MPEG 2 Software Decoder for Vista Media Center

C

CRSharff

Gawd
Joined
Jun 18, 2006
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Before you read the title and start to flame me for Vista being shipped with its own decoder and that I no longer need one for Vista that is not what I am talking about.

I have a Dvico FusionHDTV7 Cool and it is hooked up to standard basic analog cable and this card does not have a hardware decoder on it so per Dvico's website it says in order for this card to work with analog cable signals I need to install a MPEG 2 decoder such as Mainconcepts.

I have downloaded Mainconcepts decoder and all seems well but it has a watermark in the top left corner and was wondering if there are any free decoders out there that I can use with Vista Media Center to enable analog cable TV on my card to work?

I have tried Purevideo and was working for awhile but then I uninstalled it for some reason and when I went to go put it back on it wouldn't work.


Any help is appreciated thank you.
 
Yeah I have and use ffdshow and it does not allow my TV tuner to be set up with analog TV.
 
as you said, vista includes a decoder, are you talking about an encoder? No card has a hardware mpeg2 decoder anymore. Most analog cards include a hardware mpeg2 encoder though - which media center needs to use the card.
 
Killing2Live said:
Before you read the title and start to flame me for Vista being shipped with its own decoder and that I no longer need one for Vista that is not what I am talking about.
Click to expand...
Actually you are talking about it and you do need a decoder cause the included one works but isn't that great for video quality.

Anyways, your tuner card has no hardware encoding chip so the only way to get it to work with VMC is to run hacked drivers and a hacked MPEG2 encoder since your card doesn't natively support it and VMC doesn't support software encoding tuners.
 
Anyways, your tuner card has no hardware encoding chip so the only way to get it to work with VMC is to run hacked drivers and a hacked MPEG2 encoder since your card doesn't natively support it and VMC doesn't support software encoding tuners.
Click to expand...

Yes that is exactly my problem, my card needs software encoding since I do not have a analog tuner in my computer in addition to my Dvico.

I'm am confused by what you say about how Vista Media Center doesn't support software encoding tuners but yet I have been able for Vista Media Center to recognize my analog cable by using Mainconcepts MCE encoder as well as Purevideo but Purevideo stopped working and Mainconcepts works but will glitch and freeze my computer as well as having a watermark in the upper left.

You say I need hacked drivers and a hacked MPEG2 encoder?
Can I have some insight?
 
You just answered your own question. You need a special encoder (Mainconcepts MCE encoder) in order to get your analog tuner to interface with MCE which it's whole purpose is the trick MCE into thinking you have a valid tuner when you really don't.

Since you have most of it working you should try a different decoder since Purevideo doesn't work on Vista.
 
Oh okay I think I am starting to understand. Thank you

Is there any other special encoders other than Mainconcepts that can trick my MCE to interfacing with my card?
And do you have any suggestions for different decoders or anything?

Again your comments and advise are appreciated. Thank you
 
Nope. There are a few methods to doing this but, like I mentioned earlier, they're all related to hack drivers/encoders which means that they're all kind of proprietary to certain cards. ATI has theirs, DVICO has theirs, etc.

What I would suggest in your case is either buy a cheap ATI 550 Pro or 650 Pro tuner. Before doing that though I would try a different MPEG2 decoder other then the Purevdeo one since it's not supported by Vista (and doesn't work correctly, no hardware acceleration). PowerDVD is the one I would try. I use it, TV looks better then the default MS decoder but never as good as the Purevideo was in XP. :(

But yeah, I would go with adding another tuner instead since it's more reliable/ more stable and less dependant on running hacked software.
 
Okay well I actually have an old Hauppauge PVR-250 laying around.
I took it out because it wasn't supported on Vista 64 bit but now I am back on 32bit.
I guess I just don't really need two analog tuners but if it makes my life that much easier than I might think about adding it.

Thanks again
 
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