SageTV Overlay not working *VMR does*

[mattsm]

Does anyone have any idea why Overlay would just be showing a blank screen? Sounds comes through, but I can't for the life of my figure out why Overlay isnt working!! I've tried several codecs: Cyberlink, Nvidia, SageTV...

By the way VMR9 is working fine....

-M

[mattsm]

Of course right after I wrote this, I realize it is just not working on my second monitor. Any idea why that stopped working?

-M

[stanger89]

Overlay often (usually?) doesn't work on the secondary display.

[Opus4]

Originally Posted by mattsm

Of course right after I wrote this, I realize it is just not working on my second monitor. Any idea why that stopped working?

Do you mean it used to work? If so, did you change video cards?

What version of Windows is it? I think Vista went backwards in terms of overlay support.

What video card do you have, and is its driver up to date?

Do you have any other video decoders installed? In my experience, it has been a matter of the decoder not supporting overlay on a secondary monitor, not a video card limitation. The SageTV MPEG Video Decoder doesn't work with overlay on a secondary monitor on my PC, but "Intervideo NonCSS Video Decoder for Hauppauge" (came with a Hauppauge card I guess) does.

Try installing Placeshifter on that PC & try running it on the secondary monitor. In the PS Servers Manager, go to the Settings dialog and make sure "Enable 3D Acceleration" is not checked. I know that uses overlay & it definitely is able to play video on a secondary monitor, so you might try it to test your video card.

Originally Posted by stanger89

Overlay often (usually?) doesn't work on the secondary display.

Have video cards taken a step backwards? They've been supporting overlay on secondary monitors for years... but I've heard that overlay is now actually emulated on some of the newer video cards, so I don't know if that means they've stopped supporting its use on secondary monitors. Or, as I said above, it is often a decoder limitation instead of a video card limitation.

- Andy

[Ryokurin]

Originally Posted by Opus4

Do you mean it used to work? If so, did you change
Have video cards taken a step backwards? They've been supporting overlay on secondary monitors for years... but I've heard that overlay is now actually emulated on some of the newer video cards, so I don't know if that means they've stopped supporting its use on secondary monitors. Or, as I said above, it is often a decoder limitation instead of a video card limitation.

- Andy

Higher end ones like some Matrox cards supported overlay on secondary monitors, but for the most part if a modern card did overlay on secondary, it was rendering in software, and likely tore the video, at least in my experience.

[mattsm]

Originally Posted by Opus4

Do you mean it used to work? If so, did you change video cards?

What version of Windows is it? I think Vista went backwards in terms of overlay support.

What video card do you have, and is its driver up to date?

Do you have any other video decoders installed? In my experience, it has been a matter of the decoder not supporting overlay on a secondary monitor, not a video card limitation. The SageTV MPEG Video Decoder doesn't work with overlay on a secondary monitor on my PC, but "Intervideo NonCSS Video Decoder for Hauppauge" (came with a Hauppauge card I guess) does.

Try installing Placeshifter on that PC & try running it on the secondary monitor. In the PS Servers Manager, go to the Settings dialog and make sure "Enable 3D Acceleration" is not checked. I know that uses overlay & it definitely is able to play video on a secondary monitor, so you might try it to test your video card.

Have video cards taken a step backwards? They've been supporting overlay on secondary monitors for years... but I've heard that overlay is now actually emulated on some of the newer video cards, so I don't know if that means they've stopped supporting its use on secondary monitors. Or, as I said above, it is often a decoder limitation instead of a video card limitation.

- Andy

I upgraded SageTV to the latest version and I believe I also upgrade the NVIDIA drivers. I'm not sure why NVIDIA would disable this feature if it worked before. But, then again... who knows. I'm running XP with the latest NVIDIA drivers (178.24).

[Opus4]

Originally Posted by Ryokurin

Higher end ones like some Matrox cards supported overlay on secondary monitors, but for the most part if a modern card did overlay on secondary, it was rendering in software, and likely tore the video, at least in my experience.

I don't know anything about that technical detail, but I would think it should still work better than VMR9 on a secondary monitor.

I've been using overlay full screen at 1600x1200 on my secondary monitor & haven't noticed tearing or any other problems. I'm using an older nVidia GeForce 7800 GT. For a 1080i recording, I get about the same 30% cpu usage for the primary & secondary monitors. (primary is 1920x1200)

Originally Posted by mattsm

I upgraded SageTV to the latest version and I believe I also upgrade the NVIDIA drivers. I'm not sure why NVIDIA would disable this feature if it worked before. But, then again... who knows. I'm running XP with the latest NVIDIA drivers (178.24).

So you mean it used to work for you? If so & you still have the older video drivers, I would try reverting.

Can you try Placeshifter, like I mentioned above?

- Andy

[mattsm]

Originally Posted by Opus4

So you mean it used to work for you? If so & you still have the older video drivers, I would try reverting.

Can you try Placeshifter, like I mentioned above?

- Andy

I will try reverting, but I upgraded for other reasons. If I have time I will give Placeshifter a shot. As a side note, Windows Media Player works fine on the second monitor and I am pretty sure it is using overlay.

-M

[Ryokurin]

http://www.firingsquad.com/news/news...searchid=20948

180 betas were released yesterday as well. Meant for 8, 9, and gtx 200 cards. I haven't tried these, but just posting a link incase older drivers don't help.

[mattsm]

Originally Posted by Ryokurin

http://www.firingsquad.com/news/news...searchid=20948

180 betas were released yesterday as well. Meant for 8, 9, and gtx 200 cards. I haven't tried these, but just posting a link incase older drivers don't help.

I was looking for BETAs, I will try these first as I think I was using a BETA version before.

Thanks,

-M