Stutter, stutter, stutter, stutter

[sgraves66]

Here's the deal. I have an ATI x1950 pro w/256MB successfully running SageTV Client @1080i using Overlay (stutters like crazy in VMR9). Nice card, but decided to upgrade to an 8600GTS. Not only does Overlay stutter like theres no tomorrow but also VMR9. I have Cyberlink, Intervideo and PureVideo codecs installed. I've been using one specific video to test each codec - all stutter in the exact same place in VMR9 (whether FSE is enabled or not). So, I decided to head back to the store and pick-up an 8800GT to test. Same stutter in the exact same place in the same file on the new card. So, I pop my handy X1950 back in, no stutter in Overlay but of course stutters in VMR9. Now I'm dead set on getting VMR9 to work. Soooo, I head back to the store to try to hunt down an HD3870 - no luck, so I instead get an HD2600 pro. Same stutter in VMR9 and stutters in Overlay.

I'm willing to troubleshoot until I drop dead. I have a few more days left until I need to return these guys. Until then, I have an x1950, 8800GT, 8600GTS and an HD2600. I would think that the x1950 is plenty of card to handle VMR9, maybe I'm wrong.

CPU usage is consistent in VMR9 on all cards (~10-11%) which tells me hardware acceleration is working. Enabling FSE doesn't really appear to help. With all the cards, except the x1950, Overlay also stutters. Very frustrating because I can playback the exact same test file in MediaPlayer without any problem.

[sgraves66]

If anyone has a working system utilizing vmr9 and any of the aforementioned cards, please post your motherboard and video card model.

[briands]

You may want to read this thread. Seems the sage decoder in the latest versions has problems giving up to other decoders and does not seem to perform very well.

[sgraves66]

I finally was able to get my existing x1950 to work stutter free and returned the others. After reinstalling the ATI WDM for AVIVO, enabling VMR9 and setting the decoder to Default everything started working. As for the Nvidia cards, I have no idea what the problem may have been.

Thanks for the info - I'm going to read that topic as well.

[sgraves66]

After doing a bit more research, I noticed that DXVA was not enabled and I was using the Sage MPEG decoder. CPU usage was ~44-50% although VMR9 playback was smooth. As soon as I forced the Cyberlink decoder to be used, CPU usage dropped to the normal ~10% (DXVA enabled) but the stutter returned.

To correct the stutter, I needed to change Avivo video settings in ATI Catalyst Control Center. By default, "Use automatic deinterlacing" is checked. This needed to be unchecked and forced to "Adaptive". I'm not entirely sure why this worked; however, after doing a few google searches, this setting appears to correct most video playback issues regardless of application being used.

Since this corrects the ATI card issues, I'm assuming there are similar settings for Nvidia cards although I no longer have one available to test.

[sgraves66]

Ok. More problems... Even though the "Adaptive" setting for deinterlace appears to retain in Catalyst Control Center after reboot, the stutter reappears after each. To correct this, I have to manually change the deinterlace mode to another value then back to "Adaptive".

I'm thinking of rebuilding my box at this point. I've even used Rad Light to ensure the correct graph is being built (no Sage decoders/demux). It's obviously a software/driver related issue but not sure my box is now the best platform to use for troubleshooting further. I've been switching between ATI radeon drivers and Omega drivers. This time I'm going to setup 4 partitions with clean XP/Vista32 installs. 1 for XP Omega, 1 for XP ATI, 1 Vista ATI, 1 clean.

[vapochilled]

Wish I could offer help, but I'm suffering with Sage right now also.
My system is easily twice the speed of my old HTPC, yet is suffering stutter right out of the box, even with a box standard install. Shame you have to mess with software like this to make it play nice.
Keep us posted, lot of people watching this I'm sure.

[mikesm]

Originally Posted by sgraves66

Ok. More problems... Even though the "Adaptive" setting for deinterlace appears to retain in Catalyst Control Center after reboot, the stutter reappears after each. To correct this, I have to manually change the deinterlace mode to another value then back to "Adaptive".

I'm thinking of rebuilding my box at this point. I've even used Rad Light to ensure the correct graph is being built (no Sage decoders/demux). It's obviously a software/driver related issue but not sure my box is now the best platform to use for troubleshooting further. I've been switching between ATI radeon drivers and Omega drivers. This time I'm going to setup 4 partitions with clean XP/Vista32 installs. 1 for XP Omega, 1 for XP ATI, 1 Vista ATI, 1 clean.

Ok, I have great performance from my AT 2600, but you really need the right drivers. On the main ATI 2400,2600 thread on avsforums, you will find some links to modified drivers. I have had excellent luck with the arfster 7.7 modified drivers on my 2600 for MPEG2 playback using the Cyberlink decoder in PowerDVD 7. Wipe out what you have now, install that driver, then the cyberlink decoders (set use hardware acceleration in the powerdvd setup), and then set Sage to use them I think you'll like the result.

The sad truth is that most of the ATI and Nvidia drivers are optimized for gaming and not HD playback. It takes a LOT of work to get the things to work just right. Also, please read over the known working configs found in this thread: http://forums.sagetv.com/forums/showthread.php?t=26297.

I wish the Sage folks would take more ownership over certifying hardware/software configs, or at least disclosing the configs they test with. They have expressed a preferenace for ATI hardware, and I have found ATI gear seems to be easier to make work with Sage, or least their drivers aren't so broken as nvidias.

Of course, with the HD extender out now, maybe they have less reason to debug all this crap, as an easier solution now exists. :-)

[sgraves66]

Thanks for the info. Some of what I've tried has also come from the avsforums. I've never had any issue with Overlay rendering with the x1950, but I know vmr9 should work and prefer the menu transparency. Besides, it's a feature of the SageTV product and should work regardless.

I'm not as concerned with Sage qualifying exact hardware so much as getting their bundled codec/software to work properly with Nvidia and ATI and building/configuring the filter graphs (even driver settings) according to the hardware installed. I've played around with the directshow api's but recently switched to libvlc (VideoLAN) for video playback - no issues with stutter in my projects; however, I'm also not trying to overlay images.

On the upside, I know that my card does work - just a matter of determining exactly what has to be done for the required settings to retain.

As far as the HD extender goes, considering the overall price of a client system, it seems like a pretty nice alternative (waiting on more feedback from users, tho) If they added a DVD (HD/Blueray combo) drive to it, I'd be more inclined to purchase immediately.

[sgraves66]

Originally Posted by vapochilled

Wish I could offer help, but I'm suffering with Sage right now also.
My system is easily twice the speed of my old HTPC, yet is suffering stutter right out of the box, even with a box standard install. Shame you have to mess with software like this to make it play nice.
Keep us posted, lot of people watching this I'm sure.

What's your current setup? (video card, etc)

[vapochilled]

Asus M2A-VM HDMI mother board, 3 GIG of OCZ PC2 6400 memory
AMD AM2 X64 4000 x2
Currently running an Nvidia 8400GS, that's going to go in favour of a PNY8600 GT.
Even with the 8400 I should be able to run sage and watch video! but it simply stutters all the time.
I've opened a ticket, but if there's no answer, I'll have to ask for a refund and go back to V4, at least it worked.
I ran an XP2600 with 512 meg of ram for 4 over 3 years and the damn thing never skipped a beat.
The new PC should be so much better, I don't get it, and the forums seem so quiet these days.
Are people giving up on sage or is it just a small handful that are having issues?

[kevine]

See my posts in this thread to get the HD2600 Pro working.
http://forums.sagetv.com/forums/show...617#post246617

I think the key is the AVS Forum registry tweaks but I did many of those things a the same time.

I do not stutter in any codec, overlay or VMR9, FSE yes or no.Currently I am using Sage verion 6.3.5 and the Sage codec with hardware acc. enabled.

[mkanet]

SageTV is one getting closer and close to fixing this problem once in for all... well, at least for people choosing to use Vista.

Hardware acceleration in their mpeg2 video decoder is just a stepping stone necessary for EVR.

[joenobody33]

Originally Posted by sgraves66

To correct the stutter, I needed to change Avivo video settings in ATI Catalyst Control Center. By default, "Use automatic deinterlacing" is checked. This needed to be unchecked and forced to "Adaptive". I'm not entirely sure why this worked; however, after doing a few google searches, this setting appears to correct most video playback issues regardless of application being used.

I have also been having a slight stuttering problem with some videos. Once i set the deinterlacing method to "Adaptive" everything seems perfect. But now the "Pulldown detection" button is grayed out. Does this mean the ATI card is no longer doing inverse telecine on film content?

[mikesm]

Originally Posted by mkanet

SageTV is one getting closer and close to fixing this problem once in for all... well, at least for people choosing to use Vista.

Hardware acceleration in their mpeg2 video decoder is just a stepping stone necessary for EVR.

Ha! I will believe that when I see it. These guys have a religious objection to EVR - I think hell will freeze over before we see EVR support in Sage. I would love to be proven wrong, but noone from Sage has ever admitted that this is on the features list. Without it, Vista playback will always be dicey.

Just face up to it - it's the cost of doing business on the MSFT platform.

[mikesm]

Originally Posted by sgraves66

Thanks for the info. Some of what I've tried has also come from the avsforums. I've never had any issue with Overlay rendering with the x1950, but I know vmr9 should work and prefer the menu transparency. Besides, it's a feature of the SageTV product and should work regardless.

I'm not as concerned with Sage qualifying exact hardware so much as getting their bundled codec/software to work properly with Nvidia and ATI and building/configuring the filter graphs (even driver settings) according to the hardware installed. I've played around with the directshow api's but recently switched to libvlc (VideoLAN) for video playback - no issues with stutter in my projects; however, I'm also not trying to overlay images.

On the upside, I know that my card does work - just a matter of determining exactly what has to be done for the required settings to retain.

As far as the HD extender goes, considering the overall price of a client system, it seems like a pretty nice alternative (waiting on more feedback from users, tho) If they added a DVD (HD/Blueray combo) drive to it, I'd be more inclined to purchase immediately.

BTW, I find the ATI 7.7 drivers, with the registry tweaks here: http://exdeus.home.comcast.net/~exdeus/ati-hd2x00/
work very well on my HD2600 under XP. I have the avivo settings set to use vector adaptive only with pulldown detection, and have excellent 1080i playback, though I am using VMR9 and FSE.

Vista will always be dicey until Sage does EVR. Once I got my power management settings right under XP, I dumped Vista and upgraded to XP and got some benefits in playback.

This is all using the PowerDVD 7 codec set. It also had the side benefit of dealing with an incredibly annoying problem of certain of my old replaytv recordings killing the audio subsystem in Vista. Literally, if I played one of those recordings in WMP, Sage, etc..., the audio would cut out in my realtek HD audio driver (I use SPDIF), and not return until a reboot happened. Now I can play anything and not have problems, and I get bitperfect audio for music too.

thx
mike

[sgraves66]

Originally Posted by vapochilled

Asus M2A-VM HDMI mother board, 3 GIG of OCZ PC2 6400 memory
AMD AM2 X64 4000 x2
Currently running an Nvidia 8400GS, that's going to go in favour of a PNY8600 GT.
Even with the 8400 I should be able to run sage and watch video! but it simply stutters all the time.
I've opened a ticket, but if there's no answer, I'll have to ask for a refund and go back to V4, at least it worked.
I ran an XP2600 with 512 meg of ram for 4 over 3 years and the damn thing never skipped a beat.
The new PC should be so much better, I don't get it, and the forums seem so quiet these days.
Are people giving up on sage or is it just a small handful that are having issues?

I was using the M2A-VM HDMI, but switched to the M2N-E. I PXE-boot linux in hopes of installing diskless SageTV clients one day - the board had serious issues with kernel 2.6.22/23 and ACPI. As you mentioned, the on-board ATI1250 just didn't seem to be able to handle HD although it should be powerful enough. I may try it again based on these new findings.

[sgraves66]

Originally Posted by mikesm

BTW, I find the ATI 7.7 drivers, with the registry tweaks here: http://exdeus.home.comcast.net/~exdeus/ati-hd2x00/
work very well on my HD2600 under XP. I have the avivo settings set to use vector adaptive only with pulldown detection, and have excellent 1080i playback, though I am using VMR9 and FSE.

I actually found those guys after you mentioned the afster changes. After importing them, the stutter appears to be gone (even after reboot).

Just to clarify for the other folks, I returned my HD2600 and am using an X1950 Pro with the registry changes found in the link above. Here's what I have set:

"Fleshtone_DEF"="0"
"Fleshtone_DE_MIN"="0"
"ColorVibrance_DEF"="0"
"ColorVibrance_DE_MIN"="0"
"ColorVibrance_NA"="0"
"Fleshtone_NA"="0"
"DXVA_DetailEnhance"="0"
"DXVA_NOHDDECODE"="0"
"VForce24FPS1080MPEG2"="0"
"VForce24FPS1080H264"="0"
"VForce24FPS1080VC1"="0"
"DXVA_Only24FPS1080MPEG2"="0"
"DXVA_Only24FPS1080H264"="0"
"DXVA_Only24FPS1080VC1"="0"
"DXVA_WMV_NA"="0"
"SORTOverrideFPSCaps"="0"
"TrDenoise"="0"
"UseBT601CSC"="1"
"VForceMaxResSize"="2800000"
"SORTOverrideVidSizeCaps"="2800000"


I'm not entirely sure that they all apply to my specific card but it is working for the time being We'll see how long...

[sgraves66]

Originally Posted by joenobody33

I have also been having a slight stuttering problem with some videos. Once i set the deinterlacing method to "Adaptive" everything seems perfect. But now the "Pulldown detection" button is grayed out. Does this mean the ATI card is no longer doing inverse telecine on film content?

I've tried both "Vector adaptive" and "Motion adaptive" with "pulldown detection" enabled - both stutter for me. The only settings which work without stutter are "Adaptive", "Bob", and "Weave".

[mikesm]

Originally Posted by sgraves66

I've tried both "Vector adaptive" and "Motion adaptive" with "pulldown detection" enabled - both stutter for me. The only settings which work without stutter are "Adaptive", "Bob", and "Weave".

That maybe a 2600pro vs x1950 issue. UVD is the 2600 is pretty nice...

thx
mike