PocketMPV problems

[mike6432]

I have some movie files on my 1 gig Sandisk CF card and I'm trying to play them on my iPAQ 3955. When I laod the file...I can hear sound...but no video...and when i click on the screen...it freezes up and i have to soft reset the unit. I can see the little keyboard icon in the bottom right corner...I can turn tha ton and off but that will soon freeze up, and where all the movie controls are supposed to be...are not there..unless i click blindly...then SOME icons will appear. but the movie is still frozen right after...still no video. I download both versions... 8.blah bah.1603 and the other one...8.04303 or whatever they are..both same problem. 04303 seems to progress a bit further but i still can't see anyhting. I figure maybe the CF is too slow...nope...it does same thing for a simple MP3 file on my SD Sandisk card. Someone please help me. :bangin:

[Buddha]

1) Did you try uninstalling the program entirely (including removing the registry keys and such) ?

2) What happens when you play a movie from the device itself? (when you play a movie stored into the RAM of your pocketpc)

3) What kind of movie are you trying to play? MPEG or DivX?

4) Did you make it yourself?

5) Is the movie specially made for playing on a PPC? (does the resolution not exceed 320x240? and what bitrate does it have?)

6)As for the MP3's what happens when you store those in RAM and try playing them from there? Also try playing them from the CF with another player, for example: WinamPAQ or PocketMusic or GSplay2 and see what happens then.

7) Did you try with different movie files or just one?

[mike6432]

It's an episode of a TV show I got off Kazaa. It's about 40 MB's. It is a DivX file. I can't copy it to the RAM, not enough space. I don't want to delete practically everyhting on the PPC, isn't that still too big anyways? I doubt it's meant for PPC, would compresing it work?

[Steven Cedrone]

Can you watch it on your PC?

Steve

[mike6432]

Yes I can...the movies are 320X231. I just downloaded Virtual Dub and i'm trying to mess with that. I also just tried playing the movie file in Real player for PPC and it said it cannot be played.

[mike6432]

Is virtual dub needed? I clicked compress...but nothing happened.

[Buddha]

Well you could try to download another file and see if you have the same problem with it.

The resolution seems fine and at 40meg for a tv show (which i suppose is about 40mins long) the bitrate is probably low enough aswell. But still, it could be the specific way this file was encoded that is giving you troubles. There several variants of codecs used for encoding divx

to name some of the most widely used:

Divx 3.11
DivX 3.11 SBC
DivX 4.12
DivX 5
Xvid

Files encoded with DivX 3.11 using Smart bitrate control (SBC), for example, can give problems when played on a ppc while they work fine on a PC.


I doubt it's meant for PPC, would compresing it work?

Re-compressing it with Divx 5 COULD work but...


If you really want to watch stuff on your ppc my advise would be to try to make your own small test-file encoded with DivX 5 ( 5mb or so, whatever you can fit in your PPC's RAM ) and then try playing it from there. Then try copying it to the CF card and playing it from there and see if you can get it to work.


Is virtual dub needed? I clicked compress...but nothing happened.

Virtualdub is only needed for editing/making DivX'es and other types of movie formats. Using Virtualdub is a little more 'complex' than just pressing 'Compress' :wink:


Learning howto convert movies for ppc viewing can be tricky at first but once you get the hang of it it can be so rewarding :)

There is also a new program that just came out which is supposed to make convertion to DivX 5 really easy, its called DrDivX, I haven't tried it out yet (since virtualdub offers me all i need
) but you might want to check it out, they offer a 15 day try-out of the program and it's supposed to make converting really SIMPLE.

*UPDATE*
Since I haven't had time to try Dr DivX out I checked some more information about it, what i found is that it comes with DivX 5.0.5 PRO which I'm not sure PocketMVP supports yet (if i remember correctly pocketMVP supports up till 5.0.3) So I guess using this is not yet an option, but I will test this and post what i find.
*/UPDATE*

[Buddha]

Here are some links about making movies for ppc and using virtualdub etc, that you might want to give a read


This guide (http://www.pocketmatrix.com/guides/dvd2divx/)
This Thread (http://www.pocketpcthoughts.com/forums/viewtopic.php?t=9170)
This thread (http://www.pocketpcthoughts.com/forums/viewtopic.php?t=11986)
This site (http://www.doom9.org)

[hollis_f]

Since I haven't had time to try Dr DivX out I checked some more information about it, what i found is that it comes with DivX 5.0.5 PRO which I'm not sure PocketMVP supports yet (if i remember correctly pocketMVP supports up till 5.0.3) So I guess using this is not yet an option, but I will test this and post what i find.
*/UPDATE*I just couldn't get DrDivX to work. But it was handy having the DivXPro codec included. PocketMVP plays a 200MB file encoded with DivXPro perfectly (although I didn't use any of the 'pro' features).

[Ekkie Tepsupornchai]

I'm curious if anyone who uses the DivXPro codec (and takes advantage of the "pro" features) see a big difference in quality compared to the standard DivX codec.

[Buddha]

Well I have given DrDivX a spin and although i could see this becoming a 'newbie' 'one-or-two-click' conversion tool for easy conversion one day, for now it isn't an 'easy' option (yet), the first thing beeing that there is no decent encoding profile for usage with PocketPC and as a result beeing that you end up having to set as many things as when you're doing it in vdub :|

(And i have to add to that, that when using the 'advanced settings' in DrDivx, Using VirtualDub was more intuitive and flexible than DrDivx since DrDivx wants to set certain things for you so it happens that when you adjust one setting it changes the other one... but this last remark is purely something that annoyed me personally)

[Ekkie Tepsupornchai]

Thanks for the feedback Buddha,

I was waiting for someone who was a regular VDub user to provide feedback. I've recently gone away from Gordian Knot for creating my *.avs files to AviSynth and while AviSynth requires a bit of a learning curve itself (in addition to all the other apps we use), the power and flexibility was amazing. I had to perform some IVTC on some FILM material that wasn't consistent in its 3:2 patterns. AviSynth in combo with some great plug-ins took care of it with minimal overhead. In another instance, I was stitching together slices of the same video together but applying different filters to each (to maximize viewability on my contrast-deficient iPaq) and the results were seamless.

I guess what worries me most about these one/two-button push solutions is the loss of control that I need to do the things I want to do, though admittedly, these types of solutions are needed if the general public is to start taking advantage of DivX.

Ekkie

[KayMan2k]

I use VirtualDub often.. I find Vidomi to be an excellent tool for MPEG2 video - but it doesn't yet support filters - my only complaint.