Develop Bugs

Rhodium Video Performance?

I`m a Kaiser Owner, and looking at the Rhodium as a possible upgrade, but like many others here I`m sure, I`m concerned about iffy video performance. HTC really seem to have dropped the ball on this one, my experiences of the Kaisers video have made me wary.
Anyone heard any feedback on this topic? Anyone with a pre-production model give us a heads up?
For example, could the Rhodium play a 640*480 WMV video without dropping frames?

Same processor as the old TP must mean same video issues, right?

I had Kaiser, and with the right encoding & software video was absolutely fine! I don't know what all the complaints were about.
The Xperia can handle full resolution video pretty well if encoded correctly, and I'm sure this will be the case with the TP2 as well, as the hardware should be powerful enough to do it.
I can't comment on the Touch Pro, as I haven't used one. The TP2 has quite a high-res screen, but I'm sure it'll be fairly easy to get a decent video experience from it.

DavidMc0 said:
I had Kaiser, and with the right encoding & software video was absolutely fine! I don't know what all the complaints were about.
The Xperia can handle full resolution video pretty well if encoded correctly, and I'm sure this will be the case with the TP2 as well, as the hardware should be powerful enough to do it.
I can't comment on the Touch Pro, as I haven't used one. The TP2 has quite a high-res screen, but I'm sure it'll be fairly easy to get a decent video experience from it.
Click to expand...
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I think they made the drivers for the touch pro better didnt they? the 3d ones? so if they did yeah it will be VERY good if they do that for this to which I bet they will if they did for the old one

Won't be burned again!
Link278 said:
I think they made the drivers for the touch pro better didnt they? the 3d ones? so if they did yeah it will be VERY good if they do that for this to which I bet they will if they did for the old one
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
To my knowledge nothing has been improved with the drivers for the touch pro. I have a Sprint TP and video sucks on it. Some ppl have messed around with 3d drivers with various levels of success, but nothing official has been done. There's a whole sticky thread at PPCGeeks on TP video playback tips:
http://forum.ppcgeeks.com/showthread.php?t=57282
So far I haven't really got anything to work for me reliably. What ppl fail to realize is that having a bigger/better screen is only going to make things worse if the hardware/drivers aren't improved. 320x200 video played fine on my Touch and probably would be fine on my TP, but going to 640x400 is 4x the resolution.
Unless HTC improves the 3d/video drivers, the TP2 is going to be as bad or worse than the TP because it is the same stinking hardware. I was so disappointed that the TP2 is just a rehashed TP which really has no better hardware than the Touch--just better screens w/o the greater horsepower to drive them.
I hope I am wrong about this and the TP2 video and graphics are awesome, but I certainly will not upgrade to it until I am certain the situation is improved.

Beefstew83 said:
To my knowledge nothing has been improved with the drivers for the touch pro. I have a Sprint TP and video sucks on it. Some ppl have messed around with 3d drivers with various levels of success, but nothing official has been done. There's a whole sticky thread at PPCGeeks on TP video playback tips:
http://forum.ppcgeeks.com/showthread.php?t=57282
So far I haven't really got anything to work for me reliably. What ppl fail to realize is that having a bigger/better screen is only going to make things worse if the hardware/drivers aren't improved. 320x200 video played fine on my Touch and probably would be fine on my TP, but going to 640x400 is 4x the resolution.
Unless HTC improves the 3d/video drivers, the TP2 is going to be as bad or worse than the TP because it is the same stinking hardware. I was so disappointed that the TP2 is just a rehashed TP which really has no better hardware than the Touch--just better screens w/o the greater horsepower to drive them.
I hope I am wrong about this and the TP2 video and graphics are awesome, but I certainly will not upgrade to it until I am certain the situation is improved.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
wow then check this out u might be able to get alot more out of your touch pro but I am not sure because I have a kaiser
http://www.fuzemobility.com/the-new-3d-drivers-are-here-with-video/

Link278 said:
wow then check this out u might be able to get alot more out of your touch pro but I am not sure because I have a kaiser
http://www.fuzemobility.com/the-new-3d-drivers-are-here-with-video/
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Thanks for pointing that out. I am going to try them and they will probably help some, but I had already heard about it and for the most part they only address part of the problem.
If, and it's a BIG IF, HTC fully optimized ALL the drivers for the TP2, then it could be quite a bit better than the TP. Given HTC's crappy history I would have to have it thoroughly proven to me before I would believe it. However I am hoping against experience that it will be the case.

Maybe this is one of the big reasons why they stuck with much of the same hardware. So they could optimize everything. Hopefully.

Poke_N_PDA said:
Maybe this is one of the big reasons why they stuck with much of the same hardware. So they could optimize everything. Hopefully.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I really hope you're right because I never thought of that, but I heard the new touchflo is alot smoother

scoob101 said:
I`m a Kaiser Owner, and looking at the Rhodium as a possible upgrade, but like many others here I`m sure, I`m concerned about iffy video performance. HTC really seem to have dropped the ball on this one, my experiences of the Kaisers video have made me wary.
Anyone heard any feedback on this topic? Anyone with a pre-production model give us a heads up?
For example, could the Rhodium play a 640*480 WMV video without dropping frames?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Hello, I would have to say that the video quality is 100% better than the TP. I have been watching full videos with NO quality loss in sound or video. I was using the Sprint Touch Pro and was not very happy, but the TP2 is perfect. I can even get 2 full movies out of one charge!!! I have been watching a lot of DivX movies the same ones I watch on my PC, with no issues (well, except each one takes up about 700MB.)
The set up I have been using is, CorePlaer and the D3D Driver. DivX player works well also, but the text gets very small due to the resolution. Hope this helps!

Core player
Video quality is great with core player. Watched 2 movies on my TP2 today and it was very good with great frame rate. And I could use higher res mp4 movies if i wanted to and still keep 100% playback so i havent even pushed it yet. Totally recommended.

I can play a 800x480 AVC encoded movie with aac+ audio at ~1.2Mbit without any hiccups through HTC's video player. Coreplayer on the otherhand can't come anywhere near handling this. Looks damn good too! I used MEGUI with AVC Zune settings to make the video from a bluray movie. It's about 1GB in size.

curious
Just curious why the video player thats built in will play only some of my mp4 files? Thats one of the reasons why I went with coreplayer was because most of my mp4 movies would play a green screen with audio on the built in player and wmp.

Anyone know if TP2 has the same qtv video hardware acceleration?
I'm surprised nobody has posted anything about qtv.
http://forum.ppcgeeks.com/showthread.php?t=57282
I have a TP and mp4 video plays flawlessly through HTC album because it has the proper qtv drivers. My problem has been with playing divx in coreplayer with the reverse engineered qtv driver. I was hoping that HTC would drop qtv in the TP2 so that I could play divx in a player with proper video drivers. Does anyone know if HTC still uses qtv in the TP2?

Greyfoxzero said:
Just curious why the video player thats built in will play only some of my mp4 files? Thats one of the reasons why I went with coreplayer was because most of my mp4 movies would play a green screen with audio on the built in player and wmp.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
MP4 is a file format that supports a few different video codec. Mostly like the green screen means the video codec isn't supported by the player. I would highly recommend these days to encode the video with H.264 as the video codec. This codec is the standard supported by all major companies these days, Apple, Adobe, MS, etc. Some video cameras like the Sanyo Xacti also captures video natively as MP4 (H.264) so there is no need to encode the video.
And TP2 plays MP4 (H.264) video well both in HTC Album and WMP.

TP2's Multimedia capabilities - Camera, Audio and Video...??

Folks,
First off I realise that the TP2 is a business mobile so it has to make compromises and reading the reviews especially on GSM Arena I have picked up that the Camera is OKish with funny colouring, The Video is less good with low framerate ie 15fps as opposed to 30fps and the sound quality is average ie for MP3s.
Perhaps some of these will be improved via firmware or software.....???
I also appreciate that the market is splitting in personal/mulimedia devices and business smartphones like the TP2.
I would appreciate any comments from current users on their views/experience of the above.
Thanks,
Sam

[Q] Video capture quality on the G2..

All the video samples from the G2 I have seen on Youtube so far have not been impressive. Most disturbing about these videos is the sound quality, it is pretty bad. I have a Nexus One (hacked with Cyanogenmod's 720p recording feature) and it also isn't that great so I'm guessing this is a 'feature' of HTC phones. Compared to the Galaxy S (from Samsung) the HTC phones (G2, N1 and even the EVO) seem to suck in the video / audio department.
In a recent post I read that the audio codec for a HD recording off the G2 is this:
AMR (samr), Mono, 8k, 32 bits per sample
Could this be the problem and can this be changed?

AMR == Adaptive Multi-Rate Audio Codec. Dunno what the "s" in "samr" is all about tho.
I see a comparison with the nokia 8 and there is a definite sound quality difference. (Be sure to watch this in 720p)
Wonder if the sample rate is adjustable by firmware/settings or if it's set in hardware. Strangely wikipedia lists 14 modes, none of which are at the "8k" (rate?) you reported... I see AMR_7.95 tho.
Anyway, my g2 is on the way....
W

cowmixtoo said:
AMR (samr), Mono, 8k, 32 bits per sample
Could this be the problem and can this be changed?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Wow, yeah that's pretty bad.. 8k.

ericc191 said:
Wow, yeah that's pretty bad.. 8k.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Yep, my watch can do better..

I just confirmed that my N1 encodes audio in the exact same format.

cowmixtoo said:
I just confirmed that my N1 encodes audio in the exact same format.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Idle thought- I wonder if the codec is set to a low bandwidth to accommodate slower SD card speeds. I think the g2 comes with a class 2, and this thread suggests that there is stuttering when playing back at the HD setting.
This is just idle speculation.

http://vimeo.com/15487989
Done a couple days ago, not so much about the audio, but the video couldnt keep up.

Yup, I noticed a lot of stuttering when playing videos back too.

ericc191 said:
Yup, I noticed a lot of stuttering when playing videos back too.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
What SD card?

Agreed. Audio isn't stellar and playback has stuttering. In fact, I've already experienced a weird situation where the video wouldn't actually play - just showed a blank screen with the audio playing.
I love this phone, but the video / audio / picture quality on my Sprint Epic is far superior.
Sent from my T-Mobile G2 using XDA App

VValdo said:
What SD card?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
8GB Class 6 Transcend. It usually transfers up to 7mb/ps, so definitely not the issue.

ericc191 said:
8GB Class 6 Transcend. It usually transfers up to 7mb/ps, so definitely not the issue.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Damn thought it might be it... well what else causes stuttering? Not buffering enough... or maybe cpu being pulled to do something else..?
Is there any message from logcat when it's stuttering?
Meanwhile, I'm looking at the video camera source to see if there's any way to change the audio bitrate...
Lines ~230:
Code:
for (AudioEncoderCap encoder : EncoderCapabilities.getAudioEncoders()) {
switch (encoder.mCodec) {
case MediaRecorder.AudioEncoder.AMR_NB:
AUDIO_ENCODER_TABLE.put("amrnb", MediaRecorder.AudioEncoder.AMR_NB);
break;
case MediaRecorder.AudioEncoder.AAC:
AUDIO_ENCODER_TABLE.put("aac", MediaRecorder.AudioEncoder.AAC);
break;
}
}
AUDIO_ENCODER_TABLE.putDefault(MediaRecorder.AudioEncoder.DEFAULT);
/*
AUDIO_ENCODER_TABLE.put("amrwb", MediaRecorder.AudioEncoder.AMR_WB);
AUDIO_ENCODER_TABLE.put("qcelp", MediaRecorder.AudioEncoder.QCELP);
AUDIO_ENCODER_TABLE.put("evrc", MediaRecorder.AudioEncoder.EVRC);
AUDIO_ENCODER_TABLE.put("aacplus", MediaRecorder.AudioEncoder.AAC_PLUS);
AUDIO_ENCODER_TABLE.put("eaacplus", MediaRecorder.AudioEncoder.EAAC_PLUS);
*/
VIDEOQUALITY_BITRATE_TABLE.put("1280x720", 6000000);
VIDEOQUALITY_BITRATE_TABLE.put("720x480", 3000000);
VIDEOQUALITY_BITRATE_TABLE.put("800x480", 3000000);
VIDEOQUALITY_BITRATE_TABLE.put("640x480", 1600000);
VIDEOQUALITY_BITRATE_TABLE.put("352x288", 360000);
VIDEOQUALITY_BITRATE_TABLE.put("320x240", 320000);
VIDEOQUALITY_BITRATE_TABLE.put("176x144", 192000);
VIDEOQUALITY_BITRATE_TABLE.putDefault(320000);
}
The video bitrate is right there.. how do you change the audio I wonder....? And what's up with the commented-out bits...
Maybe I'll try to get this running... I have no g2 yet to try it on but will soon.
W

One more thought... This is an old issue. If you doubt the potential the video camera COULD have, take a look at this audio comparison linked from the thread. At least on the n1, the microphone is capable of way better sound than the camera app currently offers. The g2 has a faster processor-- it should be able to encode better sound.. AAC? Ogg?
Update: It's not the camera app's fault. It's Android's. There is an open issue for this. It looks like Android itself doesn't support anything better. The good news is this isn't a hardware limitation. As someone suggested, a WebM encoder seems like an obvious thing to add.

VValdo said:
One more thought... This is an old issue. If you doubt the potential the video camera COULD have, take a look at this audio comparison linked from the thread. At least on the n1, the microphone is capable of way better sound than the camera app currently offers. The g2 has a faster processor-- it should be able to encode better sound.. AAC? Ogg?
Update: It's not the camera app's fault. It's Android's. There is an open issue for this. It looks like Android itself doesn't support anything better. The good news is this isn't a hardware limitation. As someone suggested, a WebM encoder seems like an obvious thing to add.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Well that's a plus.

VValdo said:
One more thought... This is an old issue. If you doubt the potential the video camera COULD have, take a look at this audio comparison linked from the thread. At least on the n1, the microphone is capable of way better sound than the camera app currently offers. The g2 has a faster processor-- it should be able to encode better sound.. AAC? Ogg?
Update: It's not the camera app's fault. It's Android's. There is an open issue for this. It looks like Android itself doesn't support anything better. The good news is this isn't a hardware limitation. As someone suggested, a WebM encoder seems like an obvious thing to add.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
wow amazing! i really hope we can fix this issue

I just starred the issue (they look at that don't they?)... I recorded some video at a concert last night and while the video wasn't terrible, the sound is absolutely unbearable. Makes the videos pretty much worthless

I keep wondering if it's possible to stuff our own codec in there. I mean, some of the android phones have higher quality audio, right? If so, how do they do it? Why are those codecs commented out in the video camera code for...?
Doesn't cyanogenmod have FLAC support? Couldn't other codecs be added to the phone app, even if they're in java?
You're right, the current audio situation sucks.

High-Quality Audio Recording

I have a question for the developers (im not one):
Though the KF doesnt have a built-in mic, it supports an external one for audio recording. Ive been using Android devices for a little over two years, and have tried a number of audio recoring apps on them.
There are a number of stereo microphones available (from Belkin, Tascam, Blue, etc) that allow high-quality stereo recording on ipods and iphones. There are a number of apps available for recording on Android, but the quality of the recordings is not great. Why is that? Is there something inherent in the Android platform that does not permit hi quality recording?
Sent from my Kindle Fire using Tapatalk

This link might enlighten you a bit. Along with extremely poor audio-latency it would seem that audio recording is also problematic. Strange to find this in an audio device such as a phone eh?

Thanks; I actually used to use the Rehearsal Assistant app. I posed this same question to the developer of J4T, which is a very cool Android multitrack recording app, and I just got his response:
"One reason might be that the best recording quality that is supported by most Android phones is mono, 16-bit pcm, with samplerate 44100. So to make sure a recording app runs on most most android phones, the developer should probably use those numbers and not go any higher.
But it also means it's possible to have android phones that can record at much higher quality, and maybe they are out there. But that capacity may go unused, because the apps are developed for the 'average' phone.
Perhaps on other platforms the 'average phones' have higher bitrates and samplerates.
There are actually 2 ways to do audio recording on Android, but I'm not familiar with the other way (where you can record to AAC or AMR format). Perhaps the quality using those codecs is better than PCM, I don't know.
Please don't take this as a definite answer - this is just a guess from my perspective, maybe a manufacturer (or the Android team) would give a different answer."
I've been using a Belkin Tundtalk stereo microphone with a 3rd-generation ipod nano to make reharsal recordings of my rock band; the quality is actually very good. It records in wav format, stereo, 16-bit pcm, with samplerate 44100. So, outside of the fact that Android records in mono, not stereo, the potential for decent quality is there. The lousy quality must have a lot to do with the cheesy microphones used in the Android phones. If I could find a decent quality mic that would work with my Android phone (or with the Fire), I imagine it would make a big difference.

Yeah, from what I know about Android audio going the other way, the audio-latency issues, Google really managed to screw up on a bunch of levels. The audio app market on the iPhone is pretty big and they just haven't stepped up to the plate for developers from what I can see. I see a few apps coming out like AudioSketch that claim to have custom low-latency audio drivers, but that one isn't available for the Kindle Fire so I really can't say. But, sorry, I am digressing. I'd be curious as to see what results you get from your experiences.

grvthang said:
Perhaps the quality using those codecs is better than PCM, I don't know.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
This man doesn't now a thing about sound encoding. PCM is uncompressed audio format so it have smallest use of CPU and it has best quality. Only problem is that is space-hungry in comparison with other codec's.
In audio, whole system is good as the weakest thing in it. You need good MIC, you need good MIC input, you need good audio driver and you need good recording app. If one link in this chain is inadequate resulting sound quality is on level of that poor part.

Hey, just a thought but you might be able to turn your question into a free Kindle Fire if you were so inclined.

Buffet_of_Lies said:
Hey, just a thought but you might be able to turn your question into a free Kindle Fire if you were so inclined.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Now that you've brought it to my attention, I AM so inclined! That's for letting me know.

I posted my question there, and after about an hour it was Closed as "not constructive" lol.
As I said, I'm not a developer. Even before I posted the question here I googled the subject and haven't been able to come up with a definitive answer as to why this is so. I would think there would be a huge market for after-market microphones for people to use on their Android phones (as there is for iphone and ipod). If I was an iphone fanboy, this would be my first argument against Android - crappy audio recording!

[Q] Best audio codec considering limited space?

Hello,
I just switched from an HTC Raider to a Galaxy Nexus and so far, I love it, except that there's no MicroSD slot, therefore limiting a bit the space available for music.
I have about 13 GB of music, which barely fits on the phone. They're mostly all MP3 196 kbps. What I'd like to do is convert my library to a different format in order to have at least some space for my apps and other stuff on my phone.
Is there any better format I should use? I'd ideally like to reduce the size while not losing too much quality. I, honestly, am quite a noob in terms of audio codecs.
I've checked .ogg but it doesn't seem to do that much of a difference in terms of file size (went from 4.26 MB to 4.06 MB).
Thanks!

If you're already at 196 any further compression would result in terrible sound quality. You'd have to select a smaller bit rate (no less than 128) and reencode from a high quality source like flac wave or best the original source.
Otherwise, you might just have to pick some to leave out, or create some rotating playlists so you can listen to something different every week or something.
Or look into Subsonic music streaming server and run that on your home machine. Then you have access to all no matter where you are.
Sent from my Galaxy Nexus using XDA

Why don't you load that music to the cloud (online) and stream it to the phone using the stock music player. The stock music player on 4.0 supports streaming music unlike the older versions so you can save space on your phone.
Sent from my Galaxy Nexus using XDA

+1
Getting Google music setup at first with all your music can take a while ..ESP if you are like me and have to have correct album art ..no duplicates ..etc . But once its there it actually sounds great when streamed with high quality turned on.
And saves all that space!
Sent from my Galaxy Nexus using xda premium

I thought about streaming, but I recently changed wireless carriers and went from 6 GB of data per month to 500 MB, so I have to be extra careful (I activated 3 days ago and I'm already about to go over, so imagine with music).
I hate creating playlists or changing music every so often, I usually get random trips throughtout the day and want to listen to a specific song. I guess I'll have to make due with that, though.
Thanks for your help y'all!

Try to convert to eAAC+. This codec have the best quality/bitrate-ratio.
Sent from my Galaxy Nexus using XDA

blockbusta said:
Try to convert to eAAC+. This codec have the best quality/bitrate-ratio.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I'll check this out, thank you!

I convert all my FLAC to 150k AAC (variable bitrate)
Sent from my Galaxy Nexus using XDA

blockbusta said:
Try to convert to eAAC+. This codec have the best quality/bitrate-ratio.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I've just converted 1 063 songs from 11.3 GB down to 1.72 GB, and quality is still more than decent.
The compression rate is simply retarded, I now feel like my 16 GB phone turned into a 160 GB iPod, just because of that codec lol
Thanks again dude, really appreciated!

lucas.scott said:
+1
Getting Google music setup at first with all your music can take a while ..ESP if you are like me and have to have correct album art ..no duplicates ..etc . But once its there it actually sounds great when streamed with high quality turned on.
And saves all that space!
Sent from my Galaxy Nexus using xda premium
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Its great but pulling data all day with data caps and its a battery drainer doesnt add huge cons.

Actually...
Not THAT good, I hadn't tried any bass heavy songs, but just did and doesn't sound too well. I'll try to convert to eAAC+ again but at a higher rate.
Sent from my Galaxy Nexus using XDA

cedrikfd said:
I've just converted 1 063 songs from 11.3 GB down to 1.72 GB, and quality is still more than decent.
The compression rate is simply retarded, I now feel like my 16 GB phone turned into a 160 GB iPod, just because of that codec lol
Thanks again dude, really appreciated!
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Do all players support it?

cedrikfd said:
Actually...
Not THAT good, I hadn't tried any bass heavy songs, but just did and doesn't sound too well. I'll try to convert to eAAC+ again but at a higher rate.
Sent from my Galaxy Nexus using XDA
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
let us know how you make out i'm interested in the results ... I was pretty sure AAC was the only real alternative to mp3 in a lossy codec, it produces a smaller in size file with a higher quality ... you probably have to set the bit rate about the same or slightly less than 192kbs

adrynalyne said:
Do all players support it?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I don't know if all players supports it, but the Music 4.0 from Google does. I would assume something like PowerAMP or WinAMP supports it as well (I converted them through WinAMP on my PC)
Sent from my Galaxy Nexus using XDA

cedrikfd said:
Actually...
Not THAT good, I hadn't tried any bass heavy songs, but just did and doesn't sound too well. I'll try to convert to eAAC+ again but at a higher rate.
Sent from my Galaxy Nexus using XDA
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
eAAC+ is ALWAYS going to sound like **** at any bitrate if you have ears.
Use something like 150K LC-AAC ("normal" AAC)

Matt08642 said:
eAAC+ is ALWAYS going to sound like **** at any bitrate if you have ears.
Use something like 150K LC-AAC ("normal" AAC)
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
he probably has ears! lol
here is a good read to draw a conclusion from
http://www.musicbanter.com/general-...mats-mp3-ogg-m4a-etc-quality-comparisons.html

blowtorch said:
he probably has ears! lol
here is a good read to draw a conclusion from
http://www.musicbanter.com/general-...mats-mp3-ogg-m4a-etc-quality-comparisons.html
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
tl;dr: Use a modern codec (Ogg Vorbis, AAC, LAME MP3) at a bitrate >128Kbps

I've converted my mp3 files to HE-AAC (eaac+) 64kbps with great results!

cedrikfd said:
I've just converted 1 063 songs from 11.3 GB down to 1.72 GB, and quality is still more than decent.
The compression rate is simply retarded, I now feel like my 16 GB phone turned into a 160 GB iPod, just because of that codec lol
Thanks again dude, really appreciated!
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Which bitrate are you using? 48 kbps?