Disappointed with the quality of my setup

[srcurtis]

I have setup my first PVR and I guess I’m a little disappointed with the quality. I’ve had a good long play with the settings now and am struggling to achieve any real improvement due to my lack of knowledge in this area.

I was wondering if anyone would be good enough to give me some pointers on how to achieve a better/brighter/smoother picture quality.

Here is my setup:

Celeron 2.6GHz on a Shuttle board (not sure of spec without checking)
512MB
300GB (only 5400 with 2M Cache)
PVR250
ATI Radeon 9600
USB-UIRT
XP Pro
SageTV 2.0.19
Latest Hauppage drivers
Latest ATI Drivers
Latest every patch that I can think of

The unit links to Pioneer PDP434HDE plasma via the VGA port, I tried S-video and Composite (as a fair test against my 4 year old TiVo) but the ghosting and picture quality was so bad that I was forced to use the VGA port.

I have configured SageTV to operate as a server so that I can connect to it from other workstations, but do not currently do so. The PC is dedicated to SageTV except for XMLTV to obtain listings.

I accept that the picture that I get from my TiVo (connected via Scart using Composite) does show more MPEG artifacts but in general it’s much smoother, brighter and sharper.

I’ve tinkered with the color calibration and set the sharpness to maximum.

The source is a SKY digital satellite box linked via Scart using the Composite out to the PVR250 Video 1 Composite input.

The Radion 9600 is set to 1024x768 resolution at 60hz (same resolution as my plasma), I’ve tried both 32 and 16 bit color depth, currently it’s set to 16 as I thought that it may be faster to update less memory and therefore give me a smoother image.

Color is calibrated as follows:

Brightness 162
Contrast 163
Saturation 166
Hue 130
Sharpness 255

Other settings are pretty much defaults:

Aspect ratio: Source
Recording Quality: Best 3GB
Video Renderer: Overlay
MPEG2 Decoder Filter: InterVideo NonCSS fir Hauppage
Dscaler Deinterlacing filter: Disabled
Celeron fix: Disabled
3D Acceleration: Enabled
Overlay Color Keying: Enabled

I would describe the picture as ‘jerky’ although that probably sounds far worse than it actually is. The picture could really benefit from more contrast and might be described as slightly yellow?

Don’t get me wrong, I can see the benefits over TiVo and I am generally very impressed with the results, but I’m sure that with a little tweaking it can be much better as the old TiVo does deliver a ‘generally’ better image with what I assume is far inferior hardware.

Any help would be VERY MUCH APPRECIATED.

Also, can anyone recommend a video card that outputs via HDMI?

I must say that I was VERY disappointed with the S-Video and Composite output from the Radion 9600, has anyone else experienced this?

Thanks in advance.

Steve

[mikejaner]

I just spent this past weekend tweaking my output, so let me see if anything I did can help you.

First, I tweaked the Overlay output in the ATI control panel. Although the colors are close, you are right about it being a little off. Tweak with the brightness and gamma as well as color and contrast. After you think you have the color looking right but a little dim, go to your TV menu. I did this and it make a world of difference when I increased the brightness of the TV. This combination of tweaking the Overlay of the ATI card, and the color output of my TV got all of the colors right.
Now for the jerkyness. The Intervideo decoders do a great job of putting the picture on the screen but a terrible job of deinterlacing. I tried all of the decoders I could get my hands on, and with the help of others, was able to find the best combination of picture quality and deinterlacing from the NvDVD 3.0 drivers. The sound drivers of NvDVD have issues and will lock Sage, so I use Intervideo decoders for the audio. After all of that, I have to say my picture is pretty good, and damn close to the 350 hardware output.

[kny3twalker]

the composite or svideo from your video card will be bad because the image has to be rescaled and then interlaced before output

and it is for SDTV not an HDTV

sounds like you are headed the right way though by connecting via VGA

you definitely need to try different decoders

I personally prefer NVDVD as well for image quality
it is one of the most configurable decoders and supports VMR9 nicely bhut your 9600 will have trouble producing a smooth image
I prefer overlay to VMR9
the sharpness is much better you should not have to turn the sharpness to max with it
if you want a video card that will do VMR9 nicely look at the 9800 PRO and 5900s non SE/XT
not sure any video cards can do that connection yet
but with pci express it is probably right around the corner
sonic decoder is another nice decoder to try
pm me and I can help you with NVDVD

also you can try out higher recording qualities
look at the FAQs for some that I have wrote to give more choices

tweaking the video card overlay setting may help
but I would also look into stanger89s color calibrating
also in the FAQs

[stanger89]

Well the first thing I notice is that your capture color settings are WAY off from what I've come to expect. Now there's variation between cards and sources, but Brightness, Contrast and Saturation in the 160s seems really high to me, I'd try setting them closer to 100, with Sat at about 128 (or whatever default is). If you want to get fancy check the link in my sig (thanks for the ref kny!)

The other thing you'll probably need to do is calibrate your display to your PC, to do that I'd try something like Digital Video Essentials. You'll need to get some video decoders that support DVD playback, but between calibrating your display correctly and adjusting the capture settings it should make a big difference in color/brighness/contrast. For sharpness you can always try ffdshow (which I use for color calibration as well).

As for not smooth playback, it sounds like you're describing microstudder, you might want to give ReClock audio renderer a try.

[garyc]

MikeJaner,

Are you using the "P4R800-V Deluxe" or "P4R800-VM" motherboard? And do I understand correctly that the on-board S-Video is what you're using? Does the X-Card play into this at all? I'm going to build a couple of clients this fall and it sounds like the board you used might be just the ticket -- on board 6-channel audio, good video output, etc. And using a "known to work well" solution should help me avoid a lot of the problems I've been following in these forums

My current primary desktop uses an Intel D875PBZ motherboard that I've been very happy with, and barring a reason to switch would probably just use for all of my other builds -- but from this and other forums it sounds like there are issues with Sage and the 875 chipset, so I may avoid using it.

[mikejaner]

I have the P4r800-VM, and yes, I am using the Svideo out from the mother board. As a note, I did have to order the Svideo/Composite adapter which plugs into the Motherboard. I think it was like $14 or something from NewEgg. Anyways, the Motherboard has been rock solid and is of very good quality. I currently use my Xcard for Playback of DVD's separate from Sage. I hope to have it work with Sage in the future, but that is waiting on an update for OSD which might be done by somebody as a plugin in the future.
As far as the issues with the 875 and other Intel chipsets. These issues are only related to using full output of the PVR 350. If your not using the output of this board, or not using it at all, there should be no problems with that chipset. I could be wrong, but I am pretty sure, that is what you heard about.

[jominor]

Check you decoder. I have an older ATI8500 and was originally using the Intervideo decoder. When I swiched to the hardware accelerated RAVISENT that came with the card, I was stunned by the quality difference.

Try using whatever decoder came with the card.

Second, use the color calibration in Sage 2.0. Again, when I tweaked the sharpness and brightness, I got a difference in picture quality as large as when I changed decoders.

My PQ is better than standard TV. Even the wife thinks so...

[srothwell]

I've heard everyone talking about NDVD.

Where do I get that?

[srothwell]

mikejaner,

You said you tweaked your overlay settings on your ATI card.

I did the same, and as many other people have reported in this forum, Sage resets the overlay settings to default the next time if wakes up, or more likely, loads a clip.

There doesn't seem to be anything that can be done to "lock" them.

Can you verify that your overlay settings were left as you set them and, if so, what did you do to do that?

Thanks,

Stacy

[kny3twalker]

pm me for info on NVDVD but I found they reset after reboots not when loading a new clip
this was a few drivers ago though on the ATI side and I think I tried it again after that on a later driver and it was fine
just depends I guess on whether ATI has broken that feature or not

[glbrown]

The current ATI catalyst drivers only support overlay settings for the overlay that's currently open. Change shows in sage or any application and the settings reset to defaults.

This has been busted for awhile and no fix is in sight. This is the stupidest bug/design flaw I have ever seen and the ATI people should be flayed.

[stanger89]

Well it took them I think 11 revisions to fix the interlaced overlay bug

[x[corwyn]]

The output from my xcard is outstanding. It looks better than direct cable hook up. My crappy 27" TV in my room has a better looking picture than the Sony Wega with dircet cable input now. Of course if I didn't have to have a 2nd monitor for OSD it would be donwstairs (HINT HINT Get OSD on the Xcard, look at all the people bitching about visual quality!!!!) on the Sony. Point being if you have the ability to have a monitor and TV together, the XCard is the bomb.