demux's anyone?

[pBS]

just had a breakthru moment, turns out the only thing holding back my system from easy HD playback was the DeMux!! not codecs, video cards, cpu...

well, like most systems, i was using the default MS demuxer, and that works well for sd content...but hd was acting like it couldn't get the data fast enough..stutters on both audio and video,making playback about half speed..

so i changed it to MainConcept MPEG Splitter [from pvr150 or MVP] and lo and behold! HD with little effort!
HUGE difference in playback ease...fluid and everything seems correct in osd,skips,etc..

and now all my mpeg codecs work just fine...
i noticed this because i was playing a dvr-ms file in HD and it had no problems!
so i surmised that the only difference was the demux and tried another one..
Nero's splitter is really good too if you have that...
just go to config.xml and set

<PreferredMpegPlaybackDemux>MainConcept MPEG Splitter</PreferredMpegPlaybackDemux>

[that is if you have it installed]
use GSpot to see which ones you have...look for splitter or demultiplexer or demux..

for those of you who's HD playback is only good with .DVR-MS, try this and make mpg's with ati's muxer...works fine for me..not a problem yet..

[pBS]

One note:
Seeking will suck if you don't set it for quick seeks..
open graphedit and insert this filter, r-click and do properties on it, and check the checkbox, hit apply and ok...then close graphedit, don't save...
works great over network for HD content...

other similar filters are Mainconcept (hauppauge) MPEG Splitter and MainConcept (Muvee) filters...both better, with timestamp generation! [second checkbox]
meaning it will generate new timestamps for video with broken ones..
[too bad only mpegs]

this really is a must try for HD...i tried everything, and these solved the seeming performance bottleneck completely!

[wannabepvr]

This is interesting.

Which of your machines are you using for this playback? (P4-1.8 or P4 3.2)
And what graphics card are you using?

I was placing with some low end HD - 720x576p the other day and it maxed out my CPU. Which surprised me. It might be to do with the AC3 audio we get here.

[carpeVideo]

Google k-lite mpeg pack to get a selection including the main concept splitter

[pBS]

am using a 2.4 celeron right now..but it also works on my 1800 too..
have a ati x1550 right now...but a 9550 seems to do ok with it as well..
both of which barely played SD stuff for the longest..
all about the dirtiness of windows..
now playing everything i throw at it flawlessly..

before i was getting like 5 frames/sec before adding this...
always wondered why my 9550 could play .ms-dvr HD in media center but not a plain mpeg...figured it was the mux all along, but didn't see any different results with any others really...till i tried these..now i'm modding all my machines with it..

i'll be testing the timestamp generation ability soon...may be able to fix stupid vlc timelines for transcodes...

oh and it's a pvr1600 with ati codec and ati mux with antenna source..
tho i doubt any other format will give it any trouble..

and here i thought it might be my agp video card...lol
aparently neither video bus, memory speed [i use pc133 mem in it]
cpu [to a certain extent] or hard drive make any difference to HD..!!
of course you need a decent hardware accell video card, but my cpu on the celeron 2.4 is about 30% with 1080i!
[celeron equal to about a 2000 full p4]

anybody else have any other fav demuxes to try?

[stustunz]

so you are saying this helps with SD mpeg playback aswell?

[pBS]

not sure...all my sd worked fine already...
i noticed the non-MS muxes use less network traffic, but none of them seem to affect SD content at all...
it almost seems like the MS demux has a upper bitrate limit...as most HD content is way over dvd spec, i think it's limited to dvd spec bitrates..

i've used dscaler, and ati codecs with excellent results..very happy with results..

if SD content isn't working well, windows is damaged...try directx updates, reinstall sp2 or the new xp sp3 if you can find it.. or worst case, a 'repair install' from xp cd..

so far that's the only things that have worked for me..those old quartz fixes aren't relevant anymore..the new ones work better than those fixes....

[ram4x4nut]

Confused (lol nothing new really)

I installed MVP software, ran GSpot but I don' see any splitters. Do I need to do something different?

Ram

[-Oz-]

I noticed the de-muxes are now in the k-lite MPEG pack, they removed them from the mega pack...

[pBS]

should be at least the MS one and if you've installed any dvd burning stuff too..
sometimes the types can be confusing, it's actually classified as a mpeg1 splitter..

i was sure it came with the mvp software..maybe not the newest ver?
only other thing i have that it could have come with is the pvr150...
[in which case it might be in WinTV app installer]
also not sure if it installs in Vista or uses Vista's own..

WINDOWS\system32\Hauppauge\hauppaugemcspmpeg.ax
is the (Hauppauge) one, others probably called mcspmpeg.ax
hope that helps...not sure where i got it but i have several different ones..