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[kstuart]

I have two Home Theater PC's that I use for video playback - one I built in 2007 and the other in 2009 (both Vista 32-bit).

The 2009 one has a little higher specs and it is not hard to get things working right (although the ATI 4000 gpu is still insufficient for madVR).

The 2007 one is marginal, and everything has to be setup just right.  The following is about this 2007 PC:

I sometimes watch 25 fps video (from Europe) and the display is 60hz refresh rate only.  So, tearing is an ever-present problem.   Neither Vsync nor Triple-buffering in Catalyst settings helps.  The only things that stop the tearing are Renderless or Exclusive Mode.   MPC-HC made its own Renderless version of EVR called "EVR Custom Presenter" and later devs added some sync adjustment settings.   And it has Exclusive Mode as an option.

I've tried MC18 with these videos and the generic EVR has tearing.  There are no settings for EVR in MC18, and I don't see any Exclusive mode for anything other than madVR (the GPU is far too weak for madVR).  

VMR9 Renderless in MC18 works fine for these videos, but then I cannot get it to work for material that is not 16x9 (it stretches the material to fill the desktop).   Changing renderer between videos (often the same file type) would be too onerous, so I will probably end up with MPC-HC for 25fps and MC18 for the others on that PC.

But, I thought I would post this, in case I have missed something that would help.

Thanks in advance!

[Neco]

This sounds like a good  example for opening up the custom video mode to support  wider  Tag qualifiers other than simply  Codec & Container.    If we could set the qualifier for  FPS instead (25fps) or  Region or some such (PAL/NTSC)  and assing a custom rendering rule based on that,  this problem could be easily solved.

[jmone]

How about using ROHQ then in the madVR settings:
- Turn on exclusive mode
- try M-N or the following combos for the scaling (as they are easy)

[6233638]

Turn on VideoClock in Media Center if it's not enabled, switch to madVR (ROHQ) and enable Smooth Motion in the madVR preferences. Use bilinear scaling if you have to - most GPUs should be able to handle that.

[kstuart]

Sorry, I implied but did not make it clear.

The faster 2009 PC that does not have these problems, still does not have a fast enough GPU for madVR.

The tearing problem is with the 2007 PC that has a GPU that is not even remotely close to having enough power for madVR.

Both systems use bitstream/passthrough to AV receivers, so no VideoClock.

[6233638]

Do you have desktop composition (Aero) disabled on the machine that is showing screen tearing?

And while you may be able to fix the screen tearing, I don't think you can get smooth playback without madVR running. (Smooth Motion is designed specifically to tackle this problem)

[InflatableMouse]

Do you have desktop composition (Aero) disabled on the machine that is showing screen tearing?

Don't mean to hijack, but does that tearing appear only when you enable to option to disable desktop composition in madvr or also when you disable themes in Windows itself (enable classic theme)?

[6233638]

Don't mean to hijack, but does that tearing appear only when you enable to option to disable desktop composition in madvr or also when you disable themes in Windows itself (enable classic theme)?

I'm not really sure to be honest, and I can't test it as I'm on Windows 8 where desktop composition can't be disabled.

[jmone]

Have you tried Bilinear in MadVR as others report it the same sort of overhead as EVR.  That said... it could be time to just buy a DDR5 based GPU or two

[kstuart]

Those reports are false, I can't even use madVR with bilinear on the faster 2009 PC, much less the 2007 machine (both work fine with EVR).  I think that you need a 2010 or newer GPU for madVR (but, of course, that is a rough approximation).

(Yes, I could buy a graphics card, but the idea of the thread is to see if anything else might work.)

As far as Aero, the Windows on the 2007 machine is "Vista Home Basic" which does not include Aero at all.

I generally use Windows Classic theme on Home Theater PCs, because when the movie or TV show is full screen, you can't see any Operating System at all, so there seems no point to enabling any performance-using gizmos.  If there is any tearing connection to Themes, that would be interesting in hearing about, though.

[6233638]

Those reports are false, I can't even use madVR with bilinear on the faster 2009 PC, much less the 2007 machine (both work fine with EVR).  I think that you need a 2010 or newer GPU for madVR (but, of course, that is a rough approximation).

That's surprising - I was able to use madVR without any trouble on an Nvidia 9400-based system, which seems to be of a similar age as your ATi card.

I don't mean to push the issue, but can you try madVR again, setting all scaling options to bilinear, enabling all the "trade quality for performance" options, disabling any calibration options, and using CPU decoding. (rather than hardware acceleration)

As far as Aero, the Windows on the 2007 machine is "Vista Home Basic" which does not include Aero at all.

Unfortunately, this is your problem. When desktop composition is disabled (or missing) screen tearing is common in EVR and other renderers.

Apparently, you can enable Desktop Composition via the Registry, but I have no experience with this, so proceed with caution: http://www.ehow.com/how_7342068_hack-home-basic-aero-desktop.html
If forcing V-Sync on via your drivers isn't doing it, I'm not sure there are any other options though.

I generally use Windows Classic theme on Home Theater PCs, because when the movie or TV show is full screen, you can't see any Operating System at all, so there seems no point to enabling any performance-using gizmos.  If there is any tearing connection to Themes, that would be interesting in hearing about, though.

Sounds like the Windows Classic theme doesn't disable desktop composition.

[InflatableMouse]

Sounds like the Windows Classic theme doesn't disable desktop composition.

Correct. I do the same on my HTPC (enable classic theme) but the DWM service is still running. I'll see what happens when I stop and disable it.

[InflatableMouse]

Correct. I do the same on my HTPC (enable classic theme) but the DWM service is still running. I'll see what happens when I stop and disable it.

Stopping and disabling the DWM Service makes no difference.

[InflatableMouse]

I think I made an interesting discovery.

For some reason I always assumed classic theme would free up some resources. On newer, higher end hardware (mainly, GPU) I don't believe this does much if anything, but with Madvr I'm sort of on the edge of things using medium to high settings. In the past Windows did popup that annoying dialog that it believed things were slow advising to disable Aero. I went ahead and choose Classic theme.

Today I've been switching back and forth between classic and Aero. First with Madvr configured as follows:


With classic theme this seemed to work well, with rendering times around 12ms and presentation around 23ms.

I enabled Aero, and I was getting massive framedrops, stutters. Backbuffer queue was empty.

Next I enabled FSW mode in Madvr and rendering times dropped well below 10ms, presentation ~0.3ms with Aero still enabled.

I switched back to classic mode, expecting to see another improvement, but rendering times jumped back up to 12ms, presentation remained below 1ms though.

So for some reason, having Aero enabled with FSW mode (and maybe FSE too but I can' test that right now) I'm getting a good performance increase.

Maybe using that tweak to get Aero on your Windows version and using FSW or FSE could help you sqeeze enough of a performance gain out of your system to use Madvr after all. I think its worth a shot.

[kstuart]

The 2007 PC's IGP does not have specs equal to the  Nvidia 9400-based systems - or any 9 series, which was introduced in 2008.  So, it would not even be close to working with madVR and that is the one with the tearing.

The 2009 PC's IGP is a Radeon 4200, so that should theoretically be at least the specs of Nvidia 9 series, but I did try setting Bilinear, and every other suggested setting in a thread in this Forum for using madVR with low-spec GPU's, and there was still stuttering.  The test case was a 1080p video on a 1080p monitor, so there should not have been any scaling up or down in size anyway.

I don't have any issues on that 2009 PC - Aero is included in the OS, but is turned off - but there is no tearing with 25fps material using Red October Standard.

[InflatableMouse]

If that renderless EVR version is a directshow filter, would it be possible to register it so you can select custom in MC and configure it to use the renderless version? Would that work somehow?

If it is and you have those files, try registering it with regsvr32.exe "c:\path-to\file.ax"

[kstuart]

Unfortunately, MPC-HC has separated out the video and audio decoders (as standalone filters), but not the renderers.

It's beginning to look like I did not miss anything, so I will probably end up - on the 2007 PC - just using MPC-HC for 25fps videos and MC18 for everything else...

[6233638]

The 2007 PC's IGP does not have specs equal to the  Nvidia 9400-based systems - or any 9 series, which was introduced in 2008.  So, it would not even be close to working with madVR and that is the one with the tearing.

The 2009 PC's IGP is a Radeon 4200, so that should theoretically be at least the specs of Nvidia 9 series, but I did try setting Bilinear, and every other suggested setting in a thread in this Forum for using madVR with low-spec GPU's, and there was still stuttering.  The test case was a 1080p video on a 1080p monitor, so there should not have been any scaling up or down in size anyway.

Sorry, I had misread your post, and thought that the slower PC was the one with the 4200. (and I thought that should have been able to handle madVR - I suppose not though)

I don't have any issues on that 2009 PC - Aero is included in the OS, but is turned off - but there is no tearing with 25fps material using Red October Standard.

When you say "Aero is turned off" does that mean you actually have desktop composition disabled, or you're using the classic theme?

It's beginning to look like I did not miss anything, so I will probably end up - on the 2007 PC - just using MPC-HC for 25fps videos and MC18 for everything else...

Have you tried enabling desktop composition to see if that fixes the problem?

[kstuart]

"Have you tried enabling desktop composition to see if that fixes the problem?"

If you are referring to the registry trick to do so on Home Basic, no I have not yet tried that.

On the 2009 PC with ATI4200, I have desktop composition turned off and classic theme as well.

[InflatableMouse]

If you're interested in squeezing a bit more out of your 2009 pc you could try enabling Aero and use FSW or FSE. In my case it lowered rendering times by 3-5ms and presentation times went down to 0.3ms (24ms previously IIRC). That might be enough to pick a higher setting in Madvr.

For the older pc, to be honest I don't think the hack is going to help but if you like fiddling around give it a shot. You can always revert the changes.

[kstuart]

FSW may stand for:

    Fanhui Shi Weixing, a series of recoverable satellites from the Chinese space program
    Faso Airways airline (ICAO code)
    Feet of sea water, a designation of both depth and pressure in scuba diving

        As a unit of pressure, 33 fsw is approximately one atm

    Fellowship of Southern Writers
    Female sex workers
    Flash freeze warning, in Specific Area Message Encoding
    Forward-swept wings, a type of aircraft configuration
    Fox Sports World
    Free State Wyoming
    Freestyle walking
    Freestyle wrestling
    Friction stir welding
    Full Spectrum Warrior, a video game
    Future Stars of Wrestling a wrestling organization Val Venus is part of

FSE may refer to:

    Fast Software Encryption, a cryptography conference
    Federation of European Scouting (French: Fédération du Scoutisme Européen, FSE) may refer to
        Union Internationale des Guides et Scouts d'Europe-Fédération du Scoutisme Européen (UIGSE-FSE)
        several member organizations of the Confédération Européenne de Scoutisme; among them
            European Scout Federation (British Association)
    Feline spongiform encephalopathy
    Ferrovie del Sud Est, a railway company of southern Italy
    Fetal scalp electrode
    Field Service Engineer, working from a remote location from the main office, servicing equipment in a designated area
    Florida Screen Enterprises
    Foundation of Software Engineering
    Franciscan Sisters of the Eucharist, a Roman Catholic religious congregation
    Frankfurt Stock Exchange
    Fremont Street Experience
    FSEconomy, a multiplayer add-on for several common Home Flight Simulators
    Fonds social europeen, instrument financier européen faisant partie des fonds structurel de l'UE
    Flying Station Engineer
    Flying Squirrel Entertainment

Google search has this page as its result (and some doom9 pages that don't specify what it means).

[6233638]

Fullscreen Exclusive mode, and I guess he meant Windowed Overlay mode. (rather than Fullscreen Windowed)
I don't think the latter works on AMD cards though.

I still think enabling Desktop Composition is your best shot at fixing your v-sync troubles. (though Fullscreen Exclusive mode might work too)

[kstuart]

Quote: "I still think enabling Desktop Composition is your best shot at fixing your v-sync troubles. "

I did the hack in the page linked above to turn on Aero in the registry in the 2007 PC, and I set "Desktop Window Manager" service back to Automatic and rebooted.

I still have Themes service disabled and Classic Theme.

There was still tearing  with MC18 (red october standard) and no tearing with MPC-HC (in Exclusive Mode with the latter).

[JimH]

Kstuart,
If you use the quote button, the reply will appear quoted and attributed to the poster.  You can edit out anything you don't want to address.

You can also put quote tags around what you want.  They look like this (but with no spaces).

[ quote ]
Poster's words
[ / quote ]
Your reply

which looks like this without the spaces:

Poster's words

Your reply

[kstuart]

JimH -

I intentionally don't do that here in Interact, because the SMF bulletin board software makes the quoted area DARK and people usually skip to the original statement.

So, they lose the context.

If I put the quote in my statement, they are more likely to actually read it.

Even then people don't read much - notice that in my Remote Control thread, a long-term member did not read the part of my post that started "I do know that I can... " and simply stated that same paragraph again...

[kstuart]

So, the hack linked above seems to only do about half of the usual Aero stuff.  There is no "Aero" choice in Color & Appearance.

It seems that "Desktop Windows Manager" and "Themes" services are now running.  Frankly, I am not sure that I really understand the technical meanings of the terms "Aero" and "Desktop Composition" and I certainly don't understand how any of this relates to Vsync (Vsync is something that developers of MPC-HC spent thousands of hours looking into, and the built-in renderless EVR "Custom Presenter" was their response).

Does anyone responding in this thread actually understand these concepts ?

[6233638]

So, the hack linked above seems to only do about half of the usual Aero stuff.  There is no "Aero" choice in Color & Appearance.

It seems that "Desktop Windows Manager" and "Themes" services are now running.  Frankly, I am not sure that I really understand the technical meanings of the terms "Aero" and "Desktop Composition" and I certainly don't understand how any of this relates to Vsync (Vsync is something that developers of MPC-HC spent thousands of hours looking into, and the built-in renderless EVR "Custom Presenter" was their response).

Does anyone responding in this thread actually understand these concepts ?

Desktop Composition changes the way that windows are drawn, and enables the Windows UI to be hardware accelerated by your graphics card.
It's my understanding that a consequence of this is that it turns on V-Sync globally for the desktop and applications which do not specify anything when it comes to v-sync.
People often report that renderers such as EVR (or even madVR in Windowed Mode) lose V-Sync when Desktop Composition is disabled.
In Windows 8, you actually can't disable Desktop Composition at all.

Windows Aero leverages Desktop Composition to draw the "glass" theme in Windows Vista/7.

I can't understand why you are still experiencing these problems with Desktop Composition enabled. Are you sure you don't have V-Sync forced off in your driver somewhere?
Do AMD drivers have the option to perform a "clean install" and reset all settings?

One other thing I can think of to suggest - which sounds strange - is to try running the Windows Experience Index test on your PC. (I forget where it is in Vista - it might still be under Control Panel > System?)
On some machines with Windows 7, even if you have a capable GPU and the right drivers installed, Desktop Composition wouldn't actually be running on the GPU until after re-running that test. (don't ask me why)

[kstuart]

The GPU (ATI Express 1250) is advertised with Vista Aero as its top selling point and the drivers are the last ones released by AMD for the GPU (10.2).  I've done the Experience test twice recently and it always comes up as 3.0 for graphics, but the link to tell me what that means is dead (it goes to Windows 8 sales page).

Some of the comments on a "turn on Aero in Vista Basic" suggested that MS disabled the hack with a later update.   I have yet to find a reliable test to judge that "Desktop Composition is Turned On".

Vsync is all the way ON in the Catalyst settings.

However, the clean install of the graphics drivers IS a good idea - it's one of those things that should not be necessary IF every bit of code was perfect and bug-free, but seems to work often enough.

[kstuart]

I tried uninstalling the Catalyst and display drivers and then reinstalling them, and still tearing with MC18 with 25fps material.

Some comments in the threads on the registry changes to enable Aero in Vista Home Basic, indicate that some people think that MS updated the OS in SP1 to prevent Aero from being enabled in Vista Home Basic by changing the registry.

The problem with that rumor is that I still have not been enable to find any sort of way to test if "Desktop Composition" is Enabled.   Plenty of threads on enabling and disabling, but nothing on testing to see whether it actually is running.

[6233638]

madVR's OSD should display whether composition is enabled or not. (top left will display "Composition Rate")

[kstuart]

That's an excellent idea.... I changed to Red October HQ, it added "extra components" and then the screen was blank during playback.... I tried Ctrl-J but that did not bring up the OSD.

[kstuart]

Any thoughts on getting madVR to display or other ways to show if Desktop Composition is actually on ?