[rat666]

Hi,

i ´ve build a HTPC for my Home Theatre since AE is out and use it for higend Musik and Video streaming.
i can´t thank the devs enough for bringing AE to xbmc, for me its the most important feature in frodo.

The sound quality (via HDMI or SPDIF/Toslink) ist behind my Oppo 95 Player (even the WDTV Live sounds better) and i have some problems with playback of HDCD coded Tracks (see my Post in Linux AE tread for details).

i´ve read the the future will bring upsampling and DSP funktions for Audio.

i´m not shure if i´m alone with that (but i don´t think i am), i don´t need upsampling, DSP funktions, Volume Control, GUI Sound mixing, Preplay Gain or Preamp Level for Sound.
Also for Video handling (no deinterlace, upscaling, post processing).
For me is an untouched bitstream important (and hopefully for some others too), all the Upscaling, deinterlacing, upsampling, postprocessing and dsp funktions can be done with a AV Pre, AV Receiver or the TV.

But for many others these features are very important.



so the idea is to implement a source direct entry in the Music and in the Video Section where you can enable a bypass for all these features with one click.

Source direct (in Music) will only decode the Stream (eg. Flac, Mp3 etc.) and will the forward the PCM Stream untouched to the digital outputs (no gui sound mixing, no replaygain, no preamp level, no dsp, no upsampling, no volume control, no 5 Channel Stereo etc).

Source direct for Audio (in Video Section) will do the same thing, only decoding (based upon the settings eg AC3, DTS etc.) and then forward the PCM or Bitstream untouched to the digital Outs.

Source direct for Video decodes only the stream (mpeg2, mpeg4 etc, h264, etc.) and will bypass all postprocessing, deinterlacing, upscaling, etc.




i know, that the most of the Video settings (exept upscaling) can be set in the different menus, but with Source direct for Video there will be a central switch to turn it all off.

i hope i have explained my idea in a understandable way, sorry for my bad english.

Cheers

rat666

[alfredo]

rat666, you're not alone...

...but I'm afraid others started similar threads (even with patches) without success.

Take a look to this thread:
http://forum.xbmc.org/showthread.php?tid=64139

...and the corresponding Git discussion...
https://github.com/xbmc/xbmc/pull/1096

Hope this would change anything.

[rat666]

Hi Alfredo,

thanks for your rely and the links to github and the other tread.
good to see that i´m not alone.

i´ve read the discussion on git about the native resolution patch and did a quick check in the "native resolution" thread.
After that, i understand that it´s not so simple to implement the native resolution feature. The pure audio feature is imho much easier to implement.

but, if i get it right (not that easy in a foreign language), the conclusion of the discussion is that native resolution a usefull feature.
i suggest that the native resolution feature ist usefull for more people then the pure audio feature (wich is only usefull for audiophiles).
The problem seems to be the right implementation to get it stable to work in any case (e.g if the display is offline for a short time and if the resuoution auf the stream is not supported)
The patch seems to make the player crash in some cases.

i´m not a dev, but i´ve worked on some software projects as consultant in the past, so i can understand their concerns about a cean and stable codebase across all plattforms for the upcoming final frodo release.

i think the pure audio feature ist easier to implement, because AE has only to bypass things that already exists.

Some people (maybe some devs too) will think that there is no need for a pure audio mode, but imho if frodo is finaly out the door many users (wich use AE for audio not for decoding Dolby HD Movies) will be disapointed about the audio output.
Many devs (eg Gnif and DDDamian) have worked hard to build AE for XBMC and it´s almost perfect and it can be perfect with little more effort (bitidentical output).

Just my 2 cents

cheers

rat666

[jjd-uk]

i think the pure audio feature ist easier to implement, because AE has only to bypass things that already exists.

I believe the pure audio mode as you describe is already in AE as audiophile mode which is enabled via the advancedsettings.xml, see http://wiki.xbmc.org/index.php?title=AudioEngine

[rat666]

i think the pure audio feature ist easier to implement, because AE has only to bypass things that already exists.

I believe the pure audio mode as you describe is already in AE as audiophile mode which is enabled via the advancedsettings.xml, see http://wiki.xbmc.org/index.php?title=AudioEngine

thanks for your reply.

i´ve tried these settings before i opened this thread, unfortunatly it doesn´t make the stream bitidentical and the preamp level will also not be bypassed.

But these settings are very usefulll for me in another way (without the streamsilence setting i´ve lost the first second when i stop and start the playback again, because the preamp needs the time to change mode)


Cheers

rat666

[sialivi]

I'm very much in the same camp regarding wanting an option to disable the upscaling of video and let my hardware do that instead.

[rat666]

Hi,

there is a feature freeze since more than two weeks for the upcoming frodo release.
The devs concentrate on bugfixing, so let´s hope that the HDCD Bug will be fixed before frodo is out the door.

Maybe we get a source direct feature in the version 13 (g?)

[alfredo]

Hi,

Maybe we get a source direct feature in the version 13 (g?)

I think so... but IMHO mainly due to the fact that XBMC prioritizes being multiplatform more than being the best in one platform, I say this because leaving the upscaling/deinterlacing work to the other hardware adds more chances to being portable to less powered platforms.

[rat666]

that´s also my opinion.
XBMC has imho the best gui and featurelist, but when it comes to the output quality it´s ok but not more than ok.
Die the fact that XBMC operates on a full pc (in most cases) it has the ability (cpu+gpu power) to pruduce an digital output that is far better than the actual bluray players or streamers.

But actual it is far behind my oppo and even behind my wdtv live.

in my eyes the output quality should be on high priority, higher than new features or new plattforms.

i also own a raspberry pi and tested xbmc on it, it´s nice to see how good xbmc is working on the extreme limited plattform. But it´s joust an nice toy, not a media center. Due the lack of an 1080p aoutput and the lack of 3d capabilities and the limited audio output (48khz) it´s (at least for me) not useable as a media center.
But many people put a lot of effort in getting xbmc to work on raspberry pi.

The same thing with Android, maybe ebedde device are the future of xbmc, but at the moment android has a audio limitation of 48kz (ICS, maybe JB does a better job), so it´s also not usable as a media center in my eyes.
Netxt example ist the ATV2 thing, afaik (plese correct my if i´m wrong an things have changed) the output is limited to 720p, so it´s also not a real media center.

so imho the better way for xbmc is rather to but more effort into output quality than to be on every plattform (only support plattforms wich are capable to output real HD audio and video) and to have every possible feature.

just my 2 cents.

cheers

rat666

[Ned Scott]

Raspberry Pi outputs video at 1080p, and the audio hardware is able to support HD-audio codecs (just not enabled yet due to licensing issues). There is nothing "toy" about it.

Not to be rude, but saying that anything limited to 720 isn't a real media center pretty much invalidates your opinion. Most content being consumed on TV is 720. HD audio is one of the last ditch efforts to try to keep the optical media market alive, rather than being a significant increase in quality. 3D is a fad that the industry has been trying to push for decades. Everything you've said in this thread leads me to believe that you're a quality snob who looks at numbers and not real world results.

Even if there was a realistic quality difference to gain in all this, the vast majority of XBMC users either don't care or don't have the equipment for it to matter. If great audio and video was all that was needed to make a great movie, then Transformers wouldn't suck so hard.

All that being said, it's been said before that we have to clean up some code before adding such features. There have been players and media center setups that put "top quality" as a higher priority than anything else, and most of them die out. Meanwhile, we survive, and have a project that's stronger than ever. Typically speaking, the people who are critical about these kind of "top quality" issues are the ones who have the least understanding on how to manage a project like XBMC.

Everyone's entitled to their opinion, and I'm not attacking anyone for theirs, but I do feel it's only fair to defend the Team's project decisions.

[sialivi]

3D is a fad that the industry has been trying to push for decades.

3D is not a fad; it's inevitable. If the technology is mature enough and convenient enough this time around is a whole other matter, but as long as people have two eyes -- 3D is inevitable.

[Ned Scott]

$60 glasses that each person has to wear to watch TV and half the people get headaches from them, most movie producers can't even use the 3D effects in any way other than lame or distracting things like a really obvious object flying by. The brain already perceives 2D images with depth very well. There's an immersion effect when people watch good movies, and more often than not, 3D is actually disrupting that effect.

It's hard for me to go into, but it's pretty well established by most film makers that 3D is not the future. It's being pushed by the studios and parent companies. Some films and filmmakers can pull it off to some level, but it will never be more than the minority. It's a cash grab, and not much more.

However, that's totally besides the point. You could be right and it could be the next big thing on every single TV, but my point still stands that, in the here and now, most people don't care or they don't have the equipment. We're not going to back burner more important issues just to satisfy quality snobs that make up a tiny minority of our users.

EDIT: which is not to say that everyone who wants or uses 3D is a quality snob. Just the ones who demand it right now at the cost of other issues because they think it's the most important thing in the universe.

[rat666]

Hi Ned,

you don´t sound rude but my fear is that i sounded rude in my posts.
i wouldn´t call me a snob (but maybe i sounded like one) and i didn´t want to attack or annoy someone.
i think some parts of my posts are mistakeable because of my bad english skills.

Thanks for yor explanation about the raspberry pi, i didn´t know thats only a software limitation. (so i got a wrong information in another forum about the hardware capabilities of the pi)

Even if there was a realistic quality difference to gain in all this, the vast majority of XBMC users either don't care or don't have the equipment for it to matter.

I´m sure the majority won´t but maybe some do.
Ok, i understand your point that it´s 0,01% Feature and i also understand if the XBMC Team decides not to care about it.

All that being said, it's been said before that we have to clean up some code before adding such features. There have been players and media center setups that put "top quality" as a higher priority than anything else, and most of them die out. Meanwhile, we survive, and have a project that's stronger than ever.

i totaly agree with you, features are nothing without stability, sorry if i pointed this not clearly out in my earlier posts.
it wasn´t my objective to get a pure audio or video feature into frodo, i would be happy if it comes in version 13 or 14.
All i wanted to say is that imho something isn´t perfect with AE, maybe it has something to do with replaygain or preamp level setting with led me to the idea that a pure audio feature would be nice.
maybe after the code cleaning my HDCD coded tracks will play correctly and we don´t need the pure audio feature anymore.

please take my posts as an Information, the XBMC Team decides whether and when they take care of it.

If great audio and video was all that was needed to make a great movie, then Transformers wouldn't suck so hard.

I also agree, but a good movie with a poor picture or audio quality also doesn´t make me happy.

Everyone's entitled to their opinion, and I'm not attacking anyone for theirs, but I do feel it's only fair to defend the Team's project decisions.

their decisions made xbmc to that what it is, the best media center out there.


Cheers

rat666

[R...]

Thank you for raising this issue.
For me too, it is important that the sound (for music) in XBMC output without decoding. Now (XBMC Frodo) it only works for HD audio in movies.
I would use XBMC (since this is the best interface for HTPC) only as a source for the music. To decode music has a receiver or DAC, because they got it much better.
I hope the final version of Frodo developers will make Passthrough output device for music.

[Musicmaya]

I hope the final version of Frodo developers will make Passthrough output device for music.

it already exists

you can select pass-thru device for your external processor.