Freeview DVB-T test channels now available in Wellington

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Biddle Corp

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#95495 16-Nov-2007 11:00

ZiglioNZ: Could you guys point us to where we could buy these usb peripherals in NZ?
My laptop is not a top performer but it can decode some HD files I've downloaded with Miro.
So I guess, all these cards do is demodulation and channel decoding, and then they provide the raw MP4 stream for the PC to decode, is that right?

What spec is your machine?

Trying to decode HD MPEG4 without a minimum spec of dual core processor (either AMD or Intel) is going to give you pretty poor quality.

ZiglioNZ

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#95499 16-Nov-2007 11:25

Why? I can watch HD streams on a full widescreen TV, and they're encoded with MP4 like kind of codecs, like WMV, flv etc.
The CPU is an old Centrino, I think 1.8GHz, so nothing flash. The streams play smoothly.

Fossie

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#95501 16-Nov-2007 11:36

There is a difference between the nicely encoded files you can download off the internet and ota hd...

itey

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#95522 16-Nov-2007 14:30

most computers with new graphics cards (on from 6600GT's, note: not all 6xxx series) can decode HD fine.

sub

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#95615 17-Nov-2007 03:41

sbiddle:
There actually isn't anything special that you need to do to view them. Providing you have PowerDVD Ultra installed you can scan for digital channels and things will work straight away. You can check if you have the CyberLink H.264 codec installed by running PowerDVD and seeing if there is a H.264 icon on the main screen of PowerDVD.

Currently there are a few short loops running, a SD channel showing netball and a few 1080i channels which look nice. After a couple of tweaks my playback is now as good as I will get on my motherboard. I purchased an Asus M2A-HDMI when they were brand new and they are a bit of a dog.. It does use a lot of CPU time and I do have an X2 4800 but obviously a video card with MPEG4 hardware should make things better. sub has just released a new version of GB-PVR today that does DXVA 2.0 which should speed things up with appropiate hardware.

Running my original setup, AMD X2 4400+ CPU and nvidia 7600GS video card, I was getting nearlying constant 100% CPU usage trying to view these high def tests, with a bit of stuttering.

Yesterday I installed an ATI HD 2600pro video card, and when using it with the EVR video renderer on Vista (for DVXA 2.0), I'm now getting a low 5% CPU usage and smooth video. Thats quite a difference.

I should note that the 7600GS video card did have h.264 acceleration according to nvidia, but I only found out later that this was disabled in the AGP versions of their cards. Not so with the ATI card, but I am having the occasional blue screen with the ATI drivers... grrrrr...

lchiu7

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#95619 17-Nov-2007 07:32

Interesting. Were you using gbpvr to do it? I wonder with a more modest AMD 3600 (single core) and that card, could the decoding still be done smoothly? Was the software using both cores?

Larry

Staying in Wellington. Check out my AirBnB in the Wellington CBD. https://www.airbnb.co.nz/h/wellycbd PM me and mention GZ to get a 15% discount and no AirBnB charges.

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#95622 17-Nov-2007 08:05

Yes, that was with the current GB-PVR release (1.1.5).

Everything I mentioned in my post was an important ingredient though... Vista + EVR are required to get DXVA 2.0 working, and the ATI HD 2600 Pro card which supports DXVA 2.0.

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lchiu7

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#95628 17-Nov-2007 08:54

I have an uninstalled copy of Vista Ultimate so that's not a problem. And the video card isn't an issue. But wondering if a AMD64 3600 (single core) would do the job. Does gbpvr have code to handle two cores which is seen in the low CPU level?

Larry

Staying in Wellington. Check out my AirBnB in the Wellington CBD. https://www.airbnb.co.nz/h/wellycbd PM me and mention GZ to get a 15% discount and no AirBnB charges.

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#95640 17-Nov-2007 09:33

directshow will use multiple cores if they are available.

I cant tell you for sure whether your AMD64 3600 would fine, but I would expect it would be ok since most of the heavy work would be done by the video card. These ATI drivers are far from perfect though, and I've had the occasional blue screen and lockups since installing the device.

lchiu7

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#95714 17-Nov-2007 20:10

What card are you using sub? I have a HVR-3000 which is still in shrink wrap. Would that work?

Staying in Wellington. Check out my AirBnB in the Wellington CBD. https://www.airbnb.co.nz/h/wellycbd PM me and mention GZ to get a 15% discount and no AirBnB charges.

sbiddle

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#95724 17-Nov-2007 21:28

I'm getting around 70-75% CPU utilisation on my X2 4800 Asus M2A-HDMI board decoding the 1080i broadcast and quality is fine. I'm only getting around 20% however decoding the SD netball channel. I'm using the EVR codec under Vista at present.

lchiu7

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#95725 17-Nov-2007 21:30

Just using a standard UHF antenna and a DVB-T card?

Staying in Wellington. Check out my AirBnB in the Wellington CBD. https://www.airbnb.co.nz/h/wellycbd PM me and mention GZ to get a 15% discount and no AirBnB charges.

lchiu7

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#96780 25-Nov-2007 08:39

sbiddle: I'm getting around 70-75% CPU utilisation on my X2 4800 Asus M2A-HDMI board decoding the 1080i broadcast and quality is fine. I'm only getting around 20% however decoding the SD netball channel. I'm using the EVR codec under Vista at present.

Just to add some additional possibly relevant data. I got hold of a TV show encoded in H.264 format with AC-3 sound (720p, average 2Mbs bit rate and 1.1G filesize). Played fine on my dual core AMD 3600 with a modest video card but with CPU at about 75-80-%. However when played on my PVR which is only a AMD 64 3000 single core, CPU was up to 100% and I got stuttering in the picture. Looks like I am going to have to upgrade the PVR to Vista and get a video card with H.264 decoding in hardware in order to view the HD broadcasts coming soon.

[As an aside with a simple conversion process (no re-encoding) these files played smoothly on my PS3 :-) ]

Staying in Wellington. Check out my AirBnB in the Wellington CBD. https://www.airbnb.co.nz/h/wellycbd PM me and mention GZ to get a 15% discount and no AirBnB charges.

sub

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#96796 25-Nov-2007 10:51

Its important to note that there are lots of different ways an h.264 video can be encoded with. A typical h.264 encoded video download from the net would \be a lot easier to playback than shows that have been encoded using the MBAFF or PAFF features that are often associated with high def H.264 DVB-T. The shows that people often record from high def MPEG2 shows that people record in the US then encode to H.264 then upload to the net are often not using these sorts of advanced encoder features.

A BBC high def H.264 DVB-T sample is here: http://mirror05.x264.nl/public/force.php?file=./beyonce.at.the.bbc.1080mbaff.sample.ts

lchiu7

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#96806 25-Nov-2007 11:23

Hmm - that didn't play too well on my dual core AMD (3600). A bit jerky. That does not augur well for trying to receive HD transmissions OTA with my PVR and Hauppauge 3000 card unless I upgrade the video card.

As an aside, how good does your UHF reception have to be? I just connected an aerial to my TV and tuned into Prime. The picture has decent sound but quite a snowy picture (from Kau Kau). I wonder how forgiving H.264 broadcasts will be?

Staying in Wellington. Check out my AirBnB in the Wellington CBD. https://www.airbnb.co.nz/h/wellycbd PM me and mention GZ to get a 15% discount and no AirBnB charges.

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