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cw-kid · 2013-04-23, 13:30

Still the same.

Don't worry, think I will leave this issue for now, this older AMD/ATI MicroATX HTPC is in my daughters room connected to a small Samsung 19" LCD TV I brought back with my from Bangkok.

There are black borders top and bottom of the XBMC UI, not massive borders though but they are there and visible. The left and right of the UI looks OK and fits this small screen.

There are only two Picture Size modes on this 19"Sammy, Wide and 4:3, I have it set to wide obviously. Res in XBMC is 720P at 50Hz. TV can only do max of 1080i I think not 1080P.

I need to buy a new larger HDTV for this room anyways, probably a 26 Inch wall mount, to replace the 19" Sammy that is on the wall now.

As long as she can watch her cartoons she will be happy!

Thanks

un1versal · 2013-04-23, 13:32

The alternative is to add the command to rc.local or something so it gets run at every boot.

uNi

cw-kid · 2013-04-23, 13:40

To be honest the screen tearing is more of an issue when video is playing or if I am spinning along in the UI.

My plan was to put a Raspberry PI in the kids room but I haven't got that far yet, my daughter previously had a Linksys DMA 2100 WMC extender in her room, before I switched to XBMC. I've now had to put in this older AMD/ATI HTPC as a stop gap.

The other option would be to buy / build another Intel based ITX HTPC if I can do a cheap one, although my other two HTPCs cost about 600GBP a piece! But I did use expensive ITX cases.

un1versal · 2013-04-23, 13:49

Go Nvidia and save yourself the headaches. Rpi is great no doubt, but its still not a mature enough platform for what you expect, Intel well you need a recent kernel 3.9 and newer, but anyway.

I read something about tearing and AMD but to be honest, I cant remember where and I maybe even parrot that information before again you need to kill X for those commands or run them at system boot via /etc/rc.local or something. I believe its vsync must be on to fix tearing idk.

Code:
sudo aticonfig --initial -f

sudo aticonfig --sync-vsync=on

sudo aticonfig --set-pcs-u32=MCIL,HWUVD_H264Level51Support,1

sudo aticonfig --set-pcs-val=MCIL,DigitalHDTVDefaultUnderscan,0

My bet is on rc.local being best bet unless you find a reliable way to kill X long anough to run those.

uNi

cw-kid · (This post was last modified: 2013-04-23, 14:23 by cw-kid.)

I have just has some success! Not sure which one but one of the commands I ran seems to have killed X allowing me to apply the commands.

After running the Underscan,0 command the black borders top and bottom have now gone. I've just done several reboots and they are still gone.
The XBMC UI was then slightly too big for the TV screen, so in Settings - System - Video Output - Video Calibration I scaled the image back in to fit the TV screen perfectly!

I also ran the Vsync and H264 commands at the same time, I will have to monitor the screen tearing issues see if it has improved?

I am using the XVBA hardware acceleration setting and have turned the other two (VAAPI & VDPAU) off, think that is correct for ATI.

What does the H264 command do?

Thanks again

Screen tearing is still present, oh well least we fixed the black borders!

cw-kid · (This post was last modified: 2013-04-23, 14:47 by cw-kid.)

What about these commands:

sudo aticonfig --sync-video=on –vs=on

or

sudo aticonfig --tls=0

And then:

sudo aticonfig --input=/etc/X11/xorg.conf --tls=1

Seems there are several commands to try, to solve the screen tearing issue, will have to do some more reading on Google.

**wsnipex** · 2013-04-23, 21:08

(2013-04-23, 14:20)cw-kid Wrote: I have just has some success! Not sure which one but one of the commands I ran seems to have killed X allowing me to apply the commands.

After running the Underscan,0 command the black borders top and bottom have now gone. I've just done several reboots and they are still gone.
The XBMC UI was then slightly too big for the TV screen, so in Settings - System - Video Output - Video Calibration I scaled the image back in to fit the TV screen perfectly!

I also ran the Vsync and H264 commands at the same time, I will have to monitor the screen tearing issues see if it has improved?

I am using the XVBA hardware acceleration setting and have turned the other two (VAAPI & VDPAU) off, think that is correct for ATI.

What does the H264 command do?

Thanks again

Screen tearing is still present, oh well least we fixed the black borders!

_disable_ tearfree in amdcccle and _enable_ v-sync in xbmc (always on).

if all fails, follow the howto: http://forum.xbmc.org/showthread.php?t=116996

jonass21 · 2013-04-24, 18:13

I use linux mint 13 xfce for my xbmc box and it works great. Boots up extremely fast and I still have access to a traditional computer desktop I am familiar with if I need it. Plus Mint has also been great for me regarding hardware compatibility.