Media Player Classic - Home Cinema (MPC-HC) - v1.7.13

[mastrboy]

Is it possible to NOT crop subtitles when using "Pan & Scan -> Scale to 16:9 TV" ?

[yonta]

In D3D Fullscreen mode, I get a sudden framerate drop when I move my mouse to the bottom of the screen to make the seek bar appear.
With 1080i60 content, FPS drops to under 40 from 60. Even 480i60 content gets down to 40.
24p content doesn't really seem to get a framerate drop but the playback gets a little bit unstable (the CTRL+J graph starts to jump up and down)
I tested old versions for this problem and found out v1.7.0.7597 is the last version that doesn't drop FPS with the seek bar.

[Armada]

In D3D Fullscreen mode, I get a sudden framerate drop when I move my mouse to the bottom of the screen to make the seek bar appear.
With 1080i60 content, FPS drops to under 40 from 60. Even 480i60 content gets down to 40.
24p content doesn't really seem to get a framerate drop but the playback gets a little bit unstable (the CTRL+J graph starts to jump up and down)
I tested old versions for this problem and found out v1.7.0.7597 is the last version that doesn't drop FPS with the seek bar.
This was introduced by a commit that made the seekbar update when the position changes. Unfortunately updating the OSD is a lot slower than I expected. I will slow the updates down, but I can't completely eliminate the effect is has on performance while it is shown.

UPDATE: Couldn't get that change in before the stable, will address it in the nightlies.

[Armada]

After almost 4 months since our last stable build, we decided to release our next major version.

Security advisory: Due to known buffer overflows in the internal filters of v1.6.8 and below, it is strongly recommended that you update to the new version. More information on which filters are affected will follow soon.

Highlights of this release:


Replace the internal filters with LAV Filters. LAV Filters are modern open source DirectShow filters based on FFmpeg. They are known to be reliable and fast and overall should be more stable than the old filters. MPC-HC integrates LAV Filters directly and no extra installation steps are required. The embedded version of LAV Filters doesn’t interfere at all with other installed DirectShow filters (including the standalone versions of LAV Filters).
Support loading HTTP/RTSP/UDP/RTP streams using embedded source filters
Windows 8.1 support.
Many more bugfixes and improvements, check the changelog for details.


Due to the switch to LAV Filters, DXVA1 support for Windows XP has been dropped. Windows XP users can use LAV Filters' Nvidia CUVID decoder if they still require hardware acceleration. If you can’t use any of the available hardware acceleration methods, you can use our old standalone MPCVideoDecoder from v1.6.8, at your own risk.

This release wouldn’t have been possible without nevcairiel's LAV Filters (http://code.google.com/p/lavfilters/), alexmarsev, Armada, Underground78 and our many other contributors (https://github.com/mpc-hc/mpc-hc/graphs/contributors).

You can download the new version here (http://mpc-hc.org/downloads/). For the complete changes see the changelog (http://mpc-hc.org/changelog/).

[JarrettH]

Integration is great news! That was one of the cruxes of MPC (that you had to disable all internal filters to play nice). Does that mean it might be faster than using LAV separately?

[Armada]

Integration is great news! That was one of the cruxes of MPC (that you had to disable all internal filters to play nice). Does that mean it might be faster than using LAV separately?
Performance compared to external LAV won't change, but one of the big advantages over external LAV is that we can now better integrate LAV Filters into MPC-HC so that they'll be easier to use together.

[Dion]

Support loading HTTP/RTSP/UDP/RTP streams using embedded source filters.

This is awesome. Now if BubbleUPnP would port there app to PC grrrr. Or someone makes an alternative.

[wanezhiling]

Windows XP users can use LAV Filter’s Nvidia CUVID or Intel QuickSync decoder if they still require hardware acceleration.

Intel GPUs have no hardware support on WinXP, so DXVA or QS only works on Vista and above.:)

So LAV Filter’s Nvidia CUVID is the only available hardware acceleration method on WinXP.:)

[hello_hello]

Due to the switch to LAV Filters, DXVA1 support for Windows XP has been dropped. Windows XP users can use LAV Filter’s Nvidia CUVID or Intel QuickSync decoder if they still require hardware acceleration. If you can’t use any of the available hardware acceleration methods, you can use our old standalone MPCVideoDecoder from v1.6.8, at your own risk.

Firstly, thanks to those involved in maintaining MPC-HC.

Some questions (running XP and 8600GT video card)....
Not having needed to think about Nvidia CUVID until now, I gather it's not quite the same thing as DXVA? I tested it using a couple of h264 videos. For 720p I wasn't sure it was reducing CPU usage at all (it sat around 30% to 40%), so I dug out a 1080p video for testing. My old dual core struggles with it, stuttering a bit (although CPU usage doesn't seem to hit 100%). Enabling Nvidia CUVID dropped CPU usage to around 40% and stopped the stuttering.
As a test I then disabled MPC-HC's internal h264 transform filter and used ffdshow's DXVA decoder instead. I guess I'll be sticking with that for h264 decoding now, given CPU usage dropped to 10% as a result (most of which was probably audio decoding via ffdshow and a Winamp compressor plugin) and MPC-HC displayed DXVA in the status bar again.

So not knowing anything about Nvidia CUVID is that normal? It'd generally need to tax the CPU more than DXVA?

I also tend to have multiple instances of MPC-HC open simultaneously (for comparing encodes etc, not necessarily playing at the same time) and Nvidia CUVID seemed to have a limit of three 720p videos before the whole system "went to crap", whereas with DXVA it tends to take a lot more before things start to melt down. Maybe that's my old 8600GT video card, but I assume CUVID and DXVA aren't quite the same thing?

PS I'm not sure whether ffdshow is maintained any longer but it's DXVA decoder seems rock solid (at least on this PC) so maybe instead of recommending the standalone MPCVideoDecoder from version 1.6.8, given there doesn't seem to be much confidence when doing so, ffdshow's DXVA decoder could be suggested/recommended instead for those still using XP?

[wanezhiling]

For old CPU & GPUs, native DXVA is always the best choice, because CUVID/QuickSync/DXVA CB cost more resources due to their principle.

[mindbomb]

on the bright side, cuvid will work with vc-1 and mpeg 2, where dxva typically won't work on an 8600gt and other vp2 cards

[wanezhiling]

Q: now how can i know which git is the latest nightly build compiled from?

latest stable 1.7.0 --> a1ef5bd
latest nightly 1.7.0.23 --> ???

[Orz]

Q: now how can i know which git is the latest nightly build compiled from?

latest stable 1.7.0 --> a1ef5bd
latest nightly 1.7.0.23 --> ???

See https://github.com/mpc-hc/mpc-hc/pull/108

[The Seeker]

Will one see any benefits from using the x64 version?

[Lich King]

i've intel pentium dual core 997 processor with intel hd graphics..
should i use dxva native, dxva copyback or none (software decoding)..??
i mostly play 1080p or 720p movies..

thanks..

[Armada]

i've intel pentium dual core 997 processor with intel hd graphics..
should i use dxva native, dxva copyback or none (software decoding)..??
i mostly play 1080p or 720p movies..

thanks..
DXVA native is the fastest method and enabled by default if available, DXVA copyback is only needed when the renderer does not support DXVA and it is slower than native.

Intel GPUs have no hardware support on WinXP, so DXVA or QS only works on Vista and above.:)

So LAV Filter’s Nvidia CUVID is the only available hardware acceleration method on WinXP.:)

I made the correction, thanks for the feedback.

Q: now how can i know which git is the latest nightly build compiled from?

latest stable 1.7.0 --> a1ef5bd
latest nightly 1.7.0.23 --> ???

We have recently changed the nightly version number scheme to count the number of commits since the latest stable (git tag) instead of counting the total number of commits.

[Reino]

Intel GPUs have no hardware support on WinXP, so DXVA or QS only works on Vista and above.:)

So LAV Filter’s Nvidia CUVID is the only available hardware acceleration method on WinXP.:)Or you could use MPC-BE's Video Decoder (standalone filter).

[clsid]

Current nightlies have lower version than old nightlies. Why not bump to 1.7.1 now for nightlies to avoid confusion and use 1.7.2 for next stable?

[XRyche]

Will MPC-HC's automatic update include updating to the latest stable LAV Filters as well?

[ryrynz]

Lavfilters are built into mpc so of course updating the player updates lav too that is providing lav has been updated. It will not update external Lavfilters.

[XRyche]

Actually I should have asked if MPC-HC will keep up with the latest LAV Filters release. Just because the LAV Filters are now integrated doesn't necessarily mean they will be kept current.

[ryrynz]

It will keep up. LAV filters is regularly updated and so is MPC-HC, I notice LAV is generally updated every few weeks or so in the nightly builds.

[Armada]

Actually I should have asked if MPC-HC will keep up with the latest LAV Filters release. Just because the LAV Filters are now integrated doesn't necessarily mean they will be kept current.
The build included with MPC-HC is based on the latest git commit with some custom MPC-HC patches (https://github.com/mpc-hc/LAVFilters). The update checker will not check for LAV updates nor is it currently planned to, but it's something we can consider if keeping up with the updates turns out to be a problem.

We will try to keep it up-to-date, but if we are ever lagging behind you can also do it yourself. Grab a zip package with the filters from the LAV Filters project page and just extract the *.ax and *.dll files into the LAVFilters (or LAVFilters64) subfolder. The version of LAVFilters is checked before it is used as we currently require version 0.58.1 at minimum.

Ofcourse we recommend that you just use the version packaged with the stable or nightly MPC-HC until we release an update as using a non-packaged version is not officially supported.

[isamu]

Hello and thank you for the latest version guys. I tried the latest 1.5 version yesterday on some anime and the performance and quality is very good. I was intrigued by the built in shaders MPC has , so I started playing around with some of them, and have a few questions:

1)Which sharpen shader do you recommend for anime? "Sharpen complex x2"? "Edge sharpen"? Is sharpen edge better than sharpen complex x2 or vice versa?

2)Should I place the sharpness shader in the "Pre-resize pixel shaders" or "Post-resize pixel shaders" box...or both? What is the difference?

3)Is there a way to adjust the level of sharpness you wish to apply for each shader? Perhaps some sort of sharpness slider like in ffdshow?

[AngelGraves13]

Forced subtitles doesn't work in the latest MPC HC since the switch to LAV filters.

I'm using MPC BE with LAV set up to play Forced Subtitles by default ONLY. MPC HC ALWAYS plays subtitles now...even under the Forced option. Don't know what the issue is exactly. They're set up the same but HC doesn't respect the Forced option.

[Thunderbolt8]

Current nightlies have lower version than old nightlies. Why not bump to 1.7.1 now for nightlies to avoid confusion and use 1.7.2 for next stable?this.

[Armada]

Forced subtitles doesn't work in the latest MPC HC since the switch to LAV filters.

I'm using MPC BE with LAV set up to play Forced Subtitles by default ONLY. MPC HC ALWAYS plays subtitles now...even under the Forced option. Don't know what the issue is exactly. They're set up the same but HC doesn't respect the Forced option.
Have you turned this option on for the internal LAV filters or for the external one? The settings are separate.

UPDATE: Fixed in the nightly: https://github.com/mpc-hc/mpc-hc/commit/d08a416f969ee4a6de591c18d068dbfd9d602905

[kasper93]

We have option for it in subtitle misc settings if I recall correctly. Can't test it right now on the phone...

Tapatalk 4 @ GT-I9300

[karamancho]

Since I don't use internal LAV filters with MPC-HC, I've added LAV video and audio decoders and splitter in the external filters list.
What about the LAV splitter source, do I need to add that one too in the external filters list?

[clsid]

You do not need to add anything at all to the external filters list. MPC-HC automatically uses the filters that are installed on your system when needed. The external filters lists exists purely to override the merits of the filters.

[kasper93]

> What about the LAV splitter source, do I need to add that one too in the external filters list?

It won't be used anyway. You need to use installer to register LAV as source filter for particular extensions.

> You do not need to add anything at all to the external filters list. MPC-HC automatically uses the filters that are installed on your system when needed. The external filters lists exists purely to override the merits of the filters.

Exactly, in fact external filters should be empty (if possible, I use it only to block few things with insane high merit) and you should configure your system so correct filters are used.

[karamancho]

When I remove everything from the external filters list MPEG Layer-3 Decoder and AVI Splitter are loaded instead of LAV Audio Decoder and LAV Splitter (WinXP)

[fohrums]

MPC-HC is missing only 1 major component that will have me completely sold: "Streaming video-progress loading bar" that way I can see how much the player has loading and where i'm able to skip without it rebuffering. Any thoughts on this folks? I'm very shocked it's not implemented yet.

[AngelGraves13]

Have you turned this option on for the internal LAV filters or for the external one? The settings are separate.

UPDATE: Fixed in the nightly: https://github.com/mpc-hc/mpc-hc/commit/d08a416f969ee4a6de591c18d068dbfd9d602905

Thnx...works now.

[AngelGraves13]

Can you guys add an Audio and Subtitle button in the UI similar to MPC BE?

[GCRaistlin]

Exactly, in fact external filters should be empty (if possible, I use it only to block few things with insane high merit)
I believe it's true if you don't perform any post-processing using ffdshow raw video? Besides ffdshow rav video I have VSFilter in External filters list. Is it OK?

you should configure your system so correct filters are used
Is there a way to discover what video formats (of which FOURCC codes) are supported by LAV Video?

[ashlar42]

Anyone able to summarize why MPC-BE? I see a list of features in the relevant thread but is there anywhere to understand its genesis?

[GCRaistlin]

How to find out the current audio delay (changed by "+"/"-" keys) in MPC-HC?

[Dstruct]

Status bar.

[Megalith]

Do the developers have any plans to fix the MPC Audio Renderer, which is supposedly broken? What exactly is wrong with it, anyway?

[mindbomb]

i think it only supports 16 bit stereo for one.

[Peter_Pan]

On my old machine (WinXP SP3, Athlon64 X2 4600+, NVIDIA GeForce 210, NVIDIA 296.10 WHQL, LAV Filters 0.58.2 Stand-Alone) the new MPC hogs the CPU if I enable in the output section VMR9-Renderless for the Video-Renderer. Further settings like VMR-Mixer-Modus, Surface: 3D-Surface (recommeded) and Resizer: Bicubic A=-1.00 (PS 2.0) are enabled for high quality .srt-subtitle display. With the previous version, MPC 1.6.8.7417, and the external usage of the LAV Filters 0.58.2 this subtitle settings work flawlessly. 720p, 1080p or other resolutions make no difference with this combo. So something maybe wrong with the implementation of the LAV Filters package as deactivating internal LAV Filters and using the 0.58.2 external one package, makes no difference with the new 1.7.0.7858 (a1ef5bd).

So according to the internal LAV Filter video decoder settings in the internal filters section of the new MPC (a1ef5bd), NVIDIA CUVID is availabe and in playback mode its also marked as "active", but it doesn't "seem" to be in effect properly, because as soon as I enable VMR9-Renderless subtitles, the CPU usage is again on the fritz. Disabled again, everything gets back to normal, meaning no more CPU hogging! So either its a CUVID implementation matter, or - and this seems more likely to me - VMR9 (Renderless) is the "troublemaker". ;)

Sadly VMR9-Renderless is required to get those SRT subtitles displayed. Obviously, other video renderers won't work with these.

I hope someone more sophisticated with this issue than me can reproduce the above described behaviour of the new MPC. I also tried newer nightly builds of MPC which came after (a1ef5bd) but ended with the same results.

[hello_hello]

I just popped in to report the same problem as Peter_Pan in the post above. I've only tried srt and DVD subtitles, but so far DVD subtitles are fine, srt subtitles.... not so much. Some additional information:

The problem only exists for me while the subtitles are actually being displayed. Even if they're enabled, for periods where there's no subtitles on the screen the video plays normally. As soon as the subtitles appear it basically freezes.

I've tried WVM9 renderless and EVR custom presenter. Same problem with either renderer. I've also tried ffdshow's video decoder, ffdshow's DXVA decoder and LAV filters both with and without NVIDIA CUVID enabled . I've even used ffdshow's own subtitles filter to load the subtitles but so far nothing allows me to work around the problem. I just can't play video while displaying srt subtitles.

WinXP SP3, Nvidia 8600GT.

Thanks.

[Peter_Pan]

The problem only exists for me while the subtitles are actually being displayed. Even if they're enabled, for periods where there's no subtitles on the screen the video plays normally. As soon as the subtitles appear it basically freezes.
Exactly to the point hello_hello. I just experienced it again with the new nightly and your description can't be more precise. I hope this ugly bug can be fixed in time.

[clsid]

Please test some old nightly builds. That should help narrow down the period in which the problem was introduced. This will speed up the process of solving the problem.
http://nightly.mpc-hc.org/old/

[hello_hello]

Versions 1.6.8.7259 and 1.6.9.7503 seem to display srt subtitles fine using internal transform filters, and also when using ffdshow's DXVA decoder, but not when using ffdshow's standard video decoder. Maybe that's been the case for a long time and I've not noticed, given I pretty much always use DXVA.

Version 1.7.0.7545 is the same except it's internal transform filters won't work with srt subtitles either, so it's ffdshow/DXVA only for 1.7.0.7545 (I don't have LAV filters installed on this PC for testing).

By the current stable version, ffdshow/DXVA decoding no longer works with srt subtitles either, so there's no displaying srt subtitles at all.

I'm not 100% sure it's a CPU usage issue as such, although for my old E6750 dual core, enabling srt subtitles does increase CPU usage a bit, however nowhere near 100% for the video I'm currently playing (720p). CPU usage sits around 30% without subtitles enabled, then jumps to about 55% with them enabled and the video starts to stutter and freeze.

For the moment at least, it seems srt subtitles and MPC-HC's internal h264 decoder stopped playing nice with the change to version 1.7, and when using an external decoder (except DXVA) the problem began earlier. If it'll help to know exactly when, I can play around some more later.

[hello_hello]

I tried (I think) the last stable build (1.6.8.7417) and version 1.6.3.4922 and they're exactly the same (as each other).

So to summarise:
Prior to version 1.7, srt subtitles can be displayed as long as DXVA decoding is used (I haven't got LAV filters installed to check NVIDIA CUVID so I'm just referring to internal decoders or ffdshow). Disabling DXVA causes stuttering whether MPC-HC or ffdshow is decoding.

From version 1.7 onwards there's no internal DXVA decoder so an external DXVA decoder (ie ffdshow) must be used to display srt subtitles, but somewhere between 1.7.0.7545 and the current stable version, even that stopped working.

Just to make sure it's not a h264 or mkv only issue, I tried an Xvid/Avi while loading some external srt subtitles using the current stable version and the stuttering returned. CPU usage sat around 55% (E6750) but playback stopped and started and even mouse movement was erratic until I disabled the subtitles.

I hope the above helps.
Cheers.

[Peter_Pan]

Just to make sure it's not a h264 or mkv only issue, I tried an Xvid/Avi while loading some external srt subtitles using the current stable version and the stuttering returned. CPU usage sat around 55% (E6750) but playback stopped and started and even mouse movement was erratic until I disabled the subtitles.
I did a little trial & error myself and it seems to me the last version without the above quoted symptoms is MPC-HC.1.7.0.7634.x86. With this one HD-MKVs and normal XviDs with srt-subs play as smooth as they should, meaning no abnormal CPU-usage or even freezing during playback.

Beginning with the version right after this one, MPC-HC.1.7.0.7646.x86.VS2012, the above described problems occur right after enabling VMR9-Renderless srt-subtitles. So maybe it has something to do with the introduction of "VS2012"? Again, I don't know the technical details behind this so its just an assumption of mine.

[hello_hello]

I did a little trial & error myself and it seems to me the last version without the above quoted symptoms is MPC-HC.1.7.0.7634.x86. With this one HD-MKVs and normal XviDs with srt-subs play as smooth as they should, meaning no abnormal CPU-usage or even freezing during playback.

Unfortunately I'm getting a different result, which is kind of odd. I tried 1.7.0.7634.x86 and still got stuttering video using MPC-HC's internal h264 decoder. With ffdshow decoding (no DXVA) it also produced stuttering video. Only ffdshow's DXVA decoder allowed me to play video with srt subtitles smoothly. Strange....

[wanezhiling]

Try to disable VMR-9 Mixer Mode