Television Aspect ratio

[stustunz]

I managed to get a better image by unchecking the hardware accleration box so I am getting closer. I cant get it to do the auto aspect thing though.

if using onboard video accleration it may not help that much

In Nvidia it has the 3 options overlay, vmr7, vmr9.

pvrx2 can only use vmr9 (vmr custom) so these setting make no difference

I have set it to vmr9. In gbpvr config.exe I am using pvrx2 and I have set that to vmr exclusive.

this forces pvrx2 to have full rights to the video card so nothing else can write to the screen


each system is different so what works for one may not work for another sorry if i sent you a bit wrong
another decoder you might like to try is the mpv decoder its free heres the link also tells you how to register it there aswell
http://www.free-codecs.com/download/MPV_Decoder.htm

[No1Daemon]

if using onboard video accleration it may not help that much

pvrx2 can only use vmr9 (vmr custom) so these setting make no difference



this forces pvrx2 to have full rights to the video card so nothing else can write to the screen


each system is different so what works for one may not work for another sorry if i sent you a bit wrong
another decoder you might like to try is the mpv decoder its free heres the link also tells you how to register it there aswell
http://www.free-codecs.com/download/MPV_Decoder.htm

So are you suggesting I not use onboard video acceleration or I should just try gbpvr?
When I first started using gbpvr I believe I had as an option both mpv decoder and also dscaler which have since dissapeared. I will download and try them both if possible. So when I do should I make sure I have set it to vmr custom or else I will still be using my onboard graphics, is that correct?

[stustunz]

what i am saying is you may not gain that much cause you system is pretty fast so it(your cpu) would probably do just as good a job as you onboard video plus it may share some resources anyway (i am not totally sure what the difference would be)

gbpvr works better on slower systems and you can use overlay etc
but you lose the eye candy pluss it wont be around for much longer
if it was me i would stick with pvrx2
give it a week or 2 and a bit more fiddling you will find a sweet spot

you could do a search for onboard video and see what others are using as far as codecs(forum search at top off page)

you are always using your onboard graphics card unless you slot another one in
the difference in using hardware acceleration is that the processing is off loaded to the graphics processing unit(gpu) instead of the cpu doing it
the vmr custom and fse are renderer this is to do with the way its written to screen
try vmr custom first if you find the video a little jumpy full screen exclusive may help smooth this out (but as i said earlier it will take over your video so nothing else can be scene on the screen you not be able to see anythiung other than pvrx2 )

[No1Daemon]

Thanks for all your suggestions.
I have now tried intervideo noncss, mainconcept hauppauge, gpl, mpeg, dscaler and nvidia of course and my system default.
I have tried all combinations of overlay, vmr7 and vmr9 with all combinations of the decoders and none of them made any difference to the aspects, just the quality of the video.
It seems no matter what I set any of them to I do not get it to auto aspect unfortunately, so it looks like I wil have to give up on it.

I appreciate the responses and your time though.

[stustunz]

just add a custom ratio
honestly you will never get it right
the broadcasters need to get there shit together its not a gbpvr problem

[No1Daemon]

I never did get an answer earlier when I asked as to why this doesn't happen or seem to be a problem with a satellite tuner box? Do you know what the difference would be?
I have one of those hooked up still while I am tweaking the htpc and it never displays anything as 4:3 or any other aspect regardless of the type of broadcast.

[stustunz]

your one must be better than my cheap one i got from dick smith
are you sure its not just cropping the picture
you may find its not getting all the picture
as in if you compare the exact same picture at the same time do you see as much
look for wher ethe tv icon is

[No1Daemon]

Its hard to compare them really. I compared kidzone just a second ago and something called miss spider was on. GBPVR displayed it with 2 inch black bars on either side and the satellite tuner was full screen. The kidszone icon was clearly in screen so it didnt appear stretched at all

[stustunz]

sorry it doesnt do what you want
i know what you are saying it pisses me off to when it doesnt fit

[sub]

It seems no matter what I set any of them to I do not get it to auto aspect unfortunately, so it looks like I wil have to give up on it.

As I explained earlier in this thread, I'm fairly sure you're getting what you're supposed to see. Its showing you the complete picture, but sometimes they include black bars in the picture. The size of the black bars can vary depending on several things. For example...

- some shows broadcast a proper widescreen signal and it'll fill your widescreen tv (like TV1 News etc)
- some shows were originally shot in 4:3 so when they're broadcast they add black bars to the left and right to make it the correct aspect ratio on a 16:9 screen (like lots of the content on TV6 and C4)
- some content includes very small black bars on the left/right or top/bottom, often because it has been ARC'd to 14:9 as a compromise to make sure the most picture is visible for both analog and digital broadcasts of the same picture. (often seen on Maori TV).

The screenshots and descriptions you've provided sound consistent with these.

I never did get an answer earlier when I asked as to why this doesn't happen or seem to be a problem with a satellite tuner box? Do you know what the difference would be?

The behaviour I describe above in GB-PVR is consistent with what you'd typically see on a set top box, though they often introduce some minor zooming. This zoom will only remove a small part of the picture though, not the sort of black bars you'd get with a 4:3 video on 16:9 screen.

I compared kidzone just a second ago and something called miss spider was on. GBPVR displayed it with 2 inch black bars on either side and the satellite tuner was full screen.

Because of my kids I'm very familiar with this show - its definitely 4:3. There is no way it fills your widescreen without stretching it, or cutting the top/bottom off. It'll be doing one of these two.