MyTheatre DVB Network Encoder Plugin

[technazz]

Ok this plug is has been running great for a while and now Im have Freezing problems and Im getting corrupt files that can play but only around 20 secs or so even though the file is an hour long(2 GIG). It doesn't not play in VLC or WMP. THis happens randomly or if my CPU spikes up a little> I have a 3 GIG processor with 1 gig or ram so I think its good enough.

Now it may be a few different things that are causing this but I wanted to know how you guys are setting up the graphs and audio in My Theatre.

Does it really matter since we are running in headless mode?

Can you guys post your settings for Graphs and Audio to use with MTSage. Im trying to narrow down the problem.

thanks

Technazz

[peterjb]

You're correct in that when running in headless mode what graph's MT have defined for use are largely irrelevant. I do however have autograph setup in MT and specify the video/audio/render to what I have defined for SageTV. In my case Sonic,AC3Filter and Overlay(Generic).

What version of MT are you using and what type of program are you recording? There are a number of issue on the MT support forum regarding MT 3.33.5 recording issues and corruptions in HD recording. There is thesuggestion that increasing the size of the timeshift buffer in memory may alleviate the issue somewhat. I've gone back to 3.33.3 and I haven't had any noticeable problems with recording.

Cheers

Peter

[lirender]

Peter,

Thanks for all the hard work on this great plugin. Unfortunately I've struggled getting my system stable after upgrading to a new ASUS a8n-vm cst board. I just can't get MyTheatre stable (using Nvidia's PureVideo) so I've stopped using your plugin & Sage for the last couple of months.

I've been extremely happy using Herby's free RitzDVB (www.ritzdvb.com) app instead of MyTheatre and for me (any many others I've read) it is as stable as the surface of a granite optical workbench. What makes it even more exciting is I'm now getting 1-2 second channel change time (I actually use the CH+- now)! MyTheatre was always much longer.

Ritz is based on the old "open" DVBCore by Saar and thus uses the std plugins API. I was thinking it shouldn't be too hard to get your plugin compatible with it. I think everyone would appreciate the faster resulting channel change times. Its clean and stable but I miss the great features in SageTV .

I'm going to try dropping the plugin into Ritz tonight. Any suggestions?

Thanks

(I've had really weird problems with the menus not rendering/refreshing in Sage with this new Nvidia 6150 motherboard. Anyone out there with a 6150 motherboard successfully using this plugin?)

[Alfiegerner]

Originally Posted by lirender

I'm going to try dropping the plugin into Ritz tonight.

Looking forward to seeing how you get on.

[peterjb]

If RitzDVB provides full DVBCore API support, the essentials of the plugin may work. The Plugin also looks at the command line options provided to MT and relies on the MT Plugin directory structure. The main issue you will probably have is the Channels database - Does RitzDVB have one? And if so, does it look like the one in MT? If it doesn't the plugin will not work at all!

The reason the channel changes are so muck quicker than the current version of MT is the version of MT that RitzDVB is based on. MT 3.12, by all accounts was/is quicker to change channels than any later version. The downside of that version of MT is a lack of device support and some mpg compatibility issues. From memory - It didn't support some of my DVB-T devices and didn't do BDA compatible devices at all. The mpg files that it records are also not in a suitable format to be burned directly to DVD and have some issues with FF & RW functionality during playback.

Having said that, If you can source a copy of MT 3.12. You can simply drop the current version of plugin into the plugins directory and it should work with those devices that the version of MT Supports.

Cheers

Peter

[lirender]

Thanks for the hints. Sound like the db will be an issuee. Ritz uses a Channels.dat file instead of a Channels.mdb file. I think SharpC's channel editor can convert Ritz to MyTheatre. If I drop a syncronized Channels.mdb, will your plugin see it or does it go through a DVBCore API to access?

I couldn't find a MyTheatre 3.12. Anyone know where I might get it?

Thanks

[lirender]

No luck. I copied a working Channels.mdb to the main RitzDVB folder and copied a working plugins folder there as well. Got an error message in german (see attached screenshot).

I think I will pursue getting MyTheatre working...

Thanks

[rickgillyon]

What sort of card do you have?
Have you tried the latest SageTV Beta with no plugin?

[technazz]

Originally Posted by rickgillyon

What sort of card do you have?
Have you tried the latest SageTV Beta with no plugin?

How is the latest Beat working with this plugin??

I havent bothered until i hear good news!


technazz

[rickgillyon]

Originally Posted by technazz

How is the latest Beat working with this plugin??

I wouldn't know, as I said you don't need a plugin to watch DVB-T with the latest Beta. I have four DVB-T tuners running rock-solid with SageTV as native tuners, why would I use this plugin too?

If the card you have is not yet working with Sage, these plugins will provide some cover, but I've no idea why anyone wouldn't be rushing to try their DVB-T with the new version!

[peterjb]

Originally Posted by technazz

How is the latest Beat working with this plugin??

I havent bothered until i hear good news!


technazz

The latest beta works very well with the plugin. I can now get playback of HD from LiveTV and recordings with no issues at all. I'm even tempted to install it on my main rig..

I can also report that the DVB-T support in the beta works well - I'm having issues ( that I'm working through with SageTV Development ) with rendering HD content. LiveTV video in the beta seems to sometines stutter a bit compared to LiveTV recorded through the plugin, but I'm sure that will be ironed out. I'm pretty sure that I will be looking to move to native DVB-T support once all the kinks are ironed out.

Cheers

Peter

[johnnytyler]

Peter, or anybody else

1st I'd like to thank you for this great plugin it's awesome, I use DVB-S, so keep up the good work esp. since I don't use DVB-T yet. I was wondering if you have noticed that the picture quality on SageTV is not as good as in native Mytheatre even when using the exact same codecs. I think SageTV encodes the information and has lower quality than Mytheatre, I was wondering if there are any tweaks that I can use to improve pic quality. By the way I am using FFDSHOW which has helped but is still not as "crisp" as native mytheatre. Colors are slightly off and sharpness is certainly off. Any help would be appreciated

[johnnytyler]

Oh and by the way does AC3 work on the latest beta and has the end of show been fixed??

[xred]

Originally Posted by johnnytyler

Peter, or anybody else

1st I'd like to thank you for this great plugin it's awesome, I use DVB-S, so keep up the good work esp. since I don't use DVB-T yet. I was wondering if you have noticed that the picture quality on SageTV is not as good as in native Mytheatre even when using the exact same codecs. I think SageTV encodes the information and has lower quality than Mytheatre, I was wondering if there are any tweaks that I can use to improve pic quality. By the way I am using FFDSHOW which has helped but is still not as "crisp" as native mytheatre. Colors are slightly off and sharpness is certainly off. Any help would be appreciated

Yep I have noticed this too. I get bad interlacing on channels from mytheatre but not on the one from my cable tuner.

Are you using Mytheatre on the same PC as Sage is installed? Or are you accessing the Mytheatre tuners over a network? I access mine over a wired network and I get bad interlacing on high motion or animated content.

[technazz]

Originally Posted by johnnytyler

Peter, or anybody else

1st I'd like to thank you for this great plugin it's awesome, I use DVB-S, so keep up the good work esp. since I don't use DVB-T yet. I was wondering if you have noticed that the picture quality on SageTV is not as good as in native Mytheatre even when using the exact same codecs. I think SageTV encodes the information and has lower quality than Mytheatre, I was wondering if there are any tweaks that I can use to improve pic quality. By the way I am using FFDSHOW which has helped but is still not as "crisp" as native mytheatre. Colors are slightly off and sharpness is certainly off. Any help would be appreciated

Im getting the same results in picture quality for SAGE/MTusing the new ATI Cyberlink decoders.

If you record a show in MT.. then Play in Windows Media or other Player.. is it the same??

Try recoding with MT then import the MPG into SageTV and see if its the same.. that will rule out the Plugin.

Ive noticed you can set the DVD quality for each tuner. Try Changing it for the Network encoder tuner. I had mine set at the highest seting I changed it to best and it helped.

Also in MT setting the buffer to about 100-150 Meg instead of 10 Meg.

Technazz

[peterjb]

Originally Posted by johnnytyler

Peter, or anybody else

1st I'd like to thank you for this great plugin it's awesome, I use DVB-S, so keep up the good work esp. since I don't use DVB-T yet. I was wondering if you have noticed that the picture quality on SageTV is not as good as in native Mytheatre even when using the exact same codecs. I think SageTV encodes the information and has lower quality than Mytheatre, I was wondering if there are any tweaks that I can use to improve pic quality. By the way I am using FFDSHOW which has helped but is still not as "crisp" as native mytheatre. Colors are slightly off and sharpness is certainly off. Any help would be appreciated

I must admit, that I have never spent a lot of time watching MT nativel, so I can't draw any real conclusions. Video quality is always subjective and can depend on a large number of factors, such as what hardware/software you have as well as your personal taste. As an example of the hardware/software factors, one of the rigs I do development on is a W2K P4 1.8 Intel 845G chipset with integrated graphics and native MT is unwatchable on it - I mean it's really cr*p - It stutters , is jerky and has block artefacts all over the place. The same rig using SageTV and the plugin and the same video/audio codecs as MT, is more than acceptable - In fact I spent last week watching the Australian Open and the Cricket on and off on it at work - So go figure..

Having said that I'm generally pretty happy with my current SageTV video setup. I run Overlay, Sonic 2.31 video codec, ATI Catalyst 6.1 drivers, Powerstrip ( for PAL timings ) on my Radeon 9600 Pro connected to my TH42-PW4 plasmas vga port. As of yet, I haven't tweaked my setup using Avia or video essentials ( My wife is about to kill me if I don't stop fiddling ) - so the likelihood is that it should only get better.

I agree with Technazz, that making the timeshift buffer larger in MT does seem to produce a noticeable difference in the quality of the recorded mpeg - especially for HD recordings. But it does slow down your channel changes! I've learn't to live with it.

Cheers

Peter

[Motofreak75]

I found the problem (for me) with video quailty (in HDTV) is not with MT since i don't run timeshift feature in MT (ver 3.33.3), but with decoder setup with sage. I have been using Nvidia (ver185) in VMR9 with FSE. using Pete's plugin in 1080i mode and it is working great. If you have a good video card and have matched sages decoder settings to Nvidia settings.

Because if you have just set in sage to use VM9, then it will not produce a great video stream and it looked funny on my big sony tv. I had to manual set the nvidia decoders in windows media player to use VMR9. Once I did that, it was a like night and day in terms with cpu usage and video quality.

[johnnytyler]

wow well thanks for the great replies

My system is set up as:
Intel 3.6, 1 gig ram, ATI x800, latest ATI drivers
SageTV 4.0 (not upgraded yet),
Mytheatre 3.3.5
Codecs Cyberlink (off PowerDVD 6), default with FFDSHOW
not using NVIDEO yet because had probs in the past dont remember what version,
FSE on or off produces same pic
I Have it outputed to a Sony RPTV via DVI

Mytheatre outputed to RPTV is noticably sharper and almost HDTV quality using my ffdshow setting with no stutters. SageTV on the other hand is not as sharp and looks somewhat pixelated.

I will certainly try increasing the buffer in MyTheatre, but I would hate to have more channel lag as I'm already avg 5-8 sec.

I was also wondering if you guys have tried the SageMC 16x9 STV and if that has worked well with you

[johnnytyler]

Oh forgot to mention my capture card is Twinhan 1020a

[johnnytyler]

MotorFreak75, how did you set the plugin to output 1080i, and how did you change your NVIDEO codecs in Media player. I have also had a problem setting up ffdshow with the NVIDEO codecs in SageTV hence the reason for using cyberlink