DVD playback, DVDMax on G400

[klima]

Hi all!
I think it will be very interesting for every user of G400 Matrox card to share our experiences with DVD playback.
I have G400 DH 32MB and Toshiba DVD-ROM, PII 300 with 128MB RAM. My films are great on monitor screen but I have problems with PAL TV output in DVDMax mode.
Do you have some similar problem? Or anything you want to say about it?
Thanx for participation.

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Jiri Klima

[Snake-Eyes]

Since I already have a standalone DVD player in my home theater system I haven't tried the G400 through the television yet. But the MatroxDVD player seems to work just fine through the monitor, both in a window and full-screen. The only problem I experienced had to do with the fact that I didn't have DMA enabled for my IDE DVD-ROM drive. That appears to have been a problem with Win98SE, in which the DMA checkbox wasn't even displayed in the properties tab for the drive.

I have an Abit BE6 motherboard- with the built-in DMA66 controller, which this drive is connected to. Since this device is the first one I've added to the DMA66 controller since this install of Windows, the controller drivers weren't installed, and Win98 wasn't displaying it in the Device Manager. I manually reinstalled the drivers for the DMA66 controller, and the DMA checkbox appeared under the DVD's properties tab.

Now that it's enabled, there've been no probs at all with playback, where before there were hitches during parts of the playback.

As I said, I still haven't tried displaying the DVD playback on a TV/second monitor, either through DVDMax or DualHead Clone, but will, as soon as I find an S-Video cable long enough to reach from the back of my PC to my television (15' minimum).

I think your idea of sharing info about our experiences is cool, too.



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Ace

[whiplash]

I used to run DVD's with cinemaster and a G200 TV out module.

Now I use the G400MAX DVDMax and let me tell you the quality is fantastic, (PAL). I could not belive the improvement, crisp clear and fast output to the TV, and all while I am still working on the P.C.

I use the re-badged cinemaster that came with the G400. The DVDMax gives a much better output than dual head mode, (which is very very good anyway).

[wiggo]

I also have problems with output to a PAL TV. The film jerks approx once per second, whilst the playback on the monitor remains fine. NTSC playback introduces interference to the signal, for some reason, which produces small oscillations in colour across the screen.
I also have a Videologic DVD player card (a rebadged hollywood+). The G400 appears to have slightly higher quality playback, but I need the S/PDIF out of the Videologic, as my sound card is a MX300 (no digital out).
Maybe Matrox could include a PAL 60Hz option with their DVD player, as is included with the Videologic? This may solve the PAL playback problems as no 60Hz to 50Hz conversion would be needed for a NTSC DVD.

[This message has been edited by wiggo (edited 09-09-1999).]