ATI Radeon HD 2X00 (2400,2600,2900) series owners thread

[Andy o]

Arfster or Sarvatt or anyone who's knowledgeable about the video capabilities of these cards, could you break down for us some of the advantages/disadvantages, in your opinion, for video of GPUs like the 2400 and 2600 vs. their Nvidia counterparts? I think it's well known by now that Nvidia will pretty much smoke ATI on 3D graphics. I remember somewhere in this thread Arfster or someone mentioning that ATI had better potential for video, like deinterlacing and such.

I personally have had a much, much less problematic experience with the Gigabyte 8500 GT than with both the Sapphire 2400 pro and HIS 2600 pro, but alas, Nvidia cards don't provide audio over HDMI.

Thanks.

[Sarvatt]

outside of incompatabilities that are going to happen because people have wildly varying setups, it all comes down to the drivers for both of the cards for me. I have had way more of a headache on the 3 Nvidia cards that have gone through this HTPC, including a bug where media center would crash randomly halfway during video playback that they didn't fix for 3 years that you can imagine turned me off of the brand for HTPC usage :D in comparison the problems I've had with this card are just minor irritations and user errors. here's a list of acceleration modes available on 8500gt in vista x86-

DXVA2_ModeMPEG2_IDCT NV12 720x480 1280x720 1920x1080
DXVA2_ModeMPEG2_MoComp NV12 720x480 1280x720 1920x1080
DXVA2_ModeVC1_IDCT NV24 720x480 1280x720 1920x1080
DXVA2_ModeVC1_IDCT NV12 720x480 1280x720 1920x1080
DXVA2_ModeWMV9_IDCT NV24 720x480 1280x720 1920x1080
DXVA2_ModeWMV9_IDCT NV12 720x480 1280x720 1920x1080
DXVA2_ModeVC1_MoComp NV24 720x480 1280x720 1920x1080
DXVA2_ModeVC1_MoComp NV12 720x480 1280x720 1920x1080
DXVA2_ModeWMV9_MoComp NV24 720x480 1280x720 1920x1080
DXVA2_ModeWMV9_MoComp NV12 720x480 1280x720 1920x1080
DXVA2_ModeVC1_PostProc NV24 720x480 1280x720 1920x1080
DXVA2_ModeVC1_PostProc NV12 720x480 1280x720 1920x1080
DXVA2_ModeWMV9_PostProc NV24 720x480 1280x720 1920x1080
DXVA2_ModeWMV9_PostProc NV12 720x480 1280x720 1920x1080
1720ac81-9d1b-4f63-9a37-4a88483d0b87 NV24 720x480 1280x720 1920x1080
1720ac81-9d1b-4f63-9a37-4a88483d0b87 NV12 720x480 1280x720 1920x1080
DXVA2_ModeH264_VLD_NoFGT NV24 720x480 1280x720 1920x1080
215da78e-a71b-417e-8ef8-463251a57206 NV24 720x480 1280x720 1920x1080

More WMV9 less VC-1 more mpeg2 on nvidia. VC-1 is more important to me than mpeg-2 and WMV9 is useless to me, so I'm happy with the ATI. There is a forceUVDmpeg2 option in the 7.8 beta drivers that didn't exist in the video acceleration dll for catalyst 7.7 (haven't gotten working though) so hopefully one day they add that and give us VLD mpeg2 decoding which will put the ATI cards on top with no questions about it. I can't comment on the 2600 series mpeg2 performance as I only had about an hour to play with one, and my opinion is based on my experience with a HD 2400 Pro with all of the mpeg2 quirks and lack of acceleration problems. As of now I don't see any other major reason to go with one over the other though, both are pretty much equal gambles as to if they will work with your components :D 2600 pro definitely seems to be the sweet spot for a HTPC though, I wish they were available back when I purchased the 2400!

[Andy o]

Thanks for your input. In reality, pretty much the only thing that makes me wanna switch to Nvidia right now from my otherwise OK-working 2600pro is the HDCP thing, but I still have a bad flavor in my mouth because of the 2400pro that I had, and the recent (and not so recent) marketing lies from ATI. OK, maybe not flat-out lies (then again, maybe yes!), but misleading enough to be counted as such. Oh, and the abysmal and disgraceful experience I had with their software for the HDTV Wonder.

[magnusr]

I have ordered the HDMI dongle and suspect it will work. (assuming I can cram the passively cooled 2400 card into my PC and that I do not have a card with a bad chip...!)

There also might be a receiver interaction going on here, besides computer settings. On the Onkyo 875 thread, people nave noted that for audio on hdmi to work; hdmi is actually set to OFF on the 875 (seems weird...but there you go).

Here is the full text from the ATI ordering page. I think the key part is the second notation about which boards are supported. So I agree with the comment that ATI is covering its proverbial corporate assets.

Note: "This as a replacement to lost or damaged adapters ONLY. It can not be sold separately. This adapter will not enable HDMI through the DVI output of any Radeon™ HD 2000 series board; it will only work if your product was originally shipped with a DVI-HDMI adapter."

Supported on the following product:

* RADEON HD 2900
* RADEON HD 2600
* RADEON HD 2400

The Yamaha has no such problem. Its doing audio over hdmi with my ps3. All the way to 7.1 PCM. Other people are using standalone hd-dvd/blu-ray players with this receiver over hdmi also without a problem (including audio ofc).

Besides im not trying to do audio over hdmi with the 2600xt. Since the 2600xt dosent support 5.1/7.1 audio over pcm i dont want its audio. Im doing analog 5.1 audio connection to my receiver. Ive also tried disabled the ati hdmi audio, but it dosent make a diffrence on the blinking.

The problem here is that the ati 2600xt simply dont seem to support a receiver in the middle of the hdmi chain when watching video with hdcp (causing a blink every 15 seconds). Strip the hdcp from the movie and it plays fine. Connect the card directly to the monitor bypassing the receiver works fine with hdcp video without blinking. But since i dont have more than one plug in my monitor i want to do it through the receiver. I dont want to swap cables all the time. Besides im not using the tvs remote, im only using the receiver remote :)

[lkuech]

Hi @ll.

Is it necessary to remove all handmade registry hacks before updating to the catalyst 7.8 (when it comes out) to have a brand new start. Or does the driver delete the whole section anyway?

Bye
Lars

[Andy o]

The problem here is that the ati 2600xt simply dont seem to support a receiver in the middle of the hdmi chain when watching video with hdcp (causing a blink every 15 seconds). Strip the hdcp from the movie and it plays fine.
How do you strip HDCP? :D

I just wish the numbnuts who came up with HDCP were reading forums. Maybe they don't even know how to read. At this point the only people for whom it's gonna be a deterrent is the legitimate, lay customer who doesn't know about AnyDVD, and it's gonna be a deterrent against proper playback, not against piracy. Just like with every other popular media copy protection ever uttered under the sun.

[magnusr]

How do you strip HDCP? :D

I just wish the numbnuts who came up with HDCP were reading forums. Maybe they don't even know how to read. At this point the only people for whom it's gonna be a deterrent is the legitimate, lay customer who doesn't know about AnyDVD, and it's gonna be a deterrent against proper playback, not against piracy. Just like with every other popular media copy protection ever uttered under the sun.

HD Decrypter from: http://www.dvdfab.com/free.htm

I only did it to test.

I agree that hdcp pretty much sucks. But this is ait's fault. They havent implemented hdmi/hdcp 1.1/1.2a/1.3 according to standards.

[magnusr]

Microsoft has released 2 important hotfixses (the same that was beta released last week). They can be downloaded from microsoft for both vista x86 and vista x64.

KB938194
KB938979

They are supposed to fix display problems and so on.

Gonna try em when I get home.

[Digitalspirit]

ATi technical support is a total waste of time.

I am running the Radeon HD 2900XT with the Catalyst 7.7 drivers and am using Vista Ultimate x64, Asus P5W DH Deluxe mainboard. ATi claim the DVD > HDMI dongle and 2900XT supports video and audio via HDMI, I get only video from the card when plugged into the HDMI port on my Panasonic HDTV. I have asked for a solution but receive only useless generic responses with useless solutions that even a n00b would know. They even sent me a link the the Windows XP drivers for HDMI audio, even though I reported that I am using Vista!!! The HDMI audio driver shows up in device drivers, but there seems no way to enable it. It's doing my head in now. :(

I also get the 'Display driver atikmdag stopped responding and has successfully recovered' problem, which also has no solution. Bearing in mind this is a brand new PC, it's pretty discouraging.

I'm not too impressed with ATi or their card so far and am wishing I had stuck with Nvidia. If anyone has any ideas on the HDMI audio issue then I would appreciate it! Thanks.

[millerbrad]

ATi technical support is a total waste of time.

I am running the Radeon HD 2900XT with the Catalyst 7.7 drivers and am using Vista Ultimate x64, Asus P5W DH Deluxe mainboard. ATi claim the DVD > HDMI dongle and 2900XT supports video and audio via HDMI, I get only video from the card when plugged into the HDMI port on my Panasonic HDTV. I have asked for a solution but receive only useless generic responses with useless solutions that even a n00b would know. They even sent me a link the the Windows XP drivers for HDMI audio, even though I reported that I am using Vista!!! The HDMI audio driver shows up in device drivers, but there seems no way to enable it. It's doing my head in now. :(

I also get the 'Display driver atikmdag stopped responding and has successfully recovered' problem, which also has no solution. Bearing in mind this is a brand new PC, it's pretty discouraging.

I'm not too impressed with ATi or their card so far and am wishing I had stuck with Nvidia. If anyone has any ideas on the HDMI audio issue then I would appreciate it! Thanks.

I can't vouch for the 2900, but I know that the 2600XT passes sound to my Panny Plasma.

Also, I submitted a ticket to ATI regarding only being able to get 2 channel sound instead of 5.1 audio over HDMI. Here was their response...

At this moment, 5.1 audio drivers are not available for Windows Vista. We are in developing these drivers but there's no ETA on when it should be available. Please check our drivers and software page for any updates.

[Digitalspirit]

Here is the latest ATi response.

"The solution in the KB article does apply to Windows Vista as well.

Are you not using the DVI-to-HDMI adapter that came in the box/packaging?"

How stupid do they think people are. How would I connect it to my HDTV if I didn't use the boxed DVI>HDMI dongle? LOL. Now they are telling me the drivers (which make no mention of Vista) are also for Vista!

Thanks for that response millerbrad. Do you think it could be the quality of the lead? I am using the Philex 5m HDMI to HDMI Cable (Transfers true High Definition pictures and up to 8 audio channels). Maybe I require a higher grade lead. I really don't know now and as you can see, ATi are about as much use as a chocolate fireguard. Thanks anyway.

[millerbrad]

Here is the latest ATi response.

"The solution in the KB article does apply to Windows Vista as well.

Are you not using the DVI-to-HDMI adapter that came in the box/packaging?"

How stupid do they think people are. How would I connect it to my HDTV if I didn't use the boxed DVI>HDMI dongle? LOL. Now they are telling me the drivers (which make no mention of Vista) are also for Vista!

Thanks for that response millerbrad. Do you think it could be the quality of the lead? I am using the Philex 5m HDMI to HDMI Cable (Transfers true High Definition pictures and up to 8 audio channels). Maybe I require a higher grade lead. I really don't know now and as you can see, ATi are about as much use as a chocolate fireguard. Thanks anyway.

If you have another HDMI component to test your HDMI cable, you could make sure the cable is OK. I use this cable (http://www.monoprice.com/products/product.asp?c_id=102&cp_id=10240&cs_id=1024004&p_id=2504&seq=1&format=2&style=) with no problems at all.

Also, you may have already done this, but make sure that you have the correct device set as default in the Sound menu of Control Panel.

http://www.sapphiretech.com/us/productfiles/Catalogue_HDMI_Sound_output.pdf

[Sarvatt]

ATi technical support is a total waste of time.

I am running the Radeon HD 2900XT with the Catalyst 7.7 drivers and am using Vista Ultimate x64, Asus P5W DH Deluxe mainboard. ATi claim the DVD > HDMI dongle and 2900XT supports video and audio via HDMI, I get only video from the card when plugged into the HDMI port on my Panasonic HDTV. I have asked for a solution but receive only useless generic responses with useless solutions that even a n00b would know. They even sent me a link the the Windows XP drivers for HDMI audio, even though I reported that I am using Vista!!! The HDMI audio driver shows up in device drivers, but there seems no way to enable it. It's doing my head in now. :(

I also get the 'Display driver atikmdag stopped responding and has successfully recovered' problem, which also has no solution. Bearing in mind this is a brand new PC, it's pretty discouraging.

I'm not too impressed with ATi or their card so far and am wishing I had stuck with Nvidia. If anyone has any ideas on the HDMI audio issue then I would appreciate it! Thanks.

This is like the 5th time I've posted it in this thread now, but try these drivers :)
http://www.realtek.com.tw/downloads/downloadsView.aspx?Langid=1&PNid=24&PFid=24&Level=4&Conn=3&DownTypeID=3

ATI HDMI Audio Device R1.68 2007/5/23 15112k GO GO GO

I get ac3 5.1 passthrough and 2.0 PCM just fine. I just use ffdshow audio for everything, and have it convert everything into a 640k ac3 stream. If you check all the ATI information pages they only list AC3 and 2.0 PCM support now even though other manufacturers and reviews have stated its supposed to pass DTS, and I have a feeling they are going to pull another bait and switch with it like how they have done with mpeg2 offloading. Keep at it with submitting tickets until you feel satisfied with their response though, even if you're just submitting blank ones because you still have the problem and they didn't fix it. If they think you have resolved the problem the people that actually fix the crap probably wont even see that there's a problem and after 3-4 responses they usually get it to people that can actually help. Their early tier support is funny though, no? I get a laugh every time I put in a ticket with some of the crap they come up with :D

[Digitalspirit]

Thanks a lot guys. Will check out your solutions when I get home. Nice to know "real" world users are far more help than the actual vendor themselves.

I have to admit, as irritated as I was with their response, it did raise a laugh as to how stupid their replies were.

i will report back to let you know if I got a result. Cheers! ;)

[dildano]

dildano,

I have the same MSI 2600XT fanless card and it behaves exactly as you describe. MSI needs to release a new BIOS and fix the borked UVD with the 7.7 CC drivers.

I managed to get that MSI card to work with the MSI drivers from their site but since it doesn't have scaling in the the CCC it was not fitting my 37" Westy properly.

I got a Sapphire 2600XT and it works fine. Also got a Sapphire 2400pro and it works fine too.

Sorry to hear about your similar experience with the MSI RX2600XT, but I'm glad that it's not just me! Newegg has been gracious enough to take the card back and even provide a return shipping label, so it's going back to Newegg tonight. I think I'll try the MSI RX2600Pro instead since it at least has a BIOS update available. I really want the fanless design!

By the way, MSI was totally useless when I called them about the problem with the RX2600XT. They haven't gotten many calls on that model, so had nothing to offer. They basically told me that my best bet was to return it to the place where I bought it. That's just bad tech support!

[DJ79]

Is this the type of corruption some of the earlier posters mentioned with the 2600?

This is with MSI 2600PRO (BIOS Version 010.053.000.003, BIOS Date 2007/06/28), MCE 2005, PowerDVD 3104 (latest patch), Catalyst 7.8 beta (8.40), but was no different with 7.7.

http://img183.imageshack.us/img183/1748/dsc04716qo9.jpg (http://imageshack.us)

http://img129.imageshack.us/img129/9599/dsc04717qi3.jpg (http://imageshack.us)

http://img129.imageshack.us/img129/4708/dsc04718es4.jpg (http://imageshack.us)

[slymobile]

Sorry to hear about your similar experience with the MSI RX2600XT, but I'm glad that it's not just me! Newegg has been gracious enough to take the card back and even provide a return shipping label, so it's going back to Newegg tonight. I think I'll try the MSI RX2600Pro instead since it at least has a BIOS update available. I really want the fanless design!

By the way, MSI was totally useless when I called them about the problem with the RX2600XT. They haven't gotten many calls on that model, so had nothing to offer. They basically told me that my best bet was to return it to the place where I bought it. That's just bad tech support!

The weird thing is the card does actually work, but not with the ATI drivers, and only with the HDMI adapter. Its definitely a driver issue and I feel it may be a simple fix on MSI's or ATI's part, maybe the next round of driver updates will fix this. I too like the fanless design, it looks cool too. I was holding out for a fix so I haven't returned it to Zipzoomfly. I bought there because of free shipping, its like next day delivery since they are located close to me.

I may change it to the 2600pro model, since I don't play games anymore, only blu-ray, hd-dvd, and dvds. Keep us informed on the MSI fanless 2600pro model once you get it.

[slymobile]

Is this the type of corruption some of the earlier posters mentioned with the 2600?

This is with MSI 2600PRO (BIOS Version 010.053.000.003, BIOS Date 2007/06/28), MCE 2005, PowerDVD 3104 (latest patch), Catalyst 7.8 beta (8.40), but was no different with 7.7.



Yes, thats the type of corruption with similar setup. Not only that, it will crash my computer. Sometimes will work when PowerDVD is in fullscreen mode, but corruption will recur if exit to windowed mode. System will crash when it wants to when PowerDVD is running with this setup.

Playing MPEG2 is fine, but the corruption occurs with VC1 and AVC.

I have an Intel Q6600 OC to 3.4GHz with MSI 2600XT fanless, now installed with Sapphire 2600XT.

[Sarvatt]

Which drivers are working for you? I downloaded a set when you posted that but I dont think I got the right ones as the umdva dll wasn't different. I'd be interested in looking through the working ones to see whats different :) I grabbed these http://download1.msi.com.tw/files/downloads/dvr_exe/ATI_8.383_Vista.zip

[slymobile]

Which drivers are working for you? I downloaded a set when you posted that but I dont think I got the right ones as the umdva dll wasn't different. I'd be interested in looking through the working ones to see whats different :) I grabbed these http://download1.msi.com.tw/files/downloads/dvr_exe/ATI_8.383_Vista.zip

Yes, this driver works, but only when using HDMI adapter with the MSI 2600XT. This driver doesn't have scaling in the Catalyst control center so it is useless for me to use with my 37" Westy.

[indieke2]

Is this the type of corruption some of the earlier posters mentioned with the 2600?

This is with MSI 2600PRO (BIOS Version 010.053.000.003, BIOS Date 2007/06/28), MCE 2005, PowerDVD 3104 (latest patch), Catalyst 7.8 beta (8.40), but was no different with 7.7.

http://img183.imageshack.us/img183/1748/dsc04716qo9.jpg (http://imageshack.us)

http://img129.imageshack.us/img129/9599/dsc04717qi3.jpg (http://imageshack.us)

http://img129.imageshack.us/img129/4708/dsc04718es4.jpg (http://imageshack.us)


I have this with a Sapphire 2400 Pro, but at 48 hz only. I have a few blocks though in 60 Hz, but very short and once and a while.

[Digitalspirit]

Ok, i need to post 5 times ...

[Digitalspirit]

to be able to post an image! Jesus!

[Digitalspirit]

This is like the 5th time I've posted it in this thread now, but try these drivers :)
http://www.realtek.com.tw/downloads/downloadsView.aspx?Langid=1&PNid=24&PFid=24&Level=4&Conn=3&DownTypeID=3

ATI HDMI Audio Device R1.68 2007/5/23 15112k GO GO GO

I get ac3 5.1 passthrough and 2.0 PCM just fine. I just use ffdshow audio for everything, and have it convert everything into a 640k ac3 stream. If you check all the ATI information pages they only list AC3 and 2.0 PCM support now even though other manufacturers and reviews have stated its supposed to pass DTS, and I have a feeling they are going to pull another bait and switch with it like how they have done with mpeg2 offloading. Keep at it with submitting tickets until you feel satisfied with their response though, even if you're just submitting blank ones because you still have the problem and they didn't fix it. If they think you have resolved the problem the people that actually fix the crap probably wont even see that there's a problem and after 3-4 responses they usually get it to people that can actually help. Their early tier support is funny though, no? I get a laugh every time I put in a ticket with some of the crap they come up with :D


Ok fixed. DVI closest to motherboard is the only one HDMI audio enabled.

[DJ79]

Yes, thats the type of corruption with similar setup. Not only that, it will crash my computer. Sometimes will work when PowerDVD is in fullscreen mode, but corruption will recur if exit to windowed mode. System will crash when it wants to when PowerDVD is running with this setup.

In my case, PowerDVD itself crashed once or twice upon exit. Several times, maybe twice per day, the system froze while just browsing the web (even the mouse pointer wouldn't move), and about ten seconds later video signal would go out. After loading the beta 7.8 drivers three or four days ago, it only happend once, except that I got a blue screen instead of video going out. In all cases, the board itself was just mildly worm to the touch, in other words, quite cool.

I'll see if I can upgrade the BIOS, and wait until the official CC 7.8, hoping the board is not physically defective.

[dildano]

Is this the type of corruption some of the earlier posters mentioned with the 2600?

This is with MSI 2600PRO (BIOS Version 010.053.000.003, BIOS Date 2007/06/28), MCE 2005, PowerDVD 3104 (latest patch), Catalyst 7.8 beta (8.40), but was no different with 7.7.

Yep, that's exactly the type of corruption I'm getting on my MSI RX2600XT. Thanks for posting the pictures! Now I know I'm not just crazy or incompetent.

Have you tried upgrading the BIOS on your RX2600PRO? You can find it here (http://global.msi.com.tw/index.php?func=downloaddetail&type=bios&maincat_no=130&prod_no=1234). I'm really curious to see if the updated BIOS fixes your RX2600PRO since I literally just ordered one a couple hours ago. I'll be extremely pissed if I get another MSI card with the same problem, and it can't be resolved.

Slymobile, you made an interesting point about HDMI. I don't have an HDMI port on my monitor (which is where I'm doing all my testing), so I guess I can't test that theory. Would a DVI --> HDMI cable work? Also, I'm not sure I understand your comment on scaling. Why won't it work on your Westy 37"? I'm able to send 1920x1080 straight through HDMI to my Toshiba 47" with no problems - no scaling required. Haven't tried it yet with the RX2600XT though...

[Andy o]

I also got that type of corruption with my Sapphire 2400 pro in Vista, when using hardware acceleration for HD-DVDs, ripped or not, in Power DVD 7.3. I wonder if it's the same reason.

[DJ79]

Thanks for the link. I'll try this a little bit later. Funny, MSI's Live Update 3 just informed me that my BIOS version 010.053.000.003.025741 from June 28 is the most current one.

[slymobile]

you made an interesting point about HDMI. I don't have an HDMI port on my monitor (which is where I'm doing all my testing), so I guess I can't test that theory. Would a DVI --> HDMI cable work? Also, I'm not sure I understand your comment on scaling. Why won't it work on your Westy 37"? I'm able to send 1920x1080 straight through HDMI to my Toshiba 47" with no problems - no scaling required. Haven't tried it yet with the RX2600XT though...

The 1920x1080 output of the card both DVI and HDMI doesn't match exactly to the 37" Westy, it is smaller than the screen. So I have to use the software scaling in CCC 7.7 or 7.8 to match it to the display which the MSI drivers, for some odd reason doesn't have this scaling feature.

[dildano]

I also got that type of corruption with my Sapphire 2400 pro in Vista, when using hardware acceleration for HD-DVDs, ripped or not, in Power DVD 7.3. I wonder if it's the same reason.
When you disable hardware acceleration, does it make any difference? It didn't matter for me which makes me wonder if it really doesn't have anything to do with the UVD. Also, a previous post by Slymobile indicates that he resolved the exact same issue by using the vendor-provided drivers and an HDMI cable. Interesting...

[dildano]

The 1920x1080 output of the card both DVI and HDMI doesn't match exactly to the 37" Westy, it is smaller than the screen. So I have to use the software scaling in CCC 7.7 or 7.8 to match it to the display which the MSI drivers, for some odd reason doesn't have this scaling feature.
What's the res on your Westy? According to the manual, I'm not supposed to hook up my Toshiba 47" directly to a computer via HDMI or DVI, but it actually works beautifully. 1-to-1 pixel mapping in native mode on the TV. Guess I can try lugging my HTPC downstairs to test out the HDMI theory...

[slymobile]

What's the res on your Westy? According to the manual, I'm not supposed to hook up my Toshiba 47" directly to a computer via HDMI or DVI, but it actually works beautifully. 1-to-1 pixel mapping in native mode on the TV. Guess I can try lugging my HTPC downstairs to test out the HDMI theory...

The native res of the Westy is 1920x1080. I have the same scaling problem with 8600GT, so the scaling issue is not just with ATI HD 2000 series.

[Andy o]

When you disable hardware acceleration, does it make any difference? It didn't matter for me which makes me wonder if it really doesn't have anything to do with the UVD. Also, a previous post by Slymobile indicates that he resolved the exact same issue by using the vendor-provided drivers and an HDMI cable. Interesting...

You know, I'm pretty sure I didn't get it with HW accel off, but after so many tweaks and trials and errors with 3 different cards, 2 of them ATI, I am not 100% sure anymore. Make it 95%. Unfortunately I already returned the card, so I can't test again, but almost anything can cause those kind of artifacts, so I wouldn't bet that it's the same thing for all of us.

[DJ79]

When you disable hardware acceleration, does it make any difference? It didn't matter for me which makes me wonder if it really doesn't have anything to do with the UVD. Also, a previous post by Slymobile indicates that he resolved the exact same issue by using the vendor-provided drivers and an HDMI cable. Interesting...
The problem is that in the latest versions of PowerDVD you can't even disable it. The 2605 version didn't support hardware acceleration on these boards, and it displayed properly. The later versions have it on no matter what you select. Sure, you can downgrade PowerDVD, but what are you going to do when you're forced to upgrade in order to get new DRM keys?

[dildano]

The problem is that in the latest versions of PowerDVD you can't even disable it. The 2605 version didn't support hardware acceleration on these boards, and it displayed properly. The later versions have it on no matter what you select. Sure, you can downgrade PowerDVD, but what are you going to do when you're forced to upgrade in order to get new DRM keys?
You can't disable it? Like the checkbox is greyed out? I've tried PDVD 2911 and 3104, and in both cases I've been able to uncheck the box. However, it didn't make any difference with the video corruption problems.

[arfster]

You can't disable it? Like the checkbox is greyed out? I've tried PDVD 2911 and 3104, and in both cases I've been able to uncheck the box.

You can uncheck it, but it'll auto-recheck itself when you playback with hardware capable of acceleration. Try it :-)

[DJ79]

You can't disable it? Like the checkbox is greyed out? I've tried PDVD 2911 and 3104, and in both cases I've been able to uncheck the box. However, it didn't make any difference with the video corruption problems.
That's what I'm saying. You can uncheck it, but it doesn't make any difference at all. While the video is playing, you see it's grayed out and checked.

On the other note, I just looked at the first page in this thread, and I realized some 2400's also have this corruption. Unlike those, the 2400PRO that I tried did the acceleration fine -- actually, PowerDVD was pretty much the only thing it did right.

Let's try the BIOS update now... I'll keep you posted.

Edit: Nothing... It says Flash already updated. Oh, well...

[dildano]

Let's try the BIOS update now... I'll keep you posted.

Edit: Nothing... It says Flash already updated. Oh, well...
Doh! Now that sucks because I've got an RX2600PRO on the way from Newegg. This is just bizarre! I'll try the MSI drivers and an HDMI cable tonight to see if I can get my RX2600XT working like slymobile did...

[tawd1992]

I've been trying to keep up with this thread, but there are so many pages now I'm sure I've missed a lot. Most of the people using this card here are using it for HD video, so it's been hard to find anything regarding this card & sd content.

I have the Sapphire 2400 Pro & it's practically unusable. I really don't know whether it's a driver issue or the card is defective. My setup is very simple, s-video cable straight from card to tv, Vista Ultimate, Nvidia Dualtv, Amd 3000, 2GB ram. I just want to be able to watch sd tv in Vista Media Center playing simple mpeg2 files & I have nothing but problems.

I initially installed Catalyst 7.7 drivers & whenever I FF or RW the picture has artifacts (skinny lines a few inches wide that are different colors randomly spaced on the screen.) I also got these same artifacts when changing channels. About 10 or 15 minutes into the video the artifacts would come back & the video would play 2-3x as fast as normal, but the audio would play normal. Sometimes I would get a hard freeze. I uninstalled the 7.7 drivers & tried the 7.6 drivers & while there aren't really any artifacts the driver will still crash after playing a video for 15-30 minutes with the screen going blank. I have to restart the pc.

I've been monkeying around with this card for 2 weeks now thinking that it justs needs the drivers fixed, but I'm not sure if it's the drivers or if it's defective. Is anybody using this card for sd video without experiencing these types of problems? It's almost a waste to return it, after paying the 15% restocking fee & shipping & handling, I'll be lucky to get $30 back.

[Luar Azul]

When you disable hardware acceleration, does it make any difference? It didn't matter for me which makes me wonder if it really doesn't have anything to do with the UVD.

I have also got this kind of corruption with PDVD, but only with VC-1 video and with hardware acceleration on. I have tried it with a previous version of PDVD, and the artifacts disappeared when the hardware acceleration were turned off.

My graphics card:
Graphics Chipset ATI Radeon HD 2400 PRO

BIOS Version 010.051.000.002
BIOS Part Number 113-B16905-X04
BIOS Date 2007/05/17


Thanks for posting the pics, it's exactly the same kind of corruption I'm getting!

[millerbrad]

I get ac3 5.1 passthrough and 2.0 PCM just fine. I just use ffdshow audio for everything, and have it convert everything into a 640k ac3 stream.

Hmm.. maybe ffdshow is the key to getting 5.1 over HDMI. The Realtek drivers didn't do the trick for me using the pre-installed Microsoft codecs. I even disabled my mobo's onboard Sigmatel audio, thinking maybe that was interfering with the HDMI sound.

I'll give ffdshow a try when I'm free on Friday.

[Sarvatt]

I've been monkeying around with this card for 2 weeks now thinking that it justs needs the drivers fixed, but I'm not sure if it's the drivers or if it's defective. Is anybody using this card for sd video without experiencing these types of problems? It's almost a waste to return it, after paying the 15% restocking fee & shipping & handling, I'll be lucky to get $30 back.

My Sapphire Radeon HD 2400 Pro accelerates SD Mpeg2 just fine, it's the only form of mpeg2 acceleration that works perfect for me. I had a bunch of driver stopped responding errors in 7.6 and 7.7 drivers but the 7.8rc3 have been working great here.

I noticed sapphire added bios flashing tools to the HD 2000 series download pages, so I did a bit of digging and I found that they are giving out bios updates through email if you have problems. I found an updated Sapphire Radeon HD 2600 Pro bios dated 8/1/2007 given out by sapphire's chinese division if anyone has the card and fully understands the risks involved and knows how to backup/recover and would like it.

BIOS 010.060.000.000
BIOS 113-B14802-X01
BIOS 2007/08/01

http://www.shkl.com.cn/SR3E42KC.BIN

I really wish I spoke chinese at times like these, seems like all the really good information and updates for these cards are posted over there and filtered over to here eventually :D

[Sarvatt]

Hmm.. maybe ffdshow is the key to getting 5.1 over HDMI. The Realtek drivers didn't do the trick for me using the pre-installed Microsoft codecs. I even disabled my mobo's onboard Sigmatel audio, thinking maybe that was interfering with the HDMI sound.

I'll give ffdshow a try when I'm free on Friday.

Does the AC3 test in the playback devices page for the HDMI device output 5.1 AC3 for you? Easiest way to check if it's working..

[Sarvatt]

Well I finally found a program that does what I've been looking for, you can drag and drop files into it to find out what's actually going on with acceleration. Here's the results for HD2400 Pro in vista x86 and 7.8RC3 drivers.

http://img368.imageshack.us/img368/9904/mpeg2dxvaxk2.th.jpg (http://img368.imageshack.us/my.php?image=mpeg2dxvaxk2.jpg)

Cyberlink DXVA available modes in EVR for MPEG2. These are DXVA1 acceleration modes only, Cyberlink isn't using DXVA2 for MPEG2 on the 2400 at least. No wonder all the problems!! We don't even get HD resolution DXVA1 MPEG2 acceleration with current drivers without DXVA_NOHDDECODE, sad when 6 year old cards can do better :D The Microsoft MPEG2 decoder uses ModeA and ModeC only, also limited to DXVA1.

http://img368.imageshack.us/img368/6259/mpeg2deinterlacingwy9.th.jpg (http://img368.imageshack.us/my.php?image=mpeg2deinterlacingwy9.jpg)

Even worse, check out this pathetic deinterlacing modes list showing whats available in each colorspace. Only bob and weave are available for HD resolutions with DXVA, this is why we couldn't force it arfster... Maybe you should pass along that pic with your ticket :D I'm sure theres a similar registry entry to DXVA_HDDECODE for deinterlacing to enable the higher resolutions, theres so many options in the atiumdva.dll...

[Craigger]

My Sapphire Radeon HD 2400 Pro accelerates SD Mpeg2 just fine, it's the only form of mpeg2 acceleration that works perfect for me. I had a bunch of driver stopped responding errors in 7.6 and 7.7 drivers but the 7.8rc3 have been working great here.

I noticed sapphire added bios flashing tools to the HD 2000 series download pages, so I did a bit of digging and I found that they are giving out bios updates through email if you have problems. I found an updated Sapphire Radeon HD 2600 Pro bios dated 8/1/2007 given out by sapphire's chinese division if anyone has the card and fully understands the risks involved and knows how to backup/recover and would like it.

BIOS 010.060.000.000
BIOS 113-B14802-X01
BIOS 2007/08/01

http://www.shkl.com.cn/SR3E42KC.BIN

I really wish I spoke chinese at times like these, seems like all the really good information and updates for these cards are posted over there and filtered over to here eventually :D

I was hoping I wasn't the only one with these hardware errors triggering the VPU recover. I have hope now that the 7.8 Cats will fix these problems.

[Sarvatt]

yeah I haven't had a single VPU recover error since moving to the 7.8RC3's, definitely give them a shot if thats your problem. The only issue I have with them outside of the video acceleration problems that are no different than 7.5, 7.6 and 7.7 is the control center crashing and restarting itself whenever I switch from remote desktop and back, not really that big a deal and I had the same problem in every other driver release too :D They add GPU load and DXVA based clocking support too, my card runs at 110mhz most of the time now on these 7.8's.

Also one thing I read about thanks to babelfish off of a chinese forum is there was also a compatability problem with 680i based motherboards for all of the 2400 and 2600 series that the bios updates help (it was part of the reason for the recall) if anyone is having problems and is using one of those.

[M007]

I got an MSI HD2600Pro.
When used with Vista Media Center, on DVB-T sd sources, sending 1080p60 to the screen, I get some kind of remanence on the obscure parts of the screen.
Does anyone else noticed that?

Another problem is that from time to time I got to remove the card from the mainboard to let it start working. else the screen stay blank and nothing to do : shutdown disconnect, hardreboot, ... nothing to do except removing the card and re-plugging it.

[saintsaints]

Tried a 2600pro agp, with 7.8 as soon as boot up, I get a 50 percent cpu usage without starting any apps and with 7.6, cpu idles at zero but play a hd-dvd with PD in XP crashes instantly with or without acceleration checked, but sd dvds work.

[magnusr]

Anyone got a newer bios than may for a 2600xt 256MB GDDR4?

[cybrsage]

I got an MSI HD2600Pro.
When used with Vista Media Center, on DVB-T sd sources, sending 1080p60 to the screen, I get some kind of remanence on the obscure parts of the screen.
Does anyone else noticed that?

Another problem is that from time to time I got to remove the card from the mainboard to let it start working. else the screen stay blank and nothing to do : shutdown disconnect, hardreboot, ... nothing to do except removing the card and re-plugging it.


So the drivers work with the Vista Media Center, but not the XP MCE 2005. :(

[lkuech]

@Sarvatt:
Is it necessary to remove self made registry hacks like the NOHDDECODE etc. before updating the Catalyst driver or is the driver deleting the whole section anyway? I want to be sure that everything is "ATI default" after updating to 7.8 to have a "clean" start to test which values make sense under the new driver version.

Bye
Lars

[arfster]

Even worse, check out this pathetic deinterlacing modes list showing whats available in each colorspace. Only bob and weave are available for HD resolutions with DXVA, this is why we couldn't force it arfster...

Yuck, no wonder. Good spot :-) Downloaded it myself, for deinterlacing modes the 2600XT has the same range of modes, but all are avaiable for HD resolutions:

http://img148.imageshack.us/img148/3867/untitledxd7.jpg (http://imageshack.us)

This matches with what we've found in practice at least: the 2600 uses them with standard directshow, the 2400 doesn't. I wonder how PDVD is managing to force 2400 HD 3C-deinterlacing though?

For acceleration I get (no dxva_nohddecode added, just standard registry):

http://img232.imageshack.us/img232/8625/untitledeb8.jpg (http://imageshack.us)

No WMV cos it's Vista, and I think your extra mpeg2 ones are cos of 7.8.

The cyberlink decoder is pretty flexible though, it can use dxva1 and dxva2. Acceleration in Vista EVR can only happen with the latter, so it definitely works.

[brotbuexe]

Is this the type of corruption some of the earlier posters mentioned with the 2600?

I have this here only with HDDVD, and only for a couple of seconds when the movie starts or changed resolution/title or so.


With MSI RX2600XT T2D512EZ (512MB DDR3)

BIOS Version 010.053.000.003
BIOS Part Number 113-AB21100-100
BIOS Date 2007/06/29

All with Detonator 7.7 and latest PowerDVD.

I hope MSI will bring a bios update for the corruption problem.


Currently with the 7.8 RC3 i didnt get any accleration in PowerDVD. Don't know why.

[BrianH33]

Looks like those bad cards are untrue

False Alarm: Defective Radeon Report "Completely Untrue (http://www.dailytech.com/article.aspx?newsid=8374)

[dildano]

Now everyone's denying the bad BIOS/UVD situation (from DailyTech (http://www.dailytech.com/article.aspx?newsid=8374)). Maybe it really is a driver issue. Has anyone tried anything like tweaking their PCIe voltage?

[arfster]

Has anyone tried anything like tweaking their PCIe voltage?

My 2400xt was _really_ sensitive to PCIe voltage, corruption everywhere when I had +0.1. Might be some vdroop issues for others here?

[hooded]

I have an older AMD 3000+ machine in a HTPC box that will not really allow me to upgrade the mobo due to power supply issues.

It seems like several people here have purchased AGP versions of this card, however I have been completely unable to find anyone selling it on the internet. Could someone help me out and direct be to a reseller.

[nownot]

i have a problem that is driving me crazy. today is 1 1/2 weeks ive been trying to get hd playback going and im still stuck. hardware is e6300 (od'ed 2.8 mhz), sapphire hd 2600 pro, 37 westinghouse 1080p, onboard optic out to receiver, asus p5b mb 965 chipset, 2gb ram. software is powerdvd 7.3.2911 patched with newest update, drivers vary. with new drivers and powerdvd updated and non updated i get green and black blocks all over the place unwatchable. with old drivers and nonupdated it get green and black blocks, and with powerdvd updated i get no video, hardware acceleration is enabled on all combinations. any help on this. old drivers are 8.380 and new are 8.391 (i believe or something similar). also not getting any sound from powerdvd, dont know whats up with that. any help is greatly appreciated. thanks.
p.s. im playing evofrom hdd.

[arfster]

.....with new drivers and powerdvd updated and non updated i get green and black blocks all over the place unwatchable. with old drivers and nonupdated it get green and black blocks, ....

Green blocks usually mean hardware acceleration has gone loopy. I'd just send it back for a refund - the drivers are bad, but they're not that bad.

Sounds like there's a lot of faulty hardware out there, or perhaps incompatiblities with motherboards (cards overly sensitive to voltage variation?). Personally I've only ever seen corruption with a 2400xt, and that was down to overheating from its badly seated heatsink. The 2400pro and 2600xt have always been fine, with Xp and Vista, and 7.6/7.7/7.8.

[nownot]

ya i just got this a few days ago from newegg so i might be giving them a email. would like to try all options before i do though.



should i give dx10 a try and see if that matters any?

[deniax]

The video is all blocky and choppy (sorry about the lack of technical terms here). It really seemed like my whole machine would slow down because it was difficult to get the mouse over to the stop button in PDVD. I thought maybe it was the motherboard or CPU, so I put the RX2600XT in my main machine which is known to play HD content with no problems (E6600 with an X1900GT). Exact same corruption issues there. My HTPC was running over VGA at 1680x1050, and my main machine was running over DVI at 1680x1050.

Maybe it's not really the UVD, but something is definitely wrong with this video card. In PDVD, it doesn't make any difference if I enable or disable hardware acceleration.

So now I'm trying to figure out if I should try getting the exact same card again, or maybe go for the MSI RX2600Pro instead. At least the RX2600Pro has a BIOS update available if it really is the UVD at fault.

Thoughts?Have the same card and also the same problems :(
MSI really needs to fix these issues....

[arfster]

ya i just got this a few days ago from newegg so i might be giving them a email. would like to try all options before i do though.



should i give dx10 a try and see if that matters any?


Nah. With me they all work with fresh XP-SP2 and Vista installs, and those were Sapphires also incidentally (2400pro, 2400XT, 2600XT).

[nownot]

edit :: also installed the new avivo and it didnt seem to help. :(

while playing i can look at info vc1: shows no data passing through or nothing. mlp 5.1 640kbps for audio. i dont even think the program is trying to play the video. must not feel like it, lol.

[BJ.Eagle]

Hi guys I need some help with a small problem. I can play back just about any movie with hardware acceleration on my ATI 2400 Pro.

But when I try to display subtitles with DirectVOBsub (version 2.37) UVD hardware acceleration is turned of. I might have something to do with the Hali Media Splitter (ver 1.7.189.11) I'm using to play .mkv files. But Hali works fine with HW acceleration _without_ DirectVOBsub...

It dosn't seem to matter if the subtitles are .vob or .srt nor if they are embedded in the .mkv or not...

Any suggestions would be greatly appreciated. :confused:

Best regards

[nownot]

i just sent sapphire a message explaining the problem and asking if it was a known issue or maybe a bios update for the card. if not this im stuck in mud and dont know what to do. i could just convert to mkv and not loose any quality but then i have to conver audio which is where i got stuck last time. so well see what happens, will post response from sapphire when i get it.

[nownot]

how do you enable hardware acceleration for mkv playback?
Hi guys I need some help with a small problem. I can play back just about any movie with hardware acceleration on my ATI 2400 Pro.

But when I try to display subtitles with DirectVOBsub (version 2.37) UVD hardware acceleration is turned of. I might have something to do with the Hali Media Splitter (ver 1.7.189.11) I'm using to play .mkv files. But Hali works fine with HW acceleration _without_ DirectVOBsub...

It dosn't seem to matter if the subtitles are .vob or .srt nor if they are embedded in the .mkv or not...

Any suggestions would be greatly appreciated. :confused:

Best regards

[nownot]

here are a few pics the first is what i see when i dont update powerdvd. green black and crazy
[img=http://img337.imageshack.us/img337/9995/untitledrj5.th.jpg] (http://img337.imageshack.us/my.php?image=untitledrj5.jpg)
2nd is after i update i get a black screen with no video being output through powerdvd.
[img=http://img184.imageshack.us/img184/3377/pdvdupwd4.th.png] (http://img184.imageshack.us/my.php?image=pdvdupwd4.png)

[cybrsage]

Sounds like there's a lot of faulty hardware out there, or perhaps incompatiblities with motherboards (cards overly sensitive to voltage variation?). Personally I've only ever seen corruption with a 2400xt, and that was down to overheating from its badly seated heatsink. The 2400pro and 2600xt have always been fine, with Xp and Vista, and 7.6/7.7/7.8.

You are talking about PCIe cards, right? I have been unable to get the HD2600PRO AGP to work with MCE2005.

I am trying again tonight, though.

[Sarvatt]

Yuck, no wonder. Good spot :-) Downloaded it myself, for deinterlacing modes the 2600XT has the same range of modes, but all are avaiable for HD resolutions:

The cyberlink decoder is pretty flexible though, it can use dxva1 and dxva2. Acceleration in Vista EVR can only happen with the latter, so it definitely works.

Are you using EVR in DXVA Checker? Right click and check the EVR box if not. What you showed there is Cyberlink using DXVA1 on your card as well, on another card with DXVA2 (Geforce 8500GT) I get ModeMPEG2_IDCT reported as being used not the DXVA1 mpeg modes (A,B,C,D aren't DXVA2) its listing.

Hi guys I need some help with a small problem. I can play back just about any movie with hardware acceleration on my ATI 2400 Pro.

Vobsub doesn't work with hardware acceleration :( You have to find a playback program that will set up a custom presenter for EVR because the method of showing the subtitles while using EVR works in a way VobSub wont work with. KMPlayer is the only one I have found with an actually working EVR custom presenter but it's too much of a pain in the butt to use that just for mkv's with subtitles so I use coreavc until playback programs get better :D

@Sarvatt:
Just uninstall the drivers, then delete the registry keys that may be left over and reinstall.. it should delete DXVA_NOHDDECODE just fine as thats one of the things it looks to delete in the inf. If you have a 2400 you'll have to put the key back in thogh, thats the only registry tweak I need on 7.8's.

[maxleung]

UVD lost with DirectVOBsub

Yes, this is a known issue (well, at least by me - I posted about it a few pages back i think). There is nothing you can do about it AFAIK.

The only player that will render subtitles AND let you have h/w accel on these new ATI cards is KMPlayer.

[arfster]

Are you using EVR in DXVA Checker? Right click and check the EVR box if not. What you showed there is Cyberlink using DXVA1 on your card as well, on another card with DXVA2 (Geforce 8500GT) I get ModeMPEG2_IDCT reported as being used not the DXVA1 mpeg modes (A,B,C,D aren't DXVA2) its listing.

Yeah, I tried with and without EVR ticked, but it produces the same thing. However, I'm definitely getting acceleration with EVR + Cyberlink + mpeg2, and that's only possible with DXVA2. Maybe the tool's EVR thing isn't accurate or fully functional? For example, if I untick EVR and load some h264, it tells me it's using modeh264_vld_fgt, which won't work with anything except EVR in Vista.

[nownot]

sapphire told me to rma my card. so i guess ill be emailing newegg tomorrow, maybe, still dont think its the card but wth. if i dont go w/ sapphire who should i go with what card. right now i have a 2600 pro. thanks.

[hendermd]

I have an older AMD 3000+ machine in a HTPC box that will not really allow me to upgrade the mobo due to power supply issues.

It seems like several people here have purchased AGP versions of this card, however I have been completely unable to find anyone selling it on the internet. Could someone help me out and direct be to a reseller.
Circuit City has them in stock and Best Buy has them on back order.

[tawd1992]

My Sapphire Radeon HD 2400 Pro accelerates SD Mpeg2 just fine, it's the only form of mpeg2 acceleration that works perfect for me. I had a bunch of driver stopped responding errors in 7.6 and 7.7 drivers but the 7.8rc3 have been working great here.

:D
That's good to hear. I guess I'll hold out till the 7.8 drivers come out & try those. I really do like how much smaller the 2400 pro is than my Gigabyte 8500GT & also that it idles around 53C compared to 70C for my 8500GT. The hotkeys are nice for switching displays & of course being able to adjust overscan is a necessity, when is Nvidia going to add overscan to their drivers?

[nownot]

installed 7.8 beta and this is what i was greeted with. [img=http://img170.imageshack.us/img170/9319/1001149ee1.th.jpg] (http://img170.imageshack.us/my.php?image=1001149ee1.jpg)
not to pretty. pretty sure i have a defective card no. going to rma on monday. well any objections.

[cybrsage]

My try failed again.

I still cannot use the HD2600Pro AGP with MCE2005. I canot use the new card AND the media center app at the same time...it is not supported hardware.

[BJ.Eagle]

how do you enable hardware acceleration for mkv playback?

I installed Hali Media Splitter, ATI xcode Avivio dirvers, PowerDVD Ultra 7.3 on my Vista Ultimate. That's it for hardware decoding in just about any player (WMP 11, WMP classic, VLC etc.).

If you want HW decoding in Vista Media center theres a small program called vmcd.exe (Vista Media Center Decoder Utility <- google) that lets you set Powerdvd HD codec for playback in Media Center (only choose it for video - media center doesn't like the audio codec - at least not on my system), and disable the shell thumbs extension in Hali or you will have frequent crashes when browsing your movie library.

Theres also a registry entry floating around on the Internet that lets Media Center see .mkv files as well as .avi

Vobsub doesn't work with hardware acceleration You have to find a playback program that will set up a custom presenter for EVR because the method of showing the subtitles while using EVR works in a way VobSub wont work with...

Thanks for the answer - though not quite what I hoped for :(

[iolaus]

Hey all,

My saga to get smooth 24Hz playback on DVD and HD-DVD material continues.

I switched from a 8600GTS to a 2600XT yesterday and reinstalled Vista from scratch.

Installed Catalyst 7.7 drivers/panel and things looked good. Encountered the first snag when I set refresh rate to 24Hz and projector couldn't lock on. OK, installed Powerstrip, tweaked, and got 24Hz working.

At this point I tried playing a DVD in Media Player and got terrible tearing.

Slightly bummed, I installed PowereDVD Ultra to see if it would do any better but it didn't. I then installed Zoom Player so I could tweak things further.

At this point, it seems the only way I can get smooth playback of DVDs is with 23.976Hz Refresh, Cyberlink Decoder, Reclock, and Overlay. DScaler5 seems to freak out no matter what I pair it with unless I set the refresh rate to 60Hz.

On the bright side I have a solution that seems to work but on the other hand I'd rather not have to use Reclock (which I don't think is built for Vista) and would like to use Haali or EVR instead of Overlay if possible.

Has anyone else gotten DVD content to play back successfully at 24Hz in Vista? If so, could you share your configuration?

Thanks,
Ryan

[lkuech]

Hi.

I have tried to use the 7.8 beta. But I'm now back to 7.7 because my analog audio out is lost after installing the 7.8. But I need it in my configuration.

I have a Realtek HD Audio (onboard ASUS P5W DH Deluxe). It makes no difference if I install the ATi audio driver or not.

Any ideas?

Thanks a lot

Bye
Lars

[madshi]

These seem to be a parallel development, cos they're dated july/16th but have some features the official 7.7s don't. For example, GPU% is now in the control panel, so no more need for rivatuner.

Even nicer for HTPC users: the card downclocks itself when needed, to 110mhz core and 250mhz memory. Should cut heat output and power use a lot.
How do you enable that downclock stuff? I'm having a brand new 2600Pro installed in my XP system with the 7.8 rc3 drivers and my clocks always stay at 630/500MHz.

[gbcrush]

A little puzzled over this one. got my new 2600 Pro yesterday.

Traded This card (http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814121083) out for This one (http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814125074) .

Getting rid of problematic HDCP and a fan (albiet a quiet one) in the process.

But, and it might've just been paranoia. I had the feeling that maybe the deinterlacing wasn't as good on the new card, and maybe there was some oversharpening or something (some small areas where I could see "corners and blocks on slightly curver surfaces) when scaling SD DVD material up to 1080p.

...Of course, I started my comparisons with related, but not the same source material as I usually use (including TV shows on DVD). so that might have contributed to the buyers paranoia...


But I got to thinking, well the 2400pro doesnt select some deinterlacing modes because it doesnt have the horsepower. Maybe the new card is slower enough that the auto select picks a worse kind? But I checked the stats this morning on new egg, and the new card is actually faster (plus, those numbers are verified for the Gigabyte card on their site).

But then I remembered something. I re-ran the Vista performance rating tool last night after installing the new car. My rating dropped from a 5.0 to a 4.7 (caused by the Gaming score). The Desktop Aero rating went down from 5.1 to 4.8 I think. But this is faster? What gives?

Any thoughts?

[topcaser]

How can i check this HDCP thing? I have no HD DVD player. Can i download a short sequence with HDCP from internet?

[RogueWarrior]

I have the HIS 2600 Pro and Vista Ultimate - but I do not have PowerDVD Ultra. I am using Vista's codec and FFDShow for Divx.

To mimic Topcaser - how do I test the card's hardware acceleration? I do not have a HD DVD or Blue Ray player or PowerDVD - but I want to test the card. Can you point us to a place where we can get files with 5.1 sound and VC1 or such files? I can download RivaTuner to validate the hardware acceleration - what we need is a set of files that run long enough to test.

Thanks!

[Sarvatt]

did 24hz work the way you wanted it to on the 8600gt? do you have 3:2 pulldown disabled? are you watching 23.976fps material? have you tried forcing vsync on? does your projector switch to another mode like a ruby at non 60hz? are you using a different connection type than you were using on the 8600gt if it worked before? last question is because some projectors that I know of only work right at 24/48hz over one of the inputs and not HDMI. have you looked into the thread on your projector here on avsforum to find the quirks of your specific one to see if there are any limitations that could be stopping you? sorry for all the questions but there are so many variables that could cause your problem, these are just a few things I would look for.

[millerbrad]

Does the AC3 test in the playback devices page for the HDMI device output 5.1 AC3 for you? Easiest way to check if it's working..

Good news! Installing ffdshow audio decoder gave me my 5.1 sound over HDMI. Dolby Digital and DTS both play when I set 640k AC3 output. I also get 5.1 in Media Center.

Unfortunately, now I've lost 2-channel sound through my TV when I play digital sources (DVD / ATSC). If there is only 2 channel sound to begin with, the sound plays fine on the TV (i.e. with analog cable channels and Windows system sounds).

Any idea how to play both 5.1 and 2-channel sound streams simultaneously?

[Sarvatt]

A little puzzled over this one. got my new 2600 Pro yesterday.
But I got to thinking, well the 2400pro doesnt select some deinterlacing modes because it doesnt have the horsepower. Maybe the new card is slower enough that the auto select picks a worse kind? But I checked the stats this morning on new egg, and the new card is actually faster (plus, those numbers are verified for the Gigabyte card on their site).
Any thoughts?

http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?p=11258527&&#post11258527
2400 only does bob and weave at HD resolutions right now, advanced deinterlacing is only available with hardware accelerated surfaces too. Nothing higher than bob/weave in YUY2 software mode at any resolution :( 2600 works fine as per arfsters post not far after that one but it looks to not use the better deinterlacing modes in YUY2 either.

How do you enable that downclock stuff? I'm having a brand new 2600Pro installed in my XP system with the 7.8 rc3 drivers and my clocks always stay at 630/500MHz.
Click the lock button on the overclock page..

How can i check this HDCP thing? I have no HD DVD player. Can i download a short sequence with HDCP from internet?
http://www.cyberlink.com/english/support/bdhd_support/diagnosis.jsp

[Sarvatt]

Hi.

I have tried to use the 7.8 beta. But I'm now back to 7.7 because my analog audio out is lost after installing the 7.8. But I need it in my configuration.

I have a Realtek HD Audio (onboard ASUS P5W DH Deluxe). It makes no difference if I install the ATi audio driver or not.

Any ideas?

Thanks a lot

Bye
Lars

I notice all of the posts from people not getting it working right and having config issues all have one thing in common, they're using realtek HD audio sound mixed with the ATI HDMI audio. Driver issue using 2 different realtek drivers maybe?

[Sarvatt]

Good news! Installing ffdshow audio decoder gave me my 5.1 sound over HDMI. Dolby Digital and DTS both play when I set 640k AC3 output. I also get 5.1 in Media Center.

Unfortunately, now I've lost 2-channel sound through my TV when I play digital sources (DVD / ATSC). If there is only 2 channel sound to begin with, the sound plays fine on the TV (i.e. with analog cable channels and Windows system sounds).

Any idea how to play both 5.1 and 2-channel sound streams simultaneously?

Do you mean you have a problem getting ffdshow to output 2.0 streams as AC3 to your TV/receiver, or do you mean you want to have sound output to 2 different outputs at the same time? If it's the former, make sure you don't have encode only multistream audio checked and disable the mixer completely, it encodes and passes 2.0 as ac3 just fine for me. Glad to hear it works for you too though :D If you meant the latter it's a vista limitation and theres no workaround that I know of, but MS has posted over on thegreenbutton saying they are looking into changing it in the future.

[maxleung]

I have a Realtek HD Audio (onboard ASUS P5W DH Deluxe).

Hmmm that's odd. I thought the Asus P5Ws had the Analog Devices chip? Oh wait - maybe that's only the P5B motherboards. nevermind.

[millerbrad]

Do you mean you have a problem getting ffdshow to output 2.0 streams as AC3 to your TV/receiver, or do you mean you want to have sound output to 2 different outputs at the same time? If it's the former, make sure you don't have encode only multistream audio checked and disable the mixer completely, it encodes and passes 2.0 as ac3 just fine for me. Glad to hear it works for you too though :D If you meant the latter it's a vista limitation and theres no workaround that I know of, but MS has posted over on thegreenbutton saying they are looking into changing it in the future.

With a second DVI-to-HDMI dongle Vista lets me use both HDMI ports on the 2600 for audio & video at the same time. So, I've managed a workaround on Vista only allowing output on one audio device.

I'm trying to get ffdshow to output both 2.0 and 5.1 audio over HDMI simultaneously. My AV receiver has no problem with the 5.1 streams which play on digital content, but my TV doesn't play them. It appears that when 5.1 audio is available, it's the only audio passing over HDMI for me.

Tried disabling the mixer & multistream audio in ffdshow. No luck.

[Sarvatt]

I don't see how that's going to be possible since you're technically only outputting to 1 device and the exact output is getting sent over both outputs at the same time.. Would have thought your TV could handle the 5.1 input stream and convert it to 2.0 as my old junky TV can though. :D I am very confused why you are saying "it's only passing audio over HDMI" when you're saying you are only outputting via 2x HDMI at the same time? It sounds to me that its just a limitation of using the 2 HDMI thing in that AC3 5.1 is only passing to 1 output. The only possible solution I can think of is to look into using FFDShow profiles and mapping profile switching to your remote to switch between a no mixer profile and one with 2.0 channel stereo mixer using something like mediacontrol. If you force 2.0 stereo in ffdshow's mixer does it output to both when the source is 5.1? is ffdshow properly handling AC3 input or does it switch to the MS codec?

It's really good to know that 2xHDMI somewhat works though, definitely will be swapping my hd 2400 for a hd 2600 when I get a new receiver :D

Here's a link to media control
http://damienbt.free.fr/

Edit: Thought of one more thing to check, try enabling or disabling exclusive control in the windows sound properties page, disabling all enhancements and messing with the default format incase its at 24bit or non 48000khz.

[Andy o]

A little puzzled over this one. got my new 2600 Pro yesterday.

Traded This card (http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814121083) out for This one (http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814125074) .

Getting rid of problematic HDCP and a fan (albiet a quiet one) in the process.

What kind of problems were you having with HDCP? Was it over a DVI-HDMI or over DVI-DVI connection? Did the Gigabyte just fix your HDCP problems completely?

I sill haven't received a response from the ATI tech regarding this. I have had HDCP trouble only with a DVI-DVI connection with both a Sapphire 2400 pro and a HIS 2600 pro. I was thinking since the HDCP thing is in the GPU itself maybe all these Radeon cards were incompatible with my DVI setup, so might switch to Nvidia, but maybe I can switch for another 2600pro. I don't dig the huge heavy Gigabyte heatsinks, though, but I got an extra Zalman VNF100 I can fit there.

[madshi]

Click the lock button on the overclock page..
Have already tried that. The clocks still stay the same all the time.

[Sarvatt]

oh sorry, I misread your post! your card must not have the powerplay options in the bios then, or maybe it doesn't work in XP as I have only used it in vista? a rivatuner 2.02 report will tell you the clock speeds in the bios and if there are multiple levels available, every bios I've gone through has it so its weird yours doesn't..

[Andy o]

Does anyone know if ATI will come up with a noise reduction slider, or a "detail" (I guess that means "sharpness") slider, maybe in 7.8? I am using 7.7 in Vista x86, by the way. I see "denoise" and a "detail" strings with DEF, MIN and MAX suffixes in the registry. I already changed them to zero, but the denoise setting was already on zero, I can't remember if I'd changed it before, or is it's the default setting. The Anandtech review said that ATI does apply noise reduction by default, so I don't know. And maybe the denoise thing isn't even for noise reduction, anyway? I really don't want my picture messed with noise reduction or "sharpness" enhancements. Especially noise reduction. NR should be done in the final edit of the videos in my opinion, not in the real-time post-processing.

[Andy o]

Anyone knows about differences of power consumption between a 2600pro and a 8600 GT? My 300W supply has had no problem with a 2400pro, a 2600pro and a 8500GT, and surprisingly, even a X1900GT, but I didn't really stress that card. The 8600 GT I think "requires" a 350W power supply, but I don't know what that means, the ATI "require" at least a 450W from what I remember from their website.

The thing is that I have a Pentium Dual Core 2160 slightly OC'd at 2.25 GHz, 2 laptop HDDs and a laptop DVD drive connected, and the USB HD-DVD drive when I'm watching HD-DVD only, and not much more. Maybe I'm saving some power with the laptop parts.

Thanks.

[millerbrad]

I don't see how that's going to be possible since you're technically only outputting to 1 device and the exact output is getting sent over both outputs at the same time.. Would have thought your TV could handle the 5.1 input stream and convert it to 2.0 as my old junky TV can though. :D I am very confused why you are saying "it's only passing audio over HDMI" when you're saying you are only outputting via 2x HDMI at the same time? It sounds to me that its just a limitation of using the 2 HDMI thing in that AC3 5.1 is only passing to 1 output. The only possible solution I can think of is to look into using FFDShow profiles and mapping profile switching to your remote to switch between a no mixer profile and one with 2.0 channel stereo mixer using something like mediacontrol. If you force 2.0 stereo in ffdshow's mixer does it output to both when the source is 5.1? is ffdshow properly handling AC3 input or does it switch to the MS codec?

It's really good to know that 2xHDMI somewhat works though, definitely will be swapping my hd 2400 for a hd 2600 when I get a new receiver :D

Here's a link to media control
http://damienbt.free.fr/

Edit: Thought of one more thing to check, try enabling or disabling exclusive control in the windows sound properties page, disabling all enhancements and messing with the default format incase its at 24bit or non 48000khz.

Not sure what I meant about the "only passing audio over HDMI", because that's what I WANT. Audio over both HDMI ports. Sorry about that.

Anyhow, I have all enhancements off.

With exclusive mode ON, in Media Center, my Denon receiver shows that the HTPC is sending all of the correct audio modes (5.1 and 2.0). However, anytime the AV receiver says it's getting a Dolby Digital (5.1 or 2.0) or DTS signal, the TV won't play the same sound. The TV WILL play all of the system sounds, however (i.e. when you move the cursor or select something in Media Center), and anything from an analog TV channel. Basically, the TV only plays audio that my receiver thinks is analog 2.0. In Control Panel, the DTS and Dolby Digital tests play on my AV Reciever, but not the TV.

With exclusive mode OFF, I get sound on both the AVR and TV in Media Center, but it's only in non-Dolby Digital 2.0, no matter what the source. In Control Panel, the DTS and Dolby Digital tests play correctly on my AV Reciever, but no sound on the TV.

I find it hard to believe that my TV (8-month old Panasonic TH-58PX60U plasma) won't accept digital audio signals over HDMI. But, that's exactly what my situation seems to imply.

Then it gets weirder.

I tried setting the mixer like you recommended in ffdshow to 2.0 audio. My receiver still picks it up as 5.1 for a 5.1 source.

Am I correct to assume that I somehow don't have ffdshow set up as the codec for Media Center?

Why did I only get 5.1 audio after I installed ffdshow, even though I apparently don't have it set as the active codec?

And the most important question: how do I enable ffdshow in Media Center? I followed the setup instructions in the Sticky of this forum. I also enabled the system tray icons, but they never seem to appear when I'm running Media Center.

[Sarvatt]

is AC3 or DTS set to SPDIF in the codec page of ffdshow by any chance? I set mine to liba52 and libdts to have it decode the stream and reencode it as it fixes any sync problems and my onboard realtek non HD drivers didn't work with SPDIF, but my Envy24 device does. I know all the extra processing just makes it sound worse but I can't tell any difference :D To force FFDShow for audio for TV in vista MCE you need to find out the GUID of ffdshow audio using something like directshow filter manager (mine is {0F40E1E5-4F79-4988-B1A9-CC98794E6B55} for reference)

http://www.softella.com/dsfm/download/6B7A28D8/DSFMgr.zip

then open regedit.exe, go to HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion \Media Center\Decoder and change PreferredMPEG2AudioDecoderCLSID to FFDShow's GUID.

Also max out the merit in the ffdshow audio settings so it prefers it for all the other audio decoding in my videos :D It's really good to hear you get DTS passthrough by the way, my TV can't decode that so I can't test it and other people have posted saying it wasn't working for them.


I find it hard to believe that my TV (8-month old Panasonic TH-58PX60U plasma) won't accept digital audio signals over HDMI. But, that's exactly what my situation seems to imply.

As weird as it sounds it sounds like it to me too.. It could be the drivers though still! To be sure you can just run the HDMI from the HTPC to the tv and leave the receiver one unplugged completely (and maybe even reboot) and run the tests again. You could also use the media control plugin and have the ffdshow audio load a profile that downmixes and outputs 2.0 16 bit PCM when you want to switch to the TV but that is kind of clunky.. It's definitely going to take alot of work experimenting to get it working right if it will as it's not exactly a common situation and I doubt it's intended to even work in the first place :D

[soren]

My eyes hurts from reading post after post after ....

I simply cannot find an answer to something as simple as getting 1080p24 out from my new Sapphire HD2600XT with HDMI. Could someone point me in the right direction before I go nuts?

I got a JVC DLA-HD1 projector that takes 1080p24.
Watching HD-DVDs at 1080p60 sucks once you get used to 1080p24 (I had it working with a 8600GT before).

[magnusr]

A little puzzled over this one. got my new 2600 Pro yesterday.

Traded This card (http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814121083) out for This one (http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814125074) .

Getting rid of problematic HDCP and a fan (albiet a quiet one) in the process.

What hdcp problems did it get rid off? Passing through a receiver?

[dildano]

This definitely isn't a good sign. I replaced the MSI RX2600XT with an MSI RX2600PRO, and I'm still getting the exact same video corruption issues with VC1 content. I then reloaded Vista32 from scratch, loaded the Catalyst 7.7 drivers, and loaded PDVD 7.3 Ultra. Still getting the same corruption. I'm starting to think that I'll never get this crap working...

[topcaser]

Has anyone tried this: I am using DVBViewer. When i click on view-filter-Cyberlink Decoder and pressing at the same time the ctrl button on the keyboard, i get more options in the property window. there is a checkbox now which says: Auto (BTW: This is only valid for H.264 Cyberlink decoder). If i click on this, the 2400XT GPU is at 99% all the time during watching germans Bundesliga start on HD.
Nevertheless CPU usage is down 5%.

I will getting my 2600 xt Palit version today. Will try this then if it is also at 100%.

Nevertheless: Worked like a charm.

[Andy o]

This definitely isn't a good sign. I replaced the MSI RX2600XT with an MSI RX2600PRO, and I'm still getting the exact same video corruption issues with VC1 content. I then reloaded Vista32 from scratch, loaded the Catalyst 7.7 drivers, and loaded PDVD 7.3 Ultra. Still getting the same corruption. I'm starting to think that I'll never get this crap working...

That's gotta be pretty frustrating. Sorry if you have said this before, but have you tried different displays and cables, and does it happen the same on both DVI connectors of the card? Have you tried ripped VC-1 content? It doesn't happen with H.264?

[madshi]

How can I make VC-1 acceleration work with my 2600Pro with MPC? It currently doesn't work (Windows VC-1 decoder, XP Prof, 7.8rc3, VMR9 + EVR).

Thanks!

[arfster]

Has anyone tried this: I am using DVBViewer. When i click on view-filter-Cyberlink Decoder and pressing at the same time the ctrl button on the keyboard, i get more options in the property window. there is a checkbox now which says: Auto (BTW: This is only valid for H.264 Cyberlink decoder). If i click on this, the 2400XT GPU is at 99% all the time during watching germans Bundesliga start on HD.
Nevertheless CPU usage is down 5%.


Good spot, thanks. Doesn't do anything with my setup (vista, 7.7, 2600xt) though, no change in GPU usage at all.

What's your GPU at normally with that channel?

[topcaser]

Good spot, thanks. Doesn't do anything with my setup (vista, 7.7, 2600xt) though, no change in GPU usage at all.

What's your GPU at normally with that channel?

Normally it is also at 99% but has several peaks over time down to 50% - 70%. Nevertheless, when i activate this Auto Switch the peaks disappear.

[topcaser]

A few hours ago, my new Palit 2600 xt arrived. I plugged it to my mobo and its the same as with the Saphire 2600 xt two weeks ago (i send this card back since it is really noisy):

I dont get any output on the screen - my LCD says: No signal although the PC boots up. (HDMI connection PC - LCD)

What i have done now is (i did the same with the Saphire 2600 xt last week): pluuging a S-video cable to the card and LCD and i got a signal at least. I was able to install all that driver stuff. Nevertheless: At each boot i dont get a signal at the beginning. When the PC has loaded the driver into XP, LCD gets a signal and prints me the welcome message. I dont see the splashscreen from BIOS or from Windows at all:-(

Really annying. Has anyone an idea.

I tried also a Saphire 2400xt (i used it up to now) and with that card i did not have those problems (except the overscan at beginning: is this normal - didnt get it with my onBoard 6150). It is only with the 2600 xt.

[ricabullah]

I can not follow this topic anymore.
Can somebody make a summary related with 2600 series?
Thanks in advance!

[topcaser]

Another question:
My LCD (LG LB2r) is not capable to show a native resolution at 1360x768@50. I have to switch to 720p@50 instead which let the LCD interpolate. The result is not as sharp as i watch native 1360x768@60 but this frequency has some jedder.

Neverheless: It is worth to connect the LCD with a S-Video Cable and watch TV over this connection (i cant try it because iam using only a cheap and worst compsite cable). Is S-video capable to transport such high frequencies?

[Andy o]

The cards might be booting up at a resolution/refresh rate that your LCD can't take. Does your LCD have any warning messages when inputting any unsupported resolutions/refresh rates? Have you tried with another monitor, via DVI and VGA? Which monitor are you using by the way?

What mobo are you using, and have you disabled the 6150 in BIOS before connecting the cards?

[topcaser]

The cards might be booting up at a resolution/refresh rate that your LCD can't take.

could be. But do you think this card behaves not equally the same as a 2400xt at startup? I dont know...


Does your LCD have any warning messages when inputting any unsupported resolutions/refresh rates? Have you tried with another monitor, via DVI and VGA?

No warning message. Just "no signal" message. The same happens when i tweak the graphics card with power strip. I have no other monitor. I have got only this LG LB2R. It is a 32" TV which can work native with 1360x768@60. Very very good picture quality

[(quote]
What mobo are you using, and have you disabled the 6150 in BIOS before connecting the cards?[/QUOTE]
I am using an Abit Board (NF-M2 nview). The onBoard is disabled as soon as i plug the PCIe-x16 in. There is no additional switch. And: The 2400 xt worked like a charm from booting pointing of view

[arfster]

Normally it is also at 99% but has several peaks over time down to 50% - 70%. Nevertheless, when i activate this Auto Switch the peaks disappear.

Hrrrm. Is your HD provider using mpeg2? A 2400xt shouldn't be maxxed out with h264.

[topcaser]

And the next problem:
After trying several cards (2400xt, 2600xt Sapphire, 2600 xt Palit), CCC is not be installable any more. Better said: I install it and things look very good. But after reboot i can not see any CCC items in the context menu (right mouse click on the desktop). Also if i want to start CCC via Start menu dont works. I have deinstalled CCC and installed it again. The contextmenus are now where i expected them to be. But: It does not opens. I deinstalled all stuff again and in safe mode performed driver cleaner. Installed again: The same again.

Next problem: I get a lot of discontinuties (dont know why) at watching television (Bundesliga Bayern vs. Rostock on HD. Bayern Munich is back again. Wow:-)). Nevertheless: Only at the disconituties i get those pixel mess, we have seen a lot here in this thread. As if the UVD has to have synchroniye again.

Next problem: This fan is really annyoing. It is much quiter than the one from Sapphire. Nevertheless, i have got a low noise system. This is not acceptable at the moment. Four things here:

1. either i install a new, much quiter fan - if this is quiter is the question. Does anyone know, what fan matches on the heatsink?

2. Dismount the heatsink and install one without a fan. (My case is very small (Antec Fusion) Therefore i can not mount most heatsink solutions)

3. Tweak the BIOS or underclock and undervolt the graphics (i have round about 53 degrees at the moment when i watching soccer) (Does anyone knows how to do??)

4. Buy a passive one (Heatsinks are very huge and may not fit in the case (i think Andy_o has asked already in another post!?)

The best thing would be to tweak the card and hold the fan at a certain revolution. I have done this already with my very cheap CPU cooler Alpine 64 hold it @5 V and is very quiet. That is an idea: What do you think about this: clamp the fan directly to 5V. Worth a try.

Here is a list of all my problems:
1. fan
2. CCC dont start
3. No signal at boot start
4. is s-Video good for HDTV?

[topcaser]

Hrrrm. Is your HD provider using mpeg2?

I am not sure about this. How can i double check this? It is Premiere HD.

[magnusr]

4. is s-Video good for HDTV?

sucks! Use dvi/hdmi.

Analog vga or component could also work. But those dosent support hdcp (dunno if powerdvd likes analog connections on hdcp content).

[arfster]

I am not sure about this. How can i double check this? It is Premiere HD.


In DVbviewer click view menu, filters, what decoder is it - Cyberlink AVC, or Cyberlink Video/SP?

[topcaser]

Cyberlink H.264/AVC Decoder

[arfster]

Cyberlink H.264/AVC Decoder

Hrrm, then you should be OK - h264 is decoded on the UVD (mpeg2 isn't), so the GPU only has to do deinterlacing and scaling. I could do this on a 2400pro if I remember right. What output resolution are you using?

If you're in Vista, try disabling Aero - does GPU % drop?

Also try going in to CCC, avivo video, basic quality, switching off auto and manually selecting motion-adaptive. Does your GPU % drop? It shouldn't be maxxed out, that causes smoothness problems. You really have to get it down a little.

[madshi]

Also if i want to start CCC via Start menu dont works. I have deinstalled CCC and installed it again. The contextmenus are now where i expected them to be. But: It does not opens.
Had the same problem. Solved it by starting some services which I had stopped/disabled. Try to start all services which are not started yet (but make a list so you can undo it later). Maybe that helps.

[topcaser]

I could do this on a 2400pro if I remember right. What output resolution are you using?

720p@50


If you're in Vista, try disabling Aero - does GPU % drop?

No i am in XP. Unfortunately my Vista HD crashed and i did not try it there.


Also try going in to CCC, avivo video, basic quality, switching off auto and manually selecting motion-adaptive. Does your GPU % drop? It shouldn't be maxxed out, that causes smoothness problems. You really have to get it down a little.
Can not try it at the moment since:
1. CCC dont works.
2. Working with Palit 2600 xt at the moment.
3. 2400xt will go back on monday

Can you help me with the other problems?
1. fan
2. CCC dont start
3. No signal at boot start
4. is s-Video good for HDTV?

Yeah, i know this output is not hdcp capable. But on television there is no HDCP at the moment... Maybe it is a temporarily solution to me

[topcaser]

Had the same problem. Solved it by starting some services which I had stopped/disabled. Try to start all services which are not started yet (but make a list so you can undo it later). Maybe that helps.
Did you created a ticket at ATI? You mean i should start some services and after each started service try to start CCC?

[arfster]

Can you help me with the other problems?
1. fan
2. CCC dont start
3. No signal at boot start
4. is s-Video good for HDTV?


1) We have to wait for tools like atitool to add fan speed control for these models :-(

2) Urrrgh, sounds like your driver install is totally screwed. Can only suggest a total uninstall, driver cleaner, manually hunt for registry remnants.

3) With s-video?

4) Definitely not :-(

[topcaser]

It works with SVideo - Composite. Dont know, why DVI not works at beginning. Andy_o thinks a resolution is forwarded from the 2600xt cards which the LCD can not deal with. Is there not a sort of norm the cards have to output?

What do you think of disconnect the fan from card and connect it to 5 V directly?

[Andy o]

And the next problem:
After trying several cards (2400xt, 2600xt Sapphire, 2600 xt Palit), CCC is not be installable any more. Better said: I install it and things look very good. But after reboot i can not see any CCC items in the context menu (right mouse click on the desktop). Also if i want to start CCC via Start menu dont works. I have deinstalled CCC and installed it again. The contextmenus are now where i expected them to be. But: It does not opens. I deinstalled all stuff again and in safe mode performed driver cleaner. Installed again: The same again.

Next problem: I get a lot of discontinuties (dont know why) at watching television (Bundesliga Bayern vs. Rostock on HD. Bayern Munich is back again. Wow:-)). Nevertheless: Only at the disconituties i get those pixel mess, we have seen a lot here in this thread. As if the UVD has to have synchroniye again.

Next problem: This fan is really annyoing. It is much quiter than the one from Sapphire. Nevertheless, i have got a low noise system. This is not acceptable at the moment. Four things here:

1. either i install a new, much quiter fan - if this is quiter is the question. Does anyone know, what fan matches on the heatsink?

2. Dismount the heatsink and install one without a fan. (My case is very small (Antec Fusion) Therefore i can not mount most heatsink solutions)

3. Tweak the BIOS or underclock and undervolt the graphics (i have round about 53 degrees at the moment when i watching soccer) (Does anyone knows how to do??)

4. Buy a passive one (Heatsinks are very huge and may not fit in the case (i think Andy_o has asked already in another post!?)

The best thing would be to tweak the card and hold the fan at a certain revolution. I have done this already with my very cheap CPU cooler Alpine 64 hold it @5 V and is very quiet. That is an idea: What do you think about this: clamp the fan directly to 5V. Worth a try.

Here is a list of all my problems:
1. fan
2. CCC dont start
3. No signal at boot start
4. is s-Video good for HDTV?

About your CCC issue, have you tried uninstalling everything with the ATI software uninstall thing in the Add/remove programs list, or did you uninstall only the driver and CCC? I don't know if there's any difference, but it's worth a try. http://support.ati.com/ics/support/KBAnswer.asp?questionID=20561

On the boot issue, I still think it should be the card not outputting at a resolution your LCD can take at startup. It is entirely possible that the 2400 you had did output at some res/refresh rate that your LCD did take. Does your card have a jumper for PAL/NTSC? Long shot, but still... My 2600 pro I think boots up at 1280x1024 at 60 Hz, if I remember correctly. You don't even have an old monitor, or another computer at home? Maybe just take your PC to some friend's place or something and try it there.

About the fan... yeah, I get you. When I bought the card, the fanless 2600s were still not in stock, so I got a Zalman VNF100. Actually I got two by mistake because the first store took too long to ship mine, so now I got one extra that I'm selling ;), but you said you have a small case, so I don't know. I had to modify just a bit (pull the fins together) my VNF100 to fit the case, but it fit the 2600pro perfectly. The VNF100 is pretty much identical in size and shape to the VNF102 that comes with this (http://www.hisdigital.com/html/product_ov.php?id=320&view=yes) HIS 2600 card, only better (3 heatpipes instead of 2).

[madshi]

Did you created a ticket at ATI? You mean i should start some services and after each started service try to start CCC?
I didn't create a ticket at ATI. I think I disabled the needed services myself when I installed the PC because I didn't need them at that time. Of course it would be nice if the ATI installer could check for that services. But now that I've solved the problem for me, I didn't feel the need to create a ticket. I guess I'm being selfish... :o

[looneybindk]

I just got at Asus HD 2400 pro(passively cooled), but im having problems. When i try to play a HD-DVD movie via PowerDVD (newest version + patch) i get bad macroblocking and shuttering play. Some movies will even lock the pc up and the screen will go blank. I tried catalyst 7.7 and 7.8 RC3, with the same result. If i take the the card out at play the movie with the onboard nv 6150 it plays just fine (but with no VC-1 and h.264 acc, witch was why i bought the ting) Any suggestions before i RMA this sucker?

EDIT: The macroblocking and shuttering play is there even with the hardware acc. turned off in powerdvd, but the crashing only happens with it on.

[dildano]

I just got at Asus HD 2400 pro(passively cooled), but im having problems. When i try to play a HD-DVD movie via PowerDVD (newest version + patch) i get bad macroblocking and shuttering play. Some movies will even lock the pc up and the screen will go blank. I tried catalyst 7.7 and 7.8 RC3, with the same result. If i take the the card out at play the movie with the onboard nv 6150 it plays just fine (but with no VC-1 and h.264 acc, witch was why i bought the ting) Any suggestions before i RMA this sucker?

EDIT: The macroblocking and shuttering play is there even with the hardware acc. turned off in powerdvd, but the crashing only happens with it on.
I feel your pain. A lot of us are having the same problem. Essentially, it goes something like this:

- VC1 content stutters and has macroblocking all over the place
- H264 content stutters and may even bluescreen or reboot your machine
- MPEG2 content plays fine

I've tried an MSI RX2600XT as well as an MSI RX2600PRO, and got the same results on both. The one thing I haven't done yet is hook my machine up to my HDTV via DVI --> HDMI to see if that makes a difference. So far I've been doing all of my testing over an analog VGA cable to my LCD monitor (1680x1050).

By the way, you're not disabling the hardware acceleration even though you're unchecking the box in PDVD. I got educated on that several posts back. That's why it doesn't seem to make a difference whether you've got it enabled or not - because it's actually always enabled when you try to play any HD content.

Time for my to haul my machine downstairs. Will update the thread on my results...

[arfster]

- VC1 content stutters and has macroblocking all over the place
- H264 content stutters and may even bluescreen or reboot your machine
- MPEG2 content plays fine


Looks like a fault with the UVD, either hardware or some BIOS thing (MPEG2 isn't accelerated in UVD).

Don't waste your time - just return it and get another brand.

[topcaser]

CCC Prolems:
Ha! Guys, i know what i have installed until my last CCC installation: DotNet 3.0

I wanted to give it a try since DotNet delivers EVR for XP. What do you think, may be this is the problem?

[topcaser]

@arfster
BTW: My GPU (2600xt) is now at 50% when i watching Premiere HD. No Registry Hack at all

[dildano]

Looks like a fault with the UVD, either hardware or some BIOS thing (MPEG2 isn't accelerated in UVD).

Don't waste your time - just return it and get another brand.
Horishito! I can't believe it was so simple! Everything's working fine now. I hooked up my machine to my Toshiba HDTV via DVI --> HDMI, and VC1 and H264 are now working fine. So I don't know if it was an issue with the VGA cable or the lower resolution on my Dell LCD (1680x1050).

So guys, if you're having problems with corrupt video, try using a DVI or HDMI cable first of all. Then (if you can) hook it up to an HDTV so that you can run it at 1920x1080 (1080p).

Now I need to get the audio working...

As a side note, do any of you guys have experience streaming HD content over an 802.11n wireless network? Is it fast enough for high-bitrate content? I really don't want to fish a CAT6 cable through my wall...

[arfster]

@arfster
BTW: My GPU (2600xt) is now at 50% when i watching Premiere HD. No Registry Hack at all

Hrrrm, rather high I think. My 2600XT (Sappire DDR3) plays BBC HD (also h264 1080i, around 16mbit) at 30% or so - 20% if I turn off Aero. Part of that difference is that Vista's EVR is slightly easier on the card than XP's VMR9, but that's only a smallish gap. Just the same as your 2400xt should never have been maxxed out. Something weird with your setup that's really hurting the card's performance, but I've no idea what :-( Maybe the driver issues are causing problems, I dunno.

Oh, and yeah - reghacks aren't needed to get acceleration working on the 2600 cards. You do need them to switch off colour and fleshtone garbage though (disabling them in CCC doesn't work).

[looneybindk]

So guys, if you're having problems with corrupt video, try using a DVI or HDMI cable first of all. Then (if you can) hook it up to an HDTV so that you can run it at 1920x1080 (1080p).

So what your saying is that instead og running it @1360x768 (witch is my lcd's native res) i should run it @1920x1080? ill try this when i get home...

[dildano]

So what your saying is that instead og running it @1360x768 (witch is my lcd's native res) i should run it @1920x1080? ill try this when i get home...
Well, how do you have your computer connected to your LCD? I'm still not sure if it was the VGA cable of the resolution of my LCD TV.

Also, for the sake of thoroughness, I'm running the Catalyst 7.7 drivers, Vista32, and PDVD 2911 patched to 3104.

Arfster or Sarvatt, any words of wisdom here? :)

[soren]

My eyes hurts from reading post after post after ....

I simply cannot find an answer to something as simple as getting 1080p24 out from my new Sapphire HD2600XT with HDMI. Could someone point me in the right direction before I go nuts?

I got a JVC DLA-HD1 projector that takes 1080p24.
Watching HD-DVDs at 1080p60 sucks once you get used to 1080p24 (I had it working with a 8600GT before).
Anyone?

The 24 Hz listed in the ATI control panel seems to be interlaced???

[looneybindk]

Well, how do you have your computer connected to your LCD? I'm still not sure if it was the VGA cable of the resolution of my LCD TV.

DVI -> DVI

[millerbrad]

is AC3 or DTS set to SPDIF in the codec page of ffdshow by any chance? I set mine to liba52 and libdts to have it decode the stream and reencode it as it fixes any sync problems and my onboard realtek non HD drivers didn't work with SPDIF, but my Envy24 device does. I know all the extra processing just makes it sound worse but I can't tell any difference :D To force FFDShow for audio for TV in vista MCE you need to find out the GUID of ffdshow audio using something like directshow filter manager (mine is {0F40E1E5-4F79-4988-B1A9-CC98794E6B55} for reference)

http://www.softella.com/dsfm/download/6B7A28D8/DSFMgr.zip

then open regedit.exe, go to HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion \Media Center\Decoder and change PreferredMPEG2AudioDecoderCLSID to FFDShow's GUID.

Also max out the merit in the ffdshow audio settings so it prefers it for all the other audio decoding in my videos :D It's really good to hear you get DTS passthrough by the way, my TV can't decode that so I can't test it and other people have posted saying it wasn't working for them.

As weird as it sounds it sounds like it to me too.. It could be the drivers though still! To be sure you can just run the HDMI from the HTPC to the tv and leave the receiver one unplugged completely (and maybe even reboot) and run the tests again. You could also use the media control plugin and have the ffdshow audio load a profile that downmixes and outputs 2.0 16 bit PCM when you want to switch to the TV but that is kind of clunky.. It's definitely going to take alot of work experimenting to get it working right if it will as it's not exactly a common situation and I doubt it's intended to even work in the first place :D

DSFM and regedit did the trick. Even with the merit turned all the way up on ffdshow, the MS Codecs were still running.

With ffdshow running correctly, I've concluded that my TV can't process Dolby Digital or DTS audio.

I now have ffdshow audio profiles for 2.0 and 5.1 audio that work as I want them to. I just need to figure out how to get the Media Control Plugin working how I want it to (sure would be nice if I could assign an audio preset to a specific button on the remote... I'll need to bug the author about that :) )

Anyhow, I've gone well off topic at this point, so I'll move my questions elsewhere. The moral of the story is that with ffdshow, the Realtek drivers and running in exclusive mode, the 2600XT can output either Dolby Digital or DTS over both HDMI ports simultaneously.

Thanks for all your help, Sarvatt!

[Sarvatt]

No problem at all man! One last thing you might want to check is that you have the right audio input source for your TV set in the TV's menus. I have to pick DigitalHD for the audio input as it defaults to the analog 2.0 input for HDMI, but I do get AC3 over HDMI on my Vizio L37. (Edit: Nevermind, you said 2.0 LPCM passthrough was working) The strange thing is that ATI just put up a knowledge base entry and they don't mention DTS support either, so maybe DTS passthrough only works if you use the second DVI dedicated to the receiver since people trying to passthrough via a video card-receiver-TV link haven't been able to get DTS working? Or maybe you are decoding the DTS in ffdshow and outputting the AC3 from that?

737-28948: Radeon™ HD2xxx series - LPCM 5.1 modulated audio signal NOT supported on Integrated HD Audio Codec

The information in this article applies to the following configuration(s):

* Radeon™ HD2900 series
* Radeon™ HD2600 series
* Radeon™ HD2400 series
* DVI-HDMI Adapter (Part Number: 6141054300G)

Symptoms:
Linear PCM 5.1 Audio is not available when playing HD DVD and Blu-Ray content.

Solution:
The integrated HD Audio codec of Radeon™ HD2xxx series does NOT support Multi-Channel Linear PCM (5.1). It supports 2-Channel LPCM and Multi-Channel AC3 5.1 Audio formats for HDMI output using DVI-HDMI adapter.

Also, you could ask the FFDShow tryouts people on their forums or doom9 to work FFDShow audio into the keys and remote thing that already exists for the video plugin :)

[Sarvatt]

Arfster or Sarvatt, any words of wisdom here?

I had to run my 1366x768 native TV at 1280x720 over both HDMI and VGA as there were major problems with CCC's choice of timings at 1360x768/1366x768. It took me way too long finding a set of timings that actually worked right on my TV at 1366x768 in powerstrip and for some reason it would revert to CCC's timings on reboot over DVI. The default 1360x768 actually uses 1080i with the desktop size scaled to a 1360x768 window in the middle of that, then rescaled so that the 1360x768 window is full screen.. CCC is horrible about timings, thats for sure :D

[millerbrad]

No problem at all man! One last thing you might want to check is that you have the right audio input source for your TV set in the TV's menus. I have to pick DigitalHD for the audio input as it defaults to the analog 2.0 input for HDMI, but I do get AC3 over HDMI on my Vizio L37. (Edit: Nevermind, you said 2.0 LPCM passthrough was working) The strange thing is that ATI