I have two installs of Windows, one is old, the other is the one I usually use. On the old one VLC works fine when playing DVDs. On the new one VLC has strange pauses and distortion in the audio. What could be the problem? VLC plays things fine when it is off the hard disk but has trouble playing from the DVD (strangely not CDs, though). I have tried reinstalling VLC.
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VLC Issue
- Thread starter Tralis
- Start date
Being that VLC is a freeware the installer worked well when first used on the older copy of Windows. Have you tried downloading a fresh copy for the second installation there? I've been running it here mainly for Vista while XP sees Cyberlink's PowerDVD for audio as well as video files on the drive and easily plays both audio and video disks like vcds as well as dvds.
It was needed for Vista here since Windows might have to be reinstalled to see WMP 11 work with video seen and not just the audio portion or getting a new version of the PowerDVD software. There are several free players to try out for XP at this late date by seraching around like SuperDvD. Which version of Windows are you running there?
It was needed for Vista here since Windows might have to be reinstalled to see WMP 11 work with video seen and not just the audio portion or getting a new version of the PowerDVD software. There are several free players to try out for XP at this late date by seraching around like SuperDvD. Which version of Windows are you running there?
XP Professional on both.
5.1 Capability is really important to me too. It would be better to have Stereo DVD playback than nothing, but 5.1 is really nice.
Maybe I am misunderstanding, but what would downloading a fresh copy for the old windows do since it already works? I have tried re-installing and re-installing VLC on the new copy of windows.
5.1 Capability is really important to me too. It would be better to have Stereo DVD playback than nothing, but 5.1 is really nice.
Maybe I am misunderstanding, but what would downloading a fresh copy for the old windows do since it already works? I have tried re-installing and re-installing VLC on the new copy of windows.
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If the original download got tainted somehow a fresh download would likely see better results. I've stored various updates and freewares in folders on drives and on removable media and still had to go for new copies at time when something won't go on right.
The current software installed for sound itself whether onboard or with an expansion card may not be seeing the full 5.1 there for some reason as well. If the software needs a reinstall there the speakers settings may suddenly see the 5.1 setting working properly again. Often a simple update repairs what the original or prior update loses.
The current software installed for sound itself whether onboard or with an expansion card may not be seeing the full 5.1 there for some reason as well. If the software needs a reinstall there the speakers settings may suddenly see the 5.1 setting working properly again. Often a simple update repairs what the original or prior update loses.
Oh, I see. Each reinstall of VLC was a seperate download. My drivers work fine with my surround sound; games that support it use all 7 speakers and my sub beautifully. SuperDVD doesn't support 5.1 as I understand it.
Separate downloads can avoid storage problems as well as end up seeing a bad copy downloaded as well. VLC was installed here lately as a temp player since WMP 11 is something else with nothing seen on display whether dvd or video file. SuperDVD itself is an older freeware to see simply to test that to see if the audo portion would be heard even in two channel to see it was a software clash of some type on the one of the two XP installations there.
The thought now would be focusing on the sound software/drivers for card or onboard there. The copy of Windows this is being seen on may have seen a bad install for sound causing this problem. On the last build here I ran into speaker setting problems in both XP and Vista alike until both ended up seeing the sound card's software reinstalled.
SuperDVD's stereo is undistorted, while VLC's is distorted off a DVD is distorted no matter the number of channels it outputs.
My onboard sound is beautiful except with VLC reading from a disc. I have had no other sound trouble. I did reinstall my sound drivers for a different reason, though (Nvidia network driver trouble, so I updated all my Nvidia onboard sound).
"Check to make sure that your DVD drive is set to UDMA mode 2 in the new install. It's obviously not anything to do with the software. Also, check the interupts and addresses to make sure that nothing is conflicting."
Forgive my ignorance, but how do I do either of those things?
Thank you both for your help, by the way.
My onboard sound is beautiful except with VLC reading from a disc. I have had no other sound trouble. I did reinstall my sound drivers for a different reason, though (Nvidia network driver trouble, so I updated all my Nvidia onboard sound).
"Check to make sure that your DVD drive is set to UDMA mode 2 in the new install. It's obviously not anything to do with the software. Also, check the interupts and addresses to make sure that nothing is conflicting."
Forgive my ignorance, but how do I do either of those things?
Thank you both for your help, by the way.
When seeing more then one drive on a single ide port often there are varying access times for each drive/device. In the device manager you would right click on the ide controller to see the properties screen come up.
You then look in the advanced tab for transfer mode settings with a selector there. That should already be set to the udma mode in XP by default being far newer then the earlier versions like the 9X family of Windows there.
Some rather elaborate methods include using the registry editing tool to dreate a new value in the system registry itself while that comes with warnings for obvious reasons. http://users.bigpond.net.au/ninjaduck/itserviceduck/udma_fix/
The MS recommendation on the other hand is far more practical.
To enable DMA mode using the Device Manager
1.
Open Device Manager.
2.
Double-click IDE ATA/ATAPI Controllers to display the list of controllers and channels.
3.
Right-click the icon for the channel to which the device is connected, select Properties, and then click the Advanced Settings tab.
4.
In the Current Transfer Mode drop-down box, select DMA if Available if the current setting is "PIO Only."
If the drop-down box already shows "DMA if Available" but the current transfer mode is PIO, then the user must toggle the settings. That is:
•Change the selection from "DMA if available" to PIO only, and click OK.
•Then repeat the steps above to change the selection to DMA if Available.
http://www.microsoft.com/whdc/device/storage/ide-dma.mspx
You then look in the advanced tab for transfer mode settings with a selector there. That should already be set to the udma mode in XP by default being far newer then the earlier versions like the 9X family of Windows there.
Some rather elaborate methods include using the registry editing tool to dreate a new value in the system registry itself while that comes with warnings for obvious reasons. http://users.bigpond.net.au/ninjaduck/itserviceduck/udma_fix/
The MS recommendation on the other hand is far more practical.
To enable DMA mode using the Device Manager
1.
Open Device Manager.
2.
Double-click IDE ATA/ATAPI Controllers to display the list of controllers and channels.
3.
Right-click the icon for the channel to which the device is connected, select Properties, and then click the Advanced Settings tab.
4.
In the Current Transfer Mode drop-down box, select DMA if Available if the current setting is "PIO Only."
If the drop-down box already shows "DMA if Available" but the current transfer mode is PIO, then the user must toggle the settings. That is:
•Change the selection from "DMA if available" to PIO only, and click OK.
•Then repeat the steps above to change the selection to DMA if Available.
http://www.microsoft.com/whdc/device/storage/ide-dma.mspx
It has nothing to do with VLC itself, I don't think. Assuming that both Windows installs are on the same computer, I would hazard a guess at settings.
http://tweakcentral.com/dma.htm
Same instructions for the DVD player
Also, go to Start > Run and type in dxdiag and click ok. Go through the tabs. You might want to adjust hardware acceleration and what not.
http://tweakcentral.com/dma.htm
Same instructions for the DVD player
Also, go to Start > Run and type in dxdiag and click ok. Go through the tabs. You might want to adjust hardware acceleration and what not.
I could try that, but I don't think that's the problem anymore. I was still curious about why SuperDvd worked fine and if it was slow transfer rate why the audio was severly shoppy and distorted but the video was absolutely fine. I decrypted a DVD into .vob and played in VLC. It sounded distorted. However if I process that .vob file into .ogg or some other file type it sounds fine.
I decrypted a DVD into .vob and played in VLC. It sounded distorted.
Like I thought software related not anything in the bios or device manager. The dvd playback on the normal disk wouldn't see any problem while the formal the disk was extracted to is simply unsupported by the player. It was written for the more common standard file types as well as disk playback,
Unsupported is definitely not the word. The extraction program split the disk I was testing into 7 .vob files. I played the second while the fourth was being extracted. It plays with great video, and audio that works but clips, hicks, and distorts a lot, exactly as if off the disk. Oddly, once the whole disk was done being ripped the exact same file played without any issues at all. The same .vob on the old-windows install of VLC works without any issues.
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I made an example of what it sounds like by recording 30 seconds of a movie played straight off the disk and played fully ripped and how different they sound. Its a 450kb zip file with an .mp3 of each. If anyone wants to hear for diagnostic purposes I'd be happy to e-mail it to you or send it through other means. I don't really know a good way to give it to people besides e-mail, but I'm willing to use something else convienient.
I think you still miseed the point there. VLC may play portions when extracting segments. But it was not written to play extractions. It was meant however to run dvds and maybe video cds as well as playing mpeg II and avi type files. Burning video files to disk with a burning program takes a video with or without sound and splits it up for later burning to disk. A disk player then reassembles the segments.
That makes sense, I guess. Why would it be fine for video and not audio, though?
Here's something even stranger:
VLC defaults to opening DVD's in "DVD (menus)" mode, in which it shows audio wierdness.
Opening in plain "DVD" mode in which it opens only a specific Title track shows no audio wierdness. This sort of renders the problem moot as long as I know the title number of what I want to watch. Still, for special features it would be a hassle, and I am extremely curious as to why this strangeness occurs.
Here's something even stranger:
VLC defaults to opening DVD's in "DVD (menus)" mode, in which it shows audio wierdness.
Opening in plain "DVD" mode in which it opens only a specific Title track shows no audio wierdness. This sort of renders the problem moot as long as I know the title number of what I want to watch. Still, for special features it would be a hassle, and I am extremely curious as to why this strangeness occurs.
That's one reason I am waiting to grab the Vista ready version of PowerDVD here rather then counting strictly on VLC since WMP 11 is a flop even in Vista itself. At least you can see the video while the sound suffers a little while MWP 11 is good for radio or an audio cd since there's no display seen when running anything.
I won't count on the VLC player indefinitely since it is rather limited being a freeware while this along with some other free programs sometimes are better then full retail softwares! AVG is free for home use for a different type of program and all too ofren does far better then some retail products with big names.
The main problem with sound there goes from extracting files instead of using VLC the way it was intended. This is where you are defeating the purpose of the player to do the reassembly of both audo and video as they are loaded into ram off of the disk while that is being played back. Plus the VLC player is a freeware seeing quite a few limits on it.
The full retail versions of media players as well as WMP will show far more support for various file types for video and sound while most players expect to compile segments together when reading from the original media not somewhere else as separate files.
I won't count on the VLC player indefinitely since it is rather limited being a freeware while this along with some other free programs sometimes are better then full retail softwares! AVG is free for home use for a different type of program and all too ofren does far better then some retail products with big names.
The main problem with sound there goes from extracting files instead of using VLC the way it was intended. This is where you are defeating the purpose of the player to do the reassembly of both audo and video as they are loaded into ram off of the disk while that is being played back. Plus the VLC player is a freeware seeing quite a few limits on it.
The full retail versions of media players as well as WMP will show far more support for various file types for video and sound while most players expect to compile segments together when reading from the original media not somewhere else as separate files.