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[WINDOWS] External Player Support Thread - Printable Version

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+---- Thread: [WINDOWS] External Player Support Thread (/showthread.php?tid=43511)



- tamitaz - 2009-12-18

I just installed XBMC RC1 like you on a Windows 7 x64 with ION ITX plateforme (1.6 GHz dual core Atom OC 1.98 GHz). I also installed CoreAVC 1.9.5 and MPC-Home Cinema .1.3.1249.0.(x64). I haven't done the playercorefactory.xml thing yet to use MPC as an external player within XBMC. But I did a 1080p playback test with MPC using the default installation settings. The result is excellent, smooth playback, no tearing, no stuttering, etc... The same file played with the XBMC player is not good, no tearing but stuterring and frame drops. This is normal as the Atom processor is not powerful enough and the XBMC player doesn't offload to the ION GPU.
I also tried (that was yesterday) on the same hardware Kubuntu 9.1 (Ubuntu KDE) + XBMC for Linux. Playback of the same 1080p fine was OK inside XBMC but after hours of tweaking different options (in XBMC). This is normal as XBMC for Linux supports offloading to the GPU. But then I had problems with sound output after plugging the HTPC in to an AV amplifier (optical connection for audio output and HDMI output for video output configured in XBMC). So up to now I prefer the Windows solution with MPC and CoreAVC. Going to modify playercorefactory.


- tamitaz - 2009-12-18

PS : playback on the Linux box was "OK" as I said after tweaking but even then the result is not as good as the Windows solution with MPC and CoreAVC.


- storkshot - 2009-12-19

I just tested RC1 and I can't find the 'Play Using...' option now from the context menu... Sad Anything I need to check?


- tamitaz - 2009-12-20

Hi, you get the "Play using" option by doing a right mouse click directly on the video file you want to play.
If you don't want to have to do this for each video file, you can configure the other video player (for example MPC HC) as the default video player in XBMC in your xml files in your user data/xbmc folder.
The location of the folder on a windows 7 64 bits edition is : C:\Users\<username>\AppData\Roaming\XBMC\userdata.
There are two xml files you can modify to get the result you want. I haven't tried all combinations but in my case I found I needed the two following files to be present with the following content :

advancedsettings.xml
<advancedsettings>
<video>
<defaultplayer>externalplayer</defaultplayer>
</video>
<externalplayer>
<filename>C:\Program Files\MPC HomeCinema (x64)</filename>
<args></args>
<forceontop>true</forceontop>
<hidexbmc>true</hidexbmc>
<hideconsole>false</hideconsole>
<hidecursor>false</hidecursor>
</externalplayer>
</advancedsettings>

[b]playercorefactory.xml[/b]
<playercorefactory>
<players>
<player name="dvdplayer" type="ExternalPlayer" audio="false" video="true">
<filename>C:\Program Files\MPC HomeCinema (x64)\mpc-hc64.exe</filename>
<args>/fullscreen /close "{1}"</args>
</player>
</players>
</playercorefactory>

Hope this helps.

With this configuration, XBMC automatically opens up MPC HC in full screen when you select a video file to play. Added to CoreAVC with default settings, you will get excellent HD playback up to 1080p on a ION ITX plateforme. Smooth playback, no tearing, no stuttering, no frame drops, etc...


- seeker83 - 2009-12-21

moby-uk Wrote:
PantsOnFire Wrote:I love using xbmc its menus are great, and i love using mpc to play the vids. But when i launch mpc from xbmc, having xbmc behind it always causes mpc to occassionally tear and/or judder.

Does anyone else find this? Is it possible to minimise xbmc while mpc takes front and centre? -Id be interested to know if this fixes the problem.

thanks all.
there's no option for minimise, only to hide. there wouldn't be any difference, CPU-wise, between the two. when XBMC if hidden it should use exactly 0 CPU-time, check with taskmgr. do you have particularly weedy HW?
I have had similar problems as PantsOnFire. They were solved a few versions ago (pre beta1 I think) but now they are back again. My symptoms are that if I launch MPC by double clicking a movie in windows explorer it plays fine without any hickups. But when I launch the same player using XBMC external player feature it keeps juddering (about once a second for 24fps movies).

Hiding XBMC doesn't help either, as long as XBMC is running I get the judder. And this is probably not a cpu problem because like you pointed out XBMC uses virtually no cpu time at all when the external player has been launched. The problem is more likely related to the changes with directx and/or video surfaces. I'm guessing XBMC locks some video window somehow that prevents MPC (or reclock) from doing what it normally does to get perfect video sync.

As I said this problem was fixed a few months ago, but it has reappeared again, I don't know exactly when it was fixed or when it reappeared (sorry Sad ) All I know is that the problem exists in RC1.

For now I'm using a batch file that kills xbmc, starts MPC with arguments given by XBMC and then restarts XBMC when MPC closes. It's not pretty but it works for now.

XBMC has undergone huge changes the past few months (and they have been very good changes! Big Grin), so at least a few things were bound to break Tongue

Anyway thanks for your work moby, you sure have done great things with this feature! Nod And I'm sure this problem can be fixed again as it has been done before.

Here are my system specs if anyone is wondering:
Windows Vista, 64-bit (WoW) Service Pack 1 build 6001. Built on Dec 16 2009 (SVN:25755, compiler 1500)
AMD Athlon™ Dual Core Processor 4850e
Desktop Resolution: 1920x1080 32Bit at 24Hz
MPC 6.4.9.1 (revision 104) (guliverkli2 I think)

I use the builtin graphics and sound on my Gigabyte 780g motherboard to output 1080p and 5.1 digital audio over HDMI.

I think I saw someone mention something about fake fullscreen and stuff? maybe that can help the juddering issues? but on the other hand I saw today that adjust refresh rate is actually working now (first time with my setup) and that's really great, so I want to continue working hehe Smile


- tamitaz - 2009-12-21

seeker83 Wrote:Here are my system specs if anyone is wondering:
Windows Vista, 64-bit (WoW) Service Pack 1 build 6001. Built on Dec 16 2009 (SVN:25755, compiler 1500)
AMD Athlon™ Dual Core Processor 4850e
Desktop Resolution: 1920x1080 32Bit at 24Hz
MPC 6.4.9.1 (revision 104) (guliverkli2 I think)
Hi seeker83, I don't think the juddering problem comes from XBMC, I have about the same setup as you have and I don't have this problem with all default settings (in XBMC). You are using MPC 6.4.9.1. Did you try with MPC-HC (1.3.1249.0) ? And maybe also try with another refresh rate (I'm running my desktop like you at 1920x1080 resolution, but with 60Hz refresh rate).
Regards.


- seeker83 - 2009-12-21

tamitaz Wrote:Hi seeker83, I don't think the juddering problem comes from XBMC, I have about the same setup as you have and I don't have this problem with all default settings (in XBMC). You are using MPC 6.4.9.1. Did you try with MPC-HC (1.3.1249.0) ? And maybe also try with another refresh rate (I'm running my desktop like you at 1920x1080 resolution, but with 60Hz refresh rate).
Regards.
Hello Smile well it might not be only XBMC, but it sure has some effect to the problem since my MPC version playes 1080p just fine when XBMC isn't running. And I've tried a few different MPC-HC versions and none of them worked as good as the old plain MPC versions, so I figured why bother with MPC-HC...

Though I might try them again now, I'm thinking I could try some different bios settings to increase the shared ram for the GPU. Maybe that can make hardware acceleration work on my integrated radeon 3200hd.

The main problem with these things is that there's so many variables; OS, driver, hardware, driver settings, bios settings, xbmc settings, mpc settings, windows settings, reclock settings. There's latterly a ton of combinations to try and chances are none of them will work, and then a new version comes out and to be absolutly fair one should try all those options again... outch.

And about the refresh thing, if I don't use a refresh rate that is a multiple of the video fps then I get judder every single time in MPC. Though things might be different in MPC-HC I guess, and there's another set of software to consider... I use Haali's media splitter and CoreAVC, while MPC-HC has it's own codecs, then again MPC-HC can probably use haali and coreavc aswell, but last time I tried I couldn't get MPC-HC to play fluently, while MPC did just fine.

When you say "about the same setup" as me... what are your exact specs? Since as you can see there are MANY variables, sadly Sad


- tamitaz - 2009-12-22

Here's my setup, it's about the same as yours, apart the hardware but your CPU is more powerful :
Antec ISK 300-65 case
Zotac IONITX-D-E MB (dual-core 1.6 GHz Atom CPU, OC 1.98 GHz)
RAM : Crucial Ballistix DDR2 - 2x 1 GB PC-6400
SSD Crucial M225 64 GB S-ATA II
Windows Vista Ultimate 64 bits 7600.16385.090713 (no SP1)
Desktop resolution : 1920x1080 32 bits 50Hz (thought it was 60Hz in another post)
MPC-HC 1.3.1249.0 64 bits
CoreAVC Pro Edition 1.9.5
And of course : XBMC 9.11 RC1
Display : same as Windows desktop
Vertical sync : always


XBMC xml files already posted :

advancedsettings.xml
<advancedsettings>
<video>
<defaultplayer>externalplayer</defaultplayer>
</video>
<externalplayer>
<filename>C:\Program Files\MPC HomeCinema (x64)</filename>
<args></args>
<forceontop>true</forceontop>
<hidexbmc>true</hidexbmc>
<hideconsole>false</hideconsole>
<hidecursor>false</hidecursor>
</externalplayer>
</advancedsettings>

playercorefactory.xml
<playercorefactory>
<players>
<player name="dvdplayer" type="ExternalPlayer" audio="false" video="true">
<filename>C:\Program Files\MPC HomeCinema (x64)\mpc-hc64.exe</filename>
<args>/fullscreen /close "{1}"</args>
</player>
</players>
</playercorefactory>

Apart those two xml files to get MPC to work as an external player in XBMC, all software is at default settings (CoreAVC, MPC, XBMC).
But your right, there's so many variables it's not always easy to get to the source of problems.
You talked about bios settings to increase the shared ram for the GPU...
I'm not sure this is the same option as the one I tweaked in the Zotac Bios but I recall having set a GPU option to 256 GB (the default was 64 I think).


- slavic77 - 2009-12-27

Hello everyone,

I've managed to make my BDMVs (BD images) be played with external Arcsoft TMT using advancedsettings.xml and coreplayerfactory.xml, it's OK.

The only problem is that the method doesn't work when XBMC runs in library mode. Is there anything I can do about it?


Blank screen after exit - wrxg33k - 2009-12-28

So I had my external player working fine in 9.04 but I installed 9.11 camelot and it doesn't work quite right. The videos load in the external player fine but when the video is done, xbmc doesn't come back into focus correctly. The screen is blank. However, if I alt-tab and select xbmc, it comes back fine. Any ideas?


- aphillippe - 2009-12-29

seeker83 Wrote:My symptoms are that if I launch MPC by double clicking a movie in windows explorer it plays fine without any hickups. But when I launch the same player using XBMC external player feature it keeps juddering (about once a second for 24fps movies).

I'm having exactly the same issue. For the record, it's not just opening the video file from within xbmc. If I open a file in mpc-hc from explorer, but have xbmc minimised, or running in the background, I get the same judder. As was said before, it might be the new directx gui taking/locking graphics resources.


seeker83 Wrote:For now I'm using a batch file that kills xbmc, starts MPC with arguments given by XBMC and then restarts XBMC when MPC closes. It's not pretty but it works for now.

Any chance of you posting this batch file, or giving instructions on how to create one? I'm pretty useless with stuff like that. I'd love to get this back working again, at least as well as babylon did (that's progress for you!). The WAF is getting seriously depleted.


Setup:
Athlon x2 4450e
Gigabyte HD3200 onboard
Windows 7 64 Professional
XBMC Camelot final 9.11


- Shadok - 2009-12-29

Hello,

On my htpc, i have an usb blu-ray player, and i'd like to be able to use it with power dvd and the external player, whatever blu-ray is in it.
As I know, the external player is supposed to work with file extension.

If I try to add a source in XBMC pointing to the drive letter (ESmile it will work only if there's a disc inside the player, it can't add only a drive letter.
When i'll insert another blu-ray, it will keep the previous blu-ray title and refuse to play the new one as the title doesn't match.

Is this possible to only map a source to a drive letter and use external player on it ?

Thanks.


- gagias - 2009-12-30

Good morning to everybody, trying MPC HC as external player for the files mkv in full screen fashions it allows me under the bar of windows.

As I can eliminate of default this problem ? This is my playercorefactory:

"<playercorefactory>
<players>
<player name="MPC-HC" type="externalplayer" audio="false" video="true">
<filename>C:\Program Files\MPC HomeCinema (x64)\mpc-hc64.exe</filename>
<args>/fullscreen /close "{1}"</args>
<hidexbmc>false</hidexbmc>
<hideconsole>false</hideconsole>
<warpcursor>none</warpcursor>
</player>
</players>
<rules action="prepend">
<rule filetypes="mkv" player="MPC-HC"/>
</rules>
</playercorefactory>"

TKS


- Mochilote - 2009-12-30

wrxg33k Wrote:So I had my external player working fine in 9.04 but I installed 9.11 camelot and it doesn't work quite right. The videos load in the external player fine but when the video is done, xbmc doesn't come back into focus correctly. The screen is blank. However, if I alt-tab and select xbmc, it comes back fine. Any ideas?

Solved:
http://forum.xbmc.org/showthread.php?p=469113#post469113


- Marble68 - 2010-01-05

wrxg33k Wrote:So I had my external player working fine in 9.04 but I installed 9.11 camelot and it doesn't work quite right. The videos load in the external player fine but when the video is done, xbmc doesn't come back into focus correctly. The screen is blank. However, if I alt-tab and select xbmc, it comes back fine. Any ideas?

I think you have to add a media type so, while in library mode, it will see the inserted DVD as video.

My XBMC sees inserted blue ray DVDs in the Music library. ARG!

Did you add this to advancedsettings.xml?
Code:
<advancedsettings>
    <videoextensions>
    <add>index.bdmv</add>
    </videoextensions>
</advancedsettings>

I found that here: http://forum.xbmc.org/showpost.php?p=366221

Right now, I'm on 9.11 and I can't get this to recognize anything in my userdata\playercorefactory.xml file.

It says it loads it; but nothing seems to apply.

I'm running in portable mode.

Vista 32 home premium.

*sigh*. Huh