No DVD Video

R

Rogers

I am resurrecting a Gateway 500 MHz machine with 512MB RAM, running XP
SP3. It does pretty well, except it will not play video from video
DVDs in the player. DVD sound (dialogue) is fine, just no video at
all. Audio CDs play just fine. I have tried three different drives
with same bad result. Device Manager shows no video problem
(no yellow flags). DriverAgent.com scans show no video driver
problem. Graphics for the few games I have loaded work fine.

What is a possible cause of no DVD video?

Thanks

Roy
 
G

GMAN

I am resurrecting a Gateway 500 MHz machine with 512MB RAM, running XP
SP3. It does pretty well, except it will not play video from video
DVDs in the player. DVD sound (dialogue) is fine, just no video at
all. Audio CDs play just fine. I have tried three different drives
with same bad result. Device Manager shows no video problem
(no yellow flags). DriverAgent.com scans show no video driver
problem. Graphics for the few games I have loaded work fine.

What is a possible cause of no DVD video?

Thanks

Roy
What DVD player software are you trying to use? There has to be some type of
MPEG2 decoder software installed. Try looking for a demo version of PowerDVD
or similar and see if that works/
 
R

Rogers

What DVD player software are you trying to use? There has to be some type of
MPEG2 decoder software installed. Try looking for a demo version of PowerDVD
or similar and see if that works/


VLC, BlazeDVD, and Media Player Classic. All work on another
machine. They play on this machine too except only audio, no video.
I have never had this problem before. I will try to download a MPEG 2
decoder to see if that helps.

Thanks

Roy
 
P

Peter Foldes

I am resurrecting a Gateway 500 MHz machine with 512MB RAM, running XP
SP3. It does pretty well, except it will not play video from video
DVDs in the player. DVD sound (dialogue) is fine, just no video at
all. Audio CDs play just fine. I have tried three different drives
with same bad result. Device Manager shows no video problem
(no yellow flags). DriverAgent.com scans show no video driver
problem. Graphics for the few games I have loaded work fine.

What is a possible cause of no DVD video?



****Gateway 500 MHz machine with 512MB RAM****

And you are wondering why it does not play DVD's ?? Unbelievable

Geez man upgrade your computer. Hint: DVD's to play videos and or movies needs at a
minimum 1Ghz machine and 1G of memory

JS
 
P

Paul

VLC, BlazeDVD, and Media Player Classic. All work on another
machine. They play on this machine too except only audio, no video.
I have never had this problem before. I will try to download a MPEG 2
decoder to see if that helps.

Thanks

Roy

What are you using for a video card ?

Maybe the hardware doesn't support Overlay Plane ?

If you've installed DirectX 9 package, then perhaps that
would add VMR7 and VMR9 ? Then, go to the preferences of
your DVD player, and see if Overlay Plane, VMR7, and VMR9
are options, trying them one at a time.

*******

Sometimes the player (CODEC) will use IDCT on the video card,
for acceleration, but support for that goes back a long
way on video cards. Perhaps if the video is pre-1999 or so,
it might not be there. I can't find an article to tell you
when it was introduced. It helps decode the "blocks" in
MPEG2 (frequency domain). While software could detect this
hardware logic block is missing in a GPU and run emulation software,
you'd probably see video at one frame per second and a lot
of skips.

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/6/63/Dct-table.png/220px-Dct-table.png

The software API for that now, is DXVA, and IDCT is rolled
in there somehow. But a DXVA call now, probably goes to the
dedicated video playback block in the GPU (which in some cases
on modern cards, is a complete decoder, not just the tiny IDCT
part of the problem).

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/DXVA

Paul
 
R

Rogers

What DVD player software are you trying to use? There has to be some type of
MPEG2 decoder software installed. Try looking for a demo version of PowerDVD
or similar and see if that works/


I downloaded two decoders. VLC and Stinky's. No improvement. Any
other ideas? As I said, I have never had this problem before.

Thanks

Roy
 
P

Peter Foldes

Although I concur that his machine has grown long in the tooth, your minimums for
proper DVD playback are arbitrary, and in the case of several machines I've
reconditioned, imaginary.



LOL. Then you have not tried to play heavy graphical images or movies or games. What
ever you say. Also you can recondition as many machines that you can the story will
still be the same with any one of them.

BTW: I can play a DVD with no graphics on my W2000 P1 with 64MB of memory so tell me
what does that tell you.

JS
 
R

Rob

I downloaded two decoders. VLC and Stinky's. No improvement. Any
other ideas? As I said, I have never had this problem before.

Thanks

Roy

Try Paul's suggestions, they are 100% on the money.
 
R

Rogers

Sometimes the player (CODEC) will use IDCT on the video card,
for acceleration, but support for that goes back a long
way on video cards. Perhaps if the video is pre-1999 or so,
it might not be there. I can't find an article to tell you
when it was introduced. It helps decode the "blocks" in
MPEG2 (frequency domain). While software could detect this
hardware logic block is missing in a GPU and run emulation software,
you'd probably see video at one frame per second and a lot
of skips.

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/6/63/Dct-table.png/220px-Dct-table.png

The software API for that now, is DXVA, and IDCT is rolled
in there somehow. But a DXVA call now, probably goes to the
dedicated video playback block in the GPU (which in some cases
on modern cards, is a complete decoder, not just the tiny IDCT
part of the problem).

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/DXVA

Paul


I discovered that the boot up options include running in VGA mode,
which, once set, fixed the DVD video problem.

Thanks

Roy
 

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