM version comes either with a disc drive or pre-installed on some computers. It seems as though it limits you to stereo sound only (somebody please correct me if I'm wrong).

The retail version is purchased separately/independently, usually either directly from cyberlink or a retailer such as newegg. The retail version does not limit you to stereo playback.

Correct, though you can get DD/DTS passthrough via digital out.

Tnx....

Correct, though you can get DD/DTS passthrough via digital out.

I think with the OEM version you get DD/DTS passthrough as well as discrete 5.1/7.1 (Linear PCM, TrueHD, DTS-HD Master Audio), but you don't get the ability to decode or encode DD/DTS.

What I know for certain is my motherboard is a Gigabyte GA-P35-DS4 and it includes DTS Connect. I have the audio driver configured to pass through DTS and DD5.1 and to encode discrete 2, 5.1 and 7.1 into DTS. I also know that with the OEM version of PowerDVD Ultra if I select DD5.1 or DTS for the audio stream on an HD-DVD/Blue-ray that it passes directly to the receiver untouched and if I select TrueHD that my receiver receives DTS 5.1 that I can only assume is being generated by the motherboard (from discrete 5.1/7.1 channels of audio).

Essentially with my OEM version I always receive very high quality 5.1 audio regardless of the HD-DVD/Blue-ray disk being played and regardless of the audio stream I have selected.

I suspect if my motherboard didn't have DTS Connect and my receiver didn't accept DD5.1 or DTS that I would be very limited in the multi-channel audio that PowerDVD Ultra OEM was able to provide.

I think with the OEM version you get DD/DTS passthrough as well as discrete 5.1/7.1 (Linear PCM, TrueHD, DTS-HD Master Audio), but you don't get the ability to decode or encode DD/DTS.

What I know for certain is my motherboard is a Gigabyte GA-P35-DS4 and it includes DTS Connect. I have the audio driver configured to pass through DTS and DD5.1 and to encode discrete 2, 5.1 and 7.1 into DTS. I also know that with the OEM version of PowerDVD Ultra if I select DD5.1 or DTS for the audio stream on an HD-DVD/Blue-ray that it passes directly to the receiver untouched and if I select TrueHD that my receiver receives DTS 5.1 that I can only assume is being generated by the motherboard (from discrete 5.1/7.1 channels of audio).

Essentially with my OEM version I always receive very high quality 5.1 audio regardless of the HD-DVD/Blue-ray disk being played and regardless of the audio stream I have selected.

I suspect if my motherboard didn't have DTS Connect and my receiver didn't accept DD5.1 or DTS that I would be very limited in the multi-channel audio that PowerDVD Ultra OEM was able to provide.

Are you sure it DD/DTS or it's actually just 2-chan PCM? My OEM version only does 2-chan PCM via spdif. No DD/DTS passthru.

I just bought the retail Ultra yesterday (from Newegg) and the install file available for me to download is 3319f. So there's an actual 3730 install out there? If so I guess you only get it if you buy directly from Cyberlink. :(

Yeah but it doesn't matter once you have the retail version you have the retail version. So even if you dl/install 3319f retail from NewEgg, then all you need to do is go to Cyberlink and dl the patch (for free) and that turns your 3319f into 3730 :)

I think with the OEM version you get DD/DTS passthrough as well as discrete 5.1/7.1 (Linear PCM, TrueHD, DTS-HD Master Audio), but you don't get the ability to decode or encode DD/DTS.

What I know for certain is my motherboard is a Gigabyte GA-P35-DS4 and it includes DTS Connect. I have the audio driver configured to pass through DTS and DD5.1 and to encode discrete 2, 5.1 and 7.1 into DTS. I also know that with the OEM version of PowerDVD Ultra if I select DD5.1 or DTS for the audio stream on an HD-DVD/Blue-ray that it passes directly to the receiver untouched and if I select TrueHD that my receiver receives DTS 5.1 that I can only assume is being generated by the motherboard (from discrete 5.1/7.1 channels of audio).

Essentially with my OEM version I always receive very high quality 5.1 audio regardless of the HD-DVD/Blue-ray disk being played and regardless of the audio stream I have selected.

I suspect if my motherboard didn't have DTS Connect and my receiver didn't accept DD5.1 or DTS that I would be very limited in the multi-channel audio that PowerDVD Ultra OEM was able to provide.


I too have 5.1 surround on EVERY BD and HD DVD I have (24 total). Some have DD/DD EX or DTS/DTS ES, but I have nothing special but passthrough going out SPDIF.

hi guys and gals, hope you can help me please?

i have been using powerdvd ultra for a while now and have so far had no real playback problems with regard to video stutter or sound problems (lets not go anywhere near the balls up that powerdvd need updating all the time etc etc!), so much so that i have been rather pleased with playback of bluray and hddvd up till now.

ever since i upgraded to the 3730 version(newest version?) my cpu rockets up to 100% usage when i play an mpeg4 avc bluray, specifically superbad. Before the upgrade i was able to play this disc with true hd sound perfectly with no stutter at all and the cpu was about 50ish% if i recall correctly, but now it stutters like crazy every few seconds which is driving me mad!!

i have made sure HA is ticked which it is, and its greyed out during playback.

i have read that other people seem to be having this problem, but noone has a solution yet? tried it with anydvd hd as well.

i have also tried updating my nvidia drivers and going back down to older versions but have given up as it doesn't seem to make a difference (latest 174.12). also tried changing the resolution from 720p to 1080i at 50hz and 60hz but also no luck there.

my system:

C2duo 2.66Ghz overclocked to 3.2 (surely powerful enough?)
4Gb memory
Nvidia 8800 GTS 320mb with latest nvidia drivers
Vista Ultimate 32bit with that new SP1 update
Powerdvd 3730

I don't really want to downgrade powerdvd as i need it to play new discs.
I just don't know why this has happened as before the update it ran fine, could powerdvd not be using HA properly? or does the new version using profile 1.1 need extra cpu usage, meaning that a quad core might be better?
I have stopped all other obvious programs running in the background but this doesn't really help much.

Hopefully anyone has any bright ideas? or do i have to wait for powerdvd to come up with ANOTHER update? or could it just be that nvidia need to update their drivers?

Why isn't this easy? spent ages getting this setup just right and now it just wont cut it!

hope someone can help!

thanks for your time

Ash

Are you sure it DD/DTS or it's actually just 2-chan PCM? My OEM version only does 2-chan PCM via spdif. No DD/DTS passthru.

@ Soyuppy,

Depends on which audio track you select. For example:

1. When I select the LPCM uncompressed track on a disc, then I get LPCM 2.0.
2. Dolby TrueHD is output in two channel.
3. Dolby Digital Plus and below is picked up by my amp as Dolby Digital EX. I get 5.1 channels out of this (Only have the 5+1 speakers)

4. DTS-HD is picked up by the amp as DTS-ES Discrete 6.1 :D :D :D
5. DTS-ES and below is received properly by the amp and I get 5.1 channels here as well.

So, depending on the track, you can get discrete surround channels from an HD DVD or Blu Ray with PowerDVD Ultra OEM.

BW

I am using PowerDVD version 3730 and when I play this BD Disc it only outputs in 2 ch. and my receiver using Digital Coax goes into the Pro Logic mode. This is with the English TrueHD audio setting. When I go to the Spanish track my receiver switches to Dolby 5.1 perfectly. When i look under the Information tab in configuration menu, audio is stated as Dolby TrueHD at bitrate of like 2306 Kbps, but it also says 2 Ch there. Oh and it says it is sending LPCM. PowerDVD seems to be sending this to my receiver in 48KHz PCM because that is what it says on the Receiver Display. I thought PowerDVD would convert all HD Audio formats to Dolby 5.1 or DTS 5.1 so older equipment could play the Dolby or DTS track. Is it because I am using Coax? This is rather frustrating. Please someone help. Thanks.

I don't think some people here understand the concept of OEM. When a company (Cyberlink) sells (OEM's) a product to another vendor (LG) all relationships are limited to the contract between those two parties.

In other words, because LG bought the software from Cyberlink (at a steep discount) you and I as the final purchaser of the hardware do not have any contract with the software vendor and the software vendor has no commitments to the final purchaser of the hardware.

IOW, support for the OEM PowerDVD comes solely from LG. If Cyberlink chooses to supply patches for the OEM product they are doing you a favor.

End Game:
If you want direct support from Cyberlink, than you need to purchase the retail version of PowerDVD. If you need support for the OEM version, then take it up with LG.

Vern

I´m using the swither between 3319a and 3730 and it works to switch but everytime I start up PowerDVD settings are default in both players so I have to set audio to 6spk all the time, really annoing, What the hell is wrong?

Edit: It´s only audio that gets back to default

I don't think some people here understand the concept of OEM. When a company (Cyberlink) sells (OEM's) a product to another vendor (LG) all relationships are limited to the contract between those two parties.

In other words, because LG bought the software from Cyberlink (at a steep discount) you and I as the final purchaser of the hardware do not have any contract with the software vendor and the software vendor has no commitments to the final purchaser of the hardware.

Your first paragraph above is quite accurate. Your second one may not be.

OEM software is bundled with hardware under a contract between the two companies. The support mechanism for that software will also be determined by the contract, and in many (but not all) cases the software is completely supported by the software vendor.

And in some cases, the contact specifies that the OEM vendor does, in fact, supply a direct license to the end customer. So it often is the case that OEM software vendor has a license extended to the end user that includes direct support to the end user.

I don't know what's in the contract between Cyberlink and LG, but it's definitely wrong to suggest that all OEM software is offered without direct support or end-user license.

In Cyberlink's case, it appears that they do consider a bundled-OEM purchase to be a license because they offer a discounted upgrade from the bundled license to a full version license. But we'd have to read the contract between the two companies to know for sure.

I've been getting support from Cyberlink since 6.5 and now with OEM Ultra that came with the LG combo- I doubt I'll get 3730, but I've submitted trouble tickets and received 24 hr responses and ftp updates. Granted, they didn't all work, what helped also were ideas from this thread and trial and error. They never told me they don't support OEM.

They never told me they don't support OEM.Ditto. It's just that the support is poor quality. I suspect it would be the same for the retail version.

hi guys and gals, hope you can help me please?

i have been using powerdvd ultra for a while now and have so far had no real playback problems with regard to video stutter or sound problems (lets not go anywhere near the balls up that powerdvd need updating all the time etc etc!), so much so that i have been rather pleased with playback of bluray and hddvd up till now.

ever since i upgraded to the 3730 version(newest version?) my cpu rockets up to 100% usage when i play an mpeg4 avc bluray, specifically superbad. Before the upgrade i was able to play this disc with true hd sound perfectly with no stutter at all and the cpu was about 50ish% if i recall correctly, but now it stutters like crazy every few seconds which is driving me mad!!

i have made sure HA is ticked which it is, and its greyed out during playback.

i have read that other people seem to be having this problem, but noone has a solution yet? tried it with anydvd hd as well.

i have also tried updating my nvidia drivers and going back down to older versions but have given up as it doesn't seem to make a difference (latest 174.12). also tried changing the resolution from 720p to 1080i at 50hz and 60hz but also no luck there.

my system:

C2duo 2.66Ghz overclocked to 3.2 (surely powerful enough?)
4Gb memory
Nvidia 8800 GTS 320mb with latest nvidia drivers
Vista Ultimate 32bit with that new SP1 update
Powerdvd 3730

I don't really want to downgrade powerdvd as i need it to play new discs.
I just don't know why this has happened as before the update it ran fine, could powerdvd not be using HA properly? or does the new version using profile 1.1 need extra cpu usage, meaning that a quad core might be better?
I have stopped all other obvious programs running in the background but this doesn't really help much.

Hopefully anyone has any bright ideas? or do i have to wait for powerdvd to come up with ANOTHER update? or could it just be that nvidia need to update their drivers?

Why isn't this easy? spent ages getting this setup just right and now it just wont cut it!

hope someone can help!

thanks for your time

Ash

Your setup is far in excess of the minimum required to play back Blu-Ray with AVC audio and TrueHD soundtrack.

Even without the DXva provided by your Nvidia 8800 you should still have enough oomph in your CPU to do all the video and audio decoding with enough safety margin to be stutter free (providing you're not doing anything else at the same time)

You may not know that several PowerDVD updates ago that little checkbox that says "Enable Hardware Acceleration Nvidia Purevideo" in the video pane of powerdvd was disabled for user-input.

It's still there, rather misleadingly, and you can still check and uncheck this box but it won't do you a bit of good, as the codecs (directshow filters) in 3730 will force DXVa if they detect it. The last powerdvd version that actually used user input with this checkbox was 3192, which is too old to be much good now and does not support BD+ and hence the newer fox discs.

When the movie is running, bring up the configuration window and observe the video pane - the value in the very same checkbox (now greyed out) will indicate the true current state of PowerDVD and Hardware acceleration (at least as far as powerdvd is concerned).

Similarly, going to the information pane will tell you if the surface type is DXva, ie Harware acceleration working, or DirectDraw (acceleration not working)

If you can get back to the forum with the result of this observation, that would be good.

I have an as yet unconfirmed theory that later versions of PowerDVD have become very buggy with regard to hardware acceleration. There have been many advances in DXva technology in the last couple of years with the move from the Nvidia 7 series to 8, and the move from Ati X series to the HD series, plus the advent of UVD and DirectX10 (Vista).

The manifestations of this "bug" vary from rig to rig, but invariably expose themselves as very high CPU load (in some cases unbearable and stutters develop), despite DXva actually appearing to be enabled in PowerDVD. My extension of this unconfirmed theory is that powerdvd is "double decoding" in both the CPU and GPU, because it's lost the plot with just which PU is doing what on the particular rig.

For example, the powerdvd codecs could be doing IDCT calculations in both the CPU and the GPU simultaneously, yet only using the results from one. This would be an easy bug to have introduced, what with the bewildering array of different GPU-based decoding solutions out there.

Virtually every GPU out there does hardware acceleration differently, even from cards in the same range, some of them use the GPU core to do calculations, other the shaders, and others have "dedicated" DSP type features. It confuses me and probably the poor cyberlink developers, who are so far the world leaders in utilising this technology.

The main competitors, Nero and Arcsoft are way behind on this....

My bold theory could be nonsense of course, I as yet have no proof but I'm working on it.

This is becomming increasingly common problem as powerdvd ultra and Nvidia/Ati keep evolving (and not always in the same direction).

I have two rigs, one is actually very similar to yours but with an 8500GT. It currently runs sweet using 3730 with Blu-ray AVC+TrueHD at less than 30percent CPU. I've not tried superbad (UK version) yet; i'll whizz it up tonight and let you know what happens.........

Your setup is far in excess of the minimum required to play back Blu-Ray with AVC audio and TrueHD soundtrack.

Even without the DXva provided by your Nvidia 8800 you should still have enough oomph in your CPU to do all the video and audio decoding with enough safety margin to be stutter free (providing you're not doing anything else at the same time)

You may not know that several PowerDVD updates ago that little checkbox that says "Enable Hardware Acceleration Nvidia Purevideo" in the video pane of powerdvd was disabled for user-input.

It's still there, rather misleadingly, and you can still check and uncheck this box but it won't do you a bit of good, as the codecs (directshow filters) in 3730 will force DXVa if they detect it. The last powerdvd version that actually used user input with this checkbox was 3192, which is too old to be much good now and does not support BD+ and hence the newer fox discs.

When the movie is running, bring up the configuration window and observe the video pane - the value in the very same checkbox (now greyed out) will indicate the true current state of PowerDVD and Hardware acceleration (at least as far as powerdvd is concerned).

Similarly, going to the information pane will tell you if the surface type is DXva, ie Harware acceleration working, or DirectDraw (acceleration not working)

If you can get back to the forum with the result of this observation, that would be good.

I have an as yet unconfirmed theory that later versions of PowerDVD have become very buggy with regard to hardware acceleration. There have been many advances in DXva technology in the last couple of years with the move from the Nvidia 7 series to 8, and the move from Ati X series to the HD series, plus the advent of UVD and DirectX10 (Vista).

The manifestations of this "bug" vary from rig to rig, but invariably expose themselves as very high CPU load (in some cases unbearable and stutters develop), despite DXva actually appearing to be enabled in PowerDVD. My extension of this unconfirmed theory is that powerdvd is "double decoding" in both the CPU and GPU, because it's lost the plot with just which PU is doing what on the particular rig.

For example, the powerdvd codecs could be doing IDCT calculations in both the CPU and the GPU simultaneously, yet only using the results from one. This would be an easy bug to have introduced, what with the bewildering array of different GPU-based decoding solutions out there.

Virtually every GPU out there does hardware acceleration differently, even from cards in the same range, some of them use the GPU core to do calculations, other the shaders, and others have "dedicated" DSP type features. It confuses me and probably the poor cyberlink developers, who are so far the world leaders in utilising this technology.

The main competitors, Nero and Arcsoft are way behind on this....

My bold theory could be nonsense of course, I as yet have no proof but I'm working on it.

This is becomming increasingly common problem as powerdvd ultra and Nvidia/Ati keep evolving (and not always in the same direction).

I have two rigs, one is actually very similar to yours but with an 8500GT. It currently runs sweet using 3730 with Blu-ray AVC+TrueHD at less than 30percent CPU. I've not tried superbad (UK version) yet; i'll whizz it up tonight and let you know what happens.........


Thanks for the reply, lots of good info there!

yeah i was having no problem running blurays with true hd before going to 3730, so much so i thought that i had this whole htpc thing sorted for hd stuff until this happened! i hought my specs were perfectly fine for hd stuff so it seems that it may be powerdvd at fault being a bit buggy?


the greyed out box shows that HA is on, and the info panel shows this :

Player Information:
Player Region Code: Not Specified
Current Drive: I:

Display Information:
Video Mode: Progressive
Display Mode: DirectShow
FourCC Code: NV12
Surface Type: Hardware Video Accelerator (DxVA)

Audio Attributes:
Audio Coding mode: MLP
Sampling Rate: 48kHz
Number of Audio channels: 5.1
Bitrate: 1824 Kbps

Hardware Information:
Processor: Intel(R) Core(TM)2 CPU 6700 @ running at 3212 MHz
3DNow! Technology: Not Detected
Enhanced 3DNow! Technology: Not Detected
3DNow! Professional Technology: Not Detected
IA MMX Technology: In Use
IA Streaming SIMD Extensions: In Use
IA SSE 2: In Use
Video Accelerator: DirectX VA (in use)
Multispeaker Audio Device: Creative SB Audigy (in use)
SPDIF Output Device: Speakers (Realtek High Definiti (not in use)

this is while playing superbad (US) version. i get 95-100% cpu usage and a lot of stutter, though it didn't happen before 3730. i have turned off everything including the sidebar and any other running processes i can think of inc antivirus stuff (norton 360 - could this be a problem at all?)

for some reason it says it is using the sb audigy when i am using the realtek onboard audio and it is working as i can hear it fine through analog...hmmm could this be a problem? audio doesn't stutter at all.

how did your version of superbad go?

cheers

Ash

EDIT : disabled the sb audigy card and it is still the same so i guess the audio thing is not the problem!

Are you sure it DD/DTS or it's actually just 2-chan PCM? My OEM version only does 2-chan PCM via spdif. No DD/DTS passthru.

100% positive.

The rear speakers are alive and well when watching movies and my Yamaha RX-V2400 tells me it is decoding DD5.1, DTS, DD EX, DD Prologic IIx, etc. plus how many and which channels the digital stream includes.

@ Soyuppy,

Depends on which audio track you select. For example:

1. When I select the LPCM uncompressed track on a disc, then I get LPCM 2.0.
2. Dolby TrueHD is output in two channel.
3. Dolby Digital Plus and below is picked up by my amp as Dolby Digital EX. I get 5.1 channels out of this (Only have the 5+1 speakers)

4. DTS-HD is picked up by the amp as DTS-ES Discrete 6.1 :D :D :D
5. DTS-ES and below is received properly by the amp and I get 5.1 channels here as well.

So, depending on the track, you can get discrete surround channels from an HD DVD or Blu Ray with PowerDVD Ultra OEM.

BW

With my hardware/software/OEM PowerDVD combo, I absolutely always get 5.1 audio as long as I select anything with at least 5.1 channels. I've tried to find a multi-channel audio source that drops me down to 2 channels at the amp/speakers and I haven't been able to find this anywhere with any of the HD-DVD/Blue-ray movies that I've watched.

For example, when I select Dolby TrueHD, I always get DTS 5.1 at my amp and the audio quality is extremely good. Flipping back and forth between TrueHD and DD5.1, the TrueHD sounds - if anything slightly crisper and more "alive".

Similarly, any multi-channel audio that my amp doesn't natively support (like 5.1 LPCM or WMA 5.1), my amp receives DTS 5.1 and all 6 channels sound excellent.

Based on this, I would assume that PowerDVD OEM does include Dolby TrueHD decoders that would on lower end hardware provide 5.1 audio through analog connections. It seems like what PowerDVD OEM is missing is DD5.1 and DTS decoders and if your audio receiver can handle these, you can take advantage of SPDIF pass-through to still get all 5.1 channels of audio.

I am using PowerDVD version 3730 and when I play this BD Disc it only outputs in 2 ch. and my receiver using Digital Coax goes into the Pro Logic mode. This is with the English TrueHD audio setting. When I go to the Spanish track my receiver switches to Dolby 5.1 perfectly. When i look under the Information tab in configuration menu, audio is stated as Dolby TrueHD at bitrate of like 2306 Kbps, but it also says 2 Ch there. Oh and it says it is sending LPCM. PowerDVD seems to be sending this to my receiver in 48KHz PCM because that is what it says on the Receiver Display. I thought PowerDVD would convert all HD Audio formats to Dolby 5.1 or DTS 5.1 so older equipment could play the Dolby or DTS track. Is it because I am using Coax? This is rather frustrating. Please someone help. Thanks.

Is yours the OEM or retail version?

It is possible that the retail version might include the ability to re-encode other sources of multi-channel audio into DD5.1 or DTS, but I wouldn't be surprised if this isn't included with even the full retail version.

Maybe someone can confirm this, but I suspect your best option if you want to be able to get 5.1+ channels of digital audio out of multi-channel audio formats that your amplifier does not support is to purchase a sound card that supports DTS connect or Dolby Digital Live. The other option is probably to switch to analog connections for Dolby TrueHD (if you have a very good analog audio card) and to switch back to SPDIF when playing DD5.1 or DTS.

With any HTPC I've built, I've always made sure my audio solution includes one of these and this works flawlessly (in my experience) at provide 5.1 or more channels digitally through a single fiber connection.

The motherboard I use in our main HTPC is the Gigabyte GA-P35-DS4 and it includes high end digital audio capabilities, including DTS Connect. There are quite a few PCI audio cards that can do the same thing.

That's ridiculous. Either they're deliberately lying or it's a case of 'one hand not knowing what the other is doing' within the company. Several others in this thread have reported that build 3730 solves the can't-play-Yuma problem. I can't believe Cyberlink doesn't know that Cyberlink themselves have already released a patch - just for retail versions. :rolleyes:

Actually, I have the retail version and 3730 does not fix the menus in 3:10 to Yuma. I live in region B.

I've bought a PS3 and its the best decision I've made in a while.

It is possible that the retail version might include the ability to re-encode other sources of multi-channel audio into DD5.1 or DTS, but I wouldn't be surprised if this isn't included with even the full retail version.It supposed to do re-encoding, but it's really terrible to get it working (at least on my system). I usually have to mess with it for about 15 minutes before it will finally output DTS 5.1 from Discs that have TrueHD or PCM audio. I have to set my sound card to 5.1 (even though I'm using SPDIF out). Normally I have it set to 2 channel. Then I have to mess with the SPDIF settings to pick AC3 only at 48kHz. Then you have to pick SPDIF output in PowerDVD after it loads, but before you play tell it to play the disc. And then it doesn't work. So, after you mess with the same settings long enough it will finally works with the same setting that didn't all the previous tries. I haven't figured out the proper order of the steps to make it work every time the first time.

I'm hoping we'll see a HDMI sound card, or a video card that supports 7.1 PCM soon. :(

One more question. Do DD Live cards work with PowerDVD Ultra Retail under XP? IE: Can I set PowerDVD to decode to 6.1 (or 5.1) and use a DD Live and or DTS Connect sound card to get AC3 or DTS from the PC? I know PowerDVD is supposed to support that, but as I detail in my previous post (right above this one) it sure doesn't work well on my system.

If it's possible, which is the cheapest one that works? Or, is there a way to get the FFDshow DD encoder to work with PowerDVD?

Thanks!

One more question. Do DD Live cards work with PowerDVD Ultra Retail under XP? IE: Can I set PowerDVD to decode to 6.1 (or 5.1) and use a DD Live sound card to get AC3 or DTS from the PC? I know PowerDVD is supposed to support that, but as I detail in my previous post (right above this one) it sure doesn't work well on my system.

If it's possible, which is the cheapest one that works?

Thanks!

Works under Vista just fine with my onboard DTS-Connect. It also worked fine when I was using the X-Mystique in DDLive! mode. Shouldn't be any different with XP.

Works under Vista just fine with my onboard DTS-Connect. It also worked fine when I was using the X-Mystique in DDLive! mode. Shouldn't be any different with XP.Ok, thanks. It would be nice if I could get FFDshow to play nice with PowerDVD instead. Then I could just use the encoder in it. :(

One more question. Do DD Live cards work with PowerDVD Ultra Retail under XP? IE: Can I set PowerDVD to decode to 6.1 (or 5.1) and use a DD Live and or DTS Connect sound card to get AC3 or DTS from the PC? I know PowerDVD is supposed to support that, but as I detail in my previous post (right above this one) it sure doesn't work well on my system.

If it's possible, which is the cheapest one that works? Or, is there a way to get the FFDshow DD encoder to work with PowerDVD?

Thanks!

See my 3 or so posts above where I talk about PowerDVD working perfectly with DTS Connect. Anything that would normally create 5.1 channels of audio that could be output through the analog speaker outputs can be instead output digitally with DTS Connect.

Personally I'm convinced that DTS Connect (or Dolby Digital Live) is an essential part of a well equiped HTPC. The only other option (that extreme audiophiles often prefer) is a very high end analog audio card.

I may not be an extreme audiophile, but I am quite demanding of my audio quality and our HTPC's DTS Connect sounds very good to me (my HTPC feeds a decent Yamaha RX-V2400 receiver, SVS sub-woofer and 5 Energy speakers and everything has been manually calibrated and optimized).

I've tried some of the software DDL/AC3 solutions and I recommend going with a hardware solution. I never was able to get the software solutions to work very well (if at all...).

With my hardware/software/OEM PowerDVD combo, I absolutely always get 5.1 audio as long as I select anything with at least 5.1 channels. I've tried to find a multi-channel audio source that drops me down to 2 channels at the amp/speakers and I haven't been able to find this anywhere with any of the HD-DVD/Blue-ray movies that I've watched.

For example, when I select Dolby TrueHD, I always get DTS 5.1 at my amp and the audio quality is extremely good. Flipping back and forth between TrueHD and DD5.1, the TrueHD sounds - if anything slightly crisper and more "alive".

Similarly, any multi-channel audio that my amp doesn't natively support (like 5.1 LPCM or WMA 5.1), my amp receives DTS 5.1 and all 6 channels sound excellent.

Based on this, I would assume that PowerDVD OEM does include Dolby TrueHD decoders that would on lower end hardware provide 5.1 audio through analog connections. It seems like what PowerDVD OEM is missing is DD5.1 and DTS decoders and if your audio receiver can handle these, you can take advantage of SPDIF pass-through to still get all 5.1 channels of audio.

@ HT Slider,

The bold comment there is one that I just don't get, and would love to know how that works. Dolby and DTS are two separate encoding companies, as I understand it. How would selecting a Dolby track (TrueHD) end up at your amp as a DTS track?

Do you have the DTS-mixing option enabled in PowerDVD, the one under the "Use S/PDIF" audio setting? Because I can do the same thing you describe above by using that function. The only problem is that you get that irritating "ringing" tone on movies.

Seriously, if you've turned that trick without using the DTS-mixing option, I'm all about learning how you did that!

BW

EDIT: Just read your post above about DTS Connect and DDLive. I don't think my audio card (integrated Realtek on a HP z555) supports those standards. That may be why you're getting the results you're getting and I'm not.

@ HT Slider,

The bold comment there is one that I just don't get, and would love to know how that works. Dolby and DTS are two separate encoding companies, as I understand it. How would selecting a Dolby track (TrueHD) end up at your amp as a DTS track?

Do you have the DTS-mixing option enabled in PowerDVD, the one under the "Use S/PDIF" audio setting? Because I can do the same thing you describe above by using that function. The only problem is that you get that irritating "ringing" tone on movies.

Seriously, if you've turned that trick without using the DTS-mixing option, I'm all about learning how you did that!

BW

EDIT: Just read your post above about DTS Connect and DDLive. I don't think my audio card (integrated Realtek on a HP z555) supports those standards. That may be why you're getting the results you're getting and I'm not.

Both before and after that post I mentioned (there are so many posts going on I understand it is difficult to read them all) that my motherboard, the Gigabyte GA-P35-DS4 includes DTS-Connect. The audio chips used on that board are excellent and work very well, especially with Vista.

Basically PowerDVD decoded the TrueHD audio (or other audio format) and sends it to the audio driver as digital multi-channel audio, which in turn uses the audio hardware to digitally encode it to DTS and then send the encoded DTS digital stream out the SPDIF port to the receiver.

If PowerDVD is trying to play back something with DD5.1 or DTS, it knows that the audio driver is configured to support SPDIF passthrough of these formats, so instead of doing anything with it, PowerDVD sends the untouched DD5.1 or DTS directly to the audio driver, which in turn sends it directly to the receiver.

Even though TrueHD is digitally decoded and then digitally encoded into DTS, the audio quality is just as good or better than the untouched DD5.1 audio track (at least I can't hear any reduction in audio quality).

How have you set up PowerDVD to do what you say? As far as I can see s/pdif is either on or off. If on then everything is passed that way and TrueHD, due to an aknowledged bug, sends only 2-channel PCM. If you set to 6-channel mode all is decoded, so would then be re-encoded to DTS by your audio card.

If you have managed to find a way to do what you suggest I am very interested. My card is currently doing the same trick, but only to 640kb/s DD. But all audio is first being decoded, then re-encoded, unless I turn off Dolby Digital Live and manually switch PDVD to s/pdif mode.

Just thought I'd drop a note that there has been some discussion in the Cyberlink forums that PowerDVD 8 is around the corner. Unfortunately, it is very light on new features (which apparently there are quite a few). They did confirm that it will have support for BD and HDDVD formats.

http://forum.cyberlink.com/forum/posts/list/2579.page

Thanks for that chillspace.

Anyone guess why the hell powerdvd seems to be scewing up deinterlacing using 8800GT OC. Every other F'ing software no problem with video, blu ray or hd-dvd, yet now for some reason powerdvd will not playback correctly.

Letters/text have stair stepping artifacts on them as to any clean edges of objects. Now keep in mind its not the entire picture, it's only the edges of text and objects that are stair stepping. I've uninstalled/reinstalled half million times. Changed settings till my fingers bleed.

Anyone with any tips PLEASE let me know , this is driving me god damn batty.

Anyone guess why the hell powerdvd seems to be scewing up deinterlacing using 8800GT OC. Every other F'ing software no problem with video, blu ray or hd-dvd, yet now for some reason powerdvd will not playback correctly.

Letters/text have stair stepping artifacts on them as to any clean edges of objects. Now keep in mind its not the entire picture, it's only the edges of text and objects that are stair stepping. I've uninstalled/reinstalled half million times. Changed settings till my fingers bleed.

Anyone with any tips PLEASE let me know , this is driving me god damn batty.

Have you set video to "Original"? I've found any other setting introduces stair-step artifacts. Most obvious on cartoons like "The Simpsons Movie".

Only setting to "Original", and leaving all the individual settings alone fixed it

I use the nVidia control panel if I need to tweak the brightness/contrast/etc.

FIrst THANK YOU for fast reply, and 2nd thanks for the right reply lol. That is what the problem was, now the real question is WTF. Why the hell would that completely destroy the picture quality. Yes stair stepping artifacts is exactly what results if taken off original. Well least I can handle watching things again, seriously 100% ruins high quality context with the mess it makes. Thank god, been dealing with that for weeks.

You're definitely in the minority. Go get a dedicated player if you want to play optical discs.

Actually JIMWHITE isn't in the minority, most people brought PWRDVD so they could play their discs on the HTPC. I personally have had so many problems with SD DVD dedicated players over the years, I'm hoping replacing everything with my new HTPC will allow me to upgrade rather than bin everything once a year.

I for one am glad I went this route regardless that PDVD is "dodgy" at the moment. At least I havent spent a Grand on a dedicated player to find it's about to be replaced with Profile 2.0 players.

Xma1e

@ HTSlider,

Thanks, I understand now.

BW

I have to agree with the comment above concerning DTS Connect and /or Dolby DIgital Live. I will never buy a mobo or a soundcard that doesn't support one or the other. They are both wonderful tools for handling all kinds of wierd (and not so wierd) audio formats and requirements and converting them to SPDIF.

Vern

I just bought a sony FZ280 e/b laptop with blu ray burner and hdmi out. It came standard with intervideo bd. When I play a movie however it comes through only two channel (I am using the hdmi for audio as well). From this forum it sounds like if I upgrade to powerdvd ultra, that program will output dd5.1 via the hdmi cable, or is there an upgrade/workaround I can buy for intervideos product. Thanks

How have you set up PowerDVD to do what you say? As far as I can see s/pdif is either on or off. If on then everything is passed that way and TrueHD, due to an aknowledged bug, sends only 2-channel PCM. If you set to 6-channel mode all is decoded, so would then be re-encoded to DTS by your audio card.

If you have managed to find a way to do what you suggest I am very interested. My card is currently doing the same trick, but only to 640kb/s DD. But all audio is first being decoded, then re-encoded, unless I turn off Dolby Digital Live and manually switch PDVD to s/pdif mode.

That's exactly how it's done for DTS Connect and DD Live. PowerDVD outputs the digital audio on 6-channel mode, and then the sound card encodes it to DTS or DDL and outputs through S/PDIF. There is not much loss in quality, I would say no discernible loss at all with 99% of equipment out there. The sound never leaves the digital domain either, so it's not being converted to analog and then digital again.

By the way, I also second the DTS Connect and (in a lesser degree) DDL cheers. But what I really am for is Dolby Headphone. Has anyone else noticed that DH is actually also 7.1 compatible? I have read everywhere including the Dolby pages, and there's no mention of 7.1 compatibility, only 5.1, but when testing with Vista (there are individual test sounds for each speaker), you can distinguish the rear channels, and with some movies you can actually hear the difference when using Dolby ProLogic IIx and without it (DPLIIx adds rear-channel information for 5.1 sources). It is working great.

I just received an email from Cyberlink about a new update:

PowerDVDUlta_3730_Patch_DVD080102-01.exe

Is this the one that came out awhile ago (1 month)?

I just received an email from Cyberlink about a new update:

PowerDVDUlta_3730_Patch_DVD080102-01.exe

Is this the one that came out awhile ago (1 month)?

080102 = 1/8/2002

080102 = 1/8/2002

Thanks,

I saw the "08" and thought is might be the upgrade to PowerDVD 8...

080102 = 1/8/2002Somehow I doubt that.

It's probably more like 01/02/08

I just did a complete clean re-install and re-format of my XP MCE 2005. Performed all my updates.. When I installed my LG OEM Version of the Cyberlink HD Suite Software. All went well, but when I re-booted I now get a MEDIA CENTER RECEIVER ERROR and the error code is reporting to a Cyberlink l file.. Of course with this error, it pops up every freakin min and disables the MCE Tuner. The intersting thing is, when I just did the same install from my CPU upgrade a few months back, I never saw this.

Now I do with a fresh install. What tha?? I know it's sometheing with the Cyberlink Install b/c I can uninstall or do a system restore point and the error goes away.. Any suggestions on how to fix? Seems like if you install certain programs before certain windows updates...its get's jacked.. Again this is a fresh install. I am simply trying to get ALL to work so I an GHOST it and never go thru 4 days of crap again... .Please anyone help!!!!:mad:

How have you set up PowerDVD to do what you say? As far as I can see s/pdif is either on or off. If on then everything is passed that way and TrueHD, due to an aknowledged bug, sends only 2-channel PCM. If you set to 6-channel mode all is decoded, so would then be re-encoded to DTS by your audio card.

If you have managed to find a way to do what you suggest I am very interested. My card is currently doing the same trick, but only to 640kb/s DD. But all audio is first being decoded, then re-encoded, unless I turn off Dolby Digital Live and manually switch PDVD to s/pdif mode.

I didn't do anything special. All I did was select SPDIF in the audio settings for PowerDVD and that took care of everything. I haven't heard of this "acknowledged bug", but in my case TrueHD definitely comes through as multiple audio channels.

All I did (in addition to selecting SPDIF in PowerDVD) was make sure that the audio driver was properly configured using the configuration wizard for Vista. In my case, I have the audio configured to use DTS Interactive to encode all discrete audio channel onto the appropriate DTS channel. I don't use DTS NEO as I prefer music in stereo to remain as stereo. I have also told the Vista audio panel, that my receiver supports DD5.1 and DTS but doesn't support WMA, so it knows it can pass through these streams. BTW, with this configuration, WMA is also converted to DTS.

My understanding on how this works is the audio driver within Vista tells all software (PowerDVD in this case) what digital audio formats the device you are using as an amp is able to decode. In my case, for DD5.1 and DTS, PowerDVD knows to send this directly to the audio driver and for anything else, it decodes the audio into discrete digital channels and passes this to the audio driver (and this is then encoded by the audio hardware on the motherboard to DTS to be sent to the amp).

Do you have the audio driver configured so it knows that your amp can handle pass-through of DD5.1 and DTS?

Are you running Vista? Maybe this doesn't work with XP??

Is yours the OEM or retail version?

It is possible that the retail version might include the ability to re-encode other sources of multi-channel audio into DD5.1 or DTS, but I wouldn't be surprised if this isn't included with even the full retail version.

Maybe someone can confirm this, but I suspect your best option if you want to be able to get 5.1+ channels of digital audio out of multi-channel audio formats that your amplifier does not support is to purchase a sound card that supports DTS connect or Dolby Digital Live. The other option is probably to switch to analog connections for Dolby TrueHD (if you have a very good analog audio card) and to switch back to SPDIF when playing DD5.1 or DTS.

With any HTPC I've built, I've always made sure my audio solution includes one of these and this works flawlessly (in my experience) at provide 5.1 or more channels digitally through a single fiber connection.

The motherboard I use in our main HTPC is the Gigabyte GA-P35-DS4 and it includes high end digital audio capabilities, including DTS Connect. There are quite a few PCI audio cards that can do the same thing.

It says OEM/Retail. I downloaded the trail version then obtained a key and upgraded to Ultra and have installed 3730. I hooked up my motherboard sound via the analog out to my receiver and now I have 5.1! It will not play 5.1 over SPDIF Coax but will over analog. It still says LPCM 2.0 with bitrate of 2304Kbps but it is deffinitely playing 5.1 surround. I am not sure why analog works and Digital does not but analog does not sound quite as good as digital would if i could use it. That just might be because I am using the Realtek 883 audio from my MB. Either way it works and sounds better than ProLogic simulating the rear speakers.

It says OEM/Retail. I downloaded the trail version then obtained a key and upgraded to Ultra and have installed 3730. I hooked up my motherboard sound via the analog out to my receiver and now I have 5.1! It will not play 5.1 over SPDIF Coax but will over analog. It still says LPCM 2.0 with bitrate of 2304Kbps but it is deffinitely playing 5.1 surround. I am not sure why analog works and Digital does not but analog does not sound quite as good as digital would if i could use it. That just might be because I am using the Realtek 883 audio from my MB. Either way it works and sounds better than ProLogic simulating the rear speakers.

This makes sense. When you play a Dolby TrueHD audio track, PowerDVD decodes it into individual audio channels and passes this digitally to the audio driver. The audio is essentially in multi-channel PCM at this point.

If you had audio hardware within your HTPC that supported Dolby Digital Live or DTS Interactive/DTS Connect and you had it configured to use one of these along with the SPDIF output, the multi-channel PCM would then be encoded into either DD5.1 or DTS before being output through the SPDIF port. Since your audio hardware does not support one of these, it can only output two channels worth of PCM audio because without the data compression with DD5.1 or DTS, SPDIF only supports 2 channels of digital PCM audio.

On the analog side of things, almost all audio cards/motherboards support at least 6 channels of analog audio so multi-channel audio works.

From what I've read (here), PowerDVD Ultra is supposed to include (OEM or retail?) the ability to re-encode multi-channel audio into DD5.1 or DTS using a software method, but unfortunately this functionality doesn't work properly (and provides horrible audio quality).

Basically, your only option to get high quality, multi-channel audio digitally to your amp in either DTS or DD5.1 today when playing a Dolby TrueHD source is to have an audio card/motherboard that supports DTS Interactive or DD5.1. DTS provides considerably higher bandwidth over DD5.1 and when I did "blind" back to back comparisons I found I personally preferred encoding to DTS over DD5.1 so if you decide to buy a new audio card you might consider finding one with DTS Connect (note DDL is also very good and many argue the audio quality is just as good as DTS Interactive - I don't want to debate this here...).

I just received an e-mail from CyberLink stating:

"Cyberlink has just released an important Blu-ray 1.1 Profile update for all PowerDVD Ultra users".

I have registered with Cyberlink that I own the OEM version of PowerDVD Ultra (and nothing else). Reading the e-mail it states clearly that this update is for all PowerDVD Ultra users and that would include us OEM users.

However, when I click on the link it takes me to here:

http://www.cyberlink.com/multi/download/dl_patch_561_112_ENU.html

From what I can tell, this is a download of the Retail patch for PowerDVD Ultra.

Is Cyberlink confused and telling everyone how to completely mess up their OEM install or is this a genuine update that us OEM users should install?

The installation instructions included in the link/e-mail simply state we need to execute the downloaded file.

Last I got was yesterday and included: As CyberLink product owners, you probably had no qualms because of our dual HD formats playback, editing and backup support. Keep in mind that CyberLink will continue with HD DVD support for all CyberLink software, but the adoption of Blu-ray will sure to be even faster!

And a bunch of other offers.

Just an update. I have now been forwarded to the actual quality assurance department to find out why PowerDVD shows VERY infrequent, but still noticeable stuttering with some titles (and always at the same points), particularly Disney Pixar's Cars on Blu-ray, mostly during pans. The most obvious occurrence is 17 minutes 20 seconds into the main movie, during an overhead pan shot showing miles and miles of freeways, and it slows down, speeds up, slows down, etc.

My machine configuration is an HP Slimline s3100n where I have upgraded the CPU to an Athlon 64 X2 5200+ (2.7GHz) and upgraded the video to an nVidia 8400GS 256MB. I still have 1GB of MM, onboard RealTek 7.1 HD audio, and Windows Vista 32-bit.

Anyway, the latest email I got was that they couldn't reproduce the issue using their test platform, a 3.2 GHz Intel Core Duo using the same video card. I asked them, don't you think there are sufficient processor and chipset differences (and memory timings) to test using an AMD platform? Ugh. I'm so disgusted with Cyberlink right now.

i have never really got hd dvd and blu ray to play back correctly in XP but in Vista it works perfectly

I just bought my first Blu-Ray disk today for my new LG dual format player. Live Free or Die Hard.

Nothing but choppy play.

What gives on this? I am using PowerDVD Ultra 7 and as far as I know it is the latest version.

Anyone keeping a list of what won't play with PowerDVD?

All hd-dvd's that I have tried have played flawlessly.

Help!!!

I've been running PWDVD relatively problem free since 3516. I recently discovered the Vista Sound Properties adjustments and decided to do some playing. When I selected 24-bit/96kHz as an output option, I ended up with some snap, crackle and pop on a few BD's that I tested so, I adjusted down to 24-bit/48kHz. This setting seemed to clear up the issue.

I'm just wondering what may be the cause of problems when I use the higher setting? Is it evidence of downsampling from PWDVD or, perhaps, the result of upsampling a lower bitrate source audio? My PC's specs are below...

Dell Inspiron 1720
Intel C2D T7500 (2.2GHz/800Mhz FSB/4MB cache)
3Gb SDRAM (DDR2 at 667MHz/Asymmetric Dual Channel)
nVidia GeForce 8600M GT (256Mb)
Sound Blaster X-Fi Extreme Audio w/analog discrete channel docking module (Express Card/5.1)
250Gb HDD (5400 RPM)
2x Blu-Ray Disc Drive
XBox 360 AO HD DVD drive
Windows Vista Ultimate (x86)

I just bought my first Blu-Ray disk today for my new LG dual format player. Live Free or Die Hard.

Nothing but choppy play.

What gives on this? I am using PowerDVD Ultra 7 and as far as I know it is the latest version.

Anyone keeping a list of what won't play with PowerDVD?

All hd-dvd's that I have tried have played flawlessly.

Help!!!

of all the movies i have that is not one of them , that is i believe is a BD+ disk ,wonder if that is causing the problem , i would go to Slysofts forum, http://forum.slysoft.com/forumdisplay.php?f=53 to see if anyboby else is having the problem with this disk

Just thought I'd drop a note that there has been some discussion in the Cyberlink forums that PowerDVD 8 is around the corner. Unfortunately, it is very light on new features (which apparently there are quite a few).
And you can virtually guarantee that most of those new features will be ways to prevent AnyDVD HD, region code change extension and HDD playback from occurring.

On the analog side of things, almost all audio cards/motherboards support at least 6 channels of analog audio so multi-channel audio works.

Basically, your only option to get high quality, multi-channel audio digitally to your amp in either DTS or DD5.1 today when playing a Dolby TrueHD source is to have an audio card/motherboard that supports DTS Interactive or DD5.1. DTS provides considerably higher bandwidth over DD5.1 and when I did "blind" back to back comparisons I found I personally preferred encoding to DTS over DD5.1 so if you decide to buy a new audio card you might consider finding one with DTS Connect (note DDL is also very good and many argue the audio quality is just as good as DTS Interactive - I don't want to debate this here...).

But is there really a point since the analog out is better than that (if you have any sort of decent analog card and much better if you have a good one liek a modded x-meridian).

I am using PowerDVD version 3730 and when I play this BD Disc it only outputs in 2 ch. and my receiver using Digital Coax goes into the Pro Logic mode. This is with the English TrueHD audio setting. When I go to the Spanish track my receiver switches to Dolby 5.1 perfectly. When i look under the Information tab in configuration menu, audio is stated as Dolby TrueHD at bitrate of like 2306 Kbps, but it also says 2 Ch there. Oh and it says it is sending LPCM. PowerDVD seems to be sending this to my receiver in 48KHz PCM because that is what it says on the Receiver Display. I thought PowerDVD would convert all HD Audio formats to Dolby 5.1 or DTS 5.1 so older equipment could play the Dolby or DTS track. Is it because I am using Coax? This is rather frustrating. Please someone help. Thanks.

I'm not sure if anyone answered this but what you're experiencing is normal with TrueHD tracks. TrueHD has no "core" compatibility stream as do DD+ and DTS-HD and DTS-HD MA.

The only conversion you can choose for non-S/PDIF compatible streams is to transcode to DTS by using the S/PDIF "DTS mixing" option. However the transcoding is seriously flawed and produces a horrid ringing noise with the sound. Therefore it's essentially useless.

Also TrueHD appears not to be compatible with this feature either--even if you enable it on a TrueHD track, it doesn't seem to work.

Therefore over S/PDIF with a TrueHD track all you can get is 48kHz/16-bit stereo (2.0) PCM. Your only choices are:

1. Use a different stream than TrueHD (not always present on the disc, however)

2. Use multi-channel analog outputs from your soundcard or motherboard to a multi-channel analog input on your receiver. (This will obviously only work for you if you have these features available on the PC and your receiver).

3. Use HDMI, which I'm assuming you don't have on your receiver and/or PC, given that you're using S/PDIF right now. Note that ATi's HDMI audio solution isn't "true" HDMI, so this will only transport S/PDIF as well.

4. Use a soundcard that has a feature like DD Live or DTS-Connect and have the soundcard's drivers transcode the audio stream it receives to DD or DTS (depending on what type of card you have). This was mentioned by someone above. Since it is a proper DTS-Connect or DD Live encode, there isn't the crappy Cyberlink ringing noise that you get with the option in PDVD otherwise.

5. Barring all those, you'll be stuck with TrueHD in 2.0 downmix mode, and you can't do anything about it.

I just bought my first Blu-Ray disk today for my new LG dual format player. Live Free or Die Hard.

Nothing but choppy play.

What gives on this? I am using PowerDVD Ultra 7 and as far as I know it is the latest version.

Anyone keeping a list of what won't play with PowerDVD?

All hd-dvd's that I have tried have played flawlessly.

Help!!!

I know my system is somewhat overkill, but PowerDVD Ultra OEM can play absolutely every single HD-DVD and Blue-ray that I've tried absolutely flawlessly. I've never once seen a single noticeable stutter anywhere when watching a movie from the DVD drive - ever.

Basically, it is not that PowerDVD Ultra is incapable of playing many of these movies, but it is incapable of playing certain movies with certain hardware.

I wonder what they have within their test lab in the way of hardware...

BTW, my hardware includes: Gigabye GA-P35-DS4 motherboard (with DTS Connect), Intel Quad Core 2 Q6600 processor, 4GB PC-6400 DDR2 RAM, genuine ATI HD2600XT, LG GGC-H20L DVD drive, 3x 500GB Seagate SATA-300 drives, 2x 300GB Seagate SATA-150 drives, and is running Vista Home Premium and PowerDVD Ultra OEM 3514. The video output is connected by DVI (w/HDCP) to our Toshiba 51" HDTV and the audio is connected by SPDIF to our Yamaha RX-V2400 receiver. This system is rock solid and seems to be able to handle just about anything, even simultaneously recording in HD, scanning HD content for commercials (showanalyser), recording in SD, transcoding an HD show to another format, serving HD content to other HTPCs within our home, while playing an HD movie with PowerDVD - all at the same time. The only way I can get it to hick-up with HD content is if I use up too much hard drive I/O and the drive is too busy to read an HD show off the hard drive that is being watched (this is with Media Center though, not PowerDVD).

I know my system is somewhat overkill, but PowerDVD Ultra OEM can play absolutely every single HD-DVD and Blue-ray that I've tried absolutely flawlessly. I've never once seen a single noticeable stutter anywhere when watching a movie from the DVD drive - ever.

Basically, it is not that PowerDVD Ultra is incapable of playing many of these movies, but it is incapable of playing certain movies with certain hardware.

I wonder what they have within their test lab in the way of hardware...

BTW, my hardware includes: Gigabye GA-P35-DS4 motherboard (with DTS Connect), Intel Quad Core 2 Q6600 processor, 4GB PC-6400 DDR2 RAM, genuine ATI HD2600XT, LG GGC-H20L DVD drive, 3x 500GB Seagate SATA-300 drives, 2x 300GB Seagate SATA-150 drives, and is running Vista Home Premium and PowerDVD Ultra OEM 3514. The video output is connected by DVI (w/HDCP) to our Toshiba 51" HDTV and the audio is connected by SPDIF to our Yamaha RX-V2400 receiver. This system is rock solid and seems to be able to handle just about anything, even simultaneously recording in HD, scanning HD content for commercials (showanalyser), recording in SD, transcoding an HD show to another format, serving HD content to other HTPCs within our home, while playing an HD movie with PowerDVD - all at the same time. The only way I can get it to hick-up with HD content is if I use up too much hard drive I/O and the drive is too busy to read an HD show off the hard drive that is being watched (this is with Media Center though, not PowerDVD).

Well, Here is my system in a nutshell

Asus P5e-VM HDMI
Intel G35 chipset - latest drivers
Intel E8400 chip
2 gb DDR 800 ram
500gb SATAII drive
Denon AVR4306
Toshiba 62" DLP HDTV
ANYDVD latest version
Vista Ultimate Edition
My Movies 2
PowerDVD Ultra 7 (downloaded from cyberlink)

Basically I get everything from the disk is not recognized to choppy video and perfect audio to my system is NOT HDCP compatible errors.
Guess I should have rented a few first. I wonder if Target will take the disk back or maybe trade it out??? If not, $30 down the drain.

Well, Here is my system in a nutshell

Asus P5e-VM HDMI
Intel G35 chipset - latest drivers
Intel E8400 chip
2 gb DDR 800 ram
500gb SATAII drive
Denon AVR4306
Toshiba 62" DLP HDTV
ANYDVD latest version
Vista Ultimate Edition
My Movies 2
PowerDVD Ultra 7 (downloaded from cyberlink)

Basically I get everything from the disk is not recognized to choppy video and perfect audio to my system is NOT HDCP compatible errors.
Guess I should have rented a few first. I wonder if Target will take the disk back or maybe trade it out??? If not, $30 down the drain.

Anyone getting choppy video with BD+ discs need to turn off AnyDVD HD...this is known to interefere with playback. This is from my own experience. I personally, have turned off AnyDVD HD indefinitely and haven't had any issues with any discs I purchased or rented in either format. BD+ discs play flawlessly.

My system specs:

HTPC v2.0: Intel E6600|2GB RAM|(2)250GB (OS)+(3)500GB WD SE16 SATA (RAID0)|Gigabyte HD 2600 XT w/ Silentpipe II|(2)Win-PVR 500|(1)ATI TV 650 Combo PCIe|LG GGC-H20L Blu-ray/HD DVD Drive|Harmony 890 Pro|MX Air Mouse|DiNovo Edge|Vista Home Premium|BTV 4.7.1 w/DVD Plug-in|BTV Link 4.7.1|AnyDVDHD (disabled) |Nero 8 Ultra Edition|PowerDVD Ultra
To be added soon: Z-Wave Homeseer Home control software

Well, Here is my system in a nutshell

Asus P5e-VM HDMI
Intel G35 chipset - latest drivers
Intel E8400 chip
2 gb DDR 800 ram
500gb SATAII drive
Denon AVR4306
Toshiba 62" DLP HDTV
ANYDVD latest version
Vista Ultimate Edition
My Movies 2
PowerDVD Ultra 7 (downloaded from cyberlink)

Basically I get everything from the disk is not recognized to choppy video and perfect audio to my system is NOT HDCP compatible errors.
Guess I should have rented a few first. I wonder if Target will take the disk back or maybe trade it out??? If not, $30 down the drain.


What Gfx are you using? If its the onboard from the motherboard, that could be part of the problem (though I wouldn't expect many errors, just crap playback). I've got a built-in HDMI port on my Gigabyte motherboard (onboard ATI X1250), but it was pretty inept at playback unless you wanted to stick to 720p. Even though the current ATI drivers have disabled HW acceleration, my system manages far better playback with a 2600pro than it did with the onboard, even though its actually getting the cpu to do most of the work.

Your cpu has plenty of welly compared to mine (I've got a BE-2350, but I think a 6750 can cruise doing the work, so an 8400 should be a doddle), so unless you're using the onboard gfx I would have thought your HW was fine
with or without HW acceleration.

I have to agree with the comment above concerning DTS Connect and /or Dolby DIgital Live. I will never buy a mobo or a soundcard that doesn't support one or the other. They are both wonderful tools for handling all kinds of wierd (and not so wierd) audio formats and requirements and converting them to SPDIF.

Vern

I also agree. PCM soundtracks sound great after being encoded to DTS. It's great for gaming also.

I also agree. PCM soundtracks sound great after being encoded to DTS. It's great for gaming also.

Ooh....ahh...why would you want to go "back" to DTS.

What's wrong with analogue out? Works for me :)

I also agree. PCM soundtracks sound great after being encoded to DTS. It's great for gaming also.

Yep, I even use a old Creative Extigy and feed the digital out on my cable box to it, it decodes the audio and then I feed output back out through my X-Merdian encoding it to DTS 5.1 or DD 5.1 that way every channel is 5.1. :)

Ooh....ahh...why would you want to go "back" to DTS.

What's wrong with analogue out? Works for me :)


Nothing! I use analog out for HD DVD's exclusively the sound is much better that way at least for me anyway.

What Gfx are you using? If its the onboard from the motherboard, that could be part of the problem (though I wouldn't expect many errors, just crap playback). I've got a built-in HDMI port on my Gigabyte motherboard (onboard ATI X1250), but it was pretty inept at playback unless you wanted to stick to 720p. Even though the current ATI drivers have disabled HW acceleration, my system manages far better playback with a 2600pro than it did with the onboard, even though its actually getting the cpu to do most of the work.

Your cpu has plenty of welly compared to mine (I've got a BE-2350, but I think a 6750 can cruise doing the work, so an 8400 should be a doddle), so unless you're using the onboard gfx I would have thought your HW was fine
with or without HW acceleration.

I am using the onboard GFX controller. I guess BD+ is more gfx load than HD-DVD.

Anyone getting choppy video with BD+ discs need to turn off AnyDVD HD...this is known to interefere with playback. This is from my own experience. I personally, have turned off AnyDVD HD indefinitely and haven't had any issues with any discs I purchased or rented in either format. BD+ discs play flawlessly.

My system specs:

HTPC v2.0: Intel E6600|2GB RAM|(2)250GB (OS)+(3)500GB WD SE16 SATA (RAID0)|Gigabyte HD 2600 XT w/ Silentpipe II|(2)Win-PVR 500|(1)ATI TV 650 Combo PCIe|LG GGC-H20L Blu-ray/HD DVD Drive|Harmony 890 Pro|MX Air Mouse|DiNovo Edge|Vista Home Premium|BTV 4.7.1 w/DVD Plug-in|BTV Link 4.7.1|AnyDVDHD (disabled) |Nero 8 Ultra Edition|PowerDVD Ultra
To be added soon: Z-Wave Homeseer Home control software

I will try and disable AnyDVD HD and see what I get.

Ooh....ahh...why would you want to go "back" to DTS.

What's wrong with analogue out? Works for me :)

Nothing wrong with analog out, except you're at the mercy of the DACs and pre-amps on the sound card/motherboard. To get great sounding analog you need to spend a lot more money on a high end card.

With an all digital solution that encodes to DTS you simply need a relatively cheap "high end" chip on the motherboard or sound card. You can then throw the extra cash you saved into a better receiver/amp or into better speakers.

Hardware that supports DTS Connect does produce very good sound quality, it is extremely simple to configure and everything works all the time - without having to switch back and forth between SPDIF for DD5.1/DTS tracks and analog for everything else (if you don't have DD5.1/DTS decoding support in software).

Well, Here is my system in a nutshell

Asus P5e-VM HDMI
Intel G35 chipset - latest drivers
Intel E8400 chip
2 gb DDR 800 ram
500gb SATAII drive
Denon AVR4306
Toshiba 62" DLP HDTV
ANYDVD latest version
Vista Ultimate Edition
My Movies 2
PowerDVD Ultra 7 (downloaded from cyberlink)

Basically I get everything from the disk is not recognized to choppy video and perfect audio to my system is NOT HDCP compatible errors.
Guess I should have rented a few first. I wonder if Target will take the disk back or maybe trade it out??? If not, $30 down the drain.

You've got a very nice system and considering mine works so well with similar hardware, I'd expect yours should also.

As others have suggested, maybe the problem is AnyDVD. I'm not running it and I'm simply playing my HD/BD movies from the DVD drive.

BTW, renting would be at least as annoying. You'd end up having to return the movies unwatched. At least owning the movie, you can watch it whenever you or Cyberlink gets your system sorted out...

You've got a very nice system and considering mine works so well with similar hardware, I'd expect yours should also.

As others have suggested, maybe the problem is AnyDVD. I'm not running it and I'm simply playing my HD/BD movies from the DVD drive.

BTW, renting would be at least as annoying. You'd end up having to return the movies unwatched. At least owning the movie, you can watch it whenever you or Cyberlink gets your system sorted out...

Okay. Here is the latest.

I disabled ANYDVD. No love.
I re-routed the HDMI from my Denon straight to the TV. Some love. I actually get a picture with no HDCP errors. I see trailers. Woohoo....right? Well.....no.
I get the main menu for the movie and cannot select any menu options to actually Play the movie. Also, the menu seems jerky on the video. I am assuming this is not how it is supposed to be.

So far, I am not impressed by Blu-Ray and all the non-sense. None of my HD-DVD's have had any trouble thus far.

Any other thoughts? This seems to be very painful.

Nothing wrong with analog out, except you're at the mercy of the DACs and pre-amps on the sound card/motherboard. To get great sounding analog you need to spend a lot more money on a high end card.

With an all digital solution that encodes to DTS you simply need a relatively cheap "high end" chip on the motherboard or sound card. You can then throw the extra cash you saved into a better receiver/amp or into better speakers.

Hardware that supports DTS Connect does produce very good sound quality, it is extremely simple to configure and everything works all the time - without having to switch back and forth between SPDIF for DD5.1/DTS tracks and analog for everything else (if you don't have DD5.1/DTS decoding support in software).

I think you have it backwards. Analog out is *un*compressed, and you're passing to your pre-amp/receiver to do the rest of the work (which is what you bought that thing for). Recompressing to DTS or DDLive, you're at the mercy of the DAC's on the HTPC, and your pre-pro/AVR can only do so much (like when you send it an MP3). If you can do analog out, you're going to get a much better sound (arguably the best sound, short of passing the native bitstream) than if you're asking the HTPC to recompress the sound. Decompressing is relatively fixed and consistent across devices, while recompressing isn't.

I think you have it backwards. Analog out is *un*compressed, and you're passing to your pre-amp/receiver to do the rest of the work (which is what you bought that thing for). Recompressing to DTS or DDLive, you're at the mercy of the DAC's on the HTPC, and your pre-pro/AVR can only do so much (like when you send it an MP3). If you can do analog out, you're going to get a much better sound (arguably the best sound, short of passing the native bitstream) than if you're asking the HTPC to recompress the sound. Decompressing is relatively fixed and consistent across devices, while recompressing isn't.

It is well known that there are all sorts of interference going on inside a PC, so your card has to be very high end, and my guess is still dedicated equipment is much better. With DTS Connect and DDL, your sound doesn't even touch the DACs because it is just converted in the digital domain. So it's just a matter of preference and convenience. On the one hand, you have compressed sound but no interference and on the other full resolution, but can have noise and other analog artifacts.

I think you have it backwards. Analog out is *un*compressed, and you're passing to your pre-amp/receiver to do the rest of the work (which is what you bought that thing for). Recompressing to DTS or DDLive, you're at the mercy of the DAC's on the HTPC, and your pre-pro/AVR can only do so much (like when you send it an MP3). If you can do analog out, you're going to get a much better sound (arguably the best sound, short of passing the native bitstream) than if you're asking the HTPC to recompress the sound. Decompressing is relatively fixed and consistent across devices, while recompressing isn't.

No. I don't have it backwards.

Analog out is audio in the analog domain, with essentially complex sine waves in voltage over time at the analog port.

This analog signal is susceptible to everything from power supply noise, RF interference, distortion in the computer's pre-amps, flaws in the digital to analog converversion process, etc. A PC is filled with digital RF noise, noisy power lines and is in general a hostile place for analog audio processing. You need a very high end sound card in order to get high quality analog audio out of a PC. A cheap sound card or regular motherboard will have very poor analog output audio quality.

SPDIF on the other hand is digital. As long as it is working, there is no risk for noise or the power supply to affect the signal. The DTS Connect hardware is also 100% digital. It takes the digital multi-channel PCM and digitally encodes into DTS using the highest possible bandwidth for DTS. Sure there is some lossy compression, but DTS still provides excellent bandwidth for very high quality audio and the DTS Connect specification guarantees that this high standard is maintained.

An true audio fanatic might prefer to use a very high end analog sound card in their PC, but unless you want to spend top dollar, DTS Connect will produce consistent, higher quality audio. Using DTS Connect, you also only need a single SPDIF connection to the receiver/amp and it doesn't matter if you use the cheapest SPDIF cable, the sound quality is always excellent. Using analog you need at least 3 cables (with 3-4 wires per cable) and the quality of even the cable affects the audio quality.

There definitely are analog sound cards and analog cables that should be better than DTS, but to get better than DTS you need to spend much more money.

Another advantage to going digital to the receiver is signal processing. Most higher end receivers provide digital signal processing to provide room and speaker compensation. My receiver for example optimizes for the frequency response and phase for each speaker so the audio quality is maximized for someone sitting in front of the HDTV. Like most receivers, this only works if it is fed a digital signal because the receiver's digital processing works in the digital domain. If I send it an analog signal, the analog signal must be pre-processed by the sound card for any room/speaker compensation. Again, unless you get a high end sound card with a high quality microphone for feedback/calibration, you won't be able to compensate for the room and speakers. Some receivers can convert the analog back into digital, process it, and then convert it back to digital - but again there are losses switching back and forth.

So, as far as I'm concerned, unless you want to get into the very high end sound card world combined with a high end amp, high end speakers and a room that is optimized for sound, DTS Connect is significantly superior - especially if you have a moderately high end receiver/amplifier that does full room compensation (and does a good job of it).

Okay. Here is the latest.

I disabled ANYDVD. No love.
I re-routed the HDMI from my Denon straight to the TV. Some love. I actually get a picture with no HDCP errors. I see trailers. Woohoo....right? Well.....no.
I get the main menu for the movie and cannot select any menu options to actually Play the movie. Also, the menu seems jerky on the video. I am assuming this is not how it is supposed to be.

So far, I am not impressed by Blu-Ray and all the non-sense. None of my HD-DVD's have had any trouble thus far.

Any other thoughts? This seems to be very painful.

I posted this in the Cyberlink forums...it worked for me but may vary depending on your hardware setup (you may have to play around with the deinterlacing options):

Depending on your hardware setup...

1. Turn off HW acceleration
2. Go into advanced video settings
3. Change smart deinterlacing to always deinterlace
4. In the drop down, choose 'Pixel Adaptive'
5. click 'Okay'
6. Turn on HW acceleration

I figured this out by trial and error (CL support was not helpful). The above steps allowed my system with an ATI HD2600XT card to play all BD and HDDVD titles without a hitch. I hope this works for you.

Can someone just confirm for me whether with build 3730 of PDVD when outputting 5.1 HD audio over analogue (i.e. PDVD is decoding), does this version *still* downmix the audio output to 48Khz?

Some seem to say it now doesn't (and outputs at full bandwidth), while others aren't sure. Has anyone got the real answer to this?

I posted this in the Cyberlink forums...it worked for me but may vary depending on your hardware setup (you may have to play around with the deinterlacing options):

Depending on your hardware setup...

1. Turn off HW acceleration
2. Go into advanced video settings
3. Change smart deinterlacing to always deinterlace
4. In the drop down, choose 'Pixel Adaptive'
5. click 'Okay'
6. Turn on HW acceleration

I figured this out by trial and error (CL support was not helpful). The above steps allowed my system with an ATI HD2600XT card to play all BD and HDDVD titles without a hitch. I hope this works for you.

That's good advice. :)

Has anyone tried to play the UK import "Almost Famous" using powerdvd?

I got my copy this week and I can get to the menu, but I can't start the movie because keyboard commands don't control the menu and the mouse is not recognized, so I'm stuck in the menu.

Anyone having this problem with this movie or any others? Any solution to this?

Thanks

Ok, I'm a bit flustered here. I just bought a Sony Vaio laptop model VGN-AR630e. It has a GeForce 8400m GT and has HDMI out. I'm using PowerDVD. I haven't updated it up to the newest I don't think. Is it possible to pass TruHD to my receiver to decode via HDMI? I've read through a lot of these posts, but as with many threads, I can't read them all. Anyone got any tips or tricks for me?

-JD-

I posted this in the Cyberlink forums...it worked for me but may vary depending on your hardware setup (you may have to play around with the deinterlacing options):

Depending on your hardware setup...

1. Turn off HW acceleration
2. Go into advanced video settings
3. Change smart deinterlacing to always deinterlace
4. In the drop down, choose 'Pixel Adaptive'
5. click 'Okay'
6. Turn on HW acceleration

I figured this out by trial and error (CL support was not helpful). The above steps allowed my system with an ATI HD2600XT card to play all BD and HDDVD titles without a hitch. I hope this works for you.

Okay. I did these things you suggested. Thank you.

I am still unable to play Blu-Ray through my Denon AVR. Another wierd thing I am seeing is that live play of my HD-DVDs stutter.

Hooked into my TV I can play it. The menu issue apparently had to do with the fact that I had to hit the ENTER key on the keyboard and could not use the remote to start the movie.

I started the movie and the video is still stuttering. The audio is fine.

Very annoying. Is there some other player other than PowerDVD that will play HDMs?

I have successfully copied HD-DVDs to the hard drive and the ones I have copied play fine.
Hmm.....now regular DVDs are stuttering. Maybe this is an onboard video problem? Disks burned to the hard drive play fine.

Ooh....ahh...why would you want to go "back" to DTS.

What's wrong with analogue out? Works for me :)

Nothing wrong with analog out, if your receiver has 5/6/7.1 inputs, which unfortunately, mine doesn't. I'll probably go analog out when I upgrade my receiver.

Ok, I'm a bit flustered here. I just bought a Sony Vaio laptop model VGN-AR630e. It has a GeForce 8400m GT and has HDMI out. I'm using PowerDVD. I haven't updated it up to the newest I don't think. Is it possible to pass TruHD to my receiver to decode via HDMI? I've read through a lot of these posts, but as with many threads, I can't read them all. Anyone got any tips or tricks for me?

-JD-

No, it's not possible. Neither PowerDVD nor current soundcards allow for bitstream TrueHD or DTS-HD MA. I think it's supposed to be coming with the G45 chipset. I guess your highest quality bet is to let PowerDVD decode to 8-channel and then output multichannel PCM through HDMI, but that requires a capable G35 motherboard. I do think that's better than bitstream, because with bitstream you only get the movie sound, not the Windows sounds, or movie extras, more or less like with S/PDIF bitstream of DD and DTS. With S/PDIF, though there is no option to digitally transmit the uncompressed PCM mutichannel audio, so bitstream is the highest quality you can get with S/PDIF.

JonProphet (or anyone who knows), by the way...

I am considering getting a laptop, and it seems yours is pretty good. I want HDMI, but with 7.1 uncompressed audio capability. Do you know if yours does this? And I'm guessing it does hardware acceleration for blu-ray and HD-DVD with the 8400M, right? I am looking at the lesser model AR610E (http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B000VCE1Z2/), which seems to have the same basic specs as yours (sans the blu-ray drive, don't need that).

Thanks for any info.

EDIT: I guess probably the AR620E (http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B000VCE20Q/) is a much better value.

No, it's not possible. Neither PowerDVD nor current soundcards allow for bitstream TrueHD or DTS-HD MA. I think it's supposed to be coming with the G45 chipset. I guess your highest quality bet is to let PowerDVD decode to 8-channel and then output multichannel PCM through HDMI, but that requires a capable G35 motherboard. I do think that's better than bitstream, because with bitstream you only get the movie sound, not the Windows sounds, or movie extras, more or less like with S/PDIF bitstream of DD and DTS. With S/PDIF, though there is no option to digitally transmit the uncompressed PCM mutichannel audio, so bitstream is the highest quality you can get with S/PDIF.

I'm not even getting PCM. Right now all that is showing Pro Logic. Not DTS or DD. I'd be happy with PCM over HDMI, but for some reason I can't. Not sure if its a software/driver issue or PowerDVD issue. I've got it connected with HDMI and have great video but only have Pro Logic for sound.

-JD-