Ffdshow FAQ - Page 9

Well I have my Athlon XP 1700+ overclocked to 2.6ghz with 217fsb. I can just about resize to 1440x1152 and then do blur and NR after that. Some resizing settings like Spline and Lanczos shoot cpu usage to 100% and I start missing frames so I am now using 1280x1024 (display native res) and I am getting less than 100% with Spline (best IMO) so I am happy.

So it depends on how much you resize basically.

I was looking on the net to get some basic info on image/video processing; I came across these two relevant websites;
I thought about posting on this thread for someone who might be interested.

Image Processing Fundamentals - Contents
http://www.ph.tn.tudelft.nl/Courses/...-Contents.html

Basic Image Processing Demos
http://robotics.eecs.berkeley.edu/~s...e20/index.html

Which is why I worked down from 1920x1080 in multiples of 16 to
1088x1072 and found stutter free play. If I go 1104x1072-stutter, so 1088x1072 is the closest to my native resolution without any problems. Also, while experimenting, I put unsharp mask before resize. It's at a low level (20) but it really helped an otherwise soft picture without that oversharp look. I'm very satisfied with my picture now...although with my settings written down, I'll probably continue to seek DVD playback nirvana!
peace out-

Owen,

Thanks so much for your reply . I have one more quick question though for all of you ffdshow users. For picture quality, is it better to use Dscaler sharpening or ffdshow's own sharpen/unsharp mask filter, or both even? So far, for sharpening I've only used the resize/sharpen option, which is excellent. My experience with unsharp mask is that it makes the picture look kinda jaggy or edgy if you will.

On another note, if you're watching a lot of Divx movies, like i do , and your CPU can handle it, resizing as high as you can makes all the difference. With my current ffdshow settings, some Divx/Xvid material is very close to DVD quality, and that is on a 50" screen!

Henry,

I found some theory on Unsharp Masking I thought you might want to know: http://www.ph.tn.tudelft.nl/Courses/...tml#Heading114

Now I am able to get some Stable picture from ZP3.1+PowerDVD5+FFDSHOW+ReClock;

THANKS TO OWEN & OTHERS;

1. I have setup in following order:
a. Blur & NR (De-Noise Set to 18).
b. Scalar Sharpen (Set to 40).
c. Re-Size 1920 x 1080, with both Loma & Chrome Set to 2.0.

2. Video Output to SONY RPTV via POWERSTRIP Configuration set to 1280X720

3. Digital Coaxial Output from M-Audio Revolution to DENON Receiver;

4. My System is: Wimp, P4 2.6C HT with 800 FSB & Intel 875 Chip on ASUS Mother Board.

5. I have PCI version of 7500 Card (taken from my Old System for now); next month I plan to change to 9700 pro AGP; currently I do not have anything in AGP Slot;

I get almost stable picture with above settings; I see some improved PQ but NOT very significant;

My Questions are:
1. Does PowerDVD5 give comparable PQ?
2. Do I need to use WinDVD 5 or Sonic Cine Player instead of PowerDVD5?

Any recommendations/Suggestions please?

Again, thanks a lot to everyone for all valuable postings!

Hmmn, I just tried Lanzcos resizing to 1024x768 on my lowly Athlon Thunderbird 1.45GHz system, and just doing that alone is causing my CPU usage to be almost 100% all the time. Adding anything else(dscaler sharpness, blur/NR, deinterlacing) will cause stutters, so I guess I'll have to go back to EXP or bicubic instead.

I've switched from lanzcos to spline....takes more cpu, but it is ever so slightly sharper ..and I can notice it......good thing about better resize methods is the sharpness you preserve is true detail, as oppossed to detail created through sharpening filter.

tbhavsar,
Why on earth are you resizing to 1920x1080 with a 1280x720 display
How did you come to use Descaler sharpen at 40. Did you find this setting best, or did you just get that setting from someone elses post
WinDVD 4.5 or 5 are the best DVD video decoders.


Owen
____________________________
The ffdshow resize - sharpen dude

Owen,
Owen,

Thanks for your reply;

I learned from the other post that if CPU can handle, more re-size then it is better to provide larger work area for PQ enhancements; But I can not make out any differences.

I got DScaler Sharpen Settings from someone else's posts; I am still playing with this settings will post my results; I have winDVD XP that came with ASUS board;

Owen,

Please check following points:

1. The DScaler help text says Sharpness filter should be used for video source; do they mean VCR source or DVD?
If it is for VCR video source then DScaler Sharpness filter should not be used. What do you think?

2. Regarding your comments on using WinDVD 4.5 /5.0; I have WinDVD 5 demo and WinDVD 4.0; when I checked for the in ZoomPlayer it is picking up ivvideo.ax file from \\Common\\Bin location where ivvideo.ax from WinDVD 5.0 having same file size; So I assume ZoomPlayer is using the latest ivvideo.ax from WinDVD 5.0; Can you please confirm file size & Create Date of ivvideo.ax file from your HTPC?

3. from your previous post, you suggested to Use overlay mode in stead of VMR9 and then use the sharpening method; can you please enlighten me why to use overlay or what is the difference between Overlay and VMR9?

The main difference is that VMR eats a lot more CPU. On an ATI card they look very similar, but overlay is inferior on other cards.

Thanks Mastiff.

I'm wondering why VMR9 takes up so much more CPU when they're supposed to be taxing on the video card's shaders...? But I do however notice that its true - it IS much more CPU intensive.

tbhavsar,
You disapoint me.

I quote myself from only two days ago.

"Using filter setting that others are using, thinking that this will give you the best result is the worst kind of folly.
Displays, personal taste and system capabilities differ so greatly that it is pointless.
You MUST experiment yourself to find the best settings for your system. It takes time, but it's the only way."

As a general rule resize to your display resolution (1280x720) or Double DVD resolution (1440x1152PAL or 1440x480NTSC).
You should go back and read this thread from about page 6.

The default setting for Descaler sharpen is 127 for a reason.
A settings of 40 is not going to do much. And if you use it after resize it will do almost nothing at 40.

WinDVD 4.5 and 5 are about the same quality so it does not matter which one you use.

Sometimes I think I am wasting my time.


Owen
____________________________
The ffdshow resize - sharpen dude

Ok...I've read to page 8 of this thread, and finally asked myself this question:

What scaling/resize algorithm do the Radeons use? Is it really that much "worse" than using the bicubic resize filter in ffdshow? I just can't imagine them being that different from one another.
I would hope that Radeon hardware used some sort of bicubic/bilinear filtering for scaling purposes....

-Ryan

I'm curious about resolution resizing in FFDSHOW. I got it all working nicely with TT last night at 1440x960 but I've noticed I can't go any higher with the horizontal resolution. For instance if I try 1920 in the first box the box turns red and the last time I did that FFDSHOW refused to start properly and TT crapped out. In fact I may be remembering that above horizontal number wrong, it might have been even smaller to the tune of 1280... But any insights into the box turning red issue would be appreciated.

Any insights into that?

I think it's because the resolution needs to be divisible by 16. 1920 is, but 1080 is not....Maybe it's assuming that you want to keep 16x9 aspect?

-Ryan

come on Owen, don't get down, i for one look forward to your posts


Steve

I find that it doesn't need to be a multiple of 16, though I'm not sure why. The "red issue" will only appear if its an odd number, at least, from the limited values I've entered that seems to be the case. I was resizing to 1200x900 before(900 isn't a multiple of 16) and it worked.

RyanDinan,

In stead of asking questions about how ffdshow resize compares to Radeon hardware, just get in there and use it to find out for yourself.

Bicubic is not the best resize algorithm for starters (read the thread).
Lanczos is a good compromise between quality and CPU load. It's definitely better then Bicubic.
Video cards don't sharpen during the resize process like ffdshow can etc.

If you find that ffdshow resize is no better then hardware resize on your system then don't use it and be happy.
Its all about what looks good to you on your system, not what looks good to others on there's.

Regards,

Owen
____________________________
The ffdshow resize - sharpen dude.

Maybe this should go somewhere else but anyways.

Even though WinDVDs bob deinterlacing mode is really really good, forcing weave is just slightly better. With the WinDVD 5 filters (and older too I am sure), go to the filter registry area and set the bobweave setting to 2 to force weave.

Its very slight but its an improvement as far as I can see.

Check it out you guys with massive screens and see if it helps. It definitely doesn't do any harm

Now all we need is a force progressive or even better, a proper auto setting that will choose between the two.

Owen,

which one is the best resizing method? Spline?

Spline is the best as far as I can see but uses alot of cpu power, then probably lanczos, followed by bicubic and experimental.

Mark, what differences can you see between spline and Lancsoz?

Michele, its almost impossible to see a difference with full moving video so I just use the menus from some disks to compare. I used the menu from the StarWars Episode II disk as I find it is one of the disks that I never have problems with freezes etc.

By menu I mean where Play, Chapter Selection is etc.

With Lanczos the menu looked good but with Spline I could see the text becoming much clearer. One thing I noticed also was that around the text in the menu, a bluish area becomes very prominent with lanczos, and with spline it becomes even more prominent. Looking at the original source and zooming in, there is a slight hint of blue there but nothing like this.

To get rid of that problem with spline being used I took down my Chroma Sharpen setting from 1.7 to 1.0 and all is still very detailed without that (what I consider to be a) negative effect of over enhancing some things.

very clear explanation mark!

With full moving video i can see the difference between HW resize (ati one) and Lancsoz.
Probably spline method is intrinsecally more sharper and detailed than bicubic or Lancsoz, so you need to move down the sharpness filter.
Do you also use unsharpmask or another sharpness filter after resize? i use unsharpmask at 20 with 1152x862 resolution (so resize is setted at 1152x864 lancsoz, and sharpening during resize is 1.2 both chroma and luma)

No I use Blur and NR first, Denoise set at 30.

Then I resize to 1280x1024 with Spline, Luma Sharpen 1.7 and Chroma Sharpen 1.0. This gives me about 90% CPU usage so anything more and I would start losing frames, and thats with an Athlon XP at 2.7ghz.

Mark what ffdshow version do you use? I read that some versions are better for athlon. Have anyone tried Sinc? Owen what sharpening method do you consider the best, Lanczos, Spline or Sinc, cpu usage aside?

My version is the latest alpha release from the ffdshow sourceforge site, its ffdshow-20030523.exe. I have tried even newer releases from some site but they are all beta, are very smooth (most of the time) but have some serious problems with jerky video some of the time too so the next version should be very good.

I have tried sinc as someone said it was the best but I get horrible vertical lines in the image with it enabled.