[popy]

@popy , @Warner306 , @brazen1 & @bsoriano :

After many days of being crushed under critical work load and travel, I finally had a chance to sit down & test out some of the new configurations, versions & revelations which came to take place in this thread the last few pages. 

Installed Kodi v18 nightly with pOpY's fix.
Installed & configured LAV Filters, MadVR & MPC-BE per Warner306's new insight on GT 1030 compatibility.
Updated PowerDVD 18 to latest build and using brazen1's playercorefactory.xml, PDVD.bat & MPCBE.bat with minor personal adjustments.

Kodi's respect for PCF for external player switching ......... FLAWLESS!!! All props to @popy for the fix. PCF working just like Kodi v17.6. I'm able to seamlessly switch from player to player, both via rules defined in PCF and via the "Play using" menu. 

Playback of UHD HDR MKVs in MPC-BE ......... FLAWLESS!!! All props to @Warner306 for recommending the correct configuration for GT 1030. HDR switching is automatic & accurate. PQ is at par with PDVD, DVDFab, et al, motion is smooth, and able to use forward, backward controls without issues. Biggest of all, I couldn't get my remote control to work with DVDFab, however, with MPC-BE it works out of the box just like Kodi or PDVD. I have in fact completely removed DVDFab at this point, since I only had one full UHD ISO and I encoded it to MKV. 

I typically use STOP in external player (not Kodi), then Close (Alt-F4) the player. This worked flawlessly. No issues. Returned to Kodi as normal and continued operation as normal.

Able to hop from Kodi internal player to PDVD to MPC-BE and back in any order flawlessly. UHD HDR playback & switching is at its best. Everything works just as it should.

I do have 3D but that's on a different, non-4K setup so I cannot accurately reproduce the issue brazen1 is witnessing.

I'll be testing a little more and post back results. 

Just wanted to thank everyone for sorting out all these issues and great recommendations.

Thanks!!

Nice, to hear that now you can use external player for UHD playback.

In my case i have an issue which comes up rarely in MPC-HC when playing 4K.
Picture is just black and audio is playing.
After starting the video again it works.
Also i played the UHD samples yesterday which was working perfectly fine a few days ago and now they are stuttering as hell!?!
Other 4K content is working.
Do you also have this issue with the 1030?Can you please post me your complete setup:

• Used Software incl. versions (MPC (HC or BE), LAV Filter, madvr, ...)
  
• Settings of madvr (queues), please screenshots of all relevant settings
  
• NVidia Driver Version 
  
• PlayerCoreFactory.xml
  

Thanks a lot
pOpY    

 @popy :

I haven't used any UHD samples as such, I've only tested playing back full UHD HDR movies in MKV container from my UHD rips. I have not experienced a single jitter or stutter or playback issue. Everything I've thrown at it has been playing smooth & flawlessly. Some of the titles I've played:

Oblivion
Ghost in the shell
Atomic Blonde
Avengers: Infinity War

I do notice that you are using MPC-HC whereas I'm using MPC-BE. I'm not sure if that makes any difference. 

Here's the remaining info you requested:

• Used Software incl. versions (MPC (HC or BE), LAV Filter, madvr, ...)
  • Windows 10 Pro 1803
    
  • MPC-BE x64 v1.5.2 (build 3788) beta
    
  • LAV Filters 0.72.0
    
  • MadVR 0.92.14
    
  • Kodi 20180814-fc9faf32-master-x64
    
    
• Settings of madvr (queues), please screenshots of all relevant settings
  • LAV Video Configuration:
    
    
    
  • MadVR Settings -- Following are the *ONLY* settings I changed in a fresh/default installation of MadVR. None of the other settings were touched at all. I left everything else as it is:
    
    
    
    
    
    
    
    
    
    
    
    
    
    
    
    
• NVidia Driver Version 
  • Version 398.82
    
    
• PlayerCoreFactory.xml
  • PCF:
    

    xml:
    <playercorefactory>
    
     <players>
    
        <player name="Blu-Ray" type="ExternalPlayer" audio="false" video="true">
    
          <filename>C:\Users\b3lial\AppData\Roaming\Kodi\userdata\PDVD.bat</filename>
    
          <playcountminimumtime>1140</playcountminimumtime>
    
        </player>
    
        <player name="4K-HDR" type="ExternalPlayer" audio="false" video="true">
    
          <filename>C:\Users\b3lial\AppData\Roaming\Kodi\userdata\MPCBE.bat</filename>
    
          <playcountminimumtime>1140</playcountminimumtime>
    
        </player>
    
     </players>
    
     <rules action="prepend">
    
        <rule filename=".*4K.*" player="4K-HDR"/>
    
        <rule filetypes="iso|bdmv|mpls|m2ts" player="Blu-Ray"/>
    
     </rules>
    
    </playercorefactory>

    
    
  • MPCBE.bat:
    

    python:
    Set file=%1
    
    Set dummy=%file:iso=%
    
    IF NOT %dummy% == %file% (GOTO playiso) ELSE (goto playbdmv)
    
    
    
    :playbdmv
    
    set pth=%1
    
    set pth=%pth:BDMV\MovieObject.bdmv=%
    
    set pth=%pth:BDMV\index.bdmv=%
    
    "C:\Program Files\MPC-BE x64\mpc-be64.exe" %pth% exit
    
    exit
    
    
    
    :playiso
    
    "C:\Program Files (x86)\NVIDIA Corporation\3D Vision\nvstlink.exe" /enable
    
    "C:\Program Files (x86)\Elaborate Bytes\VirtualCloneDrive\VCDMount.exe" /d=0 %1
    
    "C:\Program Files\MPC-BE x64\mpc-be64.exe" D:
    
    "C:\Program Files (x86)\Elaborate Bytes\VirtualCloneDrive\VCDMount.exe" /d=0 /u
    
    exit

    
    
  • PDVD.bat:
    

    python:
    Set file=%1
    
    Set dummy=%file:iso=%
    
    IF NOT %dummy% == %file% (GOTO playiso) ELSE (goto playbdmv)
    
    
    
    :playbdmv
    
    set pth=%1
    
    set pth=%pth:BDMV\MovieObject.bdmv=%
    
    set pth=%pth:BDMV\index.bdmv=%
    
    "C:\Program Files (x86)\CyberLink\PowerDVD18\PowerDVD.exe" %pth% exit
    
    exit
    
    
    
    :playiso
    
    "C:\Program Files (x86)\Elaborate Bytes\VirtualCloneDrive\VCDMount.exe" /d=0 %1
    
    "C:\Program Files (x86)\CyberLink\PowerDVD18\PowerDVD.exe" D:
    
    "C:\Program Files (x86)\Elaborate Bytes\VirtualCloneDrive\VCDMount.exe" /d=0 /u
    
    exit

Edit:

Also adding hardware specs.

Intel Core i5-2500K CPU @ 3.30 GHZ (3.60 Ghz Turbo)
8 GB (2 x 4GB) Dual Channel DDR 4 RAM
Nvidia GT 1030 (GP108-300-A1)

Samsung UN65MU700 UHD HDR display.

I should also add:

This is a Secondary (Client) HTPC. There is no media stored on this HTPC, on its drives. Everything played back on this HTPC is "Streamed" from my main HTPC which is in the Home Theatre, a couple rooms down. The streaming is achieved via the MediaBridge feature of 2 NetGear Nighthawk R7000 (AC1900) Routers using the 'AC' band. 

Thanks!! 

thx a lot for your settings.
Mine was basically the same.
Will try real movies.

PS.: Other issue (stop in kodi) is solved: https://github.com/xbmc/xbmc/pull/14306

pOpY