VFW in WMP /w avi

[scmccarthy]

Does anyone here know how to force Windows Media Player to use Video for Windows when playing AVI files?

Stephen

[mf]

unregsvr32 all the directshow codecs that can play it :D.

regsvr32 -u xvid.ax
regsvr32 -u ffdshow.ax
regsvr32 -u divxdec.ax
regsvr32 -u divx_c32.ax

etc.

To reverse the process, do regsvr32 file.ax instead of regsvr32 -u file.ax. You can also use the "AVI decompressor" filter in Graphedit and save the graph file.

[scmccarthy]

This takes care of directshow, but I believe there are three possibilities, VFW, DirectShow, and something else.

Stephen

[scmccarthy]

Oh, that's incredible, I found the problem! It is DVobSub.ax. So it is a DirectShow filter.

This is related to my losing the ability to playback an avi file with a width greater than 768. The problem did not occur in VirtualDub and VirtualDub uses VFW, so I thought if WMP used VFW, it would work in there too. The screen shot of the movie playing in WMP looked blank, so I couldn't show the problem here. I guess you'll never know.

Stephen

[mf]

If you wanna make screenshots with WMP go to Options and set Hardware Acceleration to 0. If you wanna make screenshots in Sasami2K set Control Options->Force renderer into RGB32. If you wanna make screenshots in any player with any file set ffdshow to accept Raw Input (under Codecs) and deselect all colorspaces except RGB32 and uncheck "Use overlay mixer" (also under codecs). In all of these situations you will be able to create a screenshot of your player containing video.

[scmccarthy]

Without DVobSub.ax, I can get a screenshot by pressing the print screen key. It was some sort of overlay in VobSub that was interfering, I am not sure you can uncheck using overlay for DVobSub.ax.

The key point here is that you were right in saying that a DirectShow filter was to blame, but it was not one of the four you thought of. Therefore, perhaps your suggestions for getting around the print screen problem might not work as long as the DirectShow filter for VobSub was installed. And the minute I removed it, the print screen worked. It's just that I did not realize that it should work before. And so, I did not understand why people did not understand that I could not post a picture of my problem.

I don't use VobSub anyway, it just gets installed with Gordian knot, I like subrip even though it isn't really easy to use.

Stephen

[mf]

I've always been able to make screenshots of DVobSub, since my ffdshow only outputs RGB32.

[scmccarthy]

@mfI've always been able to make screenshots of DVobSub, since my ffdshow only outputs RGB32. OK, but bear in mind that I am adding one more DirectShow filter than the four you put forth as possibllities. And DVobSub.ax turned out to be the one causing my problems. I thank you, because I wouldn't have investigated DirectShow filters if not for you. But I thought you might want to know that DVobSub.ax should be considered along with the other video ax filters. Also, I do not use ffdshow, you are saying as long as I check accept Raw input, deselect every color space except RGB32, and uncheck Use overlay mixer. So *if* I use VobSub, I should use ffdshow with it with those settings. That is very helpful.

To someone else who no doubt has been following along (I always assume there'e someone there). I'd prefer using a less convenient method than VobSub, because I don't like the fact it works through DirectShow, just so I can avoid these kinds if side effects. Although for those who do use DVobSub, using RGB32 only in ffdshow will solve the problem. That's deep and more complex than I would like, but definitely good to know.

Stephen

[gabest]

May I ask you what was the problem exactly?

Also, I think mf only suggested rgb with ffdshow because it allows you to take a screenshot since the video renderer won't switch into overlay with that.

And one more note, wmp (or any other player built on dshow) won't use vfw ever, it will pull in a vfw codec wrapper filter for only the decompressor codec which is much worse than using the dshow version of the decoder.

[scmccarthy]

I think I made an extra contrubution to the discussion by suggesting an extra DirectShow filter to check.

DVobSub.ax prevented avi files from playing that had frames wider than 768 pixels. 960 is my favorite width. Multiples of 120 are the best. Or they used to be, I switched the formula now.

Anyway, after the first 768 columns, there's vertical strips in the movie, unless I view it with VirtualDub. Now VirtualDub uses VFW for the preview and any other player does not use that, so that pointed to the likelihood that a DirectShow filter might have caused the problem.

Now I don't use subtitles often enough to justify having DVobSub.ax registered and working in the background anyway. So far, I have only used them for one movie, the Road Rants from Mad Max. They are really fun.

I don't object to using DirectShow, I guess I don't mind the suggestion that movies wider that 768 pixels are too big. What bothered me was that a movie that played fine in WMP stopped playing properly. It was important to me to fine out why. And DVobSub.ax turned out to be the bottleneck. I am not sure if you can fix it.

I find that I can get a sharper image with better color detail in an avi file, that I can playing the DVD with my PC DVD player. So size does not matter, only seeing if I can make it look better than it does on the DVD.

Stephen