H.264 playback issues

#1
Hello there,
I am looking for help with regards to HD channels playback. This issue has been driving me crazy for the past year and could never find a solution.
First of all my setup: I run ProgDVB on a win10 machine, Intel i5 2500 @3.3ghz, 8g ram, 2g amd radeon graphics r9 270x , technisat skystar USB hd. Any other info needed, please ask.
The issue I experience is that while I can watch clear channels in most cases, be it SD, HD, even 4k, I experience for some specific channels horrible playback that makes the vision of the channel impossible. Trying to describe it isn't easy, but I basically see the top part of the screen more or less OK , somehow pixelated, while the center and bottom are nearly completely green. Playback is also scattered, sound intermittent. It only happens with H.264 channels, independently from the audio encoding. I have this on different channels on different satellites, be it FTA or not. I tried buying a larger dish, I still have the issue on transponders where I have 100% l/q. I tried faster USB ports, no change. I tried any codec I could find, GPU video decoding is on, no results. Example channel FTA on 13e so anybody can test: RTL 102.5 HD 11642H 27500 3/4.
At this point, I am short of things to try, any advice is greatly appreciated.
Thanks!

Re: H.264 playback issues

#4
Hi Prog, thanks for your reply!
I have unfortunately tried around 10 different codecs with no result. On top of my mind I have tried FFDShow, Main Concept, PowerDVD, Microsoft, LAV and others (I am at work now so I cannot check the full list).
Forgot to say that I tried also on different players and the issue persists so it is not related to ProgDVB directly.
I will check later on FIle->Packet lost what am I looking for? Can I post here what I find?

Thanks!

Re: H.264 playback issues

#6
Hi Prog, I tried changing demux and renderer but no improvement to my playback. Prog and Elecard Demux work better than the others but channels are still unwatchable.
If I look at traffic info I can see that I have 15% to 30% packet lost. It could be 30% then I reload the channel and it goes down to 15, then if I load it again it changes once more bit the range is 15 to 30%.
As I said before I have this problem also on transponders where I have 100% signal quality as 13e is pretty central to me so I doubt it has to do with the dish alignment which I keep under control nearly every day. What else could cause packet loss?
Thanks!

PS I left the same channel running for an hour, not sure if this can help, what I experience is high packet loss around 30% at the start and a continuous but very slow improvement. After an hour packet loss is only 11% of total now and still dropping and the green has changed into a pinky color now :) . I am going to leave it on.

Re: H.264 playback issues

#8
Do you think it can be bad signal when I have 100 l 100q? :?

I am starting to think it is a hardware issue - excluding the processor as I think i5 is more than enough, I am thinking of issues with either the motherboard or the Technisat SkyStar USB HD itself. I pretty much tried changing every other component in the PC.
Last edited by superpapelone on Fri Oct 19, 2018 9:46 am, edited 1 time in total.

Re: H.264 playback issues

#11
ah ok, didn't know that. So a driver can lie about sat signals? I'll do my best to point the dish even better.

Prog, can you please tell me how can I then measure real signal quality? Which software can I use?

I am starting to think it is a hardware issue - excluding the processor as I think i5 is more than enough, I am thinking of issues with either the motherboard or the Technisat SkyStar USB HD itself. I pretty much tried changing every other component in the PC.

Re: H.264 playback issues

#12
I am not mean "lie". But what is quality? One losted packet per second is it 100%? 10 packets losted?

Aslo tuner can good receive traffic but some problem on USB/driver side. Try other USB or other dirver.

ps: Also check ProgDVB x32 at first.

Re: H.264 playback issues

#13
Hi Prof, tried everyrbing you suggested. I notice that with BDA driver I get everyrbing working apart from those channels, with WDM drivers quality of signal drops a lot to the point it becomes impossible to watch any channel. I am using 100cm dish from southern Ireland so I am sure I have more than enough to watch these channels... I have 2 questions:
Is there a software that will tell me real signal quality?
Within the h.264 channels, are there different standards used that could cause some channels to playback fine while others not to work? Ie different bitrates etc
Thanks