Now Playing mvpmcx2 The Director's Cut

[wtg]

Just wanted to chime in here myself and thank you for all your brilliant work. We all owe a huge debt of gratitude to you for all the time you've put in and for so nicely making your efforts available without cost. I'll definitely be sending a donation your way.

A couple things re: the new features. First, the timeline wasn't displaying for me at all. Finally I realized if I unchecked "Force minimal OSD for MVP" it worked. Is that to be expected? I'm surprised that setting influences the PCH at all. Also, the timeline has issues with showing the correct position after skipping. It doesn't seem to update correctly after a jump, though I've noticed if I immediately invoke it after it disappears, it then shows the proper position. I'm guessing you know this, but if not it's something for you to look at.

Second, thank you for supporting the command line overrides for zooming. It would be nice if mvpmcx2 zoom modes matched up with the equivalent on the PCH though, because as it is now, it's confusing.

I find the PCH Zoom settings are logical once I figured out what they meant.

• Fit -> "Fit to screen, maintaining Aspect Ratio".
  
• Full -> "Full screen, ignore Aspect Ratio"
  
• Crop -> "Crop to Full screen, maintaining Aspect Ratio."
  

With this in mind, the PCH results are predictable

Code:

PCH
    Fit
        4:3    Pillarboxed
        16:9    Fills screen
        2.35    Letterboxed(correctly)
    Full
    4:3    Fills Screen
    16:9    Fills Screen
    2.35    Fills Screen
    Crop
    4:3    Cropped to 16:9
    16:9    Fills Screen
    2.35    Cropped to 16:9

When I first ran mvpmcx2 without the zoom command-line override, I was surprised when I watched a HD recording broadcast in 1080i because it was letterboxed. You wouldn't expect a letterboxed picture watching a 1920x1080 broadcast on a 1920x1080 screen, ever. Thankfully I can get the same behavior with --zoom full, but I'm guessing I'm not the last person that'll find it confusing.

Thanks again for all your hard work making the PCH a kick-butt replacement for the MVP.

[mvallevand]

I did all my testing with minimal OSD off, I will have to revisit this but I like getting the channel numbers on live tv.

Sub really needs to do the work to optimize the OSD at this point. The updates come too often (even on the the MVP) and because so much data has to be written with HD I even have to skip some updates. On top of that I find it gets cleared too early.

I toggle through 3 zoom behaviours

a) 16x9 full screen, 4:3 pillarboxed
b) 16x9 in a 4x3 window, 4:3 full screen
c) 16x9 full screen, 4:3 fullscreen + pan & scan

It does not map to the PCH Fit Full very well. Since I don't know the aspect ratio or the video dimension I can't do better then that until I read the demux.

Martin

[zed]

I record from three sources...an HD-PVR, a Dvico ATSC card for OTA HD, and a Twinhan card for satellite (PBS). The HD-PVR records H.264 but the other two record mpeg. I use the TS Mux for all three. The problem is that it seems that the new mvpmcx2 will play either one or the other. If I specify the --mono-h264 option, the stuff recorded on the HD-PVR works fine but the others won't play, I get a black screen. If I don't use that option, the mpegs play fine but the HD-PVR files give a black screen. The previous versions handled both. They all play fine in native PCH. Am I doing something wrong? Are there other options I should be setting?

The HD-PVR always records 1080i. The others vary (720p, 1080i). I have the PCH set to 1080i 60hz component.

Thanks...

[mvallevand]

I don't have any HD-PVR 1080i samples, but the 720p work fine. So the first think is I'd like to get a 100 MB 1080i sample via megaupload or mediafire.

I don't understand why not specifying --mono-h264 causes normal files not to play since I would expect everyone would be having this problem. The best explanation I can think us is that playing the 1080i h264 file corrupts the native video playing. Could you try again after a reboot and see if --mono-h264 works.

Martin

[Turas]

i started using the new mvpmcx2 today. it works fine, especially the gbpvr osd is nice to have back!
sometimes when i press stop on video, tv-show or music playback, the pch screen goes black and doesn't return to gvpbr menu.

turas
---

[mvallevand]

sometimes when i press stop on video, tv-show or music playback, the pch screen goes black and doesn't return to gvpbr menu.

Clearly that is not expected behaviour so if you could upload your GBPVR logs when this occurs I can see if I can make it stop happening.

Martin

[zed]

I don't have any HD-PVR 1080i samples, but the 720p work fine. So the first think is I'd like to get a 100 MB 1080i sample via megaupload or mediafire.

I don't understand why not specifying --mono-h264 causes normal files not to play since I would expect everyone would be having this problem. The best explanation I can think us is that playing the 1080i h264 file corrupts the native video playing. Could you try again after a reboot and see if --mono-h264 works.

After some more playing with --mono-h264 specified...

If I restart and then play an mpeg file it works OK. Then playing an h264 (1080i from HD-PVR) works OK. Then playing an mpeg file gives black screen.

Restart and same thing.

However, if I stop the black screen mpeg, then go to another menu, say from Whats New to Ready and back to Whats New the mpeg will play OK without a restart. If I then play an h264, than try an mpeg...black screen.

Without the mono option specified, mpeg play fine but h264 gives black screen.

I also noticed that skip (Next) doesn't work on h264 but does on mpeg.

I uploaded a 1080i file from the HD-PVR to test with: http://www.megaupload.com/?d=8PLOWLGG

Thanks...

[mvallevand]

With your sample I can duplicate everything you wrote, thanks it could easily be an initialization problem

I also noticed that skip (Next) doesn't work on h264 but does on mpeg.

Do you mean on 720p samples or do you mean when you are in the PCH player which uses the centre arrows for skipping?

Martin

[zed]

I'm glad it helps. Let me know if I can supply any more info.

Regarding the skip...it's when I'm playing a file on the PCH in GB-PVR. With an mpeg file, the Next button on the remote makes the playback skip ahead but when playing an h264 file on the PCH in GB-PVR the Next button gives the triangle-! icon. In native PCH playback, the center arrow keys work OK. I may be misunderstanding the skip functionality in GB-PVR, tho, so this may be operator error.

And FWIW, I've noticed the same thing as Turas...sometimes when I stop playing a video in GB-PVR, using the Stop button on the remote, I just get a black screen, it stops responding to the remote, and I have to power cycle the PCH. I looked at the GB-PVR logs but didn't see anything of note. Which log file would have that info?

I'm just full of good news, aren't I?

[mvallevand]

I'm glad it helps. Let me know if I can supply any more info.

If I can get a 1080i h264 file to play I probably will.

Regarding the skip...it's when I'm playing a file on the PCH in GB-PVR. With an mpeg file, the Next button on the remote makes the playback skip ahead but when playing an h264 file on the PCH in GB-PVR the Next button gives the triangle-! icon. In native PCH playback, the center arrow keys work OK. I may be misunderstanding the skip functionality in GB-PVR, tho, so this may be operator error.

The prev/next keys are not supposed to work on h264 .ts files if you use the --mono-h264 option this is the standard PCH player.

And FWIW, I've noticed the same thing as Turas...sometimes when I stop playing a video in GB-PVR, using the Stop button on the remote, I just get a black screen, it stops responding to the remote, and I have to power cycle the PCH. I looked at the GB-PVR logs but didn't see anything of note. Which log file would have that info?

Compress and upload MVP*.log after the crash.

I'm just full of good news, aren't I?

No news would be bad, it means that no one is trying it.

Martin