How to playback AVCHD HD footages on HDTV using Media Player Classic Homecinema

Media Player Classic Home Cinema is an extremely light-weight free program for Windows. It looks just like Windows Media Player v6.4, but has much more additional features. You can use it as a Media Player Classic Home Theater. MPC Homecinema supports a wide range of decoding formats and file formats, following are the details:

Supported Decoding:
MPEG-1, MPEG-2 and MPEG-4 playback. Media Player Classic is capable of VCD, SVCD and DVD playback, without the need to install any additional software or codecs.

Q:	How do I play M2TS files that have been ripped from a Bluray disc?
A:	You must set the preferred source filter (a.k.a. splitter) for M2TS files to Gabest. You can configure your preferred source filters with the Codec Tweak Tool. Be aware that the content protection of the Blu-ray disc must be removed before you can play the files. You can do that with a tool such as Pavtube Blu Ray to MPC Home cinema Converter.

It has built-in codecs for MPEG-2 video and codecs for LPCM, MP2, AC3 and DTS audio, and also contains an improved MPEG splitter that supports playback of VCDs and SVCDs using its VCD/SVCD/XCD Reader. A *.mp4 and MPEG-4 Timed Text support added. An AAC decoding filter makes MPC suitable for AAC playback in MP4.

MPC Home Cinema also has H.264 and VC-1 with DXVA support, DivX, Xvid, and Flash Video formats is available in MPC HC. MPC can also use the QuickTime and the RealPlayer architectures. Media Player Classic supports native playback of OGM and Matroska container formats.

Download Microsoft DirectX

http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyId=2DA43D38-DB71-4C1B-BC6A-9B6652CD92A3&displaylang=en

1. Windows Vista or 7 (with the latest service pack you can get):- With Catalyst 10.4, ATI has followed Intel’s footsteps and only made fully-featured functional DXVA acceleration (that includes playback of videos that do not conform to Blu-ray standards) available under these two operating systems. If you use Windows XP, even if you have an ATI GPU with UVD2.x ASIC decoding silicon, you won’t get the new benefits offered by Catalyst 10.4. DXVA-assisted playback is still possible under Windows XP, but only for Blu-ray-compliant videos. For Intel GPU users, Windows Vista or 7 is mandatory.If Windows XP is really a must for you (you have an im ortant applications that runs only on XP etc.), consider switching to an nVidia GPU and use the CoreAVC 2 CUDA method for reliable playback of all non-test user-generated H.264 videos out there.My recommendation: Windows 7 Home Premium  minimum so that you can have the option to use Microsoft DTV-DVD Video Decoder available in Windows Media Player 12. Therefore Windows 7 N should not be used.
2. A qualifying video card that supports DXVA:- A list of them are available at the bottom of this tutorial. For ATI AGP GPU users, the improvements available in Catalyst 10.4, even if you use Windows Vista or 7 (playback of Blu-ray-compliant videos should still be available though). Therefore consider getting a PCI-E GPU or any supporting ATI IGP chipsets. Please note that ATI GPU with UVD1.x (UVD, UVD+) only see limited, but still remarkable improvements for decoding out-of-spec videos.
3. Media Player Classic – HomeCinema
   

FILES YOU NEED FOR TROUBLESHOOTING

1. DXVA Checker – Download here (you can check whether your card is DXVA-capable and you will need this for troubleshooting).
2. GPU-Z – Download here (shows detailed information about your GPU).
3. DirectX End-user runtime (February 2010) – Download here. Install this if you have d3dx9.dll error message when using MPC-HC.
4. Microsoft .NET 4 Framework – Download here. Needed for EVR/EVR custom presenter and also to run DXVA Checker.
5. Update for Windows Vista (KB971512) – Download here. Backport of some of Windows 7 features such as DirectX 11 for Windows Vista.

STEP 1

Download and install the MPC-HC from the link above. Unzip it where you wanted. If you have an existing MPC-HC installation (if you have CCCP or K-Lite Mega Pack), overwrite it with this copy. After that, start the program.

Download the latest version of Haali Media Splitter from the link provided above. During the setup process, when you arrived at the stage depicted below, unselect the option ‘Associate .mkv and .mka files with Windows Media Player’ before proceeding with the setup process.

If you somewhat skipped the process above, go to Start Menu —> All Programs —> Haali Media Splitter —> Media Splitter Settings (Windows 7 default start path, YMMV), and set the option ‘Use custom media type for H.264′ to ‘No’, as shown below.

STEP 2

Press O (or go to View —> Options) to open the Options window, that should look like below.

STEP 3

Go to Playback section, and make sure that Autoload Subtitles is checked. This will automatically disable DirectVobSub (auto-loading version), so no need to kill it in step 6. If you do not need subtitles, also enable this option so that DirectVobSub/vsfilter is blocked.

STEP 4

Go to Output section, and depending on your operating system, select the appropriate output you have to use. For Windows XP users, you can choose VMR7/9 renderless (if you need subtitles) plus overlay mixer and VM7/9 windowed (if you do not need subtitles – such as playing anime in AVI format that has hard subtitles, for example Dattebayo releases) while for Windows Vista/7 users, choose EVR custom presenter regardless of your subtitles needs. Keep EVR buffers as low as possible (3). If you choose renderers that did not support subtitles, DirectVobSub (auto-loading version) must be blocked in Step 6.

As I now use Windows 7, further steps will show that I am using EVR Custom Presenter.

STEP 5

Go to Internal Filters section and under Source Filters, make sure Matroska, MP4/MOV and Ogg is unticked. Then go to Transform Filter, and ensure that ‘H264/AVC (DXVA)’ and ‘H264/AVC (FFmpeg)’ are selected.

Then double click the selected ‘H264/AVC (DXVA)’ entry to open up its property page, as shown below.

So here is what you have to do depending on what GPU + driver + operating system combination you have:-

• nVidia users + whatever OS used = don’t do anything here, click OK and go to the next step.
• Other GPUs (PowerVR’s Intel GMA500 or S3 Chrome) = don’t do anything here, click OK and go to the next step.
• ATI GPUs (PCI-E or IGP ) with Catalyst 10.4 + Windows Vista or 7 = Set the option ‘DXVA(H264) Compatibility Check’ to ‘Skip all checks’, enable ‘Disable DXVA for SD’ option, click OK and go to the next step. Leave other settings as shown above.
• ATI GPUs (PCI-E, AGP or IGP) with Catalyst 10.3 or older + Windows XP/Vista/7 = don’t do anything here, click OK and go to the next step.
• ATI GPUs (AGP) with Catalyst 10.4 or older + Windows XP/Vista/7 = don’t do anything here, click OK and go to the next step.
• ATI GPUs (PCI-E, AGP or IGP) with Calayst 10.4 or older + Windows XP = don’t do anything here, click OK and go to the next step.
• Intel G45/Clarkdale/Arrandale + Windows Vista/7 = Set the option ‘DXVA(H264) Compatibility check’ to ‘Skip all checks’, click OK and go to the next step.
• Intel G45/Clarkdale/Arrandale + Windows XP = UPGRADE TO WINDOWS VISTA OR 7.

We are now going to Step 6, which is the most important step in this tutorial. This step is very important at ensuring that hardware acceleration will work at all.

STEP 6

Here, we go to the External Filters section, because we have to eliminate intermediaries between the MPC internal decoder and the renderer.

Now ask yourself whether you have installed programs like ffdshow in your computer. If you have installed codec packs such as K-Lite Codec Pack or CCCP, then you may have ffdshow Video Decoder. In that case, click Add Filter.

Select ‘ffdshow Video Decoder’ and click OK, then you will see the window populated with ‘ffdshow Video Decoder’ entry selected before.

Here, click Block to prevent ffdshow Video Decoder from being loaded by MPC-HC.

Repeat it with entries that you think will prevent the MPC-HC internal decoder from being connected straight to the renderer (either VMR9 renderless or EVR custom presenter). ffdshow video decoder and DirectVobSub (auto-loading version) are the main culprits that will do so. There could be others that I do not know. If you have done Step 3, DirectVobSub is killed automatically and you do not have to do so here, but if you choose to use video renderers that did not support subtitles like Overlay Mixer or VMR7 windowed, you have to block it here too. If you have other H.264 decoders installed in your computer, such as the ffdshow DXVA Video Decoder, CoreAVC Video Decoder, Cyberlink H.264/AVC decoder, DivX H.264 Decoder and Arcsoft Video Decoder, you should also block them here so that MPC-HC will not load them.

STEP 7

Go to Subtitles section, and set ‘Allow animation when buffering’ is ticked (for those who has low-powered CPU like Intel Atom, untick this option). As long as that option is enabled, the option ‘Sub pictures to buffer’ is not exactly important (set it to 10 if you have 512MB RAM – lower if you have less), but if this option is set to zero, subtitle animation will always be enabled (therefore to disable subtitle animation, the buffer must not be zero and ‘Allow animation when buffering’ is disabled). This will allow those anime OP/ED/insert themes that has soft karaoke effects to be displayed correctly. The appropriate renderer must also be selected in Step 4 above. With the latest MPC-HC, frame drops can be reduced to almost zero even if karaoke effects are turned on.

For ‘Maximum Texture Resolution’ option, set it to ‘Desktop’ with ‘Round up to power of two’ unchecked. This should give you very sharp-looking subtitles but remember, the higher the resolution is, the higher the CPU resources will be used. You can lower this setting to reduce CPU utilization.

Then go to the Subtitles/Default Style section, and full tick the option ‘Position subtitles relative to the video frame’ just like the screenshot below. This will ensure that subtitles will be rendered within the video picture, allowing more accuracy for positional subtitles such as signboards etc.

This step did not apply if you do not watch videos that do not have soft subtitles.

And that’s about all you should do in the Options window.  Click Apply to apply all changes you have made, and then click OK to close the Options window.

STEP 8

Right-click within MPC-HC video area, go to Renderer Settings —> GPU Control and make sure that all three options within it (Flush GPU before VSync, Flush GPU after Present and Wait for flushes), just like the screenshot below.

If you use Windows XP or use Windows Vista/7 with Aero disabled, right-click within MPC-HC video area, go to Renderer Settings —> VSync and tick any of the options there to prevent tearing. Alternative VSync is recommended for ATI GPU users, the Accurate VSync is for everyone while VSync is similar to the ‘Lock Back-buffer option in the previous stable MPC-HC build (build 908).

I use Windows 7 with Aero enabled, thus those three Vsync settings above doesn’t apply to me.

If you use Windows Vista/7 with Aero enabled, go to Renderer Settings —>Presentation and ensure that the option Disable Desktop Composition is not ticked. If it somehow was ticked, untick it. If you are masochist enough to enable it, you have to select one of the VSync methods above or else you will get tearing. This option is useless in Windows XP (and you have to select a VSync method above).

Enable Frame Time Correction option should always be checked, regardless of what some people may think.

10-bit RGB option is optional (your GPU will actually have to support this feature). Disable if you want to take screenshots of the video being played. D3D Fullscreen Mode been made obsolete by the three VSync options above (and by Aero in Windows Vista/7), but if you use Windows XP and the VSync options and GPU Flushes cannot stop tearing when playing videos, this method is still the most foolproof way to stop tearing. If you have to resort to this, the option D3D Fullscreen GUI Support allows you to use context menu to operate MPC-HC without having to exit the application.

Again, right click within MPC-HC video area, go to Renderer Settings —> Output Range and select between 0 – 255 or 16 – 235, depending on what B&W level your display device is calibrated to. Read your display device manual for more information. Usually, computer monitors (LCD or CRT) are calibrated to 0-255 level, and TV is usually set to 16-235. But many high definition TVs nowadays are calibrated to 0-255, and some of them can have both, depending on what HDMI socket being used! Read the display’s manual for more information.

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