Philips dvp 642

[Brother Darrell]

I Just recently bought one of these things(2 days go, to be exact) after reading about it in this forum. I have noticed a few problems. most notably, smearing and severe blockiness. I just encoded Amistad with the latest version of XVID. I did it with b-frames & without b-frames. both give the exact same severe blockiness & smearing. What is interesting is IF i go into the system menu while it is playing and (in this case) go to the personal picture adjustments, it will start playing just fine. Even the parts which were originally blocky & smeared. I did not adjust anything. It seems just going into the menu did the trick. It will play flawlessly after that.
Any ideas? Will changing the 4cc header to divx fix this problem?
I noticed there is a firmware upgrade available, but since it does not tell me what it is supposed to do & what problems it will fix, I have been hesitant about using it. I suppose it ain't gonna hurt to do it but I'd really like to know what it is supposed to do prior to that. Has anyone had the problem with the blockiness & smearing before?


Okay. I just did the upgrade. it did not help.

[speed_X]

Hi Brother Darrell...

I updated the firmware on mine however, I don't know what it fixes since Philips hasn't been forthcoming with that info.

As to the blockiness, what is your average bitrate for the encode?

speed_X

[Brother Darrell]

1045(on this movie).The bitrate is fine, looks very good on my pc. Also looks very good on the player..tyhat is, once I go into the personal setup for contrast, brightness..etc.. it won't let me DO anything, of course.
The point is, it's beautiful once I do that. Could not ask for a better picture.

[speed_X]

Brother Darrell and all

Here is my setup:
General

osd lang---------eng
screen saver-----on
smart power------on
disk lock NA
program NA
divx VOD NA

Audio setup

downmix----stereo
digital output--all
lpcm output--48k
sound mode--none
reverb mode--off
DRC--off

tv display

tv standard--ntsc
tv display--4:3 PS
closed caption--off
video uotput--s-video
progressive--off
smart picture--standard


preferences

audio--english
subtitle--english
disc menu--english
parental--no parental
password--NA
default--NA
mp3/jpeg nav--no menu


These are my settings. NA means not applicable, not used.

What do you mean by "it won't let me do anything"?

Is your menu password locked?

[Brother Darrell]

No, At least I don't THINK it is. I can press the system menu button while the vid is playing. It stops playing. I then go into "smart picture"->personal settings & it seems to start again with the express purpose of allowing me to use whatever is on the screen to set my personal settings. The little hand comes up, letting me know it is not allowed, then it will play the vid flawlessly.

[speed_X]

Well Brother Darrell that's got me!

Don't know what to say, perhaps you should take the unit back and exchange it.

[Brother Darrell]

Found the problem, It does not like Custom Matrix's...
My encode was using HVS Best quality.
Once I did it again using Mpeg standard or H.263, it was fine.

[bond]

Brother Darrell, speed_X

if you two have time, can you plz try whether it works to play this MP4 file (http://8ung.at/bond/sample.mp4) on this player!
someone reported that the player is able to play files with the .mp4 extension, but in a little bit fuzzy way
would be great to be sure if it works or not :)

[DJ Alik]

it looks like philips released a new firmware dated 0531 check it out
http://www.p4c.philips.com/files/d/dvp642_17/

[Brother Darrell]

Originally posted by bond
Brother Darrell, speed_X

if you two have time, can you plz try whether it works to play this MP4 file (http://8ung.at/bond/sample.mp4) on this player!


Yes it does. Bone Collector..right? Angelina Jolie And wazzizname :D the audio was out of sync though.
Gspot did not recognize the codec though. what is it encoded with?

[bond]

Originally posted by Brother Darrell
Yes it does.nice! seems you are owning one of the first "MP4-enabled" players ;)

Bone Collector..right? Angelina Jolie And wazzizname :D the audio was out of sync though.its denzel washington ^^
was the audio strongly out of sync? did the sync become bigger with the time or was it out of sync by the same length right from the beginning?

Gspot did not recognize the codec though. what is it encoded with?gspot doesnt handle .mp4 files
the video stream was encoded with xvid if i remember it right (no b-frames, no qpel, no gmc to avoid problems from this side for the player)

btw you have pm ;)

[Brother Darrell]

Kinda hard to tell, the screen remained blank for at least 5 seconds while the audio played(not accurate, just an "as I remember it" estimate).
Then the picture came up, macro blocks all over the place.
Another "as I remember it" is it stayed out of sync for the same amount of time. also...I got curious about the codec & simply changed the extention to avi & tried opening it in AviDubMod. It did not recognise it either. Bplayer would play it but it gave me the same problem as the dvd player did.ie...blank screen(well...not truly blank. it gave me a black screen frame but at the correct resolution)then finally kicked in the video.Out of sync of course.
I will try some more testing & let you know, I will also try to be a bit more specific about sync, audio quality, and vid quality.

[bond]

Originally posted by Brother Darrell
Kinda hard to tell, the screen remained blank for at least 5 seconds while the audio played(not accurate, just an "as I remember it" estimate).hm, the video stream is very dark, almost black, but i assume thats not what you mean

Then the picture came up, macro blocks all over the place.wierd, the video stream is simply mpeg-4, as output by xvid or divx5

I got curious about the codec & simply changed the extention to avi & tried opening it in AviDubMod. It did not recognise it either.renaming is not possible. mp4 and avi are totally different things
i wrote a small guide on how to find out which codec was used to encode a mp4 in my mp4 faq, linked to in my sig

Bplayer would play it but it gave me the same problem as the dvd player did.ie...blank screen(well...not truly blank. it gave me a black screen frame but at the correct resolution)then finally kicked in the video.Out of sync of course.hm, do you have the latest version of 3ivx installed? if yes, than playback should work correctly in bsplayer (at least here its that way)

[speed_X]

Hi all!

bond-> Hadn't been to the forums in a couple of days. Tried downloading the file bot no go!

Brother Darrell-> I'm glad you got it going and your problems are solved!

BTW, does anyone know what the new Philips firmware is for? There are 2 files within the archive, one is dvpxx.rom and the other is dvpxxdv.rom. What's the difference?

[DJ Alik]

Originally posted by speed_X
Hi all!

bond-> Hadn't been to the forums in a couple of days. Tried downloading the file bot no go!

Brother Darrell-> I'm glad you got it going and your problems are solved!

BTW, does anyone know what the new Philips firmware is for? There are 2 files within the archive, one is dvpxx.rom and the other is dvpxxdv.rom. What's the difference?

There is a pdf file on their website that has instructions and what was changed

[speed_X]

Hi DJ Alik!

Thanks a lot! You are a gold mine...you're really super!

I posted the info at divx forums hardware section!

[Brother Darrell]

I tried making my own mp4. I tried following the guide faithfully. I got the same thing as when I played the sample you had.
Only this time, no video at all. I did the newest upgrade and all that did was mark all my AVI's as MP4 on the disc menu. I suppose when it says it supports mp4 format, it does not mean the container.
Mind you, I have not tried a fully encoded mp4, just Xvid in the container. I am more than willing to experiment if you are willing to be the Sensei to my Quai-Chang.

[bond]

Originally posted by Brother Darrell
I tried making my own mp4.have a look here (http://forum.doom9.org/showthread.php?s=&threadid=74045&perpage=20&pagenumber=2) for a bunch of mp4 samples i created

I did the newest upgrade and all that did was mark all my AVI's as MP4 on the disc menu.what does this mean? you renamed your .avi files to .mp4?

I suppose when it says it supports mp4 format, it does not mean the container.as you already could play a .mp4 file, it surely supports the .mp4 container

Mind you, I have not tried a fully encoded mp4, just Xvid in the container.in what container? in .mp4?
beaware to NOT use xvid/divx5 features the player might not support, as qpel and gmc and to avoid problems i would suggest that you also dont use b-frames for testing

I am more than willing to experiment if you are willing to be the Sensei to my Quai-Chang.lol, i will do my best, plz have a look at the samples i linked to above :)

[SeeMoreDigital]

Originally posted by bond
lol, i will do my best, plz have a look at the samples i linked to above :) Agreed.

It's very important for us MP4 enthusiasts to establish which players can support the .mp4 container.

If the Philips DVP642 can support the .mp4 container or can be tricked into playing them be simply changing the file extension to .avi.... we would like to know please

You might also want to give these files (http://homepage.ntlworld.com/seemoredigital/Philips_DVP642_Test_Files.zip) a try?


Cheers

[bond]

Originally posted by SeeMoreDigital
You might also want to give these files (http://homepage.ntlworld.com/seemoredigital/Philips_DVP642_Test_Files.zip) a try?yep, its good to also test if the player can handle the subs (tough i fear it will not do it)

[SeeMoreDigital]

Originally posted by bond
yep, its good to also test if the player can handle the subs (tough i fear it will not do it) The subs was just a side issue really.

I just wondered if the Philips player might be happier with encodes generated by Recode2.

You may not remember but I had quite a bit of trouble playing back MP4's in hardware. And only Sorenson Squeeze and QuickTime MP4 encodes would work properly before Sigma released a firmware update.

I never did find out what the problem was!


Cheers

[speed_X]

I tested a few files from a sample I got (can't remember where)

1 3ivx_cbrmp3.....video delayed...sound stops in the middle
2 3ivx_cbrmp3..........video OK...sound stops in the middle
3 3ivx_vbrmp3..........video OK...sound stops in the middle
4 mp4 box_aac..........video OK...no sound
5 mp4 box_ar.........vid freezes..no sound
6 mp4 box_cbrm.........video OK...no sound
7 mp4 box_vbrm.........video OK...no sound
8 mp4 creator..........video OK...no sound
9 mp4u1_cbrmp..........video OK...no sound
10 mp4u1_cbrmp..........video OK...no sound
11 quicktime A..........video OK...no sound

The name of the zip archive the test files came in is "mp4 test cd v1.zip" and here is the info text file that came within the archive:

******************************************************************

1) MP4 muxer test:
mpeg-4 video stream (xvid without b-frames, qpel and gmc) muxed with mp3 (vbr or cbr) in 3 different mp4 muxer (3ivx, mp4box, mp4ui):
- 3ivx_cbrmp3.mp4
- 3ivx_vbrmp3.mp4
- mp4box_cbrmp3.mp4
- mp4box_vbrmp3.mp4
- mp4ui_cbrmp3.mp4
- mp4ui_vbrmp3.mp4

2) LC-AAC audio support test:
- mp4box_aac.mp4

3) anamorphic resize test:
mpeg-4 video stream (xvid with 2 b-frames, no qpel, no gmc) muxed with 3 different mp4 muxers (mp4box, quicktime, mp4creator):
- mp4box_ar.mp4
- quicktime_ar.mp4
- mp4creator_ar_pb.mp4

4) not spec compliant MP4 file (packed bitstream b-frames) test:
- mp4creator_ar_pb.mp4

5) XCD capabilities (.dat) test:
- 3ivx_cbrmp3.dat"

******************************************************************

These tests were done using the latest firmware from Philips (0531)

Hope this helps!

:D

[SeeMoreDigital]

Thanks speed_X,

That helps quite a bit.

So it would seem that the player can playback Mpeg4 video streams within an MP4 container but can't handle AAC audio streams and struggles with MP3 audio streams.

Can you try the encodes I posted please?


Cheers

[bond]

the samples were taken from a sample set i created and are available here (http://mp4menu.sourceforge.net/download/MP4_TestCD_v1.zip)


1 3ivx_cbrmp3.....video delayed...sound stops in the middle
2 3ivx_cbrmp3..........video OK...sound stops in the middle
3 3ivx_vbrmp3..........video OK...sound stops in the middle
4 mp4 box_aac..........video OK...no sound
5 mp4 box_ar.........vid freezes..no sound
6 mp4 box_cbrm.........video OK...no sound
7 mp4 box_vbrm.........video OK...no sound
8 mp4 creator..........video OK...no sound
9 mp4u1_cbrmp..........video OK...no sound
10 mp4u1_cbrmp..........video OK...no sound
11 quicktime A..........video OK...no soundok so to sum it up: the philips player doesnt handle aac audio as expected

it also seems to not really handle mp3 audio in mp4 atm (no matter if vbr or cbr and no matter what muxer was used to create the stream)
this maybe should be tested with other samples too to be sure, like the one created by seemoredigital (maybe i will create some more too)

it has problems with anamorphic streams created with mp4box, but not with mp4creator (this should be tested with the 3ivx muxer too)
did sample 8 and 11 resize to 16:9 during playback?

it doesnt seem to have problems with packed bitstreams in mp4 (sample #8), i assume because it has to handle them anyways because of avi

about sample 1 and 2: one of the two is a XCD sample (i assume #1 )! which one was the XCD one (.dat extension)? did you burn the image (.bin) correctly as it was available in the .zip?
if yes than the player seems to handle XCD too already


would be great if someone else could also confirm these results!

[speed_X]

Hi all!

bond and SeeMoreDigital-> Please confirm the name of the downloaded archive is "Philips DVP642 Test Files.zip"

I will unpack and give you the most details I can.

As to the AR of files #8 and 11, will replay it and see about it. How should it look on the TV? Letterboxes top and bottom?

This might take a little time but you'll have the info shortly.

[bond]

Originally posted by speed_X
bond and SeeMoreDigital-> Please confirm the name of the downloaded archive is "Philips DVP642 Test Files.zip"thats the one from seemoredigital and NOT the one you have tested now. the one you tested now is called "MP4_TestCD_v1.zip"

As to the AR of files #8 and 11, will replay it and see about it. How should it look on the TV? Letterboxes top and bottom?you will always have black borders at the top and bottom
you can see if its 16:9 if the image looks correct, meaning not squeezed horizontally

and plz dont forget to answer if you burned MP4_TestCD_v1 directly from the .bin image without changing anything!
its important to find out whether the player handles XCD!

[SeeMoreDigital]

Originally posted by speed_X
Hi all!

bond and SeeMoreDigital-> Please confirm the name of the downloaded archive is "Philips DVP642 Test Files.zip" Yes, the Philips DVP642 Test Files.zip is the one I encoded and made available for download.

It's just a basic zip file so if your running WinME or XP you should be able to unpack as standard.

EDIT: I forgot to mention. Please don't forget to try playing the files again by changing the file extension from .pp4 to .avi.

You never know, something might happen!


Cheers

[speed_X]

Originally posted by bond
thats the one from seemoredigital and NOT the one you have tested now. the one you tested now is called "MP4_TestCD_v1.zip"

you will always have black borders at the top and bottom
you can see if its 16:9 if the image looks correct, meaning not squeezed horizontally

and plz dont forget to answer if you burned MP4_TestCD_v1 directly from the .bin image without changing anything!
its important to find out whether the player handles XCD!

bond and SeeMoreDigital-> I unpacked the archive, copied each file and renamed the extensions to avi. The 4 files burned onto a CD/RW, verified and put in the DVP642. The disc loaded and showed the menu but it won't play any of the 4 files, either mp4 or avi.

As to the files from the previous test, nothing was changed. The image was burned as I received it. The AR on files 8 and 11, what am I looking for? An image that looks stretched or squashed? As I played both files, it's hard to tell if the AR is OK or not. If I had to choose, I would say they looked a bit stretched however, it's hard to tell 'cause all I had to look at was the digital gnome character so I cant be 100% certain. All I can tell you is the letterboxing top and bottom was shorter than usual for a 16:9 AR.

Is there anything else I can do to further these tests?

[SeeMoreDigital]

Originally posted by speed_X
bond and SeeMoreDigital-> I unpacked the archive, copied each file and renamed the extensions to avi. The 4 files burned onto a CD/RW, verified and put in the DVP642. The disc loaded and showed the menu but it won't play any of the 4 files, either mp4 or avi. I dont think they will play if you mix them!

Try putting the 2No .MP4's on one CD~R/RW and the .AVI's on another CD~R/RW.


Cheers

[speed_X]

SeeMore Digital-> Will do so and report back shortly!

[speed_X]

SeeMoreDigital-> Burned the mp4 and avi onto separate CDRW's and none of them would play. All I got was the file menu but they wouldn't load.

Is there anything else I could do to further these tests?

[bond]

Originally posted by speed_X
bond and SeeMoreDigital-> I unpacked the archive, copied each file and renamed the extensions to avi. The 4 files burned onto a CD/RW, verified and put in the DVP642. The disc loaded and showed the menu but it won't play any of the 4 files, either mp4 or avi.interesting that original (not modified) files produced by nero recode2 dont play at all

about the renaming of mp4 to avi or the other way round: this makes no sense at all!!! i have to make this clear once and for all: avi and mp4 are totally different and have nothing in common, no sane player will ever handle a renamed mp4 or avi file!
renaming mp4 to avi is not an option and doesnt need to be tested and doesnt need to be spread as being an option!

As to the files from the previous test, nothing was changed. The image was burned as I received it.great, so until no other reports prooving the contrary come up, it seems that the player handles XCD (800mb on a 700mb disc!)

The AR on files 8 and 11, what am I looking for? An image that looks stretched or squashed? As I played both files, it's hard to tell if the AR is OK or not. If I had to choose, I would say they looked a bit stretched however, it's hard to tell 'cause all I had to look at was the digital gnome character so I cant be 100% certain. All I can tell you is the letterboxing top and bottom was shorter than usual for a 16:9 AR.you can check out how the picture should look like in 16:9 in the following way on your pc:
install 3ivx and play the mp4box_ar file in your favourite directshow player, make sure that the "allow unsupported decoders" option is NOT ticked in the 3ivx splitter, which will use the 3ivx decoder filter and play the file in correct 16:9

[SeeMoreDigital]

Originally posted by speed_X
SeeMoreDigital-> Burned the mp4 and avi onto separate CDRW's and none of them would play. All I got was the file menu but they wouldn't load.

Is there anything else I could do to further these tests? Well that is weird, maybe it does not like the 640x352 image pixel frame size!

What size did bond use and I'll do the same. However this time I'll generate some XviD Mpeg4/AAC and XviD Mpeg4/Mp3 files for you to test.


Cheers

[speed_X]

Originally posted by bond


you can check out how the picture should look like in 16:9 in the following way on your pc:
install 3ivx and play the mp4box_ar file in your favourite directshow player, make sure that the "allow unsupported decoders" option is NOT ticked in the 3ivx splitter, which will use the 3ivx decoder filter and play the file in correct 16:9

A side by side comparison PC Vs DVP642:

On the PC the AR seems to be OK, normal. On the DVP642 all the images seem stretched. What is this?

[bond]

Originally posted by speed_X
On the PC the AR seems to be OK, normal. On the DVP642 all the images seem stretched. What is this?hm it should get stretched, make sure you use the 3ivx decoder on your pc when testing it!

not correctly played it looks like this:
|----|

16:9 like this:
|-------|

[SeeMoreDigital]

Ok,

I've generated some new 720x576 'anamorphic' XviD encodes for you to try.

I'm hoping these will work and that the problems with the others was because of the subtitles!

Anyway here are the Philips DVP642 Test02 Files.zip (http://homepage.ntlworld.com/seemoredigital/Philips_DVP642_Test02_Files.zip).


Cheers

[speed_X]

Originally posted by bond
hm it should get stretched, make sure you use the 3ivx decoder on your pc when testing it!

not correctly played it looks like this:
|----|

16:9 like this:
|-------|

bond I meant the images seem too stretched, as in head and limbs that look too skinny, tall and narrow like an El Greco painting. There seems to be a bias toward the vertical axis. To put it another way, if they could get squashed about 10 to 15% they would be on the money.

SeeMoreDigital-> will report on the latest test files shortly!

[speed_X]

Originally posted by SeeMoreDigital
Ok,

I've generated some new 720x576 'anamorphic' XviD encodes for you to try.

I'm hoping these will work and that the problems with the others was because of the subtitles!




Cheers

SeeMoreDigital-> Downloaded and burned the files onto CD/RW and neither will play, at all! All I get is a green screen, no video or audio. I don't think it likes the Xvid codec you used for the encoding!

PS: You do know I have an NTSC display. My player is set to NTSC!

[bond]

Originally posted by speed_X
bond I meant the images seem too stretched, as in head and limbs that look too skinny, tall and narrow like an El Greco painting. There seems to be a bias toward the vertical axis. To put it another way, if they could get squashed about 10 to 15% they would be on the money.hm ic, but this only happens with with the samples 8 and 11, or also with the other ones?

Originally posted by speed_X
SeeMoreDigital-> Downloaded and burned the files onto CD/RW and neither will play, at all! All I get is a green screen, no video or audio. I don't think it likes the Xvid codec you used for the encoding!strange that my xvid samples worked, but not the ones from smd
smd, maybe you do some strange things when creating the samples? maybe using your "template" is not a good idea! how exactly did you create your testing files?

[SeeMoreDigital]

Originally posted by bond
strange that my xvid samples worked, but not the ones from smd

smd, maybe you do some strange things when creating the samples? maybe using your "template" is not a good idea! how exactly did you create your testing files? Nothing strange as far as I'm aware. They work fine via both hardware and software players here. And I did not use my template!

For the XviD/AAC file, I generated the Mpeg4.avi stream using MPEGmediator. The AAC stream was created using dBpowerAMP straight to .MP4

The AAC in .MP4 stream was opened using mp4UI 1.0.1 RC2 (private build) and the video in .AVI stream was imported and muxed.

For the XviD/MP3 file, I opened up the above file in mp4UI. Deleted the AAC stream and imported the MP3 stream and muxed.

Maybe it's something to do with the burning process. I wonder if it's worth presenting them in the same way you did with your 26.3MB 'MP4_TestCD_v1'?


Cheers

[bond]

smd, i just saw that you also edited somehow the first nero digital (including he-aac) sample in mp4ui
plz try to avoid using mp4ui! beaware it also rewrites the files if you only open a mp4 in it!
mp4ui is not reliable and might fuck up things!

[SeeMoreDigital]

Originally posted by bond
smd, i just saw that you also edited somehow the first nero digital (including he-aac) sample in mp4ui
plz try to avoid using mp4ui! beaware it also rewrites the files if you only open a mp4 in it!
mp4ui is not reliable and might fuck up things! Yes, I used mp4UI to add metadata to the encode!

Sadly I think you must be correct about mp4UI.. it's not quite there yet (hopefully we can help Markus with this).... So with this in mind I've encoded the following Philips DVP642 Test03 File (http://homepage.ntlworld.com/seemoredigital/Philips_DVP642_Test03_Files.zip).

This 720x576 1.77:1 anamorphic clip was generated purely using Nero Recode2.... And did not go anywhere near mp4UI.

If this clip does not work the god knows how people will be able to make MP4 clips for the Philips player using simple tools and applications:(


Cheers

[speed_X]

smd, these are the results for test 03:

The video clip will not even load. I can see it in the menu but when I click to load it....nothing!!!

[SeeMoreDigital]

Originally posted by speed_X
smd, these are the results for test 03:

The video clip will not even load. I can see it in the menu but when I click to load it....nothing!!! Lets give it one last try with Recode2!

Test file number 04 (http://homepage.ntlworld.com/seemoredigital/Philips_DVP642_Test04_Files.zip) has been encoded with an image pixel frame size of just 576x256.


Cheers

[speed_X]

smd...your server won't answer. The file won't start downloading.

[SeeMoreDigital]

Originally posted by speed_X
smd...your server won't answer. The file won't start downloading. Strange.

I just tried it and it seems to be ok!


Cheers

[speed_X]

smd-> Was able to get the Test 04 file and burned to CDRW.

Same thing as the previous files, menu but no play!:D

[SeeMoreDigital]

If it can't play Recode2 encodes and mp4UI muxes... I give up!

But at least we've learned something


Cheers

[bond]

Originally posted by SeeMoreDigital
If it can't play Recode2 encodes and mp4UI muxes... I give up!
But at least we've learned somethingthe two mp4ui samples i uploaded worked

[SeeMoreDigital]

Originally posted by bond
the two mp4ui samples i uploaded worked God knows why mine don't work then.

They work fine here in both hardware and software.

I noticed that both your samples used smaller image pixel frame sizes than mine and had mp3 audio...

I suppose I can give it "one-last-try" using the same settings as your encodes ;)

EDIT: I forgot to ask. What codecs did you use to create the audio and video streams?


Cheers