Problem playing a MKV back with MPC and TCMP

[Dandier]

I have made a Matroska movie with VirtualDubMod and it looks terrible when playing it back with TCMP4 RC5 and MPC6.4.7.1. I wish I could include an image of it, but unfortunately I don't know how to snapshot it.

So let's me describe what I see. My screen is split in 3 parts: the movie is played back with awful colors both in the upper left and right quarters. The whole bottom half stays black.

The file can be openned and correctly played back with both VirtualDubMod and BSPlayer. After converting to OGM the playback is also OK with MPC and TCMP.

I can send a few seconds extract of my file to whoever is interested.

[K-Dash]

I dont know which mkvmerge vdubmod uses but u should use the latest mkvmerge which could be located in "New container" mkvtoolnix-0.7.7 or 0.7.5+ to playback properly with MPC, and if I'm not mistaken the author of MPC has integrated his own new splitter. Someone correct me if I'm wrong here.

[Dandier]

Thanx for your answer.

As I understand your post, it would mean that new MPC versions do not support older MKV movies... Which is far for being acceptable for most users... and contradictory with Matroska announcements...

In addition I have ripped my movie on next saturday with the very last availaible GK package. And I can playback an older movie, that I've ripped a few weeks ago.

If I understood well, MPC and TCMP have indeed their own MKV parse, while BSPlayer use the DS filter. Is that correct? It would mean that the DS parser (installed thru Matroska_Pack_MPEG4_v1.0.0.exe) can play my file back while both implementations in MPC and TCMP produce the same crappy output.

[K-Dash]

Well my mpc plays back old mkv files perfectly, its just that I have a problem switching subs on/off and changing audio files, and I think the author for MPC used his own developed mkv splitter which is built into his MPC, I'm not so sure about the latest ver but I dont see why he want to change it since its fully compatible with the newest mkv files as well.

[Dandier]

I have made further tests during the week-end, and it's becoming an irritating puzzle...

1) I have tested with older MPC versions on the same hardware (Notebook Dell Latitude P4-M 1.8GHZ, Mobility Radeon 7500 32MB): I get the same crappy playback.

2) I have tested with my home desktop computer (Home made Athlon XP 1600+, AIW 9000 Pro) and everything works okay.

3) I have updated my video drivers to the most recent available on the dell site (i.e. 7.83.030120a1-008108C-Dell). This has not changed anything.

I am unable to identify which configuration difference may be responsible of the problem.

As a matter of fact it is not that bad, because I can still read this movie with BSPlayer, but I am really wondering whether there exist a risk that further matroska evolutions may prevent me from watching some of my rips...

[Dandier]

Normally I don't believe that much to magic in IT... But I must aknowledge that I've got no rational explanation to my problem...

I performed other testing today, and the problem has eventually disappeared...

I have been wondering whether the difference between BSPlayer and the two other ones may be in the use of the oberlay mode. So I have checked out some overlay options in both players:

1) MPC was working after checking out all the RGB options in the Video Renderer. But TCMP was still delivering the previous piece of crap.

2) I have then checked out the yuv and overlay stuff in the DivX properties, and TCMP fell in order...

3) Then I got back to the original configuration, and it was indeed still working with both players... That is what I call Magic!

Well, I realize that I am not so clear with fine filter configuration. So may be there exist some options that are unstable on my system. Does somebody know more about that?

[Brother John]

Just for clarification
MPC's internal mkv splitter is only an embedded version of the widely used matroskasplitter.ax. In fact Gabest is the author of both.

Newest splitter version is 1.0.1.9, and that's also the one included in up to date MPC versions. So if you installed new MPC and new matroskasplitter.ax there should be no difference in behaviour.