Seems like a long winded approach to just use the avivo. I have HW avivo MKV playback on 3 different pcs for use in media player or media centre. To do this use graphedit to link the powerdvd h.264 decoder into your mkv graph and voila media centre/media player will now HW decode in your ati card gpu using avivo (as long as you enable it in powerdvd options first!), no need to use powerdvd itself, just have it installed!
Originally posted by Apex07: That is part of the problem, the video is too high def for my CPU, not for my PC overall. I have the ATI 2600XT which is one of the best HD cards available. The problem is that when I play the video through VLC or windows media player it uses solely my CPU for the HD decoding, making it play very poorly.
PowerDVD is unique in that it is the only h.264 HD decoder that is compatible with AVIVO(the platform that allows HD decoding to be done through my video card rather than through my CPU). So the file MUST be in .264 format. I have tried it in .avi and all the HD decoding was still being done through the CPU. If .mkv files were playable in PowerDVD I would have no problem whatsoever.
Basically what I need to do is get this .mkv file in the same format as a blu-rayDVD. So that when I play it with PowerDVD it will be recognized as blu-ray format and thus the HD processing will be done through my video card instead of my crappy Pentium4 CPU.
I hope that all made sense, if you require any additional details, let me know. Thanks.
Hey there Apex. Not sure if you're still reading this thread, but I did want to mention that even if Power DVD were able to play this file for you, you still wouldn't benefit from the card's decoding abilities. Those abilities are simply to "Decode" from the hardware which will as you mentioned, speed up the decoding process, but not the overall playability of the file. You need at least a P4 processor with a minimum speed of 3.14 Ghz just to get the file to play decently. This is due to the demands that a High Def file has on your overall system. A video card simply won't do all of this for you.
I say this with much experience in this particular matter, having played a high def AVI file in Power DVD only to be completely disappointed at my much wasted time when the playback was dismally pixelated.
When played on a new computer with a video card that has decode capabilities along with a Core 2 Duo, 3.16 Ghz processor. Even with this, a 1080p file will play funny unless I take all background apps offline.
Sorry. I really do think you'll need that new processor unfortunately.
Originally posted by Apex07: Yes I'm aware that VLC can play them, as can WMP11. The problem I'm having is that I need them to be playable in PowerDVD, which is the only player I can think of that supports the ATI AVIVO hardware decoding. Thanks anyways for the suggestion.
I believe that WinDVD also supports ATI Avivo. BY THE WAY Power DVD also supports NVidia PureVideo and PureVideoHD, so does WinDVD.
Originally posted by Apex07: Yes I'm aware that VLC can play them, as can WMP11. The problem I'm having is that I need them to be playable in PowerDVD, which is the only player I can think of that supports the ATI AVIVO hardware decoding. Thanks anyways for the suggestion.
I believe that WinDVD also supports ATI Avivo. BY THE WAY Power DVD also supports NVidia PureVideo and PureVideoHD, so does WinDVD.
To add one thing, use ConvertXtoDVD 3.2.1.55, set Enconding Target size to 7500MB or 8000MB, convert the MKV to DVD-format, burn To dual layer DVD (either directly with ConvertXtoDVD, or Nero, or Ashampoo Burning Studio). Ashampoo has the best burning results on cheaper burners, but you can't set DVD title. Nero can but you'll have to burn it at the lowest speed available. This way you'll get a DVD playable on any software DVD player, even on older PCs. Most standalone DVD players will play DVD made this way.
PS. If you have an ordinary TFT monitor, HD is useless. But if you will use HD-ready or Full-HD TV, then HD video has a purpose.
Damn, Prism is actually proving to be very useful and fast as hell. Just converted an mkv to avi during the time it took me to make 1 short and abusive phone call. Which was less than 10 mins. I have to say that I am very impressed
