Colossus : live video freezing

[shaunpatrick77]

I'm testing my shiny new Colossus, and the video quality is great! h.264 is definitely an improvement over mpeg2 & my trusty hvr2200. However after 5-6 minutes the video freezes and cpu usage drops dramatically. Skipping back seems to fix it, at least for another few minutes, so it looks like the stream/timeshifting etc is not being lost.

I'm using the Arc Soft .264 video codec and LAV audio (only one that doesnt seem to cause major stuttering) as well as the latest drivers for everything. I can't see anything obvious in the logs, so I fear I'm staring into the dreaded codec hell (?)

As I run a HD5450 I initially wanted to use the AMD/ATI media codec pack (10.7), but that results in a black screen, only seems to work for MPEG2, not sure if they have included a working .264 codec with that.

Any suggestions ?

Thanks!

[johnsonx42]

have you installed the latest patch update? lots of colossus & hd-pvr updates.

[shaunpatrick77]

Yep, running 2.1.5 and the R1 patch update (sub has really been cranking out the patches! many thanks for that btw)

[sub]

I'm using the Arc Soft .264 video codec and LAV audio (only one that doesnt seem to cause major stuttering) as well as the latest drivers for everything. I can't see anything obvious in the logs, so I fear I'm staring into the dreaded codec hell (?)

As I run a HD5450 I initially wanted to use the AMD/ATI media codec pack (10.7), but that results in a black screen, only seems to work for MPEG2, not sure if they have included a working .264 codec with that.

My guess is that it probably is decoder related, so you should probably start testing with alternative decoders to try any confirm or rule that out.

May also need to see if hardware acceleration on your ATI card is a factor - ie, try the same tests without using hardware acceleration.

[shaunpatrick77]

Hi Sub
Video is nice and stable with FFDshow (non dxva) , but that dragged me back in the world of choppy audio, and no audio codecs (or swearing at at the screen or hair pulling) seemed to help.
I've pulled the card and reverted to my hvr2200 for the meanwhile. Curious if there any changes in the next release to analog audio that might help? Or has anyone else found a good codec combo for the colossus?

Cheers.

[mvallevand]

Did you try AC3 via SPDIF instead of AAC?

Martin

[shaunpatrick77]

Sadly there's no TOSLINK SPDIF output from my cable box, just analog.

Shaun.

[shaunpatrick77]

Had a few moments this morning to temporarily reinstall the Colossus in order to try Cyberlink's PDVR11 video codec, and with 0.31 LAV audio it's the best so far, but the audio jitter is definitely still there. Most noticeable with music. As is par for the course, a skip back will fix it. Cant get away from the feeling that its related to the initial buffering to the disc somehow.