Dear Group,

This is probably a codec or driver issue, but I can seem to figure it out. I record my favorite TV shows w/Media Center 2005, no problems.  I travel a lot so I like to copy those shows to my laptop, and take them on the road. I recently changed jobs and got another Dell Latitude D630, and now when I copy my HD shows to my Del Laptop, the HD TV has no audio. The TV shows recoded using my ATI Analog card works fine. But I get no audio on my Dell Laptop, from the shows recorded using my ATI HD TV Wonder. I have MS Media Player 11 installed on the Dell running XP with all the latest SP and such. I have two ATI Anolog and one ATI HD Wonder cards in my MC 2005.

Any help?

Thanks,

 

So no replies? Why?

I have a similar problem where I get no audio or video on my laptop with HD recordings.  I can swear that it used to work.

SD recordings work fine, though.

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1: Dimension 9200 - Vista Ult, 2.4GHz Q6600 Core2Quad, 4GB RAM, 160GB, 750GB, 500GB USB, Nvidia 8300GS, PVR-150, HDTV Wonder, Vbox 3560, X360, DMA2100

2: HP m376n - MCE 2005, 2.6 P4 w/HT, 1GB RAM, 250GB, 400GB USB HD, Nvidia 6200, Emuzed MAUI, X360

You need to install AC3filter. XP can't natively handle that audio.

3rob3:

You need to install AC3filter. XP can't natively handle that audio.

That would be my diagnosis as well.  HDTV recordings have Dolby Digital sound that needs an AC3 decoder to work. You might have one already installed 3rd party if you have DVD playback capability on your laptop, but if not, then just add AC3Filter.

The AC3 decoder fixed the problem. I just have one more issue, and it seems to be an American Broadcasting Company, (ABC) issue. I keep getting a Video error after a few minutes of watching their national broadcast, and only the HD shows, not the local news, or commercials or even the Indy 500. But while watching say Boston Legal, I keep getting the MC Blue screen with an Video error that says the files need to be reinstalled.

I think they are broadcasting in 1080p and MC can only hand 1080i?

Any ideas?

Jim

 

 

 

ABC broadcasts in 720p (at least in my area).  I have not experienced the same problem on my Vista rig.  I am not currently recording in HD on my XP rig.  Maybe someone else has some ideas.

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1: Dimension 9200 - Vista Ult, 2.4GHz Q6600 Core2Quad, 4GB RAM, 160GB, 750GB, 500GB USB, Nvidia 8300GS, PVR-150, HDTV Wonder, Vbox 3560, X360, DMA2100

2: HP m376n - MCE 2005, 2.6 P4 w/HT, 1GB RAM, 250GB, 400GB USB HD, Nvidia 6200, Emuzed MAUI, X360

jimmy2iron:

The AC3 decoder fixed the problem. I just have one more issue, and it seems to be an American Broadcasting Company, (ABC) issue. I keep getting a Video error after a few minutes of watching their national broadcast, and only the HD shows, not the local news, or commercials or even the Indy 500. But while watching say Boston Legal, I keep getting the MC Blue screen with an Video error that says the files need to be reinstalled.

I think they are broadcasting in 1080p and MC can only hand 1080i?

Any ideas?

Jim

 

 

 

Odd, I'm experiencing this error intermittently as well. In my case, I get the video error fairly consistently in my recordings of Lost, just as you describe. However, recordings of Gray's Anatomy (my wife's, but also ABC) seem to be fine. Whenever I get the error, I can hit play again, and I'll get another few minutes of playback before another video error.

XP MCE2005 with SP3 (I get the same behavior whether I'm watching directly from my PC or via my XBox 360 extender).

As the previous poster indicated, ABC broadcasts in 720p.

I can switch over to my Comcast cable box, and I can still see where it stalls and or "sticks" then pickselates, then recovers. I'm talking about no MC, no over the air, just straight through the cable box, Comcast, HD. But again it recovers well enough so I don't bother. It's so quick I don't open a trouble ticket but I can tell not only my system has problems but it is just as similar on the cable network too. I can tell there is a problem/issue with the broadcast. Only on ABC. I see the problem on HD over the air, and HD straight through the cable box, but no issues through the cable on the regular non-digital ABC.  I don't receive over the air analog, but I'm sure it's fine. I get HD FOX, PBS, NBC, CBS, and a lot of local digital crap, with no problems. Just ABC.

I'm in the bussiness of moveing data - "bits"- down the line for big business. TB(s).  Most through OC3 155 MB syncronous or bigger.  EMC RDF, MirrorView Asycn and or Sync, or NAS, to a DR bunker. So I know, by feel, and yes touch, when there's a problem. I don't have a scope on it. And yes, streaming video is different than data, but 25 years in the biz tells me it ani't right. Only national ABC, not local abc channel broadcast. 

I'm not going to Vista.... for now. Or even IE7. I can't. Too much stuff won't run. I sometimes work on this system. It's pretty cool working on a 50" LCD. I have two ATI wonder analogs and one HD ATI  wonder. All less than a year old, all with the latest drivers. I got a 3.2Mhz (real Intel) w/ 2 GB of primary and 700 GB of secondary. All serial advance tech attached disks (sata), single disks, not raid, local, but another 500 gb scsi disks, R5 4+1 on a 2U super micro dual possessor, server, in the closet in the other room. It's a 2003, DC and DNS connected w/ two 1000Kbs, on the DMZ, to the ISP. I think I'm getting pretty much a full T1 down. and 300+ up.  I live in a golf course community, and I can drive around with a laptop and I might find 6 or 8 SSIDs around the neighborhood. Not much traffic. I have a cisco/linksys with "big" speed (what ever), I get maybe 30 or 40 Mbs up to the intranet.  I can run my MP3 and regular video, (wmv), but not ripped DVD over my Wireless. To the surround sound, I'm connected directly via audio optical input, to a to a Pioneer VSXti 84 ti 7.1, 130 watts per. Not HDMI. I have 2 nice Polk floor speakers, and KLM shelf, woofer and intermediates, for a total of 7, it rocks, in a 700' room.. And Component connection, also not HDMI,  to a Sony LCD 50".

I can not handle not being able to watch Lost and Boston. I got to fix this. Money is not a problem but reliability is. A funny thing though, I can copy the recording to my Dell D630 with that new AC3 driver and there's no problems. It plays perfectly. Sound isn't loud, but if I play the same recording natively on my home MC, it errors after 5 minutes. I can press the > button. (play) after it errors and most of the time it starts back up at the place it stoped and it still keeps recording, I'm a few minutes behind. But eventually it dies and I have to press stop, got to the main menu and restart. Sucks, considering i spend $4k or more and a lot of effort building my system.

 

It seems like the ABC problem is exclusive to XP MediaCenter (and over Xbox 360 extender).  The Lost file will crash in XP MediaCenter within 5 minutes, like you say, but if I play it in WMP11 on the same machine, it works fine.  Also, I can transfer it to my Vista Premium laptop and it plays fine both in WMP11 and in Vista MediaCenter. I can also stream the video from my XP Media Center machine over to my HP MediasmartTV, and it plays fine.

We're off the original topic now as this has nothing to do with your laptop, but I have a suggestion...

If this were a nationwide problem, then you would see many posts about Lost having problems.  I have not seen that occur, so it sounds like a localized problem.  I record many shows from the Boaton ABC affiliate without any problems. 

Since you have tried recording over both QAM and ATSC, then it sounds like the problem may be at your local ABC affiliate.  They accept the downstream from the network, play with it locally and then re-encode it for broadcast. 

Call them and ask to speak to an engineer.  Alternatively, you can email them if they share an email address on their website. 

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1: Dimension 9200 - Vista Ult, 2.4GHz Q6600 Core2Quad, 4GB RAM, 160GB, 750GB, 500GB USB, Nvidia 8300GS, PVR-150, HDTV Wonder, Vbox 3560, X360, DMA2100

2: HP m376n - MCE 2005, 2.6 P4 w/HT, 1GB RAM, 250GB, 400GB USB HD, Nvidia 6200, Emuzed MAUI, X360

jimmy2iron:

<snip>

I think they are broadcasting in 1080p and MC can only hand 1080i?

Any ideas?

Jim

Just so you know, there is no 1080p brodcasts right now, I don't think it's even possable in the new HDTV standard. The only way to get 1080p is HD-DVD/Blu-ray..possable some PPV/VOD with custom cable/sat boxes but, never heard of it.

NBC is at 1080i and FOX is at 720p, not sure on ABC and CBS off the top of my head but, it's pretty much the standard across the board with 720p or 1080i.

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-Dave

MCP, MCSA, MCSE 2003
Windows Vista Connected Exp:Home Theater for Technologists
Windows Vista Connected Exp:Home Theater for Sales professionals

Home theater specialist (10+ years)

DanH_HP_m376n:

We're off the original topic now as this has nothing to do with your laptop, but I have a suggestion...

If this were a nationwide problem, then you would see many posts about Lost having problems.  I have not seen that occur, so it sounds like a localized problem.  I record many shows from the Boaton ABC affiliate without any problems. 

Agreed, we are off-topic, but I would point out that we are not alone with this issue. AVSForums has an old thread that indicates that, while not pervasive, others who are experiencing this problem are located in Portland, LA, while I'm in San Francisco. Removing the MCE update KB925766 seems to have fixed the problem for some.

http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?t=760579&pp=30

I'm having the same exact problem in Pensacola, FL. Local ABC affiliate broadcasts in 720p (but so does local Fox affiliate, and I don't have this problem with them). I also have no problem with any other channel (1080i). All of these are from OTA ATSC signals. I have never recorded Gray's Anatomy, so I can't say whether that will play. Lost always crashes within 5 minutes with blue "video error" screen. No problem playing it on WMP11 or through Graphedt.

I have tried watching other HD shows on this channel and they also error'd out, so it's not just Lost. I e-mailed the engineer listed on the WEAR ABC website and got zero response.

I used to have this problem before (again, only with ABC), during the beginning of college football season. This was solved by removing that MCE update referenced on the avsforum thread. This new problem just started again a few weeks ago. The only MCE update I have installed is Rollup 2. I have loaded SP3, but the problem preceded that.

I'm thinking it may be related to another windows update (of course SP3 swallowed most of my istalled updates, so I can't remove them one by one without uninstalling SP3, a major PITA). I can't see how this is a broadcast issue if Vista boxes don't share this problem.

I may bite the bullet this weekend and reinstall MCE entirely to see if a clean install fixes the problem. Then slowly add updates until I find one that breaks it. Anyone who can come up with a solution before then, please post it to save me the reinstalling pain.

fl_litig8r:

I'm thinking it may be related to another windows update (of course SP3 swallowed most of my istalled updates, so I can't remove them one by one without uninstalling SP3, a major PITA). I can't see how this is a broadcast issue if Vista boxes don't share this problem.

I may bite the bullet this weekend and reinstall MCE entirely to see if a clean install fixes the problem. Then slowly add updates until I find one that breaks it. Anyone who can come up with a solution before then, please post it to save me the reinstalling pain.

 

Good luck! please keep us posted. I've learned to live w/ it by watching Lost only through WMP. incidentally, I never tested whether ABC shows watched live also crash Media Center. Would make no sense if they didn't.