[SevenOut]

Hello Everyone!


I'm taking a break from gaming and trying to turn my gaming rig into an HTPC. I think it's good enough to do the job, but I'm experiencing some issues that I hope someone can tell me what I'm doing wrong or in fact my system is not good enough.


My system is a Core 2 Conroe 6600 in a Gigabyte P965 mobo. I have a eVGA Geforce 8800 GTS 640 mb video card, 2 gigs of G.Skill memory and over a terabyte of storage. I'm running Vista Ultimate 32 bit.


Issues: When playing tv show files (mostly .avi, but some .mkv's) they always stutter as far as video goes. The audio seems to stay true though. The video is a little jumpy and sometimes seems to lock up and than catch up after a few seconds. Also, I have transfered some video files from my dvr over the years to my pc through a old hauppage pvr 350 card. I've made mpeg 2 files out of them and they are seriously cropped when i play them back. They look good aside from that. Is there a way to get them to fill my 16:9 HD television?


I installed FFDshow this morning hoping that would correct the jumpy playback, but no change. Thanks for any help anyone can provide!

 

[umdivx]



Quote:
Originally Posted by SevenOut /forum/post/15479745


Issues: When playing tv show files (mostly .avi, but some .mkv's) they always stutter as far as video goes.

What playback software you using? media center, media player, what?

Quote:
Also, I have transfered some video files from my dvr over the years to my pc through a old hauppage pvr 350 card. I've made mpeg 2 files out of them and they are seriously cropped when i play them back. They look good aside from that. Is there a way to get them to fill my 16:9 HD television?

well since you used an SD tuner card to capture the video they are in 4:3 format, you will need to stretch the video to get them to play back full screen.


This again all depends on your playback software.

Quote:
I installed FFDshow this morning hoping that would correct the jumpy playback, but no change. Thanks for any help anyone can provide!

if you installed FFDshow now, what were you using before?


What I tend to do is ONLY install FFDshow, make sure you don't have any codec packs, or anything stupid like that.


FFdshow and Haali media splitter is ALL i use.


- Josh

 

[SevenOut]

Hey Josh, thanks for the reply!


I'm using Media Center within Vista Ultimate. Is that a mistake? It looked cool and all incorporated into Vista so I just tagged one of my folders and it shows up under video library. I looked through the settings in media center looking for something to stretch the 4:3 vid's but didn't see anything. The 4:3clips that I did my self dont jump and do play smooth. But the mpeg2's and mkv.s all jump and stutter and stuff. My vid clips are only a few minutes in length while the tv shows are typically 40 minutes plus.


I did install some vista codec packs before I learned about FFDshow. And when they didn't work I added FFDshow. So should my first move be to remove all those codec's that I put in?


Thanks again for the help!

 

[rdunnill]

I used to get jumpy SDVD playback under Vista, but not under XP. Vista SP1 corrected that. (I never did find out what was fixed.)


Is your Vista installation updated with SP1?

 

[umdivx]



Quote:
Originally Posted by SevenOut /forum/post/15482275


Hey Josh, thanks for the reply!


I'm using Media Center within Vista Ultimate. Is that a mistake? It looked cool and all incorporated into Vista so I just tagged one of my folders and it shows up under video library. I looked through the settings in media center looking for something to stretch the 4:3 vid's but didn't see anything. The 4:3clips that I did my self dont jump and do play smooth.

if you have the mce remote, there is a "i" button on the remote, gets into the info section and it'll pop up a menu in MCE which will have an option for video stretching.


of you are doing it from a mouse/kb maybe right click on mouse or the i button on a keyboard might do the same thing, don't know about that as I only use my htpc with a remote.

Quote:
But the mpeg2's and mkv.s all jump and stutter and stuff. My vid clips are only a few minutes in length while the tv shows are typically 40 minutes plus.


I did install some vista codec packs before I learned about FFDshow. And when they didn't work I added FFDshow. So should my first move be to remove all those codec's that I put in?

yes they should be removed, however when you install codec packs they can leave things left over and still cause issues.


another thing is what video card are you running nvidida or ati?


ATI has some de-interlacing settings and anti aliasing settings in the advanced menu, and I have found that can affect the playback in MCE and cause some choppy video playback.


- Josh

 

[SevenOut]

Thanks guys!


rdunnill - yes, it is updated with SP1


Josh - I have a eVGA nvidia geforce 8800 GTS 640 mb video card. Do you recommend I stay with Media Center for playback or switch to something else? So is the only sure way I can remove the remnants from the video codecs I installed to do a new OS install?


Also, will I see much differance in picking up a 64 bit copy of Vista and using that instead of the 32 I'm currently using? Thanks for taking the time to help me with this problem.

 

[umdivx]

Media center is perfectly fine, that is what I use, and only use, well other than Arcsoft TMT for blu ray/hd dvd playback.


I don't want to tell you, you have to do a complete OS re-install, but it'd be a good bet, if you uninstall all the codecs, codec packs, ect... and you still have issues.


I am still only using 32bit vista, so honestly for htpc use i'd say no, no real difference.


- Josh

 

[SevenOut]

Ok great news about not having to buy 64 bit vista. I will work on fine tunning FFDshow with the walkthru guide and hope to have success with eliminating the stuttering. Thank you very much for the help!