Choppy Audio and Video

[sherman]

I have been using Mediaportal (and therefore TV-Server, which requires SQL server...) for a while to watch Freeview HD on my Pinnacle Hybrid Pro Stick (PCTV 330e). This setup has generally worked well, with excellent video quality (for the most part) and audio quality. However I've found the whole setup just too... heavy.

So I decided to try GB-PVR.
All channels have been detected correctly, and I can even view TV.
The problem is that both video and audio are incredibly choppy.
I think the issue is that PVRX2 only seems to be using one core, and being a cheapish laptop, I don't have hardware acceleration of H.264.
My laptop has a Core Duo Processor @ 1.66GHz, 1.5GB of RAM, and intel 950GMA graphics. Hardly a powerhouse I know, but it is capable of playing all stations bar TV3 smoothly, however both cores are needed...
I'm using the exact same H.264 decoder as before, and am using (of course) the monogram AAC decoder.

Can anyone help/give any pointers? thanks.

[sub]

I think the issue is that PVRX2 only seems to be using one core, and being a cheapish laptop, I don't have hardware acceleration of H.264.

PVRX2 isnt limited to one core. I get pretty even CPU usage across both cores of my E6400 Core 2 Duo processor. When playing video, the majority of the CPU consumed is used by the video decoder filter. It most likely something to do with the video decoder you're using deciding it can only do decoding on one core. Given the same settings it should be the same in other apps though.

[sherman]

Started my laptop this morning, and lo and behold, perfect playback with all channels except for TV3.
I also know that CPU usage has increased beyond the 44-50% that it was last night, and is now in the 70-80% region.
For some reason, despite using the exact same decoder, TV3 is not handled as well as media portal managed to handle it (ie: is unwatchable), but other than that, it is working fine.

[sub]

Remember that GB-PVR doesnt do any of the playback itself, it just hooks up the capture card up to the audio&video decoders, and the video renderer, then tells it all to start streaming the data. Assuming the same combination of audio/video decoders and video renderer, you should end up with pretty much exactly the same results (picture quality, stuttering etc) as you'd get in any other app.

[sherman]

Yeah, I suppose so..

Anyway, thanks very much for your help.

And GB-PVR is so FAST!!! Especially for getting live TV going. Best of all, I don't have any dreaded "unable to start graph" errors after a few change of channels..

[sherman]

Just thought I'd mention that I started having choppy video/audio again.
I found that if I right-clicked on PVRX2.exe in the task manager and set CPU affinity to both cores (only one was selected), I had nice smooth video/audio again.

[sub]

Interesting. I wonder what is setting it to use a single core in the first place. I'm guessing it must be the video decoder or some utility running on your machine.