VLC and hardware acceleration

[freakdiablo]

Is there any way I can check to see if VLC is using hardware acceleration or set it up so it does? Or is it file type dependent? Its just that when watching higher res movies windows task manager says VLC is using a high percentage of cpu usage, and sometimes the video becomes jittery or jumpy, and is running at around 15fps (I doubt a 8800GT would have problems with a 1080p movie, it can run crysis at that after all) Thanks

 

[DaBigJ]

When I saw this post, I remembered that I had a 1080p video clip that ran choppy with VLC. It has a .mov extension, so I played it with Quicktime. It runs perfect. I don't know what's wrong with VLC, but I'd like to figure it out too.

 

[silkshadow]

Running Crysis and playing back 1080p are two different things. However, if a machine can crank crysis, it can playback 1080p without breaking a sweat. Your problem is VLC. Its the worst for playing back HD media. Its a good noob and network vid player, however, when you get into HD it becomes a different ballgame.

Obviously, you are not playing back 1080p DRM'd discs (which would be voting for a consumer unfriendly practice with your wallet) but it should be mentioned in that exception, PowerDVD ultra should be used. Otherwise use CoreAVC and either Zoomplayer and KMplayer. Read my post at the bottom of this thread: http://www.ocforums.com/showthread.php?t=547519.

 

[MooMasster716]

Its a good noob and network vid player, however, when you get into HD it becomes a different ballgame.

Don't know what your talking about, I have a friend... who downloads 10gb Blu-ray/HD-DVD 1080p rips from torretns sites in x.264 format or .mkv. VLC plays them just as well as Nero Showtime. If you want video card acceleration then I think only Power DVD and Cyberlink can do that with official HD-DVD/ Blu-Ray media and not downloaded rips. Where are you getting you HD video anyway?.

 

[bLack0ut]

zoomplayer is the best for anything that it can read. when all else fails, THEN you use vlc.

 

[Soichiro]

Use a real video player like Media Player Classic or Zoomplayer. ANYTHING but VLC. The only thing good about VLC is being able to play avi files that are still downloading.

 

[freakdiablo]

Ok, zoomplayer seems to be the popular choice, Ill use that.

The only thing I don't get is that with my 8600gts, vlc handled 1080p fine, but when I switched to a 8800gt, problems happened.

 

[MooMasster716]

Soichiro[/left];5498869]Use a real video player like Media Player Classic or

Zoomplayer. ANYTHING but VLC. The only thing good about VLC is being able to playavi files that are still downloading.​

​

What makes them better?

Personally for everyday divx, Xvid and WMV stuff use Winamp , However; VLC plays my HD downloads from Revision 3.

EDIT: sorry for the messed up quote, For some reason the editor made everything weard
​

 

[Neuromancer]

Use a real video player like Media Player Classic or Zoomplayer. ANYTHING but VLC. The only thing good about VLC is being able to play avi files that are still downloading.

VLC is great for people that know nothing about installing codecs or dont have a ISO mounting system on their PC already etc

I personally just use CCCP with FFDSHOW 2008 and WMP11.

PLays everything I can throw at it.. it does use CPU acceleration for MKV files, but not enough to mater. I play full screen 1080i (I dont have a 1080p screen) on one monitor while playing total war on the second all on my 3850. I have no skipping or anytihng.

Only thing that is not obvious about FFDShow is when you have files with more then one audio stream, (and a benefit of VLC) you have to configure it to only play the default audio steam, VLC does this by default but until you do it in FFDSHOW config it will play both streams simultaeneously... so if you have a movie thats dubbed in russian you will hear both the english and russian tracks at the same time.

 

[silkshadow]

Only thing that is not obvious about FFDShow is when you have files with more then one audio stream, (and a benefit of VLC) you have to configure it to only play the default audio steam, VLC does this by default but until you do it in FFDSHOW config it will play both streams simultaeneously... so if you have a movie thats dubbed in russian you will hear both the english and russian tracks at the same time.

Try the ffdshow tryouts fork that I linked in that post I linked above. I believe it fixes that issue.

VLC is great for people that know nothing about installing codecs or dont have a ISO mounting system on their PC already etc

I couldn't agree more

 

[bLack0ut]

[/LEFT]
What makes them better?

Personally for everyday divx, Xvid and WMV stuff use Winamp , However; VLC plays my HD downloads from Revision 3.

EDIT: sorry for the messed up quote, For some reason the editor made everything weard
​

I hate winamp's GUI for movie playing. Zoomplayer is easily configurable with tons of options, and it looks slick to boot. Plus, I installed it from the CCCP, which means it plays pretty much everything (except the files made specifically so only vlc can play it )

 

[esveezy]

"VLC is great for people that know nothing about installing codecs"

"Its a good noob and network vid player, however, when you get into HD it becomes a different ballgame."

"when all else fails, THEN you use vlc"

"Use a real video player like Media Player Classic or Zoomplayer. ANYTHING but VLC. The only thing good about VLC is being able to play avi files that are still downloading"

Maybe I just have different expectations, but I don't understand all the VLC hate. For me, VLC is like Colt .45 - it works every time. I like that it takes zero thought to get perfect results.

Zoomplayer looks good, but it isn't really free, and I don't see how it would improve the experience of watching videos. My screen is only 1680x1050, so maybe that's the reason.

I just don't see the downside of VLC. Certainly nothing that outweighs the compatibility advantage. I guess I'd like something to help clean up crappy source video, but for normal playback of the terabytes of videos I have, I don't see much room for improvement.

And who makes files specifically so only VLC can play them?

 

[freakdiablo]

Maybe I just have different expectations, but I don't understand all the VLC hate. For me, VLC is like Colt .45 - it works every time. I like that it takes zero thought to get perfect results.

Meh, matter of opinion. I basically got hooked on VLC when I realised I can install it on a USB stick and realised I could watch my movies on any computer, and pretty much stuck with it from there.

But yeah, Ive installed all of the options with zoomplayer (plus I installed the klite codec pack a month or two ago) and everything is running fine now.

 

[esveezy]

I admit I'm a creature of habit. I got hooked early in the OSX Jaguar days when VLC was the only Mac Xvid/Divx player my poor old iMac could run decently. Then later, it got the users at work off my back about video playback - so the noob explanation kind of applies here.

As long as we can add "lazy people" to the list of ideal VLC users, I will be satisfied.

 

[Roofles]

Whenever my mother asks me "What can I use to play a file/movie at work" I tell her to get VLC. Its a fantastic player that I use for all streaming media as well as just the basic stuff. For not bothering with codecs and the like, its always my first recommendation.

For HD though, I set up Zoomplayer with FFDshow and some other accessories and it works really well for upscaling and the like.