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XBMC Media Center : Setup Guide, Knowlege Base & Support - Page 58

post #1711 of 2975
2/14/12 at 4:52pm
can xbmc play VC1 movies? I just rip the blu-ray version of the dark knight. And xbmc won't play it but media browser does.
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post #1712 of 2975
2/14/12 at 6:04pm
Quote:
Originally Posted by femi View Post

can xbmc play VC1 movies? I just rip the blu-ray version of the dark knight. And xbmc won't play it but media browser does.

femi,

Are you using the onboard GPU or are you using a dedicated graphics card?

I ask, because I was using the onboard Intel GPU, because it stated it could output HD. It did fine with H.264, but couldn't play VC-1 to save it's life. Would stutter and eventually just freeze and lock-up XBMC altogether.

I then asked on the XBMC forum, and that is when they told me that the onboard Intel chip wouldn't work with VC-1 (it could have just been the one that was on my motherboard though - not sure if it is all). They recommended a $50 radeon graphics card, and since putting it in, I have had no problems playing anything.

Hope that helps.
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post #1713 of 2975
2/14/12 at 7:24pm
Quote:
Originally Posted by MysticalJet View Post


I am sure you can, but this is a manual process for every time that you want to do this. You would have to exit the media application change, then go back? I was hoping that one of the media players had an option to do this more automatically or via hot button on the remote.

If its too detailed to answer briefly don't worry about, but why the need to zoom only sometimes? I'm not familiar with home projectors.
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post #1714 of 2975
2/15/12 at 4:01am
Quote:
Originally Posted by rsmclay View Post

femi,

Are you using the onboard GPU or are you using a dedicated graphics card?

I ask, because I was using the onboard Intel GPU, because it stated it could output HD. It did fine with H.264, but couldn't play VC-1 to save it's life. Would stutter and eventually just freeze and lock-up XBMC altogether.

I then asked on the XBMC forum, and that is when they told me that the onboard Intel chip wouldn't work with VC-1 (it could have just been the one that was on my motherboard though - not sure if it is all). They recommended a $50 radeon graphics card, and since putting it in, I have had no problems playing anything.

Hope that helps.

ok, how can i change xbmc to use my graphics card then?
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post #1715 of 2975
2/15/12 at 5:12am
Quote:
Originally Posted by femi View Post

ok, how can i change xbmc to use my graphics card then?

I uninstalled the onboard GPU, seated the graphics card in the PCI-e slot, booted up, made sure in BIOS everything looked correct, including that it was going to use the new graphics card. Once booted up, installed the new drivers, etc... for the new card, plugged in the HDMI cable to the graphics card, not the previous HDMI port, and fired up XBMC.

I didn't have to change anything in XBMC to make it work. Once I did all that, and opened up XBMC, everything worked right away.

Hopefully that helps your situation. It did wonders for mine. Like I said, it may have been just my board, since I built the low end machine from renethx guide, but the XBMC folks said that what I had for onboard had known issues with VC-1.
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post #1716 of 2975
2/15/12 at 1:13pm
Quote:
Originally Posted by Joeforsale View Post

If its too detailed to answer briefly don't worry about, but why the need to zoom only sometimes? I'm not familiar with home projectors.

A bit off topic for this thread - I'd recommend the 2.35 CIH Topic for details. Basically some movies are 16:9 ratio, as well as HD TV programs. Leaving in Zoom would mean the tops and bottoms of the picture would spill off the 2.4 scope screen.

Many HD movies are 2.4:1 aspect, hence the black bars on top and bottom. Zoom method spills these off the screen so the entire screen is filled with image.
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post #1717 of 2975
2/15/12 at 2:54pm
Quote:
Originally Posted by MysticalJet View Post


A bit off topic for this thread - I'd recommend the 2.35 CIH Topic for details. Basically some movies are 16:9 ratio, as well as HD TV programs. Leaving in Zoom would mean the tops and bottoms of the picture would spill off the 2.4 scope screen.

Many HD movies are 2.4:1 aspect, hence the black bars on top and bottom. Zoom method spills these off the screen so the entire screen is filled with image.

I gotcha. I always just accept the fact that some of my movies will have black bars. I could see where that would be annoying for a projector setup. Since XBMC can adjust to full screen on movies that are not 16:9 I would think there would be a way to adjust the advancedsetting.xml to make adjustments for certain other aspects.
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post #1718 of 2975
2/15/12 at 3:07pm
Quote:
Originally Posted by MysticalJet View Post

A bit off topic for this thread - I'd recommend the 2.35 CIH Topic for details. Basically some movies are 16:9 ratio, as well as HD TV programs. Leaving in Zoom would mean the tops and bottoms of the picture would spill off the 2.4 scope screen.

Many HD movies are 2.4:1 aspect, hence the black bars on top and bottom. Zoom method spills these off the screen so the entire screen is filled with image.

MysticalJet,

I did a search for that topic but can't find it. Do you have a link to it? Got some plans today and they are for a 2.39:1 screen and I am trying to figure out what the dimension would mean diagonal, and then what size it would be for 16x9 material.

Thanks,
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post #1719 of 2975
2/15/12 at 3:43pm
Quote:
Originally Posted by rsmclay View Post

MysticalJet,

I did a search for that topic but can't find it. Do you have a link to it? Got some plans today and they are for a 2.39:1 screen and I am trying to figure out what the dimension would mean diagonal, and then what size it would be for 16x9 material.

Thanks,

One of the topics on the main AVS forums. Here you go.
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post #1720 of 2975
2/15/12 at 4:26pm
Quote:
Originally Posted by MysticalJet View Post

One of the topics on the main AVS forums. Here you go.

LOL. I knew I saw it somewhere. I was looking in the Screen Forums though. Ugh... Sorry about that.
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post #1721 of 2975
2/15/12 at 5:48pm
Ok got XBMC up and running, using the Transparency skin. I have 6 Bluray movies ripped using MakeMKV.

All seems good so far and the new patch for HD Audio streaming works well.

One thing I noticed is that the when I select a movie and open the information, the aspect ration is listed as 16:9 for all movies - even though they are 2.4:1.

I am using Media Center Master as the scraper. so I'm not sure if it's XBMC or MCM, but is there any way to get this information to display the correct aspect ratio?

Obviously a little detail but one that annoys me
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post #1722 of 2975
2/16/12 at 6:40am
Finally set back up XBMC on my iPad, a huge improvement over when it was first released for the iPad (which I found practically unusable)
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post #1723 of 2975
2/16/12 at 7:54am
Quote:
Originally Posted by MysticalJet View Post

Ok got XBMC up and running, using the Transparency skin. I have 6 Bluray movies ripped using MakeMKV.

All seems good so far and the new patch for HD Audio streaming works well.

One thing I noticed is that the when I select a movie and open the information, the aspect ration is listed as 16:9 for all movies - even though they are 2.4:1.

I am using Media Center Master as the scraper. so I'm not sure if it's XBMC or MCM, but is there any way to get this information to display the correct aspect ratio?

Obviously a little detail but one that annoys me

Edit: Nevermind...seems I assumed wrong!
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post #1724 of 2975
2/16/12 at 9:23am
Quote:
Originally Posted by MysticalJet View Post

One thing I noticed is that the when I select a movie and open the information, the aspect ration is listed as 16:9 for all movies - even though they are 2.4:1.

That's because all Blu-Rays are 1920x1080. The "black bars" of a 2.40:1 film are encoded in that 1920x1080, so the playback software doesn't "know" they are there.
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post #1725 of 2975
2/16/12 at 9:26am
So, it looks like the logistics of setting up a private community where pretty daunting, so BlueCop has decided to leave his repo up and running. He is doing updates as well, although my bet is they won't be as frequent and focus mostly on what he wants the apps to do.

If you'd like to thank him for sticking around, I'd suggest you hang out in the support threads on the XBMC site for his plugins and help out with support. Bluecop has also asked for folks to donate to XBMC if they like what he's doing.
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post #1726 of 2975
2/18/12 at 4:28am
Hi,

What's the new hd audio patch? I want this on my xmbc, already have hd amplifier.

Thanks.
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post #1727 of 2975
2/18/12 at 5:02am
Thread Starter 
Quote:
Originally Posted by a5ian300zx View Post

Hi,

What's the new hd audio patch? I want this on my xmbc, already have hd amplifier.

Thanks.

Here it is : http://forum.xbmc.org/showthread.php?t=121877 , Links are below in the first post. Or here : http://dl.dropbox.com/u/59102680/xbm...20120211-dx.7z
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post #1728 of 2975
2/18/12 at 5:02am
Thread Starter 
Anyway, i`m done with my exams, so i`m back on the forum, i`ll get to all your issues/questions tomorrow, today is sleeping like a pig/log day .
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post #1729 of 2975
2/18/12 at 7:26am
Quote:
Originally Posted by GreenEyez View Post

Anyway, i`m done with my exams, so i`m back on the forum, i`ll get to all your issues/questions tomorrow, today is sleeping like a pig/log day .

Just wanted to make sure you saw my post over at XBMC.

http://forum.xbmc.org/showpost.php?p...&postcount=490

Intel is much much better than the 40 seconds that is still incorrectly reported around the web. This is with just standard current drivers and nothing else. Really not that much different from ATI or NVidia anymore.

Dropped frame now once every 1/(23.976-23.97251) sec = 4.78 min. That's only 0.003 off.

I have been trying to clear up this myth but it looks like it persists.
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post #1730 of 2975
2/19/12 at 5:57pm
Quote:
Originally Posted by pkscout View Post

Code:
CREATE DATABASE xbmc_video CHARACTER SET latin1 COLLATE latin1_general_ci;
CREATE DATABASE xbmc_music CHARACTER SET latin1 COLLATE latin1_general_ci;

Appears creating datbases yourself is no longer needed for Eden?
Eden seem to create them followed by a number ..?!
(see: XMBC and MySQL)

Great tip on the indexes!
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post #1731 of 2975
2/19/12 at 8:35pm
Quote:
Originally Posted by hansaplastique View Post

Appears creating datbases yourself is no longer needed for Eden?
Eden seem to create them followed by a number ..?!
(see: XMBC and MySQL)

Great tip on the indexes!

Correct. For Eden, just install Mysql, create user, grant permissions, then make your advancedsettings.xml file.

That's all you need to do.
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post #1732 of 2975
2/20/12 at 3:25am
How do you guys update your library?

Do you all manually shutdown xbmc, or manually click click library scan?

Something else?

I would like to somehow update my library or do a library scan once a day without having to do it manually.
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post #1733 of 2975
2/20/12 at 4:50am
There's an Add On (I forgot what it's called) that you can set XBMC to scan for new content at whatever time interval you choose. Mine is set for every 6 hours. I used to just exit XBMC and then restart it but that got old quick.
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post #1734 of 2975
2/20/12 at 4:56am
The card I am using supports it if I play the file in mpc it plays fine just in xbmc it gives me problems
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post #1735 of 2975
2/20/12 at 5:32am
Quote:
Originally Posted by lopiejaldflad25 View Post

The card I am using supports it if I play the file in mpc it plays fine just in xbmc it gives me problems

Sorry? Is this in resonse to another post, or just a random observation - on its own it doesn't mean much
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post #1736 of 2975
2/20/12 at 5:37am
Quote:
Originally Posted by Murilo View Post

I would like to somehow update my library or do a library scan once a day without having to do it manually.

XBMC Library Auto Update. I can't remember if it's available for both Dharma and Eden or just Eden. It's in the main repo under programs. With the newest version you can use a cron expression to have the update done at a specific time every day.
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post #1737 of 2975
2/20/12 at 9:13am
This is interesting, though obviously limited to those with cable companies that flag "copy freely" content.

http://thedigitallifestyle.com/w/ind...with-epg-data/
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post #1738 of 2975
2/20/12 at 9:54am
Thread Starter 
Quote:
Originally Posted by pkscout View Post

XBMC Library Auto Update. I can't remember if it's available for both Dharma and Eden or just Eden. It's in the main repo under programs. With the newest version you can use a cron expression to have the update done at a specific time every day.

Both, but the eden version is the only one that allows for cron expressions.
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post #1739 of 2975
2/20/12 at 10:01am
Thread Starter 
Quote:
Originally Posted by pkscout View Post

So, it looks like the logistics of setting up a private community where pretty daunting, so BlueCop has decided to leave his repo up and running. He is doing updates as well, although my bet is they won't be as frequent and focus mostly on what he wants the apps to do.

If you'd like to thank him for sticking around, I'd suggest you hang out in the support threads on the XBMC site for his plugins and help out with support. Bluecop has also asked for folks to donate to XBMC if they like what he's doing.

Yeah, i haven`t gotten any PM reply back from him, that`s probably why, thx for the info.
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post #1740 of 2975
2/20/12 at 10:06am
Thread Starter 
Quote:
Originally Posted by MysticalJet View Post

Hi Everyone,

thought I'd ask this question in here. I have it in the main forum but haven't gotten any answers so I thought I would target the specific Media application threads.

I am in the process of deciding which application to go with XBMC, Win7 MCE, and/or MPC-HC.

Here is a link to the main forum question.

I currently zoom to fit my scope (2.4) screen. Basically want to know if XBMC can offer the "shrink method" for 16:9 content (i.e.; digital rescale to fit the 16:9 vertically). Better yet, can it detect the native aspect ratio (from meta data?) and load a profile based on that so that each movie utilizes the correct profile without having to monkey around with settings each time I want to switch?

Thanks for your help.

Pressing the "Z" button on the keyboard during playback allows you to toggle between different zoom modes, besides the original aspect ratio, like Zoom or 16/9 or 4/3.

I don`t think there is a way to do it automatically.
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