After playing around with different options I'd have to say I agree with Glynor - I dislike keeping TS files, but simply because they are more problematic to play.
As it was truly said in this thread,
the power of your PC is very important:
This is my experience:
My first HTPC was last year an desktop with an Intel PIV 3.2C @ 3.5, 2 g Ram, and an Nvidia AGP8X 7600GT 256 graphic card (with Nvidia 93.71 whql driver, at this time)
The results:
Some TS files had some lost frames, even if I used the best combination (personally tested between many others) to read these TS files in WMP11, VLC, MPC, ZP.. or XP MCE2005 :
Matroska Haali Media Splitter 1.7.189.11
(Codec: SPLITTER.AX)
AC3 : AC3 filter 1.45b
(codec AC3FILTER.AX)
Power DVD 7 deluxe (Very good use of Nvidia card Hardware acceleration ++)
(With its 3 codecs :
Cyberlink Video/SP decoder (PVDV7): Codec: CLVSD.AX (6.02.2806)
Cyberlink H264 AVC decoder (PVDV7): Codec: CL264DEC.AX (1.7.1.626)
Cyberlink Audio decoder (PVDV7) : Codec: CLAUD.AX (6.02.2806))
Note : for Mpeg2 & H264 I tested also Nvidia pure video codec: Good results with Nvidia cards but.. a little under the PVDV7 results !
DirectVobSub 2.37 (for SRT subtitles ..)
(Codec: VSFILTER.DLL)
Direct show Filter Manager 05 (DFM)
With it, I set to "preferred" (00800000) all the codecs in the above list
For the main other HD video formats , I added:
QT alternative 1.81 (MOV,HDMOV,AAC..)
(Codecs: NEQTDEC.AX & COREAAC.AX)
Real Alternative 1.52 (RA,RM,RMVB..)
(Codec: REALMEDIASPLITTER.AX (6.0.12.1741, Gabest.org)
DivX 6.6 (DiVx 3 to 6)
Codec: DIVXDEC.AX (DivX decoder filter Divx Inc.)
-XVID 1.12 01112006
Codec: XVID.AX (XVID Mpeg-4 Video decoder)
You see that
I didn't used FFDSHOW at this time because I saw 3 things with FFDSHOW:
- Complex to setup
- Bad result with HD video files
- Non use at all of the hardware acceleration capacity of my different Nvidia cards tested ( 6600GT, 7800GS and last, 7600GT)
_____________________________________________________
Now,
my new HTPC is a laptop ! :
Sony Vaio FZ11Z with hdmi hdcp, Blu-Ray writer/reader, Intel Core 2 duo T7300 2gz, 2 g ram, Nvidia 8400 GT 512, HD 200 Sata (but all my multimedia data are on an distant MS Home server)
As it was said in this thread, the power of this kind of PC solve all the problems with TS files !!
=> Not any dropped frame in any HD video file, from 720p to 1080p, on any format, even H264 1080p !, Tested with Vista MCE and now
with J River MC,
I use only :
- J river codecs
- CCCP pack (so, FFDSHOW is the main codec)
and
- Previous Mpeg HD video codec installed on the laptop (very good Intervideo codec from WinDVD Blu-Ray player)
That were my 2 cents
note: I kept all my notes about all the precise setups of the codecs used with my first HTPC; tell me if someone is interested ; I can open a new thread here, for this