The
dropdown lists in the Video/Audio Decoder sections contain all
available decoders in your system that DirectShow regards as suitable
for the according format (which doesn't necessarily mean they work
well).
The DirectShow Tab allows to select the video/audio decoder and video renderer that are used for playback. The settings take effect immediately. If you select a decoder, the filter graph (the chain of DirectShow playback components ) will be rebuilt at once.
Decoder Selection | Renderer Selection
The
dropdown lists in the Video/Audio Decoder sections contain all
available decoders in your system that DirectShow regards as suitable
for the according format (which doesn't necessarily mean they work
well).
<System Default> lets Windows select the decoder - usually the one with the highest merit value in your system. Please refer to chapter 10 of the DVBViewer help file for more information. It is recommendable to select a specific decoder that shows good results, however.
For DTS audio (sometimes contained in VOB- and M2TS files) the TSPlayer preferably uses the decoder selected for AC3, provided it can cope with this format.
The modern AAC audio format
(Advanced Audio Coding) is already used in some countries (Norway,
New Zealand) for terrestrial broadcasts (DVB-T). However,
conventional AAC decoders cannot cope with the DVB packaging of AAC
audio data (LATM). So TSPlayer will probably find no suitable
component in your system. A remedy can be found in the DVBViewer
members area: The libfaad2 wrapper enables using an open source AAC
library (DLL file) in TSPlayer and DVBViewer. Please read the
installation instructions carefully!
The Context Menu that appears
after right-clicking the TSPlayer Window lists all DirectShow
components (filters) that are used for playback. Open a filter's
property page (if available) by selecting the according entry. The
DVBViewer Filter, serving as filesource filter, appears under the
name „DVBSource“. It displays the current video/audio
format on its property page.
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The „Video“ dropdown list in the Renderer section allows to select the video renderer that renders the picture and delivers it to the graphics card driver:
The
Simple Video Renderer originates from Windows 9x / Windows
2000, but is still available under later Windows versions. It
provides basic, solid video output without any special features.
The
Overlay Mixer in conjunction with the simple video renderer
provides advanced features like brightness and contrast control. It
uses a mode in which the graphics card hardware displays the video
on the desktop, thus lowering the processor load considerably.
The
VMR 7 (Video Mixing Renderer 7) has been introduced with
Windows XP. It is able to work in Overlay Mode or, if overlay is not
available, in the „normal“ software mode. Unfortunately
it provides no brightness / contrast control.
The
VMR 9 is available on all Windows platforms, provided
DirectX9 has been installed. It does not support Overlay Mode.
Brightness and contrast control depend on the capabilities of the
graphics card driver – it may work or not.
EVR
Enhanced Video Renderer: Has been introduced with Windows Vista.
The EVR is the only video renderer that enables hardware accelerated
video decoding (DXVA2) under Vista.
D3D
Renderer: Basically the VMR 9,
but with a TSPlayer-specific DirectDraw3D based allocator/presenter
component. Up to now this type of rendering has only been used by
special DVBViewer versions (TechniSat Edition, DVBShop
Player, FireDTV Viewer) .
If the selected renderer or the required mode is not available, the TSPlayer automatically falls back to the next best choice.
Please note: Only one program at a
time can use the CPU-power saving Overlay Mode for video output.
Thus, if the DVBViewer and the TSPlayer are running at the same time,
and the DVBViewer already uses Overlay Mode (with „Unchanged“
or „Overlay“ selected in the DVBViewer's options), the
TSPlayer can only use the „normal“ output. The VMR 9 or
EVR, which are particularly designed for this kind of output, mostly
provide the best quality in this case. If you want the TSPlayer to
use Overlay Mode, even if the DVBViewer is running at the same time,
select „VMR 7“ or „VMR 9“ in the DVBViewer
options.
The „Audio“ dropdown list in the Renderer section allows to select the audio renderer. It is responsible for outputting audio to the sound card. Each entry represents an audio device, a specific way of accessing it or (particularly under Vista) a kind of audio output. By selecting an audio renderer you may switch over to a different sound cards, or under Vista to a different kind of audio output (PC speakers, SPDIF, HDMI...).
Audio renderers with „DirectSound“
in their name usually provide individual volume control for each
program. Others (particularly „Default WaceOut“) are
using the „global“ Windows volume control. In this case
changing the volume in the TSPlayer will affect other programs.
„Default“ as part of an audio renderer name refers to the
default audio device selected in the Windows Control Panel.
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