Windows 7 - Good, W7 Media Center - Um...

[CX23882-19]

Yes, I tried the in-box drivers, latest drivers from Windows Update, Catalyst 9.8 and Catalyst 9.9. Every driver has the jerky-mouse problem (when starting a DXVA-accelerated video).

There's nothing particularly special or exotic about my system. MSI K9AG Neo2-Digital motherboard - was using BIOS 1.80, tried updating to 1.A0 and no improvement. Realtek HD Audio - was using Microsoft drivers, tried latest Realtek drivers. Microsoft AHCI drivers, tried IDE mode with no improvement. Cool'n'Quiet Enabled, tried disabled with no improvement. Disabled Aero, no improvement. I have no idea what's going on.

Although the jerky/freezing issue is something that I can only repro on this one system, the other issues appear to be with Windows 7 and not my hardware. Audio sync is screwed up on plenty of AVI files, until AC3Filter is installed (or presumably Shark007's codec pack). Video files do a double-start a lot of the time, regardless of whether it's a clean install or an install with Shark007 - you might not see it with things such as movies where you typically have a couple of seconds at the start, but anything which starts as soon as the video starts, such as a music video, makes it very noticeable. I have all of my media on a network share, and the network is only 100Mbps, so perhaps that accounts for double-start issue (I'll try with local media tonight) but the audio sync issue occurred on local files.

[CX23882-19]

Just an update in case anybody is interested.

My main HTPC still isn't working right with Windows 7. The worst thing is the ATI card and jerky mouse cursor when opening accelerated videos. That issue alone is a show-stopper but everything is a-ok on Vista. I've decided to stick with Vista for the time being because it is working well, but I miss the improved DVB-T features in 7MC.

My other system seems to be working fine. I did another clean installation and didn't bother with Shark's codec pack. All that I have installed is:
- ffdshow, only enabled for "Other MPEG4", all video and audio off.
- AC3Filter - this seems to fix the audio sync issues. If I remove it, sync is often bad, particularly after seeking. With it installed, audio has been in sync every time.
- Haali splitter - just for MKV.
So far, everything is playing fine. I still have the "double start" on playback occasionally. It seems to be a network buffering issue because it doesn't occur with locally-stored files. No other apps have a problem - just Media Center. Perhaps Media Browser is caching and/or scanning metadata/images which is causing network bandwidth to choke. I don't know, but it does seem to be network related.

[Methanoid]

Chaps, quick and hopefully easy question

Does W7 MC support DXVA acceleration? I have an Ion 330 system and would rather use W7MC than XBMC under Linux. Then at least I can use other Windows apps should I want to....

[aidanjt]

Yes, as does WMP. In fact, as far as I know, W7MC normally uses a fully fledged full screen DX handle with a DXVA overlay when playing video. Which would explain why it looks kinda crappy when in windowed mode.

[12GaugeShotty]

Due to some unexplained "corruption after sleep" issues I've been experiencing for the past week, I decided now was the time to upgrade to Windows 7 on my main HTPC. After a nice quick installation, I'm up and running. Windows 7 runs very smoothly, and even the AMD SB600 runs in AHCI mode with Microsoft's msahci.sys driver and without a massive CPU penalty or poor performance. I have no complaints with Windows 7 as an operating system.

But Windows Media Center - what a complete mess. I don't know where to start. The idea of build-in codecs sounds great, but unless you're using the native WTV format, video playback is very problematic. AVI, MPG, TS, MP4, MKV - every single format has one or more issues.

AVI files are very hit or miss as to whether or not they'll play back properly. AC3 in AVI is a no-go, so you'll need to install 3rd party decoders for that. But it seems that even MP3 presents problems to the new Media Foundation decoders. I presume that it's due to using VBR MP3, and you'll say it's my fault for using VBR, but the same files play back in every other player I've tried - VLC, MPC-HC, XP MCE2005, Vista Media Center etc. Only Windows 7 Media Center (and Media Player) have problems. Maybe I'm crazy enough to use VBR in AVI, but I'm not crazy enough to re-encode from the original discs so they play on one piece of software!

But it seems that even MPEG2 (MPEG2 video, MPEG Layer 2 audio in MPEG PS) is asking too much. I have a few music videos recorded from the TV, and attempting to play these on Windows 7 is seemingly asking too much. They start playing fine, and a couple of seconds in, they start playing again. With a film or TV episode it's mildly annoying, with a music video or a music video playlist it makes it useless.

Media Center still can't remember the play position when maximising or restoring the window, but that's always been broken to some extent. This is probably the same reason as standby support being broken - if your monitor goes to sleep expect to find any paused video start playing whilst you're away from the PC.

Next, TV in Media Center. Hybrid tuner support - check. MHEG-5 support - check. Working aspect ratio support - fail. It seems that if you have a 16:10 monitor, you'll have to watch vertically stretched video after tuning to a new channel.

What a shame that Microsoft could do such a great job with Windows 7, but once again they're let down by the Media Center team. This was to be expected, since they've still not fixed the ehplayer bug that they introduced into Vista MC earlier this year and know the existence of. Going from past experience, I doubt they'll manage to fix all of these bugs, they'll break more things releasing partially-functional hotfixes and "Media Center Cumulative Updates". This may come across as a rant, but it isn't. I'm not angry, just very disappointed in Media Center and the fact it manages to be flashy and pretty, but fails to accomplish it's intended task satisfactorily.

I'll let them off the hook for certain issues - the most prominent being the extended spinning circle when starting video playback and the accompanying jerky mouse cursor. This only appears on my ATI Radeon HD 3650-equipped system whereas my other system with an nVidia GeForce 8800GT functions correctly in that respect.

I'm undecided now - go back to Vista with a working Media Center, or stick with Windows 7 and hope they fix these annoying bugs.

Well, pretend that you are a normal user that just uses WMC for maybe playing your DVDs at most. In that case it works and works without a problem. If you go wanting H.264/x264 decoding then that's another story.

FYI, AVI, MKV and MP4 are containers and not formats. WMV and MPG are formats. Containers can contain multiple types of video codecs and audio codecs.

You are better off using something like Media Player Classic - HomeCinema to play your video. It also supports DXVA for that Radeon HD video card of yours.

[CX23882-19]

Well, pretend that you are a normal user that just uses WMC for maybe playing your DVDs at most. In that case it works and works without a problem. If you go wanting H.264/x264 decoding then that's another story.

Yes, playing DVDs does work, but you might as well use Windows Media Player if that's all you're going to use it for. What about digital TV - aspect ratio support is broken, just as it was in Vista with the OEM TV Pack.

FYI, AVI, MKV and MP4 are containers and not formats. WMV and MPG are formats. Containers can contain multiple types of video codecs and audio codecs.

Thanks for pointing that out, but I think it was pretty clear that I understand that AVI, MKV and MP4 are just containers. That is why I mentioned about AVI with AC3 audio being ok and AVI with MP3 VBR audio not. It was simply a matter of convenience to lump them all together in the phrase you are referring to, but I'll remember to take into account pedants in the future.

You are better off using something like Media Player Classic - HomeCinema to play your video. It also supports DXVA for that Radeon HD video card of yours.

Thanks, but that's not a solution. I need a 10ft interface that can be navigated with the remote. Vista Media Center with Media Browser does a good job. W7 Media Center with Media Browser doesn't work as well - simple as that.

[nightkhaos]

CX, I have to ask, have you gone through and configured Shark's codecs and told it not to use the default ones where the prove problematic? It's possible that you're still using the native codecs for your media.

[CX23882-19]

Yeah, and it does successfully replace the default Media Foundation-based MP3 decoder with ffdshow but then WMP and WMC just produce noise, so I had to go back to the defaults.

Right now I'm running on an NVidia based system (with an X-Fi sound card) without Shark's codec pack, just the MPC-HC Matroska splitter and AC3Filter, and it works reasonably well. MKV is perfect, MPEG is perfect, but AVI is still not right - it's better than my main HTPC but there are still minor A/V sync issues with it. I guess a lot of people don't notice bad lipsync but I do, even if it's slightly out.

The ATI based system with onboard Realtek audio is just hopeless, yet no such problems on Vista with the same hardware and even with the same drivers. I don't know what it is. I might turn off HPET and see if that makes any difference - I doubt it will but you never know.

Still having the annoying "double start" when playing files from a network server too.

[dangel]

W7 Media Center with Media Browser doesn't work as well - simple as that.

To be fair, whilst not useful - there's obviously something with your config as evidence lies to the contrary for the rest of us who have everything working well. MB has the odd bug (you do have to use the latest well-hidden-in-the-forums beta for W7) but I can't fault MC itself versus the Vista one it's a huge improvement. However, that doesn't stop lots of other stuff narfing things up - and a big one is drivers and drivers under W7 aren't quite the same thing (having spent three sodding hours fudging lexmark drivers for my parents PC to get their printer to just print because they're 'vista' not '7' drivers).
For example, I dumped my haupauge Nova T-500 because of W7 driver issues on resume - although to be fair I never (ever) got standby/resume working reliably running Vista.. I do understand your frustration though - especially for a living room PC with WAF (wife acceptance factor) to deal with. Bear with us though - we're trying to help - and can only relate our experience of what works well (shark's pack being one of them for me for years!) but everything from the choice of hardware to the driver used can cause hours of frustration sadly.

[CX23882-19]

I might have a look at another time but for now I'm just back on Vista. Life's too short to worry about this. There wasn't anything special driver-wise - standard Radeon drivers from the ATI website and the in-box HD audio drivers for sound.

Regarding AVI, I might just re-encode the files from the original DVDs when I have time, because it seems to be related to using VBR MP3 audio tracks. It's just annoying that the old AVI splitter handled these fine, even if VBR audio isn't a good idea. Others have noticed it too (http://www.mediabrowser.tv/forum/vie...hp?f=11&t=4100) but there's by no means a LOT of people.

The spinning circle problem seems to be happening if Media Center was opened in windowed mode, then switched to full screen, and then I attempt to play. When it stays in full screen all the time (which it usually will be), I haven't seen this happen once. I guess this could be a Media Browser issue, but I'm using the latest builds compiled from the trunk.

I'm not doubting that improvements have been made. It's nice to have the various enhancements for DVB TV and mixed tuner types. It's nice to have support for selecting language and subtitles for DVD. It's nice to have improved mouse support. But I'm just disappointed with the other issues. Perhaps they're just my system, or perhaps I'm just picky, but it is a bit of a let-down to make progress in some areas but break important basics.

[narz]

CX23882-19 - i have a similar type of issue using my ATI 3850, when opening MC on win7, it the mouse will stutter for a few seconds and the play OK.

You mentioned you stopped the mouse jerkyness by

I've had to disable H264 and MPEG2 acceleration (HWUVD_DisableH264 and HWUVD_DisableMPEG2) to stop the jerky mouse problem.

How do I disable them, registry ?

Another thing that bugs me, when going into full screen in MC, the picture will go black and reappear once it is in full screen, same thing when restoring. Have you experienced this and or know a fix?

[CX23882-19]

CX23882-19 - i have a similar type of issue using my ATI 3850, when opening MC on win7, it the mouse will stutter for a few seconds and the play OK.

You mentioned you stopped the mouse jerkyness by

How do I disable them, registry ?

Yes, or you can use the newer builds of DXVA Checker. I guess this doesn't happen with the newer 4xxx cards? For what it's worth, I don't think this is a Windows 7 issue - I can see a slight hesitation in Vista, but it's nowhere near as bad and it's never locked up.

Another thing that bugs me, when going into full screen in MC, the picture will go black and reappear once it is in full screen, same thing when restoring. Have you experienced this and or know a fix?

Yes, and often it will lose its place and start playing from the beginning of the file. I know of no solution to this.

[CX23882-19]

I've disabled MP3DMOD.DLL and registered the audio decoder from MPC-HC, and no longer have any lipsync problems in Media Center.

The other issues (stuttering with hardware acceleration, video restarts with restore/fullscreen, zoom mode broken) are still there but I'm willing to live with them for now.

[CX23882-19]

CX23882-19 - i have a similar type of issue using my ATI 3850, when opening MC on win7, it the mouse will stutter for a few seconds and the play OK.

I think I found the culprit: PowerPlay (the power saving feature built into the Radeon HD cards).

With my Radeon HD 3650, there are three clock speeds (110MHz, 300MHz and 725MHz). I have now set all clock speeds to the maximum, and re-enabled h.264/MPEG2 acceleration and no stuttering or freezes. It seems that the stuttering occurs when switching clock speeds, and the use of the UVD decoder prompts a clock speed ramp up from 110MHz (idle).

Once I realised that, I did a Google search and see that people had similar issues with stutter/freezes when playing games when the Radeon HD 3xxx series were released. I've never really played games on this system. I think the reason not a lot of people are reporting this is because the PowerPlay 'bug' is dependent on the graphics card's BIOS having PowerPlay enabled.