Official SageTV 3.0 Information

[GbrNole]

kny - i can now at least confirm what stanger has been stating for a couple of weeks being that the 67.03 drivers @ 1080i with anything other than dvi out works great in sage with no stuttering except for football games where extreme camera pans blur a bit.

i guess unless frey wants to do something about it then your only alternative will cost you the same either way for either a copy of mce2005 or buy a transcoder.

even though 1080i through a transcoder is working great for me now i still think i'm going to head over to the mce 2005 camp. it's still not perfect but at least i can play music AND cd's through the interface plus all vmr9 issues are eradicated.

the one thing that i can undoubtedly say for sure though is that the 6600gt picture at 1080i is much much better than my 5900xt. with no ffdshow etc. invoked just using plain old dxva i rewatched a couple of the movies that i had watched through the 6600gt and while the picture was good it just lacked that punch that the 6600gt provided.

all in all i know that the radeon cards are the easy way into vmr9 under any setup (provided you use the dongle) but i can't see the picture quality being any better than i currently get from the 5900xt i have.

[gplasky]

Saw this nice write-up on eHome and thought I would pass it on:

eHome writeup of Sage 3.0

Gerry

[stanger89]

That's just the press release posted by Dan.

[sudipto]

Not to criticize eHome or anything, but the the article seems nothing more than a ctrl-c/ctrl-v of the Sage press release during CES (that can be found in the accouncement forum here - http://forums.sage.tv/forums/showthread.php?t=9275)

[kny3twalker]

yeah I think it is ridicilous that SageTV will not even consider adding renderless exclusive mode VMR9
that is just stupid
what they are doing now eliminates 90% of the software decoding users from using VMR9 to an HDTV
with exclusive mode renderless VMR9 people with slower less able cards are able to use VMR9
now you either have to use component/ transcoders to the HDTV and have a fast video card
I am only having slight issues at 720p usually during football games and such
but when using apps like nstant media no problem
I really do not want another solution
I am going to see how the next nvidia driver update goes and sageTV to at least get 3.0 out now
I will probably jump ship at MCE 2006 if these problems have not gotten completely fixed (although I knew this is a long time, I might reconsider
sooner)
right now 720p looks about the same as 1080i on set for the most part

[stanger89]

Originally Posted by kny3twalker

yeah I think it is ridicilous that SageTV will not even consider adding renderless exclusive mode VMR9

Where'd you get that idea, I don't recall Frey ever saying they weren't going to do it.

[heffe2001]

I don't think MCE2006 is as far away as you think, I believe it goes into beta around March, for a 6 month beta cycle before release... Though that might be just an update to 2005.

Unless they break the 3 tuner total barrier though, I'll stick with Sage. If they DO allow more than 3 tuners (2 analog & 1 HD), I'll look at it, but still most likely won't switch (I've got way too much tied up in licensing, and I like the product even with the little bugs, gives me something to play with everyday ).

[kny3twalker]

Where'd you get that idea, I don't recall Frey ever saying they weren't going to do it.

well just from the fact they tell me
they are going to release an anouncement in a week
that should answer my question

they had nothing to say except Linux support and official MVP support

I do not see how either of those are related to playback issues

I think if Frey lets us know they were planning to add this even if not with beta 3.0 but only with the official release
I think many of us how find a way to get by until then
I have said I am willing to give them time
I just to do want to be wasting my time waiting for something that is not important to them
quality of video, playback, and stability should be the most important items

[ukmgranger]

I have to say that I'm really not happy with Frey using the MVP as their Sage Client box.

I use an MVP at the moment (with Matts plugin of course) and pretty good though it is, it is far, FAR from perfect. The very fact that you cant watch DVD's is just ridiculous. I am also getting major audio sync problems (it just drifts about randomly) and then there is the aspect ratio problems. On top of all this, you can't alter the brightness/contrast on the MVP which almost renders it useless on my LCD TV (increcibly angry about this one )

All in all, there are many problems with the MVP that Frey just won't be able to sort. I'm just dissapointed that they didn't come up with a better solution than the MVP.

[Wheemer]

kny3twalker, I too cannot beleive they haven't made the move to exclusive mode renderless VMR9. I was somewhat excited about 3.0 coming out with hopes that this would definately be addressed. I'm not sure what's involved with programming it in, but I'd hope it could even be looked at for the current beta.

It's sad that every time I'm watching anything I'm constantly aware of the inferiour playback. And I am not about to spend more money to solve the problem when it can be taken care of so easily by Sage. Also, this is the only major issue I have with SageTV, and it's a really big one. Beyond TV works fantastic and the playback is PERFECT even on my crappy MX 440 when using exclusive.

ukmgranger, I highly doubt Sage would be using an MVP officially if they hadn't worked out all the problems. It wouldn't be a very smart move.

[Cayars]

"taken care of so easily"

I'm not so sure this is the case. Having done a lot of programming with DirectX I wouldn't say this is the case at all. There is a lot of programming changes needed to do this.

Would it be worth it. YES, without a doubt!

Concerning the MVP. Nothing has been said one way or the other about this. I haven't even seen a message from Matt about the MVP client (in SageTV) so for all we know it could be his code that Frey has "licensed"?!?!?

[stanger89]

Re: VMR9 being "easy" I know Blight (Zoomplayer dev) said he had to hire some D3D developer to get some of the newer VMR9 stuff going in ZP.

Re: the MVP
I love this, for the last year, everyones been screaming for an MVP client, now that one's coming, everyone wants something better

And also, for those of you that want something better, did you miss the "we'll announce more clients..." comment from Dan?

[kny3twalker]

And also, for those of you that want something better, did you miss the "we'll announce more clients..." comment from Dan?

well I do not want another client but it could be nice
I have been still planning to get an MVP but I going to wait now for full support rather than dive into Matt's

and exclusive mode cannot be that
SageTV already did the hard part
renderless VMR9
exclusive mode is used for every video game so I would have to think this is something nearly perfected and not the hardest to impliment

[QUOTE"taken care of so easily"

I'm not so sure this is the case. Having done a lot of programming with DirectX I wouldn't say this is the case at all. There is a lot of programming changes needed to do this.

Would it be worth it. YES, without a doubt!
[/QUOTE]
but certainly sounds like they did the hard part already back with 2.0 beta

[stanger89]

Don't be so sure, ZP has had "windowless" (is that the same as renderless?) VMR9 for many versions, but Blight is only just now adding Exclusive mode, and had to get a D3D "expert" to get it done.

[kny3twalker]

no windowless and renderless are different
I believe BTV uses windowless and exclusive mode and there playback is worse than SageTV which uses renderless VMR9 and no exclusive mode

http://msdn.microsoft.com/library/de...aybackmode.asp

[krwren]

Will the new MVP client support DIVX?

[ukmgranger]

Originally Posted by stanger89

Re: the MVP
I love this, for the last year, everyones been screaming for an MVP client, now that one's coming, everyone wants something better

Damn right I want something better!!

I have been using the MVP for a while. It is pretty good, but not great at all. I want DVD's. Besides the MVP has problems with many things including time-shifting.

Grrrrrrrrrrrr

[kny3twalker]

Besides the MVP has problems with many things including time-shifting.

wait for official support
I am sure things will be better

[JasonJoel]

Not on my system it doesn't... I do it all the time. Works perfectly. Works even doing it on two clients at the same time in fact.

Jason

Originally Posted by ukmgranger

Besides the MVP has problems with many things including time-shifting.

Grrrrrrrrrrrr

[geogecko]

Hmm...what's the upgrade path to get SageTV 3.0 if you bought version 2.1 back in December? Will this be a free upgrade, be a partial cost upgrade, or a buy the software all over again "upgrade?"

Just wondering, as I haven't seen this question asked yet.