JRVR, or JRiver Video Renderer, is our new in-house video renderer, designed from the ground up to be cross-platform and offer high-quality video playback on all devices.
Philosophy: JRVR is designed with a few key ideas in mind
1) Cross-Platform
A cross-platform renderer allows us to offer a consistent video experience on all supported platforms, on Windows, Linux and Mac
2) High-Quality Video
High-Quality processing and presentation of the videos is the primary goal of JRVR. Including full support for HDR and other modern video technologies.
3) Ease of Use ("It just works!")
The experience should be good out of the box, and only get better with a bit of configuration, and not require hours of research to tune hundreds of options
4) Efficiency/Scalability
Low-end machines can still play video just fine. And we want to enable them to do so in high-quality. At the same time, faster machines can use more advanced features to get even more out of the videos.
JRVR may not be a full replacement for madVR for the hard core enthusiast, but it should work very well for the typical video user. And this is our goal. A solution that offers high-quality video for everyone, at no to very little setup effort.
How to Use JRVR?- On Windows, you can opt-into using JRVR in Options -> Video -> Video Mode: Red October JRVR
- JRVR is the default renderer on Linux and Mac, you can confirm it is enabled in Options -> Video -> Video Renderer
How to Configure JRVR Options? The Wiki has an explanation of the various options and how to configure JRVR. The default setup should work well for most equipment across most media producing a great image.
https://wiki.jriver.com/index.php/JRVR_-_JRiver_Video_Rendererhttps://wiki.jriver.com/index.php/JRVR_-_JRiver_Video_Renderer/ConfigurationYou may want to explore some of the JRVR options pending on what GPU you have, what media you commonly play, and what type of display you have. Without exploring all the options outlined in the Wiki, a general approach would be:
- iGPU (Integrated GPU): JRVR is very efficient and runs well on even modest iGPU (such as the very common Intel UHD graphics) with "HDR10 Passthrough" mode checked for all common media types, resolutions, and framerates.
- Dedicated GPU: JRVR also allows those with dedicated GPU to not only optionally "HDR Tonemap" HDR content to SDR displays, but also apply a range of high quality scaling and processing algorithms to take advantage of the extra performance that a dedicated GPU offers.
- Bright HDR Displays/TV: You may prefer to enable "HDR Passthrough" on such displays letting the display do the Tonemapping over your GPU (hence freeing resources on the GPU)
- Projectors: Given the comparative low light output, you may prefer to uncheck "HDR10 Passthough" and adjust the "Target Peak Nits" to suit your equipment
- SDR Displays/TV: Given the lack of HDR support and in most cases lower maximum brightness, you will likely prefer to uncheck "HDR10 Passthrough" and adjust "Target Peak Nits" to suit your equipment
What's new in MC29? JRVR is under active development, and with the introduction of MC29 the following features and improvements have been added.
Major new features:
- Playing Dolby Vision (DV) content with JRVR can now be transformed to HDR10 (note: this iS for Files with DV, and does not support BD folders that have DV layer)
- Playing HLG HDR content with JRVR can now be transformed to HDR10
- DVD playback with JRVR will now use hardware deinterlacing
- JRVR will signal the selected gamut/primaries to the graphics card, if possible (mostly relevant for BT.2020)
Other Improvements:
- Enabled Ctrl-J JRVR functionality in TV engine and non-DirectShow JR Video Player (on Windows, Mac, and Linux)
- Re-designed JRVR HDR tone mapping and related options.
- Added a JRVR performance option to avoid extraneous frame copies for systems with low memory bandwidth (on by default)
- JRVR now caches shaders between runs, for faster subsequent startups
- Improved YouTube Trailer playback to play more fluidly
- Disabled JRVR Peak Detection by default due to its performance cost and potential for brightness shifts, and moved the option into the Advanced section
- Added an option to JRVR for toggling reporting the selected primaries/gamut to the display