What decoders are being used for h.264 videos?

[phelme]

There have been some recent indications that the stand alone "MPC - Video Decoder" from the Media Player Classic project works as well for H.264.

Not to muddy this thread, but what about the audio videoframe/aac_audio_decoder_filter property? I think that would be important too.

[Opus4]

Originally Posted by phelme

Not to muddy this thread, but what about the audio videoframe/aac_audio_decoder_filter property? I think that would be important too.

I'm only focusing on one thing in this topic. There might be future topics like this in the future.

- Andy

[bastafidli]

I am using Nero Showtime to watch my h.264 videos on WinXP Laptop. I am not sure what decoder it is using or how would I configure it for Sage. If you could advice how to proceed I could test it for you.

[Opus4]

I'm guessing from waltraud's post w/the screen shot that you could see if the filter is listed in the "DirectShow Filter Manager" & use the name it shows (you can Google for that program if you don't have it)... but that only works if you know what filter to look for & if it is registered as a DirectShow filter. There may be a way to register it if isn't isn't registered, but that's beyond me at the moment.

- Andy

[bastafidli]

Andy, there are "Nero Video Decoder HD", "Nero Video Decoder", "Nero QuickTime(tm) Video Decoder" and possibly other. On this windows machine I am using only Sage Placeshifter. How can I configure it to use some particular filter? At this time the placeshifter plays my h.264 movies just fine but of course I don't know how to tell what decoder it is using .

[Opus4]

Originally Posted by bastafidli

On this windows machine I am using only Sage Placeshifter. How can I configure it to use some particular filter? At this time the placeshifter plays my h.264 movies just fine but of course I don't know how to tell what decoder it is using .

As far as I know, you don't configure that & Placeshifter uses its own player.

- Andy

[jarredduq]

I'm using ffdshow Video Decoder.

jd

[ghostlobster]

Looks like you're hearding cats here, Andy!

[setherd]

FFDshow because I can make it use vobsub and output subtitles. sometimes they just don't display correctly when they are embedded in the file itself.
I'd rather use powerdvd8 and haali splitter though

[Opus4]

Thanks, but I really only need info about decoder options not listed in the first post.


BTW: The v6.5.13 beta now contains an option to choose the H.264 video decoder in the UI. If anyone runs into issue about the decoders listed as 'known', please post here. If you need to select a video decoder from the full list of all decoders/filters, let me know the exact name of the filter you needed to be able to choose.

- Andy

[LehighBri]

I recently installed the new Windows 7 Release Candidate and love it so far. A big benefit over the beta released earlier this year is that Windows Media Player can natively play .ts H.264 recordings!

Note though that when I play the same .ts H.264 file in SageTV, I get a playback exception. I'm guessing this is because it doesn't know which H.264 decoder to use.

Question: What is the exact name of the H.264 decoder that comes built in with Windows 7 (the list that appears in the Sage UI does not recognize any H.264 decoders)? Once I have that, I plan to add that manually to my sage.properties file to try it out. Then maybe Sage could include it in the list of future H.264 decoders in a future release.

[martin]

Originally Posted by Taddeusz

Yea, I noticed the last update to 8 Ultra had the H.264 decoder dissapear. I had to roll back to the previous update.

You'd think that they would be happy that people are buying their product in order to use their DirectX filters.

They are, you just need to know which product to buy.

I bought PowerDVD 9 Ultra to get the directshow filter to use with the Sage Client. I couldn't get the "Cyberlink H.264/AVC Decoder" to work. Every time I tried to insert that filter in GraphEdit I got the message:

The filter could not be created. Resources used by this filter may already be in use.

(Return code: 0xc0000094)

Then I bought the Cyberlink HD264 Pack for WMP. After installing that, DirectShow Filter Manager lists additional filters; they are the same name as the Power DVD filters except the suffix is (HD264) instead of (PDVD9). In the SageClient.properties file I edited the h264 line to say:

videoframe/h264_video_decoder_filter=CyberLink H.264/AVC Decoder (HD264)

Now my HD-PVR encoded .ts files play with 2% to 10% CPU utilization in the Sage Client and Windows Media Player.

[Opus4]

Originally Posted by martin

In the SageClient.properties file I edited the h264 line to say:

videoframe/h264_video_decoder_filter=CyberLink H.264/AVC Decoder (HD264)

BTW: that decoder is known & already listed in the first post, so it should be selectable from within the SageTV UI; you shouldn't have to manually edit the propertied file for it.

- Andy

[martin]

Selectable in Sage Client v6.5.9? I don't see it. Where should I be looking?

I realize the working parameter was already listed, I just wanted to associate it with a product so others don't repeat my mistake. I just wasted $99.95 on Power DVD 9 when what I really needed was the HD264 pack which costs $39.95.

[Opus4]

Originally Posted by martin

Selectable in Sage Client v6.5.9? I don't see it. Where should I be looking?

I realize the working parameter was already listed, I just wanted to associate it with a product so others don't repeat my mistake. I just wasted $99.95 on Power DVD 9 when what I really needed was the HD264 pack which costs $39.95.

I knew what the main point of your post was; I was simply posting a reminder that it can be selected in the UI now. And, I just realized that two posts above yours mentions it was added to v6.5.13, so you don't have the UI option in v6.5.9.

- Andy

[SHS]

Originally Posted by martin

Selectable in Sage Client v6.5.9? I don't see it. Where should I be looking?

I realize the working parameter was already listed, I just wanted to associate it with a product so others don't repeat my mistake. I just wasted $99.95 on Power DVD 9 when what I really needed was the HD264 pack which costs $39.95.

Yup that got hurt

[Savage1701]

Not that I can think of any reason anyone would want it, but there is a hardware-intensive decoder that BTV uses. It may have a niche use.

If you want I can look it up and post it's name, which is not something obvious like "BTV H.264 decoder". But it does work fine on modern hardware.

Just an FWIW but probably as useless as "t**s on a boar pig" as my farming buddy used to say...

[fabiotv]

Originally Posted by Opus4

it was added to v6.5.13
- Andy

I have 6.5.13 but I don't see that option.
I installed Cyberlink PDVD7 h.264 codec (I can see it listed in Directshow filter manager but not in "control panel\sounds\... video codecs").
Is there anything I can/should do in order to have that option show up?
Thanks.

[Opus4]

Originally Posted by fabiotv

I have 6.5.13 but I don't see that option.

You don't see the decoder as an H.264 option or you don't see hte H.264 option in Detailed Setup -> Video/Audio -> H.264 Video Decoder Filter?

If you don't see the filter you want, but you see the H.264 option itself, choose the option to list all decoders.

If you don't see the H.264 option, make sure you are using the SageTV3.xml STV that gets installed with SageTV, not any customized STV.

- Andy

[fabiotv]

Originally Posted by Opus4

If you don't see the H.264 option, make sure you are using the SageTV3.xml STV that gets installed with SageTV, not any customized STV.

- Andy

OK, thanks. That was the culprit.