Many of my downloaded trailers are being displayed in an odd format when I stream using windows media center. The picture is squished. But when I watch the video from the dashboard the aspect ratio is fine, any fix for this?

FAQ Updates: 5/16/07:

Q: Why does some WMV content that played correctly before the updated version now play in the wrong aspect ratio or with severe stuttering issues?

A: Some content created by third-party encoders does not correctly set file attributes used to play video files and this can result in videos playing in odd aspect ratios. In addition, some higher resolution WMV v7 and v8 files may stutter and audio may not stay in sync with video. These issues will be addressed in the next release. To work around this issue you can re-encode your files to WMV9 with Windows Media Encoder available from www.microsoft.com.


Guess I'll have to wait till next time. BTW gametrailers rules.

I have been using sony vegas pro to put together some video from my HD camera sony hdr sr11. I made a project and rendered the video as WMV, here is the description of the codec

"Audio: 192 Kbps, 48,000 Hz, 16 Bit, Stereo, WMA9.
Video: 29.97 fps, 1440x1080, PAR=1.3333, WMV V9 CBR Compression, Smoothness 90.
Use this setting for high-quality HD video playback on a 3.0 GHz computer or better."

If i watch the video on the PC, it has the correct aspect ratio, but when I watch on the xbox media center, it compresses it to 4:3.

I tried to render as mpeg and the video has the correct aspect ratio, but it is letterbox within the 4:3 screen. So i get black bars on both the top and sides.

I already have the xbox configured for 16:9 and the media center interface is the proper aspect ratio.

I downloaded the latest windows media encoder and re-encoded the WMV file created with vegas. It plays fullscreen with the correct aspect ratio.

Very disappointing for a $500 program. I guess i need to figure out how to modify the code to produce the same file as the windows media encoder

I have been using sony vegas pro to put together some video from my HD camera sony hdr sr11. I made a project and rendered the video as WMV, here is the description of the codec

"Audio: 192 Kbps, 48,000 Hz, 16 Bit, Stereo, WMA9.
Video: 29.97 fps, 1440x1080, PAR=1.3333, WMV V9 CBR Compression, Smoothness 90.
Use this setting for high-quality HD video playback on a 3.0 GHz computer or better."

If i watch the video on the PC, it has the correct aspect ratio, but when I watch on the xbox media center, it compresses it to 4:3.

I tried to render as mpeg and the video has the correct aspect ratio, but it is letterbox within the 4:3 screen. So i get black bars on both the top and sides.

I already have the xbox configured for 16:9 and the media center interface is the proper aspect ratio.

I downloaded the latest windows media encoder and re-encoded the WMV file created with vegas. It plays fullscreen with the correct aspect ratio.

Very disappointing for a $500 program. I guess i need to figure out how to modify the code to produce the same file as the windows media encoder

A quick fix would be pressing the info button and picking zoom mode 3, which will stretch it to 16:9. But also, PAR sounds like its maybe proper aspect ratio, which would be the flag telling it how to be displayed. 1440x1080 is a 4:3 format, (don't know why WMV does it like this) that is stretched out over the full 1920 pixels to be widescreen. The flag there is set to 4:3, so it doesn't know to stretch it. I would imagine there'd be some setting to change that PAR to 1.7777 and I'd think that should fix it.

good call, thanks. The zoom mode looks correct.

I changed the format to 720p and it looks just as good with the normal zoom mode. the other resolution should be 1920, seems strange. is that what a desktop resolution would be? they followed the pc instead of hd?

Audio: 192 Kbps, 48,000 Hz, 16 Bit, Stereo, WMA9.
Video: 29.97 fps, 1280x720, WMV V9 CBR Compression, Smoothness 90.
Use this setting for high-quality HD video playback from a local hard drive.

good call, thanks. The zoom mode looks correct.

I changed the format to 720p and it looks just as good with the normal zoom mode. the other resolution should be 1920, seems strange. is that what a desktop resolution would be? they followed the pc instead of hd?

Audio: 192 Kbps, 48,000 Hz, 16 Bit, Stereo, WMA9.
Video: 29.97 fps, 1280x720, WMV V9 CBR Compression, Smoothness 90.
Use this setting for high-quality HD video playback from a local hard drive.

Well for some reason, they use anamorphic encoding for 1080p video, probably to cut down on file size since its not quite 1080p (1920x1080). Basically, like DVD video, its encoded to the 4:3 screen and a flag is supposed to set the player to stretch it, but it seems that the encoder isn't setting that flag to tell the player its 16:9.

Well for some reason, they use anamorphic encoding for 1080p video, probably to cut down on file size since its not quite 1080p (1920x1080). Basically, like DVD video, its encoded to the 4:3 screen and a flag is supposed to set the player to stretch it, but it seems that the encoder isn't setting that flag to tell the player its 16:9.

HDV camcorders are limited in bitrate to what can be achieved with mpeg2 on the fly encoders and the mini-DV tape format. They're stuck with a max 25mbps which is considerably light for real time mpeg2 at any reasonable pricepoint. So, they defined the HDV standard to use non-square pixels with 1440 x1080 pixels covering a 16:9 aspect ratio sensor. Most HDV camcorders actually have a full 1920 x 1080 sensor but the 1920 gets down-sampled to 1440. With an HDMI capture card, you can get the full 1920 x 1080 resolution. In any case, the mpeg2 transferred from tape to PC, does have the proper pixel aspect ratio specified (4:3). Somewhere later in the chain, is not honoring the pixel aspect ratio specified. Remember PAR = Pixel Aspect Ratio, not display aspect ratio. So, 1440 pixels that are 4:3 width/height, display full width (1920) on a 16:19 aspect ratio display. That is, 1440 * 4/3 = 1920. So, there is no "flag" per se, to tell the player 16:9. If the pixel aspect ratio specified is 1:1, then you get square pixels and you need 1920 x 1080 to get full coverage.

P.J.