Develop Bugs

Improving Movie Playback - Done !

Using the information provided in this thread:
http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=500574
I've made some benchmarks using Coreplayer, and what a surprise when I saw that this wasn't just a placebo effect:
On my Blackstone, used some divx encoded movie (container is avi, not mp4, so not playable with wmp), and a movie acquired with the camera, so .mp4.
I did a benchmark and the result is the following:
Methods
HTC Touch HD, latest Dutty's V3 rom, freshly flashed.
No Additional program installed.
Coreplayer 1.3.0 build 6213
1st movie is a DVDrip, avi, xvid.
2nd movie has been acquired with the HD's camera, so it's MP4.
Results are presented as following:AVI movie / MP4 Movie / MP4 Video paused in WMP in background​Driver QTV117 % / 135% / without wmp running a mp4 vid.
115 % / 197% / with wmp runninga mp4 vid.​Driver DirectDraw92 % / 142% / without wmp running a mp4 vid.
86 % / 186% / with wmp runninga mp4 vid.
​Analysis:
The avi movie suffers from the additional memory used by WMP in the background, and there is no improvement.
The MP4 movie benchmark improves dramatically when a MP4 vid is paused in the background with WMP.
QTv still provides better results than DirectDraw.
Conclusion
There is some kind of acceleration with WMP in the background, but only with MP4 movies !
You may notice that it doesn't seem to be directdraw dependant. Neet, I love more confusion.
I want to thank zerocool159 for this nice finding.
Edit: doesn't seem to work with all the MP4 !Will try to find the right settings.

Impressive, I want to try it first

It's not working for me, but I think I must have missed something because my benchmarking gives 43%, it's the first time I try to play a movie on my HD.

Well, you need several things, and I don't know if it's related to the Rom version I use.
Take a quick movie of whatever with your camera. Use Windows media player to play it. Put it in pause.
Without closing WMP, launch Coreplayer (the latest version I assume), and play a .MP4 movie. You can convert almost anything with the movie encoder GUI found on here.

Bump. No one interested ? Really ?

I am very interested, this is in fact very funny. Since there is special dll - qtv-mp4-"something" . Actually this is very strange. I first thought that WMP is somehow modified to use acceleration, than i have been told I am wrong. Later, there were some qtv dll´s found, as mentioned before one especially for mp4, so this acceleration is abviously not coused JUST by directdraw support of WMP. Anyway, I hope that CP will release CP 2.0 sooon. Also, if it it true, than Topaz drivers can boost video playback.

Dredd67 said:
Well, you need several things, and I don't know if it's related to the Rom version I use.
Take a quick movie of whatever with your camera. Use Windows media player to play it. Put it in pause.
Without closing WMP, launch Coreplayer (the latest version I assume), and play a .MP4 movie. You can convert almost anything with the movie encoder GUI found on here.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
That's exactly what I did, nothing special happened, with or without wmp running, i got between 40 and 43%... the divx was encoded using an encoder found on this forum ^^

Ok, try with a video you've recorded with your HD's camera. I think there's something really weird going on. I've tried with a video compressed with badaboom and it doesn't work either.
I think the file format is very specific. Will ty to see if I can find the settings used by the camera to generate those files.

When I benchmark a camera video, I get 196%, and wmp still doesn't change anything...

There is definitely something weird going on, here's what I've posted in Manilla 2d speed boost thread:
This might be interesting to some people with more knowledge.
Tried this just now and it did make things run faster and smoother however, I noticed that on my homescreen the background I'm using had several white spots dotted about all over the screen (several hundred in fact) - as though the image had suffered from it's compression.
So, thinking I'd have to restart the device I just closed everything to first make sure I didn't have too many things running and noticed when closing HTC's Album the spots disappeared in front of my eyes!!
Tried it again with JUST Album running and the same thing happened.
Don't know if it will give anyone any clue as to what's going on but I'll try and grab some pictures if you think it would help
BTW: using the stock rom from Orange v1.19
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Just saw that also, really weird.
Using MyMobiler can't get a proper picture of the white dots, but they are still there.
Will try with pocket screen.
Edit : WEIRD: I can see them but impossible to capture them !
Click to expand...
Click to collapse

i can confirm the graphical artefact displaying photos in the touchflo3d thumbview (white, blue, green smears and spots) while wmp is paused on a mp4 thingie...
having the picture thumbs scrolling is quite revealing : the dots on the pictures are part of the paused video !
theory : wmp loads some qualcomm dll for mp4 playback. said dll then does some stuff of its own that turns 2d overlay/framebuffering hw acceleration on.
meanwhile manila is doing the same thing througth some htc dll.
both apps access the framebuffer through 2d hardware, hilarity ensues !

draxredd said:
i can confirm the graphical artefact displaying photos in the touchflo3d thumbview (white, blue, green smears and spots) while wmp is paused on a mp4 thingie...
having the picture thumbs scrolling is quite revealing : the dots on the pictures are part of the paused video !
theory : wmp loads some qualcomm dll for mp4 playback. said dll then does some stuff of its own that turns 2d overlay/framebuffering hw acceleration on.
meanwhile manila is doing the same thing througth some htc dll.
both apps access the framebuffer through 2d hardware, hilarity ensues !
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Jup, I have encountered the same effect on my Laptop/PC with certain programs with video on pause, a application video overlay boxing match, so to speak...

It really isn't working for me, when I start playing the camera movie on wmp, and then i pause it and i start playing another camera video on coreplayer, wmp won't be showing the video anymore, i mean that when i get back to wmp and press play, i have sound but not picture... So maybe am I doing something wrong?

I found this branch in registry... maybe help?! I don`t know what is this...
[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\Software\Microsoft\DirectX\DirectShow\Video Renderer]
"KeyIndex"=hex:fd,00,00,00
"KeyColor"=hex:09,09,09,00
"MaxBackBuffers"=dword:00000001
"UseOverlayStretch"=dword:00000001
"UseScanLine"=dword:00000000
"SurfaceTypes"=dword:000000ff

no updates?

That's what I'm wondering...

Guys, the update is the app developed by Chainfire called GfxBoost a while ago, what's stated in this thread was preliminary observations that finaly lead to GfxBoost...
Mods you can lock this thread I think.

hello everybody,
I'd try this solution on my TP2 and it's work perfectly.
Without WMP i have 70% of speed
with it grow to 115 %.
Thank you for this solution.
Ps: I'd just start wmp with a mp3
I modify my post because this solution had work only one time.
I'd try to test with/without wmp but the speed stay at 70%, mystery, mystery !!

Best Video Setting for Smooth Video?

Anyone know what is the best setting for smooth video playback when viewing in Touch Pro 2?
I have download the Transformers 2 Trailer in FLV format and playback on my Touch Pro 2 but it seems to be laggy.
Anyone can advise me whether it is the video format problem or the phone memory problem as I have installed many applications.

chongbh said:
Anyone know what is the best setting for smooth video playback when viewing in Touch Pro 2?
I have download the Transformers 2 Trailer in FLV format and playback on my Touch Pro 2 but it seems to be laggy.
Anyone can advise me whether it is the video format problem or the phone memory problem as I have installed many applications.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Can you give a link to the same video and i will try it ?
elab

elab said:
Can you give a link to the same video and i will try it ?
elab
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7InTpNWJ4HQ

Can only get on youtube through my Rhodium at work but isn't that video HD?
It's got a pretty fast processor for a phone but it's still only 533MHz, it can't playback HD content!

I've seen a couple of DivX movies (700MB each) on my TP2 and I have no lag issues...
In fact, I did had that, but back then I was using the player supplied with DivX codecs for Windows Mobile. Once I started using Core Player, the "lag" was gone.
I'll try that YouTube HD video in FLV format and get back to you.
BTW, what player are you using?

Yea i have no issues at all with any video format with coreplayer with the exception of mkvs.

mnico said:
I've seen a couple of DivX movies (700MB each) on my TP2 and I have no lag issues...
In fact, I did had that, but back then I was using the player supplied with DivX codecs for Windows Mobile. Once I started using Core Player, the "lag" was gone.
I'll try that YouTube HD video in FLV format and get back to you.
BTW, what player are you using?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I am also using Core Player for playing back the above FLV format file.

Sorry for the delay guys, but during my video speed testing , I found that although Core Player is supposed to play MP4 files (so they say), on my TP2 Core Player says "Player: Video codec (AVC aka H.264) not supported by the player!". So it seems that I have no H.264 codecs installed, which is strange because the H.264 codec is quite common on DivX. Well, I guess the movies I've been playing were not H.264 encoded.
This happened because I downloaded (without converting) both Transformers 2 trailers (LowRes and HD) from that link. The LowRes version came in FLV format (4MB), and the HD is a 33MB MP4 file. The FLV plays flawlessly without hiccups or delays.
I'm still searching for H.264 codecs for Windows Mobile, and will report back to this topic after installing and testing the video.

The HTC player will playback mp4's encoded with H.264, so long as they're Standard Definition with stereo audio.

mnico said:
Sorry for the delay guys, but during my video speed testing , I found that although Core Player is supposed to play MP4 files (so they say), on my TP2 Core Player says "Player: Video codec (AVC aka H.264) not supported by the player!". So it seems that I have no H.264 codecs installed, which is strange because the H.264 codec is quite common on DivX. Well, I guess the movies I've been playing were not H.264 encoded.
This happened because I downloaded (without converting) both Transformers 2 trailers (LowRes and HD) from that link. The LowRes version came in FLV format (4MB), and the HD is a 33MB MP4 file. The FLV plays flawlessly without hiccups or delays.
I'm still searching for H.264 codecs for Windows Mobile, and will report back to this topic after installing and testing the video.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I have download the same file again by copying the Videoplayback file in FLV Format from Internet Explorer Temporary Files Folder, file size is 12.2MB instead of 4MB.
How you can get 4MB and how you download the Low Res file? The playback is a bit jerky and not so smooth but after comparing the original one in YouTube, it is also a bit jerky and not smooth so there is nothing wrong with the Touch Pro 2 Playback as the problem lies on the source itself.

What you wanna do is get Coreplayer.
Encode your videos into Divx with vertical res. of 720 or under and keep the bitrate under 1500kb/s.
Great image quality with approx 112% playback speed.

thedudelasse said:
What you wanna do is get Coreplayer.
Encode your videos into Divx with vertical res. of 720 or under and keep the bitrate under 1500kb/s.
Great image quality with approx 112% playback speed.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I have used Coreplayer for playback.
Tried encoding "The Black Knight" Movie in the below format :
1) Width x Height (704 x 296)
2) Bit Rate (64kbs)
3) Audio Format (Lame MP3)
4) Frame Rate (23 frames/second)
5) Data Rate (1031 kbs)
6) video Sample Size (24 bit)
7) Video Compression (XVID)
There is some portion of the playback jerky and not smooth, any problem with the above settings?

http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=467112
You could try downloading that little encoding program.
It encodes your files into the perfect format for HTC Album. The user interface of the program is very easy and it encodes your files so that they play with full resolution and a good bitrate. Hope I could have been of help. All credit goes to it's creator.

chongbh said:
I have download the same file again by copying the Videoplayback file in FLV Format from Internet Explorer Temporary Files Folder, file size is 12.2MB instead of 4MB.
How you can get 4MB and how you download the Low Res file? The playback is a bit jerky and not so smooth but after comparing the original one in YouTube, it is also a bit jerky and not smooth so there is nothing wrong with the Touch Pro 2 Playback as the problem lies on the source itself.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I used a Firefox addon that "strips" the contents out of the pages (videos, sounds, SWF, ...). It can also be used to convert to other video formats while downloading, but I didn't use this feature as I wanted to test with the real deal.
I double-checked just now, and the smaller file (LowRes) is 4.76MB and it's fully functional and it plays 'till the end. The HD is 33,9MB. Perhaps there's a different file version when you stream directly from the internet... it doesn't make much sense, but I'm just guessing.
I didn't had time to continue searching for the right codecs yet. But I'll give it a go tomorrow. I'm sure I was not the 1st to experience this "issue" and the codecs "should" exist somewhere... so I hope.

Aquila-169 said:
http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=467112
You could try downloading that little encoding program.
It encodes your files into the perfect format for HTC Album. The user interface of the program is very easy and it encodes your files so that they play with full resolution and a good bitrate. Hope I could have been of help. All credit goes to it's creator.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Thanks for your recommendation and I recode the video again, it is much smoother playing over the WMP.
Will use this program to encode future DVD or Video for playback in my Touch Pro 2.

how many of you use Divx Mobile to view avi/Divx files?

8GB micro SD cards are very cheap in Hong Kong - so I don't bother coverting files to mp4 or whatever that's compatible with HD. Instead, I just copy the whole seasons of TV series into HD and use it as PMP (my Archos 605 just died)
Getting Divx Mobile was easy enough (just have to register & download). But I noticed that it takes a while (lag) to skip. Also, when in full screen, it was grainy (pixexls) - not sure this is due to poor quality of original file (downloaded bt)...
Any other suggestions? I don't mind paying - but want the best video quality possible.
p.s. don't worry about battery life either: US$20 for a spare battery and I'm never far from a outlet (HK is just so tiny)

try coreplayer..

Try Coreplayer. its the best video player ive found so far. much faster then divxplayer

coreplayer is best. And htc's graphics are excellent

singhsukha said:
coreplayer is best. And htc's graphics are excellent
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Like all the above posts....Coreplayer, the only app you need to view those common video formats.

I have found coreplayer to be very laggy myself....Media Player plays my HD files with no issues at all......I never could understand all the fuss

Coreplayer does not support grafic accelerator of HD. Native video player is better with suitable video properties.
See this post:
http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=467112

Klael said:
Coreplayer does not support grafic accelerator of HD. Native video player is better with suitable video properties.
See this post:
http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=467112
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I agree...!!!

actually I am a bit confused (very confused I think...)
I downloaded that Encoder - but it seemed like a tool for converting the formats (not a software installed on HTC to play movies) Correct me if I am wrong. So how does that help in anyway?? I am using core now (found a cab version with flash support - so it seemed convenient so far)
I'd like to try Encoder - I have seen many knowledgeable ppl talking about it so I must be missing something here... Why does converting help?? What does "native player is better" mean?? And how does Encoder make use of HTC hardware accelerators if it isnt even installed on HTC????
pls help...

billyhongkong said:
actually I am a bit confused (very confused I think...)
I downloaded that Encoder - but it seemed like a tool for converting the formats (not a software installed on HTC to play movies) Correct me if I am wrong. So how does that help in anyway?? I am using core now (found a cab version with flash support - so it seemed convenient so far)
I'd like to try Encoder - I have seen many knowledgeable ppl talking about it so I must be missing something here... Why does converting help?? What does "native player is better" mean?? And how does Encoder make use of HTC hardware accelerators if it isnt even installed on HTC????
pls help...
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Latest HTC devices have good video capabilities but 3rd party video players do not support this hardware (yet).
Album or Windows Media Player are meaned by native video player. But they have also some limitations naturally. You should have compatible frame rate and bitrate to get maximum performance.
So, the best way to see good video on Touch HD is to convert any video file with proper settings and watch it by album or Windows Media Player.

now i get it... tried it last night on SD setting. My 350MB file converted into 200MB file and played beautifully on Album.
thx guys for helping me see the light

Coreplayer problem

Since I switched from 6.1 (official rom) to 6.5 (official rom upgrade) the coreplayer started to have a choppy playback. It does not make a difference if I install it on the sd card (class 6) or on the phone itself, same for the videos
I had no problems with videoplayback on the 6.1!
Switching to a custom ROM (6.5.5) but that didn't make the video playback any faster. What can I do?

PumpAction said:
Since I switched from 6.1 (official rom) to 6.5 (official rom upgrade) the coreplayer started to have a choppy playback. It does not make a difference if I install it on the sd card (class 6) or on the phone itself, same for the videos
I had no problems with videoplayback on the 6.1!
Switching to a custom ROM (6.5.5) but that didn't make the video playback any faster. What can I do?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Make sure you compare performance using a video you have tried before, and you considered it to run faster in WM 6.1.
Then, first thing to try is Video Settings, look for these settings:
Video Output = QTv Display (Other settings produced poor quality for me)
Video Quality = Medium or High
Then go to QTv Display, and make sure this is checked:
"TyTN II" driver mode.
I hope I was able to help you...
As side comments:
- Sometimes videos that have been compressed a lot would loose frames during playback. Sometimes we are too demanding and want to play videos at 800x480, but the TP2 can't really do it well at that resolution. Try a smaller resolution instead when converting your videos.
- In some cases, if the GUI is not using the 3D Accelerator (as with SBP Mobile Shell), CorePlayer performs terrible or even doesn't show the video.

AmazingIceman said:
Make sure you compare performance using a video you have tried before, and you considered it to run faster in WM 6.1.
Then, first thing to try is Video Settings, look for these settings:
Video Output = QTv Display (Other settings produced poor quality for me)
Video Quality = Medium or High
Then go to QTv Display, and make sure this is checked:
"TyTN II" driver mode.
I hope I was able to help you...
As side comments:
- Sometimes videos that have been compressed a lot would loose frames during playback. Sometimes we are too demanding and want to play videos at 800x480, but the TP2 can't really do it well at that resolution. Try a smaller resolution instead when converting your videos.
- In some cases, if the GUI is not using the 3D Accelerator (as with SBP Mobile Shell), CorePlayer performs terrible or even doesn't show the video.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Or you can turn off Manila 3D when playing your videos. This is a known bug with Coreplayer, WM6.5, and Manila on the TP2. Just the TP2. My Topaz doesn't have this problem with the same setup and same Energy rom. Turning off Manila is the easiest workaround. Search the Rhodium forums for a mortscript routine that will shut off Manila, execute Coreplayer, and resume Manila once you exit Coreplayer. A nicer workaround in the long run. But still a workaround.

people have complaining about playback and ive never had a problem. i both upgraded my rom to 2.07 and my coreplayer to the latest version and now im one with choppy playback. not sure what exactly is different i wish i didnt delete my old core player cab so i could test that.

AmazingIceman said:
Make sure you compare performance using a video you have tried before, and you considered it to run faster in WM 6.1.
Then, first thing to try is Video Settings, look for these settings:
Video Output = QTv Display (Other settings produced poor quality for me)
Video Quality = Medium or High
Then go to QTv Display, and make sure this is checked:
"TyTN II" driver mode.
I hope I was able to help you...
As side comments:
- Sometimes videos that have been compressed a lot would loose frames during playback. Sometimes we are too demanding and want to play videos at 800x480, but the TP2 can't really do it well at that resolution. Try a smaller resolution instead when converting your videos.
- In some cases, if the GUI is not using the 3D Accelerator (as with SBP Mobile Shell), CorePlayer performs terrible or even doesn't show the video.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
OK disabling Manila is a good idea, but what is the easiest way to shut it down? Everything else is set up correctly. And believe me, I tried each and every setting What I find surprising is that the official 6.5 gave me the same bug. Isn't it using any acceleration ?
EDIT: Windows Media Player does also have very very choppy playback. It does not matter if the files are placed on the SD Card or on the phone itself. Different file types, different file sizes. AVI, WMV, MP4 ... The moment the files have more than ~400kbit the video stutters. If I go into full screen it stutters even more

The Jack of Clubs said:
people have complaining about playback and ive never had a problem. i both upgraded my rom to 2.07 and my coreplayer to the latest version and now im one with choppy playback. not sure what exactly is different i wish i didnt delete my old core player cab so i could test that.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
It started with wm6.5 and Manila 2.x. I noticed even with Manila 2.1 this problem occurred. Only on the Tilt2 - maybe HD2 - I just know this because I own a Fuze and Diamond2 and never saw this problem. It doesn't matter what version of Coreplayer you use - even the one going back to the initial Qtv support. This has more to do with Manila hijacking the video drivers.
I say this because I noticed on a clean reboot the first execution of Coreplayer results in clean video results. But after you close it or load another video the poor performance kicks in. HTC Sense or Manila, running on wm6.5 or higher mind you, does not want other programs taking over the video driver. Not a very scientific explanation I know but this is my observation.

dario69 said:
It started with wm6.5 and Manila 2.x. I noticed even with Manila 2.1 this problem occurred. Only on the Tilt2 - maybe HD2 - I just know this because I own a Fuze and Diamond2 and never saw this problem. It doesn't matter what version of Coreplayer you use - even the one going back to the initial Qtv support. This has more to do with Manila hijacking the video drivers.
I say this because I noticed on a clean reboot the first execution of Coreplayer results in clean video results. But after you close it or load another video the poor performance kicks in. HTC Sense or Manila, running on wm6.5 or higher mind you, does not want other programs taking over the video driver. Not a very scientific explanation I know but this is my observation.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
OK I formatted the SD Card. And I even used Task 29 to format the main os! I reinstalled another ROM (6.5 but with Sense 2.1) and the problem remains.
Windows Media Player AND Coreplayer, both have a VERY VERY choppy playback.

PumpAction said:
OK I formatted the SD Card. And I even used Task 29 to format the main os! I reinstalled another ROM (6.5 but with Sense 2.1) and the problem remains.
Windows Media Player AND Coreplayer, both have a VERY VERY choppy playback.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
HI,
for Me the only ROM wich plays MP4 videos at 30fps with HTCPLAYER.exe at VGA resolution is the Valkirie ROM, and I have tried every main ROM for Rhodium many times each, maybe like 60 flashes or more.
This is the link: http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=569507
Wont be dissapointed, and dont need coreplayer for MP4, only for other formats like mpeg.
I hope this helps.

[Q] HD Video Playback and Framerate

Before I start, let me clarify that this is about playback of stored videos files (avi, mp4, wmv, mov, etc), not recording frame rate or the playback of recorded videos from the phone. Searching yielded hundreds of results, but none of them fit the scope of my question as far as I could tell. If there is something out there, please link and excuse this question.
So, my question and issue is pretty straight forward: whenever I try to play video files I have (IE: downloaded mp4 files), I get really really poor frame rates. Poor meaning 7-13 frames per second.
So the video sucks, and plays in a fairly smooth slow motion. The sound is fine, causing the video to go out of sync, and once the audio timeline ends the video file closes. The built-in player won't even load them, but RockPlayer does. I think I tried xyplayer as well. I figure this is just a codec / software issue, but all lower resolution video files (same format) play fine, so it seems to be unrelated to the applications I'm using. 800x640 video files, no problem; 1280x720 video files, not gonna happen. The videos play fine on a computer, obviously, and my buddy's Windows Phone 7 plays them fine as well (Zune software).
Any ideas?

what bitrate are the videos that skip?

I don't have many on my phone right now, but one of them is 741Kbps, about one third larger than another video that plays perfectly fine, albeit at a lower resolution. Admittedly I know very little about video encoding and all of that.

What rom are you using?

Currently Burnt Droid (1.4), but I've had the same problem on other roms (sense). I recall having this issue on an AOSP rom once, but I can't say that with complete confidence.

Bump; is this really not an issue for people? I can try and grab a sample video if that helps? I figured this would be a more global thing, not just me. The main reason I need (or want) this to work is because all of my online class lectures are recorded in this format and being able to watch the lectures on the go would be extremely beneficial.

I can play a 4gb hd rip of avatar on my phone in rockplayer (hardware mode) with no skipping
please post a link to a vid your having problems with

NewZJ said:
I can play a 4gb hd rip of avatar on my phone in rockplayer (hardware mode) with no skipping.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Hmm, ok, so it took that sentence for me to realize I'm an idiot. I've tried hardware mode with every video file I have put on my phone (avi, mp4, wmv), but wasn't surprised when they didn't play-- if they did, couldn't I just use the stock video player?-- but my school files for example are .mp4, which should play, but I guess the system player doesn't support whatever encoding/bitrate these videos are made with? Does this mean I won't get this to work unless I re-encode / convert the files I have into a new mp4 the phone will support natively?
Excuse my ignorance on the issue; I guess my understanding of the application and android system is more limited than I initially thought.