[MHoefler]

Hi!


Yesterday I found the DScaler 5 DVD decoder on sourceforge.net. Here's a link: DScaler . It's still in alpha stadium but it's awesome! Please everybody, if you are looking for a good (and free) dvd decoder, then give DScaler a try and share your opinions and results here. The latest version is 0.0.3 and it's available for download at sourceforge.


My intensive side-by-side tests with WinDVD and NVDVD 4 showed, that DScaler is noticably sharper than all others! Furthermore it doesn't have the CUE (or other color) bugs like NVDVD, it shows no banding, no solarization, perfect rendering of mid-color backgrounds, no unnecessary artifacts, no additional noise, etc. - it's simply great!


Furthermore it reduces the CPU usage on my system(s) about 20% when used together with ffdshow. I don't know why this is, but maybe it has something to do with the fact that you can choose the output color format of DScaler to be YV12 or YUV2 (I use YV12). BTW: I'm using Zoomplayer as front end.


The only problem I've found so far are subtitles. The picture stutters or freezes for several seconds when subtitles are displayed. While this is annoying, I think it will be easy to fix and soon be fixed because DScaler is open source with a lot of activity and frequent updates.


Nevertheless, this is by far the best decoder I've tested. On some german websites people already talk of it as "reference decoding" and I think that is not far from the truth. But please download it and see for yourself!


Regards, Martin.


PS: Oh yeah, it's a "No CSS" version, meaning that you can't play discs with CSS directly (which are virtually all ;-) But there are a few utilities out there that take care of this, so that you can play "any DVD" (Hint, hint ;-)

 

[Martin Rendall]

Can one install this concurrently with version 4? I don't want to muck with what already works for me, but a little experimentation would be fun.


Thanks,

Martin.

 

[Kerry W]

Quick question from a codec n00b. How would I test this using TheaterTek 2.0? Thanks for the info



Kerry

 

[wireburn]

Kerry,


You can't. TT has its decoders "built-in". You can't change them.


-Mike

 

[mo0sic]

Has anyone tried this with MCE 2005?

 

[Vern Dias]

For those who want to mix and match decoders, ZP is the best, if not the only option.


Vern

 

[JohnAd]

Quote:

Originally posted by Martin Rendall Can one install this concurrently with version 4? I don't want to muck with what already works for me, but a little experimentation would be fun. Thanks, Martin.

Yes it will run happily alongside Dscaler 4.

 

[JohnAd]

Quote:

Originally posted by mo0sic Has anyone tried this with MCE 2005?

I use it with MCE2004, at the moment it gives good performance with DVB and 2:2 pulldown stuff. The renderer in MCE2004 doesn't support deinterlacing so video stuff is just weaved and so looks horrible, this will change in future versions as will improved DVD support.


John

 

[Rushmore Grad]

I found it lacking with PAL stuff. Also, Roswell season 1, my main deinterlacing test disc was awful with dscaler 5. nvdvd with vpp was perfect, windvd was poor, but the dscaler was even worse.

 

[MHoefler]

I only use PAL discs and found no problems, except subtitiles and yes, video based material is interlaced (ugly). I hope this will be fixed soon to produce the perfect decoder!

 

[Rushmore Grad]

I watch alot of pal tv show dvds which probably explains the poor deinterlacing quality.

 

[Chriš2]

A couple questions:


Will this work in PVR apps like BTV & Sage that record in mpeg2?


Also, for DVDs that I have re-authored using DVD shrink, do these have the CSS removed so they will play using the DScaler decoder?

 

[stanger89]

Yes it works in Sage, you just need to add it to the "additional_video_decoders" line in the properties file so Sage knows it's there.

 

[cubesys]

This may be a stupid question, but here goes. I currently use ZP with windvd and ffdshow without any problems. How do i use dscaler as the dvd decoder?


I tried to look at the FAQ and i could not find anything to help


thanks

Itai

 

[FitzRoy]

Yeah, dscaler5 is still buggy (obviously, it's alpha) but I agree with what's being said about the quality. The video is right up there and the audio decoders are actually better than nvidias. I tested both on the same dts track scene from "Last of the Mohicans" and nvidias were slightly less detailed to the extent that I was objectively certain. This was with a 192x and sennheiser hd580s. John said something about using a reference implimentation and not messing with the audio in needless ways. I have to assume he's on the right track because it sounds better than anything I used before. John really appears to be catering to the videophile/audiophile with his decoders, which I thought would be people in this forum, but all I've heard is tt2.0 this and that when I've found these free decoders to be better. Maybe if he sold them for money, people would love them.

 

[DaGamePimp]

Well congrats John this is indeed an Excellent mpeg Decoder !!!


--- I just tried it [ along with nvidia 4 under Zoomplayer ] and it performs every bit as good if not better [ Awesome work !!! ] .


--- I think I just found my new favorite filter [ now on to the audio testing ] .



----------- Jason

 

[SicteR]

I love the fact that it can output in YV12 (thanx for the PM MHoefler) so no need for the extra color space conversion when used with ffdshow. You can really see the difference, my cpu load dropped from ~70% to ~50%. More headroom for ffdshow tweaking

 

[jpooton]

Quote:

Originally posted by SicteR I love the fact that it can output in YV12 (thanx for the PM MHoefler)

Care to share the magic ? I'm assuming it doesn't output YV12 by default...


-James

 

[Rushmore Grad]

I can't seem to save the settings. Everytime I load up ZP the settings revert to no spdif

 

[SicteR]

Quote:

Originally posted by jpooton Care to share the magic ? I'm assuming it doesn't output YV12 by default... -James

No it doesn't...you can switch this to YV12 in the decoder's properties