[VooD]

why xbmc (any version) always stutters with pal video, and on the contrary appears to run smooth with ntsc video?

sometimes i have to restart movies several times until the get played smooth or turning on/off demuxing/cache,etc... several times.

is absolutly ilogic for me. in addition to this, xbmp always plays video smooth in pal mode.

maybe a bug with pal timers or something?
every new cvs i expect to get fixed this problem, but i never see a simple improvement or reference in the bug list.

do xbmc coders think is a normal issue, or is just noone has uses pal systems?

its a pity, because pal video looks a lot better for video playback (in addition to get the perfect refreshrate for movies)
p.d.: it happens in every pal setup xbox console i´ve seen.

[deltop]

actually afaik most of the team is from europe and uses pal. i don't have a problem with pal and never have.

is your xbox set to pal and are you playing back pal material? or another combination? a bit more information required here as it depends on the material your playing and what setting your xbox uses.

edit: btw my machine is set to pal 60 which my tv can handle. this way i have no problem playing back ntsc or pal videos.

[VooD]

actually afaik most of the team is from europe and uses pal. i don't have a problem with pal and never have.

is your xbox set to pal and are you playing back pal material? or another combination? a bit more information required here as it depends on the material your playing and what setting your xbox uses.

edit: btw my machine is set to pal 60 which my tv can handle. this way i have no problem playing back ntsc or pal videos.

well, sttutering happens with any 25 fps video, or to be more correct with any video played in a pal resolution. my tv also supports pal 60 thats the reason i know ntsc material works flawless.
and happens with any combination of codecs, divx, xvid, mp3, ogg, it doesnt matter, if the video is played in pal mode will stutter until i restart the video a couple of times or i play a bit with demuxing, etc options.
also, every pal user i know who uses xbmc have the same problem. maybe is "too little stuttering" for some people and thats why the bug havent been taken in consideration till now, but i can assure you xbmp runs absolutly smooth and xbmc wont unless i make that "trick".

regards. (and excuse my poor english)

[Gamester17]

i have a pal xbox and a pal tv (uk) and i have no problems with or without pal60 enabled niether have any heard anyone but you who seen this isse, provide more info!

[total_ass]

before i begin, can i just say that i am not new to xbox media center, i haven't posted in these forums much, most of my xbmc time has been spent over at xbox-scene.

right, onto my very long issue. 75% of my video files i play in xbmc 'stutter' for lack of a better word. all i can say is that it has been doing this for every build since i started with xbmc which would be 9 months-ish. i used to believe that it was a problem with the videos, but the fact that they all play fine on my pc suggests that the files themselves are not the issue.

i have been researching into this issue for quite some time, and if you yourselves have the time i'd appreciate it if you could read this.

http://forums.xbox-scene.com/index.php?showtopic=322004

at the end of the topic i am convinced that the encodes are bad, but since then i have tried more and more different files.

currently im running 5th of january build, but as i have said it has been doing it since i have started with xbmc, and absolutely no settings i have tried are having any effect.

jaydee and others at x-s have helped me as much as they can with this, but no one seems to be able to help me solve it. i'd appreciate it if one of the experts or devs could help me sort this out. if need be i can post some more media info on some of the files, but i have pretty much ruled out the possibility of the files being bad, from the sheer amount i have tried.

before anyone posts, i have tried all of the basic stuff, reinstalling, deleting settings, changing cache, changing filters, and all others you could possibly suggest. but it seems my problem is much deeper than i first thought.

[VooD]

i will tomorrow...p.d.:browsing and answering post via linksbox with no usb keyboard sux lol regards

[deltop]

i know you mentioned pal 60 but you still haven't answered my question

is your xbox set to pal in the ms dash and is pal 60 set in xbmc?

it sounds as if your xbox has been set to ntsc (perhaps using the enigmah video selector disc). in this case you would see the stuttering you mention. as the xbox would be converting the pal video to ntsc, hence the stuttering. the xbox doesn't output depending on the material, it always converts. unlike say the ps2 which will output ntsc if your playing an ntsc game or output pal if your playing a pal game.

perhaps this is stating the obvious but i'm just checking to make sure that your box is in fact set to pal and not ntsc.

[VooD]

i know you mentioned pal 60 but you still haven't answered my question

is your xbox set to pal in the ms dash and is pal 60 set in xbmc?

it sounds as if your xbox has been set to ntsc (perhaps using the enigmah video selector disc). in this case you would see the stuttering you mention. as the xbox would be converting the pal video to ntsc, hence the stuttering. the xbox doesn't output depending on the material, it always converts. unlike say the ps2 which will output ntsc if your playing an ntsc game or output pal if your playing a pal game.

perhaps this is stating the obvious but i'm just checking to make sure that your box is in fact set to pal and not ntsc.

my xbox is a pal 1.4 running a xecuter2 bios, and never used enigmah video selector. pal 60 is selected in microsoft dashboards so in that way xbmc can use it when i play ntsc material (the option to allow xbmc select the best resolution for each movie and pal 60 if its avaible is turned on). of course xbmc wont switch to a 60 hz resolution unless the video you try to playback is in ntsc timing, for example 30 fps, 23.96 fps, etc.

as i said, since the first xbmc version i tryed (one year ago) pal material has been jerky. having to restart the playback several times and/or turning on/off demuxing, cache, etc several times until finally gets a smooth framerate.

and is not a data transfer issue as it happens streaming from network, reading from the dvd , and from the hd.

believe i´m a lot in video/audio stuff (thats my work) and i know with absolutle security is not my fault. also every other person i know is using xbmc with pal material suffers the same problem having to restart the video several times. and also is not an issue of playing pal material in ntsc resolution or viceversa, my tv let me know which mode is using, and my xbmc plays pal material in pal mode and ntsc material in ntsc mode.

travellings and smooth camera movementes are the best way to notice the jerkyness im talking about.

what i cant understand is why ntsc material runs smooth, and why xbmp runs pal material without any skipping and xbmc does not.

i´ll try to give a clearer and more specific details about the problem and my configuration in my next post, but i´m pretty sure is not my fault, also it happens with every possible codec combination i´ve tested altought it seems some combinations are more susceptible than others.

btw... you told nobody had ever that problem....but i know hundreds of people which cant see a difference between a game running at 30 fps and the same at 60 fps....so maybe the skipping i´m talking about is seen as something normal for some people.

regards

[jmarshall]

perhaps you could provide us with a short clip that clearly shows this issue you are noticing?

cheers,
jonathan

[VooD]

perhaps you could provide us with a short clip that clearly shows this issue you are noticing?

cheers,
jonathan

maybe. i have a realtime mpeg2/4 capturer, so i could digitize some fragments.

[VooD]

i´ve been trying to capture some examples but sadly, my video digitizer blends both interlaced fields in a progressive one, so i get just 25 fps instead 50fps and the jerkyness get is not as noticeable. in addition to this depending on if the capturer get the correct odd or even field synced with xbox´s divx decoding sometimes the captured movement is "blurry" which disguisses even more the problem.

so it seems i just have again my word.

[jmarshall]

what i meant was a source clip that we can use to see if we can observe the same thing.

[VooD]

what i meant was a source clip that we can use to see if we can observe the same thing.

yep, i know, but it really happens in every movie played in pal :p . anyway i´ll make a couple of clips so you can test wheter fails for you.

regards.

[C-Quel]

do you play over network or from media i.e. dvd - cdr ?

[Gamester17]

just to rule it out, you haven't enabled these filters, have you? (if so, try disable them);
- adjust framerate.
- high quality resampling

and again you still need to provide more information (even if you thinks it's not relative);
1. dashboard used: xbmc, evox or other?
2. exact build date of xbmc?
3. tv: pal-50/60, widescreen or normal?
4. zoom selected in xbmc: using "normal"?
5. audio: ac3 and/or dts pass-through or analog-out?

finnally, please follow this faq (link) on how to create a valid sample (using direct-streaming in virtualdubmod)