Vista (x64) Issues - A General Query

[Zach]

Since, oddly, I really haven't been able to find much talk here about Vista (x64), I figured I'd make a general inquiry myself.

Is anyone here using Vista (x64), and if so, have you run into any issues (audio/video codec issues only, please!) that you haven't been able to work around?


Now, I'm not talking about true 64-bit support necessarily; in fact, I'm more interested at time being in old 32-bit apps/codecs compatibility.

In my brief stint with Vista (x64), the only issues I ran into was 1.) not being able to register my "Pro" version of DivX, and 2.) not being able to configure that AC3Filter. As for the latter, I wasn't too concerned since the source code is available (I believe), so I could theoretically compile and debug it myself. But not being able to register DivX is what killed Vista for me (for the moment) since I'm currently in the process of converting all my old tapes and DVR recordings to DivX for space-saving reasons.

AviSynth v.2.5.7 worked fine. (***UPDATE***: Wrong. WMP11 won't exit when playing .avs scripts. One has to end the task manually.)
VirtualDub v.1.6.19 worked fine.
FFDShow installed and worked fine. (I just lazily installed the latest CCCP (http://www.cccp-project.net/).)
GSpot worked fine I believe.
DivX installed okay; I just couldn't register it to unlock the "Pro" encoder part of it.
Xvid installed okay, but I might have run into configuration issues.
AC3Filter installed fine and was being used (I believe), but I would get errors trying to configure it after installation.

So, again, is anyone else using Vista (x64), and if so, for how long and what issues have you run into in your video encoding endeavors?

[JohnnyMalaria]

For most 32-bit programs that use the registry to store data (such as registration codes etc), they need to be "64-bit" aware. On 64-bit Windows (XP and Vista versions), the registry is divided into a 32-bit section and a 64-bit section. Without doing the right checks, a program can end up writing to/reading from the wrong part of the registry.

With Vista, the program your are running may require admin rights in order to write to the registry - so you should try running them "as Administrator" - even if you are logged in as Administrator, you need to explicitly launch the program with admin rights.

Audio - this is a weak point with Vista. The old hardware-accelerated DirectSound has been retired. Many DirectShow-based programs that use audio will demonstrate poor performance under Vista compared to XP. Such software needs to be Vista-aware and use the right audio subsystem to get the appropriate performance.

[burfadel]

I hope my reply in the other post helps! Its quite a simple problem, just annoying! :)

Are you using the latest AC3filter? The current version is 1.45b

[deets]

i have vista 64bit on the way for my spare machine to test, so this thread is interesting to me as well :)

out of interest, why are you backing things up to divx and not say xvid or even avc (x264)

[squid_80]

For most 32-bit programs that use the registry to store data (such as registration codes etc), they need to be "64-bit" aware. On 64-bit Windows (XP and Vista versions), the registry is divided into a 32-bit section and a 64-bit section. Without doing the right checks, a program can end up writing to/reading from the wrong part of the registry.Incorrect. 32-bit programs normally don't have access to the 64-bit specific parts of the registry. Nor do they have access to the real windows\system32 directory, what they see as windows\system32 is actually windows\syswow64.

If I had to take a stab in the dark about the ac3filter problem, I would guess the shortcut to the configuration is incorrectly using windows\system32\rundll32.exe instead of windows\syswow64\rundll32. This happened with xvid as well.

[JohnnyMalaria]

Incorrect.

For one of our apps, it is very much correct. Relying on creating registry entries at installation time caused one feature of one of our 32-bit programs not to function on 64-bit XP and Vista. Consequently, our installer now has a custom step to test for a 64-bit OS and, if present, add the registry entries to the 64-bit hive instead of the 32-bit hive. As a result, the feature works as it should.

[burfadel]

Incorrect. 32-bit programs normally don't have access to the 64-bit specific parts of the registry. Nor do they have access to the real windows\system32 directory, what they see as windows\system32 is actually windows\syswow64.

If I had to take a stab in the dark about the ac3filter problem, I would guess the shortcut to the configuration is incorrectly using windows\system32\rundll32.exe instead of windows\syswow64\rundll32. This happened with xvid as well.

Thats pretty much what I am guessing, in the other post he had (he posted in 2 sections, but all is good), I gave the example of installing the Shockwave Player on x64 systems. You have to install, pass the error message, copy the macromed folder from syswow64 to system32 (or was it the other way around? either way, the same copy has to be in both directories), then install again!

How come Vista doesn't come with a Directsound hardware support layer? sounds pretty dumb not having one, as that would mean most games are affected!

You could effectively copy the Directsound files from directx 9 (from the redistributable) modify the supplied install inf's, then you'd have Directsound on Vista. Just use the xp ones for vista32 and xp x64 ones for vista x64.

[squid_80]

For most 32-bit programs that use the registry to store data For one of our apps, it is very much correct.
One of your programs != most.

[Zach]

out of interest, why are you backing things up to divx and not say xvid or even avc (x264)
Maybe ignorance? I have no interest in just backing things up to a hard drive. What good is that? Originally, some two to three years ago, I was just moving my old S-VHS tapes and DVR recordings to good old DVD. Now that I have purchased a DivX "certified" DVD player (an OPPO DV-970HD (http://www.oppodigital.com/dv970hd/dv970hd.html)), I'm transitioning to DivX since I can maintain the same 704x480 quality with much less space.

As my goal is to watch this stuff on my TV, not my PC, this rules out x264, right? (correct me if I'm wrong)

And yes, I could just use Xvid, but that would limit me, from what I understand, in terms of what encoding parameters I could use that would be readable by my DVD player. And besides, I already paid for and want to use the DivX "Pro" encoder since it is supposedly better (quality, multi-threaded/multi-core efficiency, etc.). <shrug>

If I had to take a stab in the dark about the ac3filter problem, I would guess the shortcut to the configuration is incorrectly using windows\system32\rundll32.exe instead of windows\syswow64\rundll32. This happened with xvid as well.

Hey, spot on! That's exactly what the problem was, though I didn't have a clue the solution was so simple. :) The error was Vista complaining about something along the lines of, "Unable to run rundll32.exe ac3filter.ax /configure."

[JohnnyMalaria]

One of your programs != most.

Many of the problems encountered with 32-bit programs installed on 64-bit versions of Windows arise from the 32-bit program (or installer) not bothering to check whether it is being installed on a 64-bit OS or not. It's a trivial check and, with a few lines of code, the authors could save the end users a lot of trouble.

Our registry issue arose because our app is designed to make extensive use of the imaging device arrival notification feature of the OS. On 64-bit Windows, the OS looks for registry entries in the 64-bit hive. A 32-bit application will add these entries to the 32-bit hive. When an imaging device arrives, the OS doesn't find them because they are not in the right hive. By detecting the 64-bit OS at install time, our entries get put in the 64-bit hive and everything works just as it does on the 32-bit platform.

Shortcuts to system32 are trivial to change to syswow64 at install time and/or within the software at runtime.

Registry and shortcut problems basically stem from the same thing - transparent redirection by the 64-bit OS of 32-bit processes coupled with 32-bit software not written to be 64-bit OS aware.

References to system32 from within a 32-bit app are supposed to be automatically redirected to syswow64 by the OS at runtime.

MS info at: http://support.microsoft.com/kb/896456

[deets]

Maybe ignorance? I have no interest in just backing things up to a hard drive. What good is that? Originally, some two to three years ago, I was just moving my old S-VHS tapes and DVR recordings to good old DVD. Now that I have purchased a DivX "certified" DVD player (an OPPO DV-970HD (http://www.oppodigital.com/dv970hd/dv970hd.html)), I'm transitioning to DivX since I can maintain the same 704x480 quality with much less space.

As my goal is to watch this stuff on my TV, not my PC, this rules out x264, right? (correct me if I'm wrong)

And yes, I could just use Xvid, but that would limit me, from what I understand, in terms of what encoding parameters I could use that would be readable by my DVD player. And besides, I already paid for and want to use the DivX "Pro" encoder since it is supposedly better (quality, multi-threaded/multi-core efficiency, etc.). <shrug>



Hey, spot on! That's exactly what the problem was, though I didn't have a clue the solution was so simple. :) The error was Vista complaining about something along the lines of, "Unable to run rundll32.exe ac3filter.ax /configure."

ill be doing the same thing later as my copy arrived :D whats the simple fix btw?

yeah if your watching via a divx player, then mpeg4 is your only option, but that does also include xvid which is multi threaded. but dont want to confused you, if you have divx pro and your happy with it, no need to change :)

I personally have recently built a mini media player PC with a 1.8 dual core (not duo!) cpu and and old AGP graphics card with HDTV out via component and i watch (and listen) to all my stuff through that, no issues with files and such, if the PC can play it, then it can output it :)

but this thread is handy as i didnt find too much about vista 64 and video etc :)

[Zach]

whats the simple fix btw?

The error, apparently, was that via the installed shortcut, the AC3Filter author was trying to execute rundll32.exe from the wrong directory (from Vista64's perspective), hence Vista was actually just complaining about not being able to find rundll32.exe. (Or if it's there, that the ac3filter.ax wasn't.)

This was so obvious that it didn't even occur to me. :D I just assumed that Vista was complaining about ac3filter.ax and the "/configure" parameter..

So the simple solution is just to fix the paths for either the rundll32.exe or ac3filter.ax, e.g., assuming ac3filter.ax got installed to system32, make the shortcut "Start in" system32 and then call...

c:\windows\syswow64\rundll32.exe ac3filter.ax /configure

[burfadel]

x64 seems to have a better feel to it, and when 64 bit programmes and games become more mainstream (which they definately will by the next Windows release, as that will be x64 only), you'll get the extra speed advantage. No point going from Xp32 to Vista32, just my opinion anyway. drivers aren't hard to find for x64 vista, as unless you fiddle and disable some stuff, you cannot install non whql drivers, and for drivers to get whql they have to fully support 32 and 64 bit vista!

[Zach]

Drivers don't have to be WHQL certified; they just have to be signed. The first thing I did was disable that requirement, though, since on my home computer I feel that requirement is overkill.

Disable Driver Signing in x64 Windows Vista (http://www.start64.com/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=862&Itemid=1)

[deets]

i cannot get it to output DTS through the spdif though, which is a royal pain. Otherwise im finding it all ok, my sound card was a right pain to get 64 bit drivers for, but that was only a cheap one :)

megui runs just fine, i turned off the file checking thing as that was a pain!

need more ram though as 1gb is being eaten up.

[deets]

haha ok i can now, using the media player 64 bit it outputs DTS or DD, but it wont use coreavc and ffdshow is all green :P oh the joys ;)

[deets]

also my patched DVD player wont play a darn thing, the only way to get it to work is via anydvd.

so my legally bought dvds wont play on vista at all, but if i downloaded a ripped version i could do! nice one MS and the MPAA im so utterly sick of being treated like this :(

[Zach]

Do you know for certain that this is a DRM issue?

I'm by no means an expert on commercial DVD playback as I have always found watching DVD's on my PC as opposed to on my $7,000 home theater setup just plain silly, nor do I have any type of HTPC setup going, BUT, I do seem to recall even WinXP having issues with DVD's "by default." (Ummm... maybe this was Win95... but whatever.)

My point is--or question is--isn't there some type of "filter" (not codec, mind you, but just some driver) needed to playback DVD's? On WinXP, people take it for granted because it's installed by default, but on Win95, one used to have to install PowerDVD (or the like) to get the drivers installed.

Maybe it's the same for Vista? <shrug>

[deets]

nope its a blocked thing from my further research :( it works just fine when i use anydvd to emulate it as rpc2 drive.

oh well....

and texas, ive lived there :P

[Zach]

nope its a blocked thing from my further research :( it works just fine when i use anydvd to emulate it as rpc2 drive.
I think something else has messed you up. :(

I just reinstalled Vista (x64), and I have installed absolutely nothing yet except my video card drivers and soundcard drivers (oh, and I did download and install all the Automatic Updates).

Based on your problems (this thread stilling being fresh in my mind), just for the fun of it, I tried to pop in a DVD just to see what would happen. I expected it to fail, if for no other reason, because I haven't installed any A/V codecs yet of any kind.

It plays fine!

http://img370.imageshack.us/img370/74/screenshotlx4.th.jpg (http://img370.imageshack.us/my.php?image=screenshotlx4.jpg)

It's playing in the background as I type this.

At any rate, I guess this is good news. You just need to figure out what messed you up because Vista itself doesn't seem to have problems with commercial DVDs. (And by the way, my Region setting on my DVD drive is still unset, so that's not your problem in case that occurs to you.)

[deets]

ah yep its not a vista issue with playing back of DVD's, just those dvd drives that have been patched to be region free :)

http://hardware.slashdot.org/hardware/06/01/01/1021218.shtml?tid=109&tid=188&tid=137

[Zach]

I don't know if my drive is "region free," per se, I just haven't set it--it says I still have five changes left. For years, though, I have never set that setting; I never do. :p

Anyway, that article you reference states this only affects drives made prior to 2000. Come on, man, that means you must have a pretty old drive, and you probably should have mentioned that since the average Joe reading this thread will otherwise come away thinking, "OMG@!OMG!OMG! Vista sucks! It won't play my DVDs!"

[deets]

Zach my texan friend :P look its clearly is talking about DVD drives that are RPC2 but are patched to RPC1:
"those with hacked drives (RPC2 with RPC1 firmware)"

im guessing you have never patched a DVD drive to remove the region encoding or riplock (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Riplock).

im willing to bet there are a heck of a lot of doom9 users with patched RPC1 drives still :P

[Zach]

:) Well, I updated the firmware direct from Sony, but I don't think that's what you are talking about. :p

Okay, point made, but at least you did find a workaround of some sort which is what this thread is all about. :thanks:

[deets]

yeah offical firmwares are ok ;)

im looking into re flashing the drive with an official firmware, then i can repatch just to remove the riplock :) or try to!

edit: go to the ffdshow tryouts thread and see how you get on with 64 bit versions? thats vital for us v64 users

[Zach]

I just discovered/noticed that WMP thinks all my mpeg2 files are 640x480. (They're standard NTSC 704x480 DVR recordings.) What's up with that?

I know this isn't an nVidia mpeg2 decoder thing nor an FFDShow thing because I tried loading them in the 64-bit version WMP which is just using its default/built-in codecs, and even it thinks they are 640x480.

[JohnnyMalaria]

Try Media Center to play the DVDs instead of WMP.

I had a difficult time trying to get WMP (on Vista) to even acknowledge that a DVD was in the drive.

Media Center recognized the DVD and played in flawlessly.

(Media Center is only provided with some versions of Vista).

[Zach]

No, that's not what I was talking about. As deets and I were discussing above, I have no problems playing DVD's. As a side note, I'm not a coward in that I prefer to solve problems, not run away from them and pretend they don't exist by using another program. :cool:


I'm talking about Plain Jane mpeg2 files that I'm getting from my DVR. They are 704x480, but WMP thinks they are 640x480. (This has been a pet project of mine for over two years, so yes, I know for a fact they are, indeed, 704x480.) This is just a Vista64 anomaly, and I just want to know if this a known issue or if this is just specific to my system.

[Zach]

I updated my original post, i.e., the "What Works" list.

It turns out that AviSynth v.2.5.7 doesn't exactly work in WMP11 under Vista64. It does, but after exiting, WMP11 remains in the process list, and one has to manually kill it; otherwise, subsequent launches of WMP11 will fail.

I don't know if this a Vista64 issue or a WMP11 issue since on XP, I never bother updating past WMP10.

[deets]

yey ive been having a chat with MS tech support in india over a few days and we have a hot fix that is for vista 64 and gives digital out in 32 bit software :D

so im sitting here using media player classic, coreavc and im getting DD output through spdif :D

yey to that, vista 64 is almost as good as xp used to be in that regard :P

[Bigmango]

haha ok i can now, using the media player 64 bit it outputs DTS or DD, but it wont use coreavc and ffdshow is all green :P oh the joys ;)

For me the fix for the green output with the x64 ffdshow avc decoder was in the ffdshow "Video Decoder Configuration" tool under "Output" disable "YUY2". After this avc plays fine with the 64bit media player.

Regarding the OP, I'm using visty x64 with the vista codecs pack with the x64 supplement, set the x64 media player as default. Everything plays fine.

As for encoding, I have not seen any app that doesn't work.