Xcard and overlay

[Rayman]

Greetings,
Is anyone currently using an Xcard as a hardware mpeg/divx decoder but rather than using the tv output of the xcard - pumping the data back into the overlay of the primary video card via the VIP port.

This gives the cpu advantage of the xcard and its attendant mpeg decoding, but is still able to preserve the access to the windows desktop and normal (more than 256 colour) menu system.

I have had this working with Meedio but due to the sever lack of other features required and the seeming stalled development took it no further down that route.

My attempts so far seem to cause spontaneous reboots -
I can run the select the xcard as the decoder and this works - however the overlay on screen does not appear to be enabled -rather saying the tv out is out the xcard.

When i try to run the system in software decoder mode and allow quartz.dll to do the redirect of the stream to the xcard in the hope that the overlay will be available - I get a reboot.

Has anyone else attempted this in any way shape or form ?
Any success ?

Rayman

[sub]

I've never tried it, but I suspect if you left the hardware decoder setting on 'none - use software decoder' and set the software decoder to 'System default' (and it was your system default decoder), then it'd probably work the way you were hoping....

When i try to run the system in software decoder mode and allow quartz.dll to do the redirect of the stream to the xcard in the hope that the overlay will be available - I get a reboot.

Ok, that'll teach me for writing a reply before reading the whole post. Sorry, I'm not sure - It's not something I've tried.

Have you tried setting the renderer to Overlay instead of VMR?

[Rayman]

yep - normally try with the renderer set to overlay -

I'll have a play again tonight if I can - i was having a some other problems that were fixed when I switched to the cybervideo (?) demux and need to have another go at it.

I'll post an update tonight after I confirm that behaviour is still as it was previously.

I was having problems with the xcard and the Dvico fusion HDTV plus co-esting - even with the no preview set - trying to scan channels with the xcard in would result in spontaneous reboot - so I had to pull the xcard out in order to be able to tune the channels.

This was a gbpvr related issue - I was able to use the FusionHDTV app with no problems - but it ignores the xcard too.

I also have a twinhan clone in their atm so I can try that to see it behave s the same also.

P.S.
Was hoping you'd appear sub - things must be going OK with release 2.0 then - congrats.
My 1.0g and 2.0g releases both have colds atm.


Rayman

[sub]

I was having problems with the xcard and the Dvico fusion HDTV plus co-esting - even with the no preview set - trying to scan channels with the xcard in would result in spontaneous reboot - so I had to pull the xcard out in order to be able to tune the channels.

This was a gbpvr related issue - I was able to use the FusionHDTV app with no problems - but it ignores the xcard too.

I dont agree. If it rebooted, the problem was almost definitely occuring in the drivers of either the XCard or FusionHDTV. The Fusion app uses their proprietary WDM drivers, wheras GB-PVR uses their BDA drivers. So this probably means buggy BDA drivers...which is very common for Dvico.

Was hoping you'd appear sub - things must be going OK with release 2.0 then - congrats.
My 1.0g and 2.0g releases both have colds atm.

Yes, all going well. They're off visiting the grand parents for the weekend, so I get a few days of peace and geeking.

[Rayman]

fair call -
whether its a BDA driver issue or the Xcard - i'll take your word for it -
but i will mention - I did have it working beautifully under Meedio -
which is supposedly using the BDA drivers for the fusion, and the Xcard.

I'll also try an appropriate graph under graphedit -
I think from memory I've had it do that correctly - Ie fusion - xcard - overlay ok.

Rayman

[sub]

Honestly, you're probably better off just shelving the xcard and using a regular video card. Mine hasnt been in my machine in about a year, and is just gathering dust in a draw somewhere.

It produces a great picture, but is just too quirky, too limited, too buggy.

[Rayman]

hmm -
had a bit more of a play but with no more exciting results -

The "sat on the shelf for a year" doenst inspire me to confidence that it will be working anytime soon !.

I appreciate it's old hardware - but its still the most elegant solution to the
rendering side problem (even still with the chroma bug).

The annoying part is it almost works - its able to output to the tvout in whichever format - but not back through the overlay to the screen.

You could convince me to abandon it if gbpvr supported widescreen hi-res skins as of course the xcard is still limitted to 720*576 max source material.

The original motivation was to allow the use of an older machine that didnt require the current phase of cyclonic cooling activity that seems the norm - or the rediculously priced other options - which mostly still have to deal with the same heat output but using larger fans at lower speed somewhere else in the system. <end rant>

for the moment ist back on the software rendering -

Is there a way to force the overlay to accept the incoming data ?

Rayman

[sub]

I agree that the XCard can produce a great picture but there are several reasons I dont recommend it to anyone, and dont spend time developing new features for this device, or actively supporting issues that popup.

- Very few people here own one, maybe only half a dozen users. This doesnt represent a big percentage of 30000 or so downloads or the last release of GB-PVR.
- no high def playback
- very limited, very slow OSD.
- major limitations with DVD playback (and the use of OSD during DVD playback)
- no developer support by manufacturer plus buggy API plus non-standard interfaces equals very time consuming development.

If I wanted to focus all my efforts on the XCard, I think I could write a fairly decent app for it, but I think it'd be a poor choice of way to spend my time.

The original motivation was to allow the use of an older machine that didnt require the current phase of cyclonic cooling activity that seems the norm - or the rediculously priced other options - which mostly still have to deal with the same heat output but using larger fans at lower speed somewhere else in the system. <end rant>

I can totally understand that, and agree with those goals. Unfortunately, the XCard is not the answer - at least not with GB-PVR.

If you're keen to pursue a solution that uses the XCard, there is a another app at http://www.8dim.com whose emphasis is on the XCard.

[sub]

You could convince me to abandon it if gbpvr supported widescreen hi-res skins

You can already do widescreen skins. I think there are a couple floating around. Reven has made one.

[Rayman]

i understand where you are coming from -
tvedia doesnt support streaming from the dreambox - thats a killer for me - unless i write a plugin.

The api and OSD are not an issue for me as i use the normal video card display and only the video data is pumped back via hardware into the overlay -

ive seen it working in other apps - live uncompressed data passed back via the overlay and mixed with the semitransparent menu data from the video card - cool -
avoids the whole api / 256 colours etc issue - just pump data to the card and retrieve it on the overlay.

This happens by default in fact with media player and the graphps - I think you do something different with the overlay to make it display the message that output is on the tv screen ?

I agree xcard users are by far the minority and not likley to be a priority - just annoying that it seems so close -

Thanks I'll try to find a high res widescreen skin then.

Rayman