What to use for MKV

[blammo585]

I just did a complete reinstall of Windows on my HTPC, and this time I went with Vista. I'm still going to run SageTV, however. With the last install I could not get MKV's to play in SageTV with 5.1 sound. They would play in Media Player Classic HC in 5.1, but not SageTV. When I tried playing in Sage, it plays in 2 channel mode and my receiver decodes it as Pro Logic II. I had AC3 Filter installed, but apparently it's not using AC3 Filter because it doesn't show up in the tray when the MKV is playing. I want to know what I need to install to play an MKV before I install anything this time. Right now everything is still pretty minimal. I've only installed Sage, PowerDVD 7 & 9, and AC3 Filter. Usually I install Matroska Splitter to get MKVs to play.

[babgvant]

To play mkv via directshow most people use the Haali splitter (make sure sage is configured to use directshow).

Ac3Filter will passthrough ac3 and dts to the receiver if you set the output mode to spdif (check this by running ac3config found in the sage dir).

MPCHC has it's own splitter, if you prefer it you can dl the standalone filter from sourceforge.

[jphipps]

I friend of mine that is a big media center guy sent me this link http://shark007.net/ for a codec pack. i have not tried it yet, I usually use CCCP, but he said this one was even better...

Thanks,
Jeff

[babgvant]

just say no to codec packs.

[MitchSchaft]

codec packs will cause troubles eventually. Avoid at all costs! ffdshow and Haali media splitter is all you need.

[babgvant]

I like to stay away from ffdshow too, it installs with crazy merit and wants to decode everything.

My box has:

- haali
- xvid decoder (much better PQ v. ffdshow IMO)
- commercial decoders for h.264, VC-1
- ac3filter

If you want to skip the commercial decoders you can try the MPCHC h.264 decoder, haali will use the WMV DMO for VC-1 so you don't need a subsititute for that, and either use the MS MPEG decoder for ATSC and DVDs or add AVIVO to the mix.

For more exotic types you may need ffshow, but you'll want to configure it to only decode those types.

[MitchSchaft]

I'll have to check out xvid. Does it do .mp4's, too?

[babgvant]

OOTB the xvid decoder is configured to support DIVX, DX50, and mp4v FourCCs in addition to XVID.

you'd need a mp4 splitter, but it should work if you have one of those.

directshow filters are [mostly] agnostic to the other stages in the pipeline. if the content can come out of the container the decoder doesn't care where it came from.

one more upside to having xvid installed is that DTB can use the encoder for compressing tv files

[Taddeusz]

The current version of Xvid does not support H.264/AVC. You'll need ffmpeg, Cyberlink, Arcsoft or some other decoder for that.

Also, ffmpeg does not support hardware acceleration. It is strictly a software decoder. Cyberlink and Arcsoft decoders can be configured to support full hardware acceleration of MPEG2 and H.264 video if you have the video card to support it.

[blammo585]

I just installed Matroska Splitter and the mkv is playing in Sage. However, once again the audio is only playing as stereo. I tried playing the same file in VMC and it's playing in 5.1. I have AC3 Filter set as someone said, but I don't think Sage is using AC3 Filter. It doesn't show up in the tray when the file is playing. Sage is set to use DirectShow. What else can I try?

[MitchSchaft]

Originally Posted by babgvant

My box has:

- haali
- xvid decoder (much better PQ v. ffdshow IMO)
- commercial decoders for h.264, VC-1
- ac3filter

What commercial decoders do you like? Is nvidia's pure platinum too old?

[blammo585]

What do you mean by commercial decoders? I use Cyberlink's decoder for Video and DVD playback. I opened an mkv with graphedit and the audio shows that it goes from the file, to AC3 Filter, and on to the Default DirectSound device. This is how it should be, right? I noticed that while playing the mkv in Sage and looking at Task Manager, it shows SageTV and SageTV Player. Should it show SageTV player as in use? I've never payed attention before while any other video was playing; I thought it just shows SageTV. Is it trying to use SageTV player instead of DirectShow. I have use DirectShow selected in the menu. I also noticed when I tried playing the file while I was recording in SageTV that the mkv's playback was jumpy and the audio was out of sync (I'm pretty sure I could use some more RAM, but does this also mean that it's not using hardware acceleration?). I really need to get this to working. I compared playback in VMC to playback in Sage; while VMC has 5.1 audio, the video quality is worse. I noticed more edges to objects in VMC. With Sage, the picture looked a lot smoother/better, but the audio is only stereo.

[babgvant]

Originally Posted by MitchSchaft

What commercial decoders do you like? Is nvidia's pure platinum too old?

If you're running XP the Nvidia decoder is an excellent choice. It doesn't work right on Vista though.

my decoder setup (off the top of my head):

VC-1: ArcSoft*
h.264: Cyberlink*
DVD: Cyberlink*
MPEG (ATSC): ATI MPEG Decoder (AVIVO) - best CC support IMO
DTS MA: ArcSoftAudioWrap*
AC3: Ac3Filter
Divx Variants: Xvid Decoder


* commercial decoders

[babgvant]

Originally Posted by blammo585

What do you mean by commercial decoders? I use Cyberlink's decoder for Video and DVD playback. I opened an mkv with graphedit and the audio shows that it goes from the file, to AC3 Filter, and on to the Default DirectSound device. This is how it should be, right? I noticed that while playing the mkv in Sage and looking at Task Manager, it shows SageTV and SageTV Player. Should it show SageTV player as in use? I've never payed attention before while any other video was playing; I thought it just shows SageTV. Is it trying to use SageTV player instead of DirectShow. I have use DirectShow selected in the menu. I also noticed when I tried playing the file while I was recording in SageTV that the mkv's playback was jumpy and the audio was out of sync (I'm pretty sure I could use some more RAM, but does this also mean that it's not using hardware acceleration?). I really need to get this to working. I compared playback in VMC to playback in Sage; while VMC has 5.1 audio, the video quality is worse. I noticed more edges to objects in VMC. With Sage, the picture looked a lot smoother/better, but the audio is only stereo.

sageclient.properties -

always_use_dshow_player=true

[MitchSchaft]

Outstanding, thanks!

[blammo585]

Where is the Sage.properties file? I'm not seeing it. I'm using Vista. When I had Sage installed on XP, I had no trouble finding the file. The only thing I see is sage.properties.default. But that's not it. Everything in it starts with "ui\...". There's a file just called "Sage", but that's a .jar file. Why am I not seeing it?

[babgvant]

Originally Posted by blammo585

Where is the Sage.properties file? I'm not seeing it. I'm using Vista. When I had Sage installed on XP, I had no trouble finding the file. The only thing I see is sage.properties.default. But that's not it. Everything in it starts with "ui\...". There's a file just called "Sage", but that's a .jar file. Why am I not seeing it?

http://forums.sagetv.com/forums/show...402#post237402

that said, I change the permissions on the sage tv folder giving users full access so I can leave UAC on and still have sage play nice with the files.