Something Media-Related is Broken...

S

Sovereign

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Mar 21, 2005
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Sorry for the vague title. However, after running several tests I'm not sure what the heck is going on.

Media playback has never been (and shouldn't be) a problem on a computer as fast as mine (Q6600, 8GB RAM). Especially not basic (non-HD) AVI and MP3s!

However, for some reason I've been having problems. I do not have any "Community Codec Packs" or other such things, only the CoreAVC 2.0 Codec for HD playback. Specifically, I experience stuttering, cracking and popping when playing videos or audio but only when I am trying to pan or rotate in 3ds max. This seems to apply only to higher-poly models.

Windows Media Player and Media Player Classic - Homecinema seem immune to the effect, but iTunes and VLC suffer. Of course, my problem is that the latter two are my default applications.

I've tried restricting executables to separate cores and changing process priority. Restricting applications to their own cores seems to work best but the problem is only minimized, not eliminated. The only way to completely eliminate any media playback issues is to use WMP for audio and MPC:HC for video.

There are no new Windows 7 x64 drivers for the Creative XtremeMusic card I have. Installing the latest video drivers for my 9800GX2 changed nothing.
 
Try switching renders in MPC-HC to something like Overlay or system default and see if it then exhibits the behavior.
 
Snowknight26 said:
Try switching renders in MPC-HC to something like Overlay or system default and see if it then exhibits the behavior.
Click to expand...

You must have missed the part where I said MPC-HC is not exhibiting this behavior. It's the fallback because VLC has an issue.
 
You must have missed the part where I suggested switching settings in MPC-HC to make it exhibit the behavior. Can't rule out renderers being the issue otherwise.
 
And iTunes has a renderer...where? The problem isn't just movies.

It's DirectShow, so I changed those options. I cycled through EVERY available render option. Smooth as butter. I did all the rotating/panning that screw up VLC and iTunes. MPC-HC never flinched.
 
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I think we need more information here.

Does this happen only with AVC/H.264 content? How is VLC configured for output? How is MPC-HC configured for output?
 
Could be a misconfigured MMCSS, though I don't know if both VLC and iTunes use it.

Lack of hardware interrupts when using 3dsmax?
Does it happen when using other 3D programs (either DirectX or OpenGL)?
What kind of CPU usage are you getting when you pan?
What happens if you play a video that doesn't have an audio track?
If it's only audio that's affected, tried using ASIO or WASAPI output?
Does DPC Latency Checker show a spike in latency when the issue occurs?

Maybe Process Explorer can shed some more light on the cause.
 
The only other app I use is Rhino 3D (OpenGL--max is D3D). CPU usage is anywhere from 5%-25% (Task Manager) when panning or rotating. The renderer is multithreaded but the app's GUI is not. Video with no audio does the same thing (it drags video playback through the mud audio or not).

DPC Latency Checker is red (4000-16000us) whenever panning or rotating is done in 3ds max. Absolute worst measured was 43423us. It says something's behaving badly (duh)...

Every time I start typing, too, the latency goes through the roof temporarily.

I've tried disabling various network adapters (Hamachi, VMWare) and other unnecessary stuff, but the latency problem remains.

What should I look for in Process Explorer?
I have very low CPU usage (less than 1%) for DPCs and Interrupts unless I do the panning/rotating in 3ds max, then it goes up to 3-5% and stays there until I stop.
 
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Update

I killed my usual background processes (Trillian, gadgets, DisplayFusion, Skype), loaded 3ds max and panned. DPC Latency through the roof!
3dsmaxfail.png


Then I tried just scrolling up and down this posting window in Firefox. The red spike is the scroll.
firefoxfailq.png


Here's sitting idle (everything closed as before).
idle.png
 
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