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DXR3/H+ video/audio output plugins manual by David Holm
=======================================================
1. Introduction
The DXR3 and Hollywood+ are two not too different mpeg-(1/2) and ac3
hardware playback cards that came at about the same time as the first
dvd-rom drives hit the market. At that time most computers weren't
powerful enough for synced software dvd playback. And even the faster
(intel-based) computers had troubles with artifacts.
Sigma Designs came up with the great idea to create a hardware
mpeg-(1/2), ac3 decoder. Sigma Designs are known for their realmagic
hardware (or they bought the company who came up with the first
realmagic boards, I don't know which).
Later Creative Labs thought, hey, we also wan't this product, and to
distribute it with our dvd-drives (the DVD Encore packages if I recall
correctly). So they bought the designs for the Hollywood plus and
replaced the circuit used to produce a proper video feed for tv's
called adv7170 or adv7175a depending on which h+ board you own with
a bt865. The reason for this is beyond my understanding as this seems
complete illogical to me, but I have had great experiences with
bt(brooktree) circuits in the past, so I don't mind.
Well, nowadays most people have no use for a mpeg-(1/2) or ac3
hardware decoder since most computers these days have no problem doing
this in software and have cycles left for posprocessing (removing of
artefacts and other garbage produced by compression).
These days, you have two uses for this card:
1. You have a slow computer which you use for vcd/dvd playback
2. You discover what I have done with the implementation of this as
an audio/video output device for mplayer (read on and you'll find
out).
2. Requirements
* First of all you will need the DXR3/H+ drivers properly installed,
including the dev-api.
These can be downloaded from dxr3.sourceforge.net (I suggest using
the CVS version since most of the time I use the latest features
which are only available through cvs)
* <mplayerdir>/libavcodec from ffmpeg (only required if you intend to
play formats other than mpeg-(1/2), highly recommended!) there are
two ways of doing this:
1. Download and install ffmpeg from ffmpeg.sourceforge.net.
Configure it with --enable-shared
2. Download ffmpeg from ffmpeg.sourceforge.net, copy the entire
contents from <ffmpegdir>/libavcodec into <mplayer>/libavcodec
(symlinking won't work!). Then edit <mplayerdir>/libavcodec/utils.c
and move the line containing register_avcodec(&mpeg1video_encoder);
out of the CONFIG_ENCODERS #ifdef block and place it outside, for
instance below register_avcodec(&rawvideo_encoder);
* Run <mplayerdir>/configure and make sure that DXR3/H+ support =yes
and optionally that libavcodec or ffmpeg.so = yes
From here on compilation (of at least my code ;) should go without
problems.
3. Usage
After installation you will have two new outdevices in mplayer:
-vo dxr3 For video output
-ao dxr3 For audio output (due to an unresolved bug
this is not recommended/useful!)
MPEG-1, MPEG-2, VCD and DVD Notes
There are some notes to take into account here for optimum playback.
When playing any mpeg-(1/2) file, this including usage of the "-dvd"
and "-vcd" options you must either add the "-vc mpegpes" or edit
codecs.conf and make sure videocodec mpegpes is listed above mpeg12.
If you fail to do this you will only get software playback which kinda
spoils most of the useful features of this card except for tv-out ;).
Remember that if you edit the codecs.conf file and move the mpegpes
section will have to specify "-vc mpeg12" if you want to playback
any of these video types _without_ "-vo dxr3"!
DIVX Notes
When playing divx's add "-vc odivx", if you get any other divx codec
to run faster tell me which one because I'll be interested in how it
could possibly be any faster than OpenDivX4Linux...
Unsupported Codecs:
If you ever get a codec unsupported message, lookup the codec in the
codecs.conf file (search for "videocodec <codecname>"), copy the entire
codec section and send it to me and I'll make sure it works with the
next patch (or the next after that if I have a thousand things to take
care of first ;) my e-mail is at the bottom of this page.
4. Todo
* Scale video played using windows codecs (High)
* Make the osd use the subpic feature of the dxr3 (almost done)(High)
* Driver options (probably not until libvo2) (Medium)
5. Contacting me
You can contact me either by e-mailing me, <dholm@iname.com> or by using
icq: 798427
Feedback, bugreports and general suggestions are appreciated (preferably
by e-mail). My name is David Holm for those of you who are incapable of
reading a heading. ;)
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