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Nvidia(9300) to TMT3 = very dark Blu-ray video

post #1 of 9
7/21/09 at 1:13am
Thread Starter 
I hope someone might help.

System: Asus P5N7A-VM motherboard with Nvidia 9300 onboard graphics and the XONAR HDAV1.3 deluxe for sound. Video playback viia Arcsoft TMT 3. All output is through HDMI.

Problem: When playing (ripped) Blu-rays from folder structure in TMT, the resulting video is too dark, as if the video levels are off (lots of black crush). When playing the M2TS file directly in TMT, however, the levels seem accurate (but I can't choose audio stream, subtitles, etc.)
I am wondering if I need to make an adjustment in TMT or in the Nvidia Control Panel.

Any help appreciated.
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post #2 of 9
7/24/09 at 6:31am
Me too... is this tmt3 or tmt2?
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post #3 of 9
7/24/09 at 7:03am
When I view SD content via folder with TMT3 over HDMI everything appears overly white. I have not viewed BD content though.
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post #4 of 9
7/24/09 at 7:43am
Quote:
Originally Posted by pneff View Post

I hope someone might help.

System: Asus P5N7A-VM motherboard with Nvidia 9300 onboard graphics and the XONAR HDAV1.3 deluxe for sound. Video playback viia Arcsoft TMT 3. All output is through HDMI.

Problem: When playing (ripped) Blu-rays from folder structure in TMT, the resulting video is too dark, as if the video levels are off (lots of black crush). When playing the M2TS file directly in TMT, however, the levels seem accurate (but I can't choose audio stream, subtitles, etc.)
I am wondering if I need to make an adjustment in TMT or in the Nvidia Control Panel.

Any help appreciated.

This is a known bug with NVIDIA and "protected path" playback via HDMI. If you connect via DVI or VGA you won't see the problem.

To the best of my knowledge there is still no way to configure the system so that nominal levels are correct for both DVD and BD playback without making changes.

This issue has been discussed in the *Official* Gigabyte GA-E7AUM-DS2H Thread (NVIDIA 9400 mATX HDMI 8 channel LPCM) thread if you're interested in finding out more.

Wo0zy
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post #5 of 9
7/31/09 at 8:13pm
Thread Starter 
Wo0zy,

Thanks for explaining that. That's pretty disappointing about the colorspace bug on the NVIDIA.
If I were to switch to an ATI card, could I get correct colorspace, 24Hz and HDMI pass-through (using XONAR 1.3) using Arcsoft TMT3?
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post #6 of 9
8/1/09 at 1:28am
ati does give you the same black level in HD and SD. However, atlest in my experiece, ati can not properly handle 23,976Hz output like the 9300/9400 and video gets expanded internally and then compressed in output, taking away blacker than black (BTB) information.

BTB is important if you care about highend video.
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post #7 of 9
8/1/09 at 1:44am
Thread Starter 
Thank you for the follow-up, bonzichrille

I do care about BTB as my output is to a Panny 1080p projector.

So am I right in guessing that there is no current solution for perfect 24Hz, correct color and HDMI audio pass-through on Blu-rays using an HTPC?
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post #8 of 9
8/1/09 at 1:52am
No, seems like it. Trully ridicoulus. I have big hopes for nvidias comming midrange gfx cards that seems to have built in soundm just like ati. Lets cross our fingers...
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post #9 of 9
8/1/09 at 2:46am
Quote:
Originally Posted by pneff View Post

Wo0zy,

Thanks for explaining that. That's pretty disappointing about the colorspace bug on the NVIDIA.
If I were to switch to an ATI card, could I get correct colorspace, 24Hz and HDMI pass-through (using XONAR 1.3) using Arcsoft TMT3?

Unless things have changed (not checked recently) this problem only exists when the video connection is seen as HDMI. There is an EDID reg hack that forces the video driver to think it's connected to a monitor (DVI) which will force all output to 0-255. This will break onboard audio but if you're getting a XONAR that's not an issue

There's one other thing you can do to improve things but purists will hate it. . Tick the dynamic contrast option in the nvidia control panel. I think the 182.50 drivers were the last to include it. It doesn't fix the levels but it atleast makes the dark scenes watchable

Wo0zy
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