madVR - high quality video renderer (GPU assisted)

[cyberbeing]

Experienced a random freeze while seeking a WMV:

madVR 0.85.8
LAV Video 0.55.3 (Microsoft WMV DMO)
LAV Audio 0.55.3
WM ASF Reader

Freeze Report (http://www.mediafire.com/?g7bgup897vpa4pk)

Edit 2/19: Another freeze while seeking a WMV, but this time it hung MPC-HC entirely so a Freeze Report was unable to be generated. I'd suspect this is probably a LAV Video bug rather than a madVR bug, but the randomness of the freeze make it difficult to confirm.


Here is another freeze report seeking a different WMV multiple times in succession while the video was paused. Hard to say if it froze from the seek, or if it froze when I attempted to unpause right after the seek.

madVR 0.86.0
LAV Video 0.55.3 (Microsoft WMV DMO)
LAV Audio 0.55.3
WM ASF Reader

Freeze Report 2 (http://www.mediafire.com/?c0shjkdjmvpsykb)

So far I've been unable to reproduce this when using the Microsoft WMV DMO directly outside of LAV Video. Seeking speed also seems an order of magnitude faster using the WMV DMO directly. I'll continue testing over the next few days without LAV Video.

[agustin9]

the smooth option looks great!

[leeperry]

Scaling is done *before* frame blending. So the cost of FRC is totally independent of the scaling algorithm. Meaning if you let madVR FRC a Blu-Ray movie to 120Hz, the cost of using Jinc3 AR is not higher than when using 24Hz. Of course there will be added cost for the frame blending and 120Hz presentation, but that's much lower compared to Jinc3 AR.
OK, thank you for the details!

Silly question here: frame interpolation(à la SVP) means that additional frames will be created in order to make the movie look smoother.....what you do is blend frames, how is that any different exactly :confused:

But well, I guess it might have to do with the "linear blending" that can be used for deinterlacing.....and my knowledge in this area is very poor :o

Also, while we're at it, ages ago ppl on HCFR were going crazy with the custom gamma curves that can be set in the nvidia drivers(and RivaTuner for AMD graphic cards), so with a lot of patience you could get the R/G/B gamma curves of your display to do whatever you want(they can set independently for R/G/B):

http://img514.imageshack.us/img514/8864/courbea2vk8.jpg

Too bad it's all done in 8bit, but you said that later on you might consider implementing your own CMS so I thought that this might a good feature request for a full blown 16bit CMS =)

Maybe you could just import those data from the nvidia drivers/Rivatuner registry, no need to reinvent the wheel really and they could be finetuned without running test patterns inside mVR(which is utterly time consuming).

[cca]

Anyone tested with DVD playback? I had trouble with the menus, with SmoothMotion ON static DVD menus do not update/display properly anymore. Animated menus work with a some additional lag.

[chainik_svp]

The only "problem" with this is its very cpu / gpu intensive, especially when the target rate is not a nice multiple of the display rate, so for me going from 23.976... to 59.996 is much more intensive than 23.976... * (5 / 2) = 59.94

I'm wondering do you think its a good option for those of us that want the smoothness of something like SVP with these nice multiples (to reduce cpu / gpu usage, or to increase SVP's quality settings), but with the accuracy of having something that helps us get 0 drops / repeats, could use SVP with your smoothing set to "always" to achieve the best of both? Is madVR theoretically going to kick in at those times when ordinarily this exact multiple 59.94 output from SVP, might not be accurate enough, and cause a frame repeat / drop on my display at 60.001 (which needs 59.996 to not drop / repeat anything).

I believe SVP with 59.94 + madVR's FRC will give you the same result as turning on "Blend frames to screen refresh rate" in SVP itself, the only difference is blending is done on GPU now.

[Anima123]

Settings are stored in the registry, too. Please check "HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\madshi\madVR\Settings". MPC-HC should have write access to that, so madVR should be able to store its settings there. Not sure why that doesn't work for you. It seems to work just fine here.


Let us know what you find! :)

I cannot save madVR settings either after upgrading to the latest version with restricted priviledge of windows account. After delete the whole madVR registry, it also failed to recreate a new entry.

It's definitely a bug for me.h

[nevcairiel]

So far I've been unable to reproduce this when using the Microsoft WMV DMO directly outside of LAV Video. Seeking speed also seems an order of magnitude faster using the WMV DMO directly. I'll continue testing over the next few days without LAV Video.

The problem is with the WM ASF Reader, it sends a new media type on every seek, which causes LAV to re-init the decoder, which is just slower. However, as a consequence LAV is about the only decoder which can properly handle dynamic format changes.

I can probably optimize this a bit, try to detect if the format itself doesn't change at all and in that case just flush the decoder instead of re-creating it, but it'll be a while until i find time to look into it.

Stop using the WM ASF Reader? :p

[cyberbeing]

The problem is with the WM ASF Reader, it sends a new media type on every seek, which causes LAV to re-init the decoder, which is just slower.

Just so I'm clear, do you believe that WM ASF Reader's behavior was causing LAV Video to hang, and this isn't a madVR issue?

In that case, I'll try using LAV Splitter + LAV Video for WMV from now on.

Stop using the WM ASF Reader? :p
For some reason, the other day I looked for "microsoft" & "wmv" in LAV Splitter, but didn't make the connection that the format "asf" was used for WMV as well. Though in hindsight, I guess it should have been obvious considering the name of Microsoft's source filter.

[nevcairiel]

Just so I'm clear, do you believe that WM ASF Reader's behavior was causing LAV Video to hang, and this isn't a madVR issue?
I can't be entirely sure what exactly is causing it, but at least the WM ASF Reader seems to be a factor. I may have time to investigate more on the weekend, all i have to go from now are your freeze reports.

[zn]

Anyone tried to run madVR in Linux using Windows virtual machine with VT-d enabled direct access to PCI-Express GPU ?
( Xen VGA Passthrough / ESXi VMDirectPath / KVM / QEMU / spice)

[madshi]

Regarding reclock, if I leave it to auto, 24 fps adaptation (60 Hz LCD), will it cause any problems to madVR, or should I disable media adaptation? Thanks.
Hehe, I meant the reclock settings, i'm just worried that it might mess up playback speed somehow.
I'm not a Reclock expert. Just try it out.

Hmm, when playing back 30 fps on 60 it enables frc with first frc option, is that intended?
No, that's not intended, will have to check that.

Sorry! If you seek during playback and if "delay playback start after seeking, too" is unchecked and "use a separate device for presentation" is checked, the previous frame will flicker for a few frames after seek.
Ok, will check that.

This is my first time using the madTestPatternSource. I just looked at the SmoothMotion24.ytp file and madVR automatically switched the refresh rate to 48Hz, as I had specified in the refresh rate changer, but the lines at the bottom flicker quite a bit. Does this mean that the display is internally converting the 48Hz signal to 60Hz?

PS: I tested this with v0.85.8 (so no frp). Not sure if that makes a difference when using test patterns with madTestPatternSource though. Does it?
I can't diagnose such a thing just based on your word "flicker". If your display internally converts 48Hz to 60Hz then the result should not be flickering so much as motion judder. But these are just words. I'd suggest that you compare (a) 24p@48Hz with FRC off to (b) 24p@60Hz with FRC on. Simply trust your eyes which one is better.

Why is there an option in the smooth motion settings page for "... or if the display refresh rate is an exact multiple of the movie frame rate"? I thought that was a good thing... If 24 fps is being played back at 24Hz, 48Hz, 96Hz, or 120Hz then there shouldn't be any need for smooth motion frame rate conversion, right?
You're mostly right. But you're forgetting the 2nd benefit of FRC. See v0.86.0 release notes.

In the next version could you add a setting to disable FRC for close matching refresh rates?

A) Disable FRC when refresh rate is within 0.001Hz of video frame rate multiple.

OR

B) Disable FRC when "dropped/repeat every..." calculation is greater than X hours?
The first option already does that. Basically it's tuned so that FRC is only enabled if e.g. the framerate is 24.000 and the refresh rate is 24.500. Any less difference than that and FRC is turned off.

C) Disable FRC with video display frame rates greater than XXfps

OR

D) Disable FRC based on a complex refresh rate to frame rate exclusion list
I plan to add FRC options to the display mode changer, once I redesign it. But that's still some time away...

Overall I don't seem to be seeing any smoothness benefit with FRC when using 23.976fps @ 95.904Hz & 23.976fps/29.97fps/59.94fps @ 119.88Hz
And you shouldn't expect to. FRC does not make source motion smoother. All it does is fix mismatches between source framerate and display refresh rate. If you already achieved a match yourself, FRC is of much less use. The only benefit would then be that you don't need audio resampling, anymore, to avoid frame drop/repeats. But I wonder if it's worth using for just that purpose alone. Currently I think FRC should only be used when there would be motion judder otherwise. Which is not the case with 23p@96Hz, for example.

Edit: The Keyboard shortcut for FRC may also be more useful as a Toggle rather than separate Enabled / Disable
Small request: Can you make the keyboard shortcut for frc into a toggle? One shortcut to turn off/on, instead of one to turn on and another to turn off?
Some people prefer toggles, others direct shortcuts. I've intentionally selected direct shortcuts this time because it makes comparisons between FRC on/off easier. For now I plan on leaving it as it is. Maybe I'll change it to a toggle some time in the future...

Maybe this is the obvious and expected result, but I tested...

23.796 -> 59.94 playback
23.796 -> 59.94 playback with smooth motion FRC
23.796 -> 71.93 playback

on my nominal 60 Hz 1080p eIPS monitor. 71.93 is through custom timing in Intel control panel on HD 4000, which can't seem to do 71.928 exactly. FRC beats no FRC on 59.94 (blending looks pretty good overall, as in generally harder to notice and less offensive than juddering), but having an integer factor is better than that. I would say that in my limited impression so far, though there are different processes and things going on under the hood, subjectively I think the 59.94 FRC is closer to the 71.93 in "quality" than it is to the original raw 59.94.
I would have hoped that 59.94 FRC looks very near in quality to 71.93. Please make sure you have the first "trade quality for performance" option unchecked. Maybe that helps improving FRC quality to get near to 71.93. But then, if your GPU and display can both do 71.93, my recommendation would be to turn FRC off, anyway. The main purpose of FRC is to make playback smooth on displays which can't natively sync to an even multiple of the framerate.

So are there any motion sharpness or less flickering benefits when playing back 24fps on 60Hz ( or even higher refresh rates ) with FRC on?
Compared to what?

After testing, WOW, no judder at all with 23.976 sources running at 60Hz :eek:. As good as 24p with manually adjusted custom resolution settings plus Reclock. (I think it might be even smoother)

One downside though, I definitely see some loss of sharpness/clarity. Not much, but noticeable.
If your display can do native 24p that might be the better option. But then, let your eyes be the final judge on what looks better to you. Have you disabled the first "trade quality for performance" option? Maybe it will reduce the sharpness/clarity loss even more. On my projector I'm hard pressed to see a difference in sharpness with FRC on/off, when playing 24p@60Hz. Since my projector can do 24p natively, though, I'm not planning to use FRC myself on this setup. I'll use it on my computer monitor, though, which can only do 60Hz.

Does the FRC option handle the Variable Frame Rate contents (Ex: 24p + deinterlaced 60p OP/ED anime) like this?

23.976 / 24 fps --> 23.976 / 24Hz (direct, no blending)
59.94 / 60 fps --> 23.976 / 24 Hz (motion blur)

madVR causes heavy playback stutters at the specified refresh rate when it presents the non-24fps contents in the middle of video files.

i.e. Japanese ISDB-T 24fps animes contents with horizontal scrolling texts. It looks like the broadcaster's encoding equipments are always to merge the scrolling text's video at 60-field rate instead of 24/30 full-frame rate.
madVR does not turn FRC on/off for subsections of a video file. Either FRC is turned on or it's turned off. If it's on, it will blend frames for 24p@24Hz, too. So you'll lose some sharpness during the 24p@24Hz parts of the video. However, the 60p@24Hz parts should be smooth. It would make a lot more sense to play this video at 60Hz with FRC on, though. That way the 24p@60Hz parts with FRC on will look almost identical to 24p@24Hz, while the 60p@60Hz parts will look much better than at 60p@24Hz. Generally, if you turn FRC on, it's better to choose the highest refresh rate your GPU and display can handle.

Yes, there is an ever so slight reduction in sharpness. Maybe disabling anti-ring could "counter" that.
The only thing that can counter the reduction in sharpness is the first "trade quality for performance" option. There's nothing more I can do.

I use SVP to interpolate to somewhere around 59.996fps as this is the highest rate I can use on my 60.00173hz display without seeing frame drops. The only "problem" with this is its very cpu / gpu intensive, especially when the target rate is not a nice multiple of the display rate, so for me going from 23.976... to 59.996 is much more intensive than 23.976... * (5 / 2) = 59.94

I'm wondering do you think its a good option for those of us that want the smoothness of something like SVP with these nice multiples (to reduce cpu / gpu usage, or to increase SVP's quality settings), but with the accuracy of having something that helps us get 0 drops / repeats, could use SVP with your smoothing set to "always" to achieve the best of both?
The Hobbit looked totally smooth to me at 48fps. So maybe it would be an option to let SVP only double the movie frame rate to 47.952fps and then let madVR FRC that to 60Hz? Just a thought, though. Your display probably can't sync to 48Hz?

Is madVR theoretically going to kick in at those times when ordinarily this exact multiple 59.94 output from SVP, might not be accurate enough, and cause a frame repeat / drop on my display at 60.001 (which needs 59.996 to not drop / repeat anything).
The only question is if FRC is on or off. If it's on, with 59fps@59Hz it will blend every frame, resulting in some lost sharpness. If it's off, things will be just as they are with older madVR versions. Whether FRC is turned on/off depends on your settings and which framerate the upstream filter reports to madVR.

I believe SVP with 59.94 + madVR's FRC will give you the same result as turning on "Blend frames to screen refresh rate" in SVP itself, the only difference is blending is done on GPU now.
That's probably true. Although SVP will use a fixed blending pattern while madVR blends with dynamic blending factors which match the measured VSync, which means that madVR's FRC automatically keeps audio and video in sync without needing any frame drops/repeats.

Here is another freeze report seeking a different WMV multiple times in succession while the video was paused.
Can't see any evidence of madVR having any part in the freeze this time.

Silly question here: frame interpolation(à la SVP) means that additional frames will be created in order to make the movie look smoother.....what you do is blend frames, how is that any different exactly :confused:
SVP frame interpolation tries to simulate a movie which was shot with a higher framerate than it actually was (like The Hobbit at 48fps). SVP analyzes the motion between all the video frames and then "invents" new frames that SVP thinks could be frames that a higher FPS camera would have recorded. That's a very complicated process, costs a lot of processing resources and can result in artifacts if the motion "guessing" goes wrong. It makes things overall much smoother, resulting in the "video look" that some like and some hate (for movies).

Frame blending is a simple mathematical process where you don't try to detect motion. Instead you simply take e.g. 30% of frame A and 70% of frame B to calculate the output frame (pixelC = pixelA * 0.3 + pixelB * 0.7). The blended frames look pretty awful if you look at them as a screenshot. Frame blending only makes sense in motion.

There are fundamental differences between the two techniques. If you're unsure about this, you should find answers with a google search.

Anyone tested with DVD playback? I had trouble with the menus, with SmoothMotion ON static DVD menus do not update/display properly anymore. Animated menus work with a some additional lag.
Ooops. I guess I should disable FRC on static DVD menus. Doesn't make any sense there, anyway. How big is the additional alg with animated menus? Is it noticeable enough to justify turning FRC off there, too?

I cannot save madVR settings either after upgrading to the latest version with restricted priviledge of windows account. After delete the whole madVR registry, it also failed to recreate a new entry.

It's definitely a bug for me.
Ok, I'll have a look.

[cca]

Ooops. I guess I should disable FRC on static DVD menus. Doesn't make any sense there, anyway. How big is the additional alg with animated menus? Is it noticeable enough to justify turning FRC off there, too?

With animated menus it's not so bad. Another problem I just noticed while trying one of my .mkv files is freezes while seeking. Disabling SmoothMotion solves the problem so it is related somehow. Also, the freezes seem to only happen in FSE mode when clicking the popup bar in the botton, not in windowed mode.

[cca]

OK, this is definitely weird. The seek freezes appear so far in only one test case but consistently. The file in question is a 1080p 10bit H264 video file, playing in a 1080p 60Hz resolution, so theoretically no scalling is taking place. Other files I tried like 720p or SD files do not seem to have the seeking freeze issue. Will try more 1080p files to confirm.

[madshi]

A sample and/or log file might help.

[cyberbeing]

The first option already does that. Basically it's tuned so that FRC is only enabled if e.g. the framerate is 24.000 and the refresh rate is 24.500. Any less difference than that and FRC is turned off.

It ignores multiples though... If you have 23.976 fps and a refresh rate of 95.904Hz or 119.88Hz, FRC is always turned on with the first option. Same with 59.94 fps & 119.88Hz.

And you shouldn't expect to. FRC does not make source motion smoother. All it does is fix mismatches between source framerate and display refresh rate. If you already achieved a match yourself, FRC is of much less use. The only benefit would then be that you don't need audio resampling, anymore, to avoid frame drop/repeats. But I wonder if it's worth using for just that purpose alone. Currently I think FRC should only be used when there would be motion judder otherwise. Which is not the case with 23p@96Hz, for example.

I wasn't expecting it to, I only mentioned it because madVR was forcing it on me if I wanted FRC available for true motion judder cases. Personally I dislike that madVR always enables FRC in these high refresh rate multiple cases, so I hope option 1 is changed to encompass this in a future version.

[cca]

Tried more files, SD/HD combinations. I am not sure it is the SmoothMotion at all now, even with it disabled I get seeking freezes at random in all files I tried regardless of SmoothMotion setting, resolution of the video or anything else. I attempted to playback by using EVR Custom Presenter in MPC-HC with the rest of the filters the same, no freezes at all.

[makakam]

I've recently upgraded my gpu from 6570 to 7770 and now the stats tell me that a frame is repeated every 6 hours or even more (I don't use reclock) which is great as with 6570 it was 26 minutes tops (with jinc 3). I have also tried 4k samples and it's all right as long as dxva native is in use otherwise it stutters. I have only E7400 cpu so the playback needs to settle first but it's playable.

[madshi]

@cca, try the previous madVR build. Do the freezes occur there, too? When the freeze occurs, is the whole media player frozen? Or just the video image? Try creating a freeze report and uploading it, maybe it helps.

[browser]

The first option already does that. Basically it's tuned so that FRC is only enabled if e.g. the framerate is 24.000 and the refresh rate is 24.500. Any less difference than that and FRC is turned off.




Do you believe that there is no point of letting FCR on for less than 0.5 difference?

From tests i made in my system with nvidia custom resolution, there was noticeable difference in judder when i changed from 23.9725xxto 23.9766xx

[cca]

@cca, try the previous madVR build. Do the freezes occur there, too? When the freeze occurs, is the whole media player frozen? Or just the video image? Try creating a freeze report and uploading it, maybe it helps.

I did get a debug log, not sure where to put it though, it's too big for pastebin :/. Will try the older madVR now.

EDIT: madVR 0.85.8 works perfectly fine, no freezes. Debug log at http://www.mediafire.com/?8bccowyzwncogr5

EDIT 2: To be completely clear, this only happens in FSE mode, if I stick to windowed mode it never freezes.

[DragonQ]

Smooth motion seems to work fine for 25i -> 50p -> 60p. Not terribly easy to notice for me but I'm really used to watching 50p stuff on a 60p screen so that's probably why. Doesn't seem to affect GPU usage either, even with linear light blending on.

Seeking is a bit dodgy with Smooth Motion enabled though using MPC-HC. The first frame after a seek is often corrupted (being a mix of the previous frame before seeking and the new frame). I've also lost sound after seeking twice (with a 1080i/25 AVC/AC3 MKV), which was fixed by another reseek.

[THX-UltraII]

Madshi, the new version feature looks promising! Is it the same as what SVP Frame (http://www.svp-team.com/wiki/Frame_interpolation_overview) can do with 23.976 Blu-Ray content which is Frame Interplolate it to 59,94Hz? If so, that would be fantastic.

Only thing I m wondering is how accurate it is. With SVP frame the FI options are endless and you can really fine-tweak the way you want it, from a max smoothness with quite some artifacts to min smoothness with almost no visible artifacts and everything between this.

How is this with madFI :D (mad Frame Interpolation)

[rahzel]

Thanks madshi. I have a Panasonic ST50 that doesn't properly handle 23.976 film. I can either set it to 48Hz (too much flicker), or allow my ST50 to convert the framerate by switching my HTPC to output 24Hz, but doing it this way introduces some slightly annoying artifacts when bright objects pan across the screen. Now I can just leave my HTPC at 59.94Hz and playback is smooth without artifacts.

[webs0r]

I find that my settings reset and I have to run MPC-HC as admin to set madVRs settings now. Is this expected behaviour?

[DragonQ]

Smooth motion seems to work fine for 25i -> 50p -> 60p. Not terribly easy to notice for me but I'm really used to watching 50p stuff on a 60p screen so that's probably why. Doesn't seem to affect GPU usage either, even with linear light blending on.

Seeking is a bit dodgy with Smooth Motion enabled though using MPC-HC. The first frame after a seek is often corrupted (being a mix of the previous frame before seeking and the new frame). I've also lost sound after seeking twice (with a 1080i/25 AVC/AC3 MKV), which was fixed by another reseek.
In addition, twice now the frame order has gone dodgy out of nowhere (it looks kind of like when you deinterlace BFF when you should do it TFF). This can once again be fixed with a reseek.

[iSunrise]

madVR v0.86.0 released

http://madshi.net/madVR.zip

* added smooth motion frame rate conversion algorithm
* added settings page for smooth motion frc configuration
* added "trade quality for performance" option for smooth motion frc
* added test patterns to madTestPatternSource to test smooth motion frc
* fixed: RGB input with odd width/height is now accepted untouched
* fixed: IVideoWindow::put_Owner() failed when pins were not connected yet
* fixed: madHcCtrl.exe autostart registry entry was incorrect / not working
* fixed: occasional crash when using DXVA scaling with high-bitdepth content
* fixed: green line at the left image border when using DXVA scaling
* file "settings.bin" is not written into win7/8 "VirtualStore", anymore
* slightly improved multi monitor behaviour (when using DXVA or MPC-BE)
* filter enumeration timer is now only active during DVD playback
* extended logging for fullscreen exclusive presentation queue
* internal software video decoders are now disabled by default (again)
Introducing the new "smooth motion" frame rate changer (FRC) with the following main features / benefits:

(1) Can convert any source frame rate to any display refresh rate, while maintaining smooth motion.
(2) Endless playback without frame drops/repeats (if your PC is fast enough) without needing Reclock.

There are disadvantages, too, of course:

(1) Slightly higher GPU usage (not too much) with default settings.
(2) Some sharpness loss (almost invisible with 23-25fps -> 60Hz conversion).

23-25fps -> 60Hz: minimal sharpness loss, nearly invisible
24fps -> 24Hz: visible sharpness loss
60fps -> 24Hz: very noticeable sharpness loss

Basically the higher the refresh rate, the better. And the lower the source framerate, the better.

....
OMG, madshi I love you! Seriously, you are the reason why I would constantly buy new graphics hardware, just because I want to test you´re extremely useful features you keep adding in madVR. Thanks a lot man!

I hope you finally accept donations soon, I want to give you something back for your hard work on this.

Time for some serious testing!

[leeperry]

SVP frame interpolation tries to simulate a movie which was shot with a higher framerate than it actually was (like The Hobbit at 48fps). SVP analyzes the motion between all the video frames and then "invents" new frames that SVP thinks could be frames that a higher FPS camera would have recorded. That's a very complicated process, costs a lot of processing resources and can result in artifacts if the motion "guessing" goes wrong. It makes things overall much smoother, resulting in the "video look" that some like and some hate (for movies).
Makes sense, :thanks:

Sammy TV's provide a "motionflow" algorithm that makes ugly artifacts at anything higher than its most conservative setting but the latter doesn't make any artifacts and really only makes motion less "hiccupy", would that be blending or interpolation? It's still great to have it on when you play 29.97fps@59.94Hz with Reclock, so I guess it's still doing more than blending after all..but Sammy call it 400Hz processing or something like that :o

[michkrol]

Hi, thanks for the new version and functionality, which works great.

Thanks especially for the bugfix to DXVA scaling, regrettably it seems to have introduced another problem - degraded image quality while scaling 10bit content. I've filed a bugreport (#13), please take a look, when time allows. Sorry to constantly bother you about this one feature, but it's quite important for me personally, and perhaps other users using a slower GPU or a notebook to play movies.

[Heuer]

When I go into madVR settings I am getting a message in the Smooth motion tab: "These settings are unknown to this version of the settings browser". Also there is no smooth motion option in the "trade quality" tab. This only happens on my HTPC, everything works as expected on my desktop PC. Any advice?

[Heuer]

Sorted! I uninstalled the previous version and reinstalled .860 and it is working correctly. Odd that I did not need to go through that process on my PC though and it has the previous version on there and the install ran without problem.

[6233638]

Just wanted to confirm that 0.86.0 is not saving settings here. They are applied until I quit MPC-HC and try playing something else.

I'm also not seeing very good results with Smooth Motion. Playing back 24p content at 60Hz still judders very obviously, and the frame blending adds noticeable ghosting to motion. Maybe I'm just really sensitive to that sort of thing.

I will be using 24Hz output anyway, but just thought I should test it.

[namaiki]

6233638, do you have the present frames in advance option enabled? Also, is it listed in the OSD as enabled? It seemed to perform very well when I tested it with present frames in advance enabled, but didn't seem to function if that was disabled. (Note: I tested ~24fps at 60Hz)

[huhn]

Just wanted to confirm that 0.86.0 is not saving settings here. They are applied until I quit MPC-HC and try playing something else.

I'm also not seeing very good results with Smooth Motion. Playing back 24p content at 60Hz still judders very obviously, and the frame blending adds noticeable ghosting to motion. Maybe I'm just really sensitive to that sort of thing.

I will be using 24Hz output anyway, but just thought I should test it.

i talk to someone with the same issue.

i ask him to try this out: change the user rights of the madvr folder and his content to administrator and then is worked fine.
edit: adding missing m keyboard is dying

[iSunrise]

madshi, in the keyboard shortcuts for FRC, you currently have two entries to enable and disable FRC. Is there a specific reason (e.x. some future additions) for this?

Can you change that to a toggle (like with deinterlacing) so we don´t need to assign two keys to it? Thanks!

[Nevilne]

New bug: sometimes (around once in 5 seconds) only the backbuffer queue becomes empty, regardless of the size, and you get frame drop. If you switch frc off - other settings untouched - issue disappears. In fullscreen exclusive mode with frc on present queue is always 3 down, but there are no frame drops.

[pie1394]

I tested 0.86.0 with BD-rip 1920x1080 23.976 fps anime contents on my Hitachi P42A01A. It represents the similar behavior like the 1080i CRT TV although the panel is 1024x1080i driving one.

Although my tests with the madVR FRC option show some good results on either 1080i TV or 1080p LCD monitor (Dell U2412M), I still prefer the TV's native FRC processing for 1080p24 native content + input signal...

Here is my subjective visual feeling:

[Moving object's edge flicking]
1. No FRC to 1080i59 (very obvious)
2. FRC to 1080i59 (a little bit)
3. FRC to 1080p59 (almost none)
4. No FRC to 1080p23 (none)

[Motion Smoothness]
1. FRC to 1080p59 / 1080i59 (very smooth in any direction)
2. No FRC to 1080p23 (smooth in general, a little bit unstable in vertical motion)
3. No FRC to 1080p59 (judder)
4. No FRC to 1080i59 (judder, vertical flicking)

[Static Resolution]
1. No FRC to 1080p23 (best ... sharp)
2. No FRC to 1080i59 (still sharp , but a little bit flicking)
3. No FRC to 1080p59 (clear, no flicking)
4. FRC to 1080i59 (clear, no flicking)

[Motion Resolution]
1. No FRC to 1080p23 (best, almost no flicking at object edge)
2. No FRC to 1080i59 (a little bit blur and flicking at object edge)
3. No FRC to 1080p59 (a little bit blur than "2", no flicking)
4. FRC to 1080i59 (blur, a little bit flicking)


ps: Win7x64 SP1, HD7970 / Catalyst 13.2 beta 6, Jinc3_AR mode

[iSunrise]

OK, here are some first observations after testing 0.86.0:

1) There seems to be a serious bug with saving the settings into the registry within madVR. Not only that, madVR even did a reset of my settings after I had done my first adjustments (that was after I´ve replaced all the old 0.85.8 files with 0.86.0). Now, it just won´t accept settings changes anymore. Settings changes are only working in the current session, but after closing the player, all the settings are suddenly lost and you have to configure madVR again. It even resets my monitor to "Unknown".

2) It seems like the FRC algorithm needs a lot more backbuffers compared to non-FRC mode to work correctly. I had serious image stuttering after using my original settings, then I just increased the backbuffers to the maximum amount and it was perfectly smooth.

So, for everyone that wants to test FRC:
Either use the default settings of madVR or increase the backbuffers a bit compared to the defaults or you´re gonna have some very unpleasant first surprises. For fast seeking I optimized backbuffers and queues to the bare minimum, since I have enough GPU power (GTX580). With FRC though, you need to give madVR a bit more headroom to work with.

3) On 3-4 of the 50fps samples I´ve tested, I get some weird "wobble" effect. It doesn´t look like normal stuttering, it´s like the frames aren´t exactly shown convergent. Maybe "edge-flicker" is a good word for it. Sample: http://www.recordedamigagames.org/recordedamigagames/longplays/Amiga%20Longplay%20%5B399%5D%20Turrican%20(a).mp4

4) 23.976Hz works perfectly smooth on a 60Hz (59.940Hz) screen and it still retains great sharpness, I couldn´t see any differences in motion at all. Totally new experience with FRC on!

[TheShadowRunner]

Hi madshi, thanks for this new build.
It seems the test patterns aren't included in the 0.86 archive at all? (no testpatterns folder)
Also, while very old, could you explain exactly what "Use managed textures XP only" exactly does again?
I searched but could not find an explicit detailed answer on how/what it's supposed to fix.
As for 0.86, it still works perfect here with all my old settings (w/Reclock and spot-on refresh rates), if you needed confirmation.

[Niyawa]

There seems to be a serious bug with saving the settings into the registry within madVR. Not only that, madVR even did a reset of my settings after I had done my first adjustments (that was after I´ve replaced all the old 0.85.8 files with 0.86.0). Now, it just won´t accept settings changes anymore. Settings changes are only working in the current session, but after closing the player, all the settings are suddenly lost and you have to configure madVR again. It even resets my monitor to "Unknown".
I can reproduce that here too. Tried everything - deleting the settings, resetting the settings, uninstalling and installing madVR again. Nothing works.

i talk to someone with the same issue.

i ask him to try this out: change the user rights of the madvr folder and his content to administrator and then is worked fine.
edit: adding missing m keyboard is dying
Aside from this. Strange stuff.

[6233638]

6233638, do you have the present frames in advance option enabled? Also, is it listed in the OSD as enabled? It seemed to perform very well when I tested it with present frames in advance enabled, but didn't seem to function if that was disabled. (Note: I tested ~24fps at 60Hz)I do, but I wasn't testing in FSE. It does seem like it might be smoother in FSE than Windowed. (I had to stop it switching to 24p when it went fullscreen) But I still see judder and ghosting.

i talk to someone with the same issue.

i ask him to try this out: change the user rights of the madvr folder and his content to administrator and then is worked fine.Strange, I have never had to change permissions before, but granting my account full access has fixed this.

[madshi]

Is it the same as what SVP Frame (http://www.svp-team.com/wiki/Frame_interpolation_overview) can do with 23.976 Blu-Ray content which is Frame Interplolate it to 59,94Hz?
I find that my settings reset and I have to run MPC-HC as admin to set madVRs settings now. Is this expected behaviour?
Just wanted to confirm that 0.86.0 is not saving settings here. They are applied until I quit MPC-HC and try playing something else.
madshi, in the keyboard shortcuts for FRC, you currently have two entries to enable and disable FRC. Is there a specific reason (e.x. some future additions) for this?

Can you change that to a toggle (like with deinterlacing) so we don´t need to assign two keys to it? Thanks!
1) There seems to be a serious bug with saving the settings into the registry within madVR.
It seems the test patterns aren't included in the 0.86 archive at all? (no testpatterns folder)
Guys, all of your questions/problems have already been asked/reported and answered since the release of v0.86.0. It seems nobody reads this thread before posting, anymore?

It ignores multiples though... If you have 23.976 fps and a refresh rate of 95.904Hz or 119.88Hz, FRC is always turned on with the first option. Same with 59.94 fps & 119.88Hz.
This is a simple bug, not as intended.

Do you believe that there is no point of letting FCR on for less than 0.5 difference?

From tests i made in my system with nvidia custom resolution, there was noticeable difference in judder when i changed from 23.9725xxto 23.9766xx
I have to decide when to enable FRC and when not. Maybe 0.5 difference is not the ideal value. Maybe it should be less, or more. I can't set this too low, though, or else FRC might accidently be turned on when it's not really needed. After all, the refresh rate alone does not decide. The audio clock deviation comes into play, too, and that is notoriously hard to measure. So I gotta leave some room for measurement errors.

I did get a debug log, not sure where to put it though, it's too big for pastebin :/. Will try the older madVR now.

EDIT: madVR 0.85.8 works perfectly fine, no freezes. Debug log at http://www.mediafire.com/?8bccowyzwncogr5

EDIT 2: To be completely clear, this only happens in FSE mode, if I stick to windowed mode it never freezes.
Seeking is a bit dodgy with Smooth Motion enabled though using MPC-HC. The first frame after a seek is often corrupted (being a mix of the previous frame before seeking and the new frame). I've also lost sound after seeking twice (with a 1080i/25 AVC/AC3 MKV), which was fixed by another reseek.
Ok, will have a look at that later.

Thanks madshi. I have a Panasonic ST50 that doesn't properly handle 23.976 film. I can either set it to 48Hz (too much flicker), or allow my ST50 to convert the framerate by switching my HTPC to output 24Hz, but doing it this way introduces some slightly annoying artifacts when bright objects pan across the screen. Now I can just leave my HTPC at 59.94Hz and playback is smooth without artifacts.
Glad to hear that!

In addition, twice now the frame order has gone dodgy out of nowhere (it looks kind of like when you deinterlace BFF when you should do it TFF). This can once again be fixed with a reseek.
Does this problem not repair itself over time? And does it happen only after a seek or does it also happen in the middle of playback, after playback was just fine for a while before?

I hope you finally accept donations soon
Not before v1.0 release.

Sammy TV's provide a "motionflow" algorithm that makes ugly artifacts at anything higher than its most conservative setting but the latter doesn't make any artifacts and really only makes motion less "hiccupy", would that be blending or interpolation?
You seriously expect me to say that based on your description? Sorry, not possible...

Thanks especially for the bugfix to DXVA scaling, regrettably it seems to have introduced another problem - degraded image quality while scaling 10bit content. I've filed a bugreport (#13), please take a look, when time allows. Sorry to constantly bother you about this one feature, but it's quite important for me personally, and perhaps other users using a slower GPU or a notebook to play movies.
No need to apologize for posting bug reports - especially not when posting them in the bug tracker (which unfortunately only few people do :(). If you do post such a bug in the tracker, you don't need to post it here in the forum, too. Posting it in the tracker is good enough. I get an email for every new bug that is created in the tracker.

When I go into madVR settings I am getting a message in the Smooth motion tab: "These settings are unknown to this version of the settings browser". Also there is no smooth motion option in the "trade quality" tab. This only happens on my HTPC, everything works as expected on my desktop PC. Any advice?
This happens if you use an old version of the madHcCtrl.exe. Probably the old version was still running when you replaced the madVR files, so that it could not be updated.

I'm also not seeing very good results with Smooth Motion. Playing back 24p content at 60Hz still judders very obviously, and the frame blending adds noticeable ghosting to motion. Maybe I'm just really sensitive to that sort of thing.
I do, but I wasn't testing in FSE. It does seem like it might be smoother in FSE than Windowed. (I had to stop it switching to 24p when it went fullscreen) But I still see judder and ghosting.
Are you using the old or new FSE path? Do you have the GPU and presentation queues set up high enough? (At least 8, the more the merrier)?

There should be no visible judder/ghosting with 24p@60Hz with FRC on. I'm very sensitive to motion related problems like this and for me with real life content FRC works great with 24p@60Hz. With computer type test patterns I can see some small degradations, but it's still much *MUCH* better than with FRC off. That said, 50fps@60Hz is not as good as 24p@60Hz, for whatever reason...

If this doesn't work well for you I can only imagine that something goes wrong on your PC. Or maybe you're testing with extreme content. Try a normal movie. And maybe try resetting to default settings, just as a test...

New bug: sometimes (around once in 5 seconds) only the backbuffer queue becomes empty, regardless of the size, and you get frame drop. If you switch frc off - other settings untouched - issue disappears. In fullscreen exclusive mode with frc on present queue is always 3 down, but there are no frame drops.
So the problem mostly only occurs in windowed mode? Does it help if you increase the number of backbuffers?

I tested 0.86.0 with BD-rip 1920x1080 23.976 fps anime contents on my Hitachi P42A01A. It represents the similar behavior like the 1080i CRT TV although the panel is 1024x1080i driving one.

Although my tests with the madVR FRC option show some good results on either 1080i TV or 1080p LCD monitor (Dell U2412M), I still prefer the TV's native FRC processing for 1080p24 native content + input signal...

Here is my subjective visual feeling:

[Moving object's edge flicking]
1. No FRC to 1080i59 (very obvious)
2. FRC to 1080i59 (a little bit)
3. FRC to 1080p59 (almost none)
4. No FRC to 1080p23 (none)

[Motion Smoothness]
1. FRC to 1080p59 / 1080i59 (very smooth in any direction)
2. No FRC to 1080p23 (smooth in general, a little bit unstable in vertical motion)
3. No FRC to 1080p59 (judder)
4. No FRC to 1080i59 (judder, vertical flicking)

[Static Resolution]
1. No FRC to 1080p23 (best ... sharp)
2. No FRC to 1080i59 (still sharp , but a little bit flicking)
3. No FRC to 1080p59 (clear, no flicking)
4. FRC to 1080i59 (clear, no flicking)

[Motion Resolution]
1. No FRC to 1080p23 (best, almost no flicking at object edge)
2. No FRC to 1080i59 (a little bit blur and flicking at object edge)
3. No FRC to 1080p59 (a little bit blur than "2", no flicking)
4. FRC to 1080i59 (blur, a little bit flicking)
Interesting. But I guess your display is a very rare beast and the results will probably be different to most other displays. In any case, if your display's 23p support is working reasonably well (and it seems it does) there's little reason for you to use FRC, I guess...

2) It seems like the FRC algorithm needs a lot more backbuffers compared to non-FRC mode to work correctly. I had serious image stuttering after using my original settings, then I just increased the backbuffers to the maximum amount and it was perfectly smooth.

So, for everyone that wants to test FRC:
Either use the default settings of madVR or increase the backbuffers a bit compared to the defaults or you´re gonna have some very unpleasant first surprises. For fast seeking I optimized backbuffers and queues to the bare minimum, since I have enough GPU power (GTX580). With FRC though, you need to give madVR a bit more headroom to work with.
Ah ok.

3) On 3-4 of the 50fps samples I´ve tested, I get some weird "wobble" effect. It doesn´t look like normal stuttering, it´s like the frames aren´t exactly shown convergent. Maybe "edge-flicker" is a good word for it. Sample: http://www.recordedamigagames.org/recordedamigagames/longplays/Amiga%20Longplay%20%5B399%5D%20Turrican%20(a).mp4
Is this with the first "trade quality" option unchecked? Generally, 50fps@60Hz doesn't work as well as 23-25fps@60Hz. As I said before, the lower the movie framerate the better. And the higher the refresh rate, the better. That said, for me when playing 50fps@60Hz, FRC on still looks noticeably better than FRC off. Are we talking about video or movie content, btw? If it's movie content, maybe using madVR's IVTC algorithm instead of DXVA deinterlacing could improve the situation?

4) 23.976Hz works perfectly smooth on a 60Hz (59.940Hz) screen and it still retains great sharpness, I couldn´t see any differences in motion at all. Totally new experience with FRC on!
Glad to hear that!

Also, while very old, could you explain exactly what "Use managed textures XP only" exactly does again?
It improves the speed of window resizing etc, but might slightly lower performance.

[iSunrise]

Is this with the first "trade quality" option unchecked? Generally, 50fps@60Hz doesn't work as well as 23-25fps@60Hz. As I said before, the lower the movie framerate the better. And the higher the refresh rate, the better. That said, for me when playing 50fps@60Hz, FRC on still looks noticeably better than FRC off. Are we talking about video or movie content, btw? If it's movie content, maybe using madVR's IVTC algorithm instead of DXVA deinterlacing could improve the situation.
Yes, I have everything unchecked to get maximum quality.

It´s a PC recording (50p), please take a quick look at my sample, as it´s very hard to explain. It´s definitely smoother than non-FRC, but because of that wobble effect it´s very annoying to watch. Use fullscreen and focus on the edges of moving objects.

I´ve tried windowed/fullscreen exclusive and different settings, so it seems inherent to the FRC algorithm itself.

Here´s a screenshot:
http://www.abload.de/thumb/50p_frc0qrf9.png (http://www.abload.de/image.php?img=50p_frc0qrf9.png)

[Farfie]

To expand on the corrupted seeking (assuming someone hasn't done this already), with FRC on, after seeking, it seems to flash between the frame you seeked from to the frame you seeked to for a few milliseconds, but only when you have "use a seperate device for presentation" enabled. So if I seeked from frame 5 to 1005, it would display 5,1005,5,1005,5,1005 for a few seconds before continuing on as normal (1006,1007...)

Disabling "use separate device for presentation," the previous scenario goes away, but introduces a new problem: tons of framedrops at seemingly random times. The queue that goes to 0 is the backbuffer.

This is all at 60hz (without reclock), and I am of course sticking with the non frame drop method, but these things should still be brought up. Again, not sure if someone has articulated it this clearly, so here I am.

win7 x64
gtx 680 - 314.07 driver

But, looks amazing while it works. I have definitely been looking forward to however you were going to deal with this problem and it exceeded my expectations. God speed on wringing out these little bugs people have :p

[corporalgator]

For everyone losing settings, you need to go to the madvr folder and set it to full permissions. If you can't do that, then you need to put your madvr folder in a folder you can control, ie your documents folder, and not in your program files. MPC doesn't care where you put it, but the newest version won't let it save the settings without admin rights.

Madshi, good work as awlays, but I don't like the motion smoother for everything. It's not as bad as the interpolators, but it still looks too much like video to me. It definitely makes panning shots better, but I can live with judder there if it means people aren't put into the uncanny valley. I'll have to test more sources, but it does not do The Wire, which I ripped from dvd and converted to 23p x264 files any favors at all. Some blu-rays look good and others don't.

[DragonQ]

Does this problem not repair itself over time? And does it happen only after a seek or does it also happen in the middle of playback, after playback was just fine for a while before?
It happens randomly (not necessarily after a seek) and yes, it does seem to fix itself if you leave it long enough.

[kasper93]

@madshi
I have one channel on DVB with news bar on bottom, and with smooth motion enabled text are blinking a little, looks better without smooth motion. I have tested on 59.94Hz.
Take a look: https://dl.dropbox.com/u/16282309/PSN.ts (top bar - black letters)
Anything can be done or it's how it suppose to look like.

[iSunrise]

For everyone losing settings, you need to go to the madvr folder and set it to full permissions. If you can't do that, then you need to put your madvr folder in a folder you can control, ie your documents folder, and not in your program files. MPC doesn't care where you put it, but the newest version won't let it save the settings without admin rights.
That may be a work-around, however, 0.85.8 and the ones before it worked fine without having to change anything manually. And I´m using PotPlayer, where I never had to change anything on my system to make madVR save my settings. There definitely is something wrong and I hope that madshi fixes that (like he already answered). With e.x. LAV we can also change the settings without having to grant permissions manually.

It may be attributed/connected to this change:

madVR v0.86.0 released
...* file "settings.bin" is not written into win7/8 "VirtualStore", anymore


EDIT: Ok, now I understand. It seems that the "settings.bin" file is now written directly to the madVR folder, which doesn´t have full access rights permissions from the OS by default if it´s created in the Program Files folder.

[corporalgator]

That may be a work-around, however, 0.85.8 and the ones before it worked fine without having to change anything manually. And I´m using PotPlayer, where I never had to change anything on my system to make madVR save my settings. There definitely is something wrong and I hope that madshi fixes that (like he already answered).

It may be attributed to this change:

Well, it's a security risk. It shouldn't be writing settings without permissions.

[Plutotype]

Thanks madshi. I have a Panasonic ST50 that doesn't properly handle 23.976 film. I can either set it to 48Hz (too much flicker), or allow my ST50 to convert the framerate by switching my HTPC to output 24Hz, but doing it this way introduces some slightly annoying artifacts when bright objects pan across the screen. Now I can just leave my HTPC at 59.94Hz and playback is smooth without artifacts.

Yeah, I dont own Panasonic VT30 plasma anymore, but what I remember is:
1. VT30 did flicker A LOT when being set to 23Hz/24Hz. When setting the display to 60Hz, the flickering was not eliminated completely, but it helped a lot.
2. VT30 and also VT50 has also issues with digital false contouring ( panning scenes ) and they are very bad especially on european models when watching at 50hz ( so called 50Hz bug ), but the false contouring is observable also at 24Hz. Also here, setting the panel to 60Hz, reduced the false contouring issue to something more acceptable level.

Maybe someone with ST/GT/VT series of Panasonic plasmas can confirm this and do some testing. I think many owners would then benefit from the madvr smooth motion feature ( excluding the motion artifacts, Panasonic plasmas offered in 2012 the best PQ ).

[iSunrise]

Well, it's a security risk. It shouldn't be writing settings without permissions.
Exactly. I guess that´s why madVR didn´t store the "settings.bin" in the madVR folder in the first place. The VirtualStore is not exactly the right place for that either, though. Is that file really needed?