nVidia Settings Suggestions

[smajor]

I've had some problems with live tv (audio/video out of sync, freezing, etc.) and I think I've narrowed down my problems to the nVidia card I have. If I switch to a less powerful card (an ancient Ati) all my problems vanish - but quality/speed suffer.

My nVidia card is an MX4000 and can't use the nVidia decoders. Does anyone use one of these cards and could you suggest any tweaks to make it work better?

Thanks!

[nitrogen_widget]

What version driver are you using?
I have had varying problems with older nvidia hardware & the newer 9X driver's.
I need to stay at 84x drivers or I get lock-ups on my fx5200 & 6200.

[Braklet]

You can use the nVidia PureVideo decoder regardless of GPU version or even brand (you can use it with ATI GPUs, even). It just can't take advantage of GPU hardware features that some nVidia GPUs support. Your CPU will have to take up that slack.

PureVideo worked a lot better for me than the Intervideo or Cyberlink decoders I tried, but I could also dump some rendering off on my 6600 GPU.

You might also consider FFDShow decoders. They support a whole lot of different media formats and many people are very happy with it. I've used it but PureVideo works better for me.

SD vs. HD also makes a big difference. I had my system tuned perfectly for live and recorded SD with my PVR-500 card. VMR9/Custom rendering, the whole shebang. Once I added an ATSC receiver I had to go through all that video tuning again to minimize frame drops. Ended up using Overlay and forcing default DirectShow filtering through System Default. Got it working fine but I must learn more about what DirectShow is doing.

[Braklet]

I have had varying problems with older nvidia hardware & the newer 9X driver's.
I need to stay at 84x drivers or I get lock-ups on my fx5200 & 6200.

I ended up going back from 9x to 84.x drivers (both accompanied by the PureVideo decoder) during my HD tuning. I can't remember exactly what changed but things seemed more stable with 84.x.

[nitrogen_widget]

I ended up going back from 9x to 84.x drivers (both accompanied by the PureVideo decoder) during my HD tuning. I can't remember exactly what changed but things seemed more stable with 84.x.

What is your setup?

[Braklet]

What is your setup?

Athlon 64 x2, nForce 4 based mobo, MTI 6600-based vidcard, PureVideo decoders. I also have a SB Audigy soundcard which some claim can affect video through shared IRQs. Attached to a big monitor via analog VGA.

[nitrogen_widget]

So I wonder if you have to go to PCIE to use the latest nvidia drivers then.

[Braklet]

So I wonder if you have to go to PCIE to use the latest nvidia drivers then.

Sorry, my 6600 card is PCI-E.

[nitrogen_widget]

OK.
Then why are there so many problems even with the latest driver release?

[Braklet]

OK.
Then why are there so many problems even with the latest driver release?

I haven't the foggiest idea. If you check back in the thread, I can't even remember the specific reasons why I decided 84.x was better. It had something to do with its interface with PureVideo... I never got a BSOD or anything like that.

I do remember that I downgraded drivers while I was sorting out my HD video quality problems after adding my ATSC receiver.

The original poster may well benefit from a driver downgrade like you say. My point was that (s)he can still run the PureVideo decoder even if the GPU can't offload rendering tasks. It's worth a try; tuning video can really be frustrating.