Which one is broken, PowerDVD or the whole Blu-ray standard?

BaldEagle

Newbie Joined: Jul 18, 2007 11:13 Messages: 12 Offline

Solved by

Sep 24, 2011 17:52

Hi guys,

I've been wondering lately that what the heck is going on as 50% of all the new BD titles I have bought seem to have serious playback problems with PowerDVD 10? And then the other 50% seem to play without any problems.

For example, I just bought 4 new Blu-ray titles with the following PowerDVD 10 results (Vista 64-bit):

Blade Runner (Region-free, plays normally)
Million Dollar Baby (B region, plays normally)
Batman (Region-free, horrible random skips/hiccups/freezes)
Batman Returns (Region-free, horrible random skips/hiccups/freezes)

In my case all the playback problems are random skips and hiccups just like people having in this thread:

PowerDVD 10 Ultra blu ray playback occasional stutter...
http://forum.cyberlink.com/forum/posts/list/16619.page

This make wonder whether the Blu-ray standard is really a mess requiring a PowerDVD patch with 50% of all the new BD titles? Or is the PowerDVD one of the buggiest Blu-ray player available on the market?

I've been in contact with Cyberlink support regarding these playback problems but their official answer reveals that they have no clue what is causing it: "I have escalated your issue to Product & Development team and they have provided the information that the hiccups issue is always annoying and could cause by performance, other software, drivers."

My PC, although now a couple of years old, should be still more than capable of playing normal non-3D Blu-ray movies:

Core Duo 2 E6850 3Ghz
Geforce 285 GTX ( Nvidia driver version: Vista 280.26, XP 266.58 )
SupremeFX II sound card
4 GB RAM
Vista 64-bit SP2 (the primary OS), Windows XP SP3
PowerDVD 10 Mark II Ultra (10.0.3306.54)
Asus BC-1205PT Blu-ray drive

What do you think? I guess we have more important things to do in our life than sending support tickets every time we buy a new blu-ray movie?

This message was edited 1 time. Last update was at Sep 24. 2011 18:35

BaldEagle

Newbie Joined: Jul 18, 2007 11:13 Messages: 12 Offline

Sep 24, 2011 20:16

I installed PowerDVD 11 Trial version to test whether these random hiccups occur also in the newer version but the whole trial version refused to play none of my Blu-ray movies. It just shows the Upgrade message "Blu-ray playback in the trial version is limited to PCs with hardware acceleration" (I have the frigging hardware acceleration so it should work on the fly) and does nothing.

If the Blu-ray standard is broken so is the PowerDVD.

stiehl

Newbie Joined: Sep 25, 2011 02:00 Messages: 4 Offline

Sep 25, 2011 02:09

I think we need to start getting the better business bureau involved considering Cyberlink knows there is a problem with their software, but refuses to fix it. Making one version of their software obsolete and malfunctioning thus forcing their customers to upgrade is just asking for a lawsuit. I suggest we all start filling out the following form:

http://www.la.bbb.org/ComplaintDetail.aspx?CompanyID=16002673

CyberLink-Michael

Senior Contributor Location: Europe Joined: Apr 18, 2007 04:05 Messages: 7418 Offline

Sep 25, 2011 04:20

Hi BaldEagle,

can you please post where did you bought the mentioned titles (if possible attach a link)

Blade Runner (Region-free, plays normally)
Million Dollar Baby (B region, plays normally)
Batman (Region-free, horrible random skips/hiccups/freezes)
Batman Returns (Region-free, horrible random skips/hiccups/freezes)

Please let us also know your exact display configuration - espically which refresh rate is used

thanks
Michael

This message was edited 1 time. Last update was at Sep 25. 2011 04:21

Technical Support

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BaldEagle

Newbie Joined: Jul 18, 2007 11:13 Messages: 12 Offline

Sep 25, 2011 08:54

Quote: Hi BaldEagle,

can you please post where did you bought the mentioned titles (if possible attach a link)

Blade Runner (Region-free, plays normally)
Million Dollar Baby (B region, plays normally)
Batman (Region-free, horrible random skips/hiccups/freezes)
Batman Returns (Region-free, horrible random skips/hiccups/freezes)

Please let us also know your exact display configuration - espically which refresh rate is used

thanks
Michael

BD titles are from the following Finnish web shop (translate pages into English. e.g., with the Google Chrome browser)
http://cdon.fi/elokuvat/batman_(blu-ray)-14293313
http://cdon.fi/elokuvat/blade_runner_-_final_cut_(blu-ray)-13543891
http://cdon.fi/elokuvat/million_dollar_baby_(blu-ray)-12578068
http://cdon.fi/elokuvat/batman_paluu_(blu-ray)-13543932

Display: Samsung SyncMaster 226BW (DVI Connector)
Resolution: 1680 x 1050 60Hz

BaldEagle

Newbie Joined: Jul 18, 2007 11:13 Messages: 12 Offline

Sep 25, 2011 16:08

I did an interesting test. I downloaded a trial version of Arcsoft TotalMedia Theatre 5 which is an alternative to PowerDVD. This trial version played all my blu-ray movies superbly unlike the trial version of PowerDVD 11 which refused to play anything. And guess what? It played my Batman blu-ray WITHOUT A SINGLE SKIP/HICCUP/FREEZE. After this test I launched PowerDVD 10 again to watch Batman and all these random skips/hiccups/freezes were immediately back.

So it was not about my computer but PowerDVD. I guess my next blu-ray player will be Arcsoft TotalMedia Theatre.

stiehl

Newbie Joined: Sep 25, 2011 02:00 Messages: 4 Offline

Sep 26, 2011 02:49

Quote: I did an interesting test. I downloaded a trial version of Arcsoft TotalMedia Theatre 5 which is an alternative to PowerDVD. This trial version played all my blu-ray movies superbly unlike the trial version of PowerDVD 11 which refused to play anything. And guess what? It played my Batman blu-ray WITHOUT A SINGLE SKIP/HICCUP/FREEZE. After this test I launched PowerDVD 10 again to watch Batman and all these random skips/hiccups/freezes were immediately back.

So it was not about my computer but PowerDVD. I guess my next blu-ray player will be Arcsoft TotalMedia Theatre.

I got really frustrated last night as well and decided to try out Arcsoft. Guess what? It worked beautifully and has a much nicer interface/features than PowerDVD. I suggest everyone check it out. Additionally, the actual developers are much more in tune with the community, not some PR bullshit like Cyberlink.

This message was edited 1 time. Last update was at Sep 26. 2011 02:50

adamw264

Newbie Joined: Sep 17, 2011 15:03 Messages: 6 Offline

Sep 26, 2011 03:16

It's good to know there is an alternative, but I bought PowerDVD10 for $92 just ten months ago, I don't want to spend another $99 USD for TMT. I expect Cyberlink to fix this as soon as possible.

BaldEagle

Newbie Joined: Jul 18, 2007 11:13 Messages: 12 Offline

Sep 26, 2011 15:03

I think some of these playback issues and bugs in PowerDVD are quite nasty. Everything may play fine for some time but then it suddenly goes crazy. The playback problems may appear during the first five minutes or in the middle of the movie. It's totally random and unexpected.

For example, I today watched Batman about 20 minutes on PowerDVD 10 and it played fine. Then I decided to watch some extras and it went totally crazy skipping/hiccupping/freezing so much that I couldn't watch those extras at all.

Once I watched the whole movie almost through without any issues and it was only at the very end of the movie when it started to stutter like mad. And no, I don't have anything such as antivirus software running in the background which might cause interference in PowerDVD (double-checked).

Yeah CyberLink, I can feel your pain if you can't reproduce these issues in your test labs.

This message was edited 1 time. Last update was at Sep 26. 2011 15:04

BaldEagle

Newbie Joined: Jul 18, 2007 11:13 Messages: 12 Offline

Oct 01, 2011 11:29

Here are more test results of my new BD purchases (PowerDVD 10 and Vista 64-bit):

Source Code (B region)

Plays normally

The Name of The Rose (Region-free)

Audio cracks and gets corrupted for 12 seconds every time in the top menu, otherwise plays normally. Total media theatre 5 plays this without any issues.

I just can't help but think that PowerDVD is full of smaller or bigger bugs which show up more or less depending on the BD title.

CyberLink-Michael

Senior Contributor Location: Europe Joined: Apr 18, 2007 04:05 Messages: 7418 Offline

Oct 01, 2011 12:38

Quote: I installed PowerDVD 11 Trial version to test whether these random hiccups occur also in the newer version but the whole trial version refused to play none of my Blu-ray movies. It just shows the Upgrade message "Blu-ray playback in the trial version is limited to PCs with hardware acceleration" (I have the frigging hardware acceleration so it should work on the fly) and does nothing.

If the Blu-ray standard is broken so is the PowerDVD.

Hi,

please post more information about your VGA - the DXDIAG should be enough..

The DXDIAG should also help to investigate the issue you face with the titel playback. Unfortunately I can not reproduce such issue here - so it needs more information.
Please also check this thread:
http://forum.cyberlink.com/forum/posts/list/8449.page

thanks and br
Michael

This message was edited 1 time. Last update was at Oct 01. 2011 12:41

Technical Support

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BaldEagle

Newbie Joined: Jul 18, 2007 11:13 Messages: 12 Offline

Oct 01, 2011 13:56

Well, after more wider testing the trial version of PowerDVD 11 (11.0.2024.53) seems to play some of my BD titles but here are the sad results (Vista 64-bit):

Blader Runner (Region-free)
Highlander (AB region)
Batman (Region-free)
Batman Returns (Region-free)

PowerDVD 11 refuses to play these 4 BD titles by giving the messages "Blu-ray playback in the trial version is limited to PCs with hardware acceleration" and "There is a disc with an unsupported format in drive F:"

Million Dollar Baby (B region)
Marked For Death (Region-free)

These 2 BD titles play normally on PowerDVD 11.

The trial version of Total media theatre 5 plays all of these titles without any issues.

I attached the DxDiag to this post as you wished.

Filename	DxDiag.txt	Download
Description
Filesize	29 Kbytes
Downloaded:	385 time(s)

CyberLink-Michael

Senior Contributor Location: Europe Joined: Apr 18, 2007 04:05 Messages: 7418 Offline

Oct 02, 2011 09:06

Hi BaldEagle,

do you use any virtual drive software?

Michael Technical Support

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BaldEagle

Newbie Joined: Jul 18, 2007 11:13 Messages: 12 Offline

Oct 02, 2011 14:26

Quote: Hi BaldEagle,

do you use any virtual drive software?

Michael

No, I'm not using any virtual drive software.

I installed the trial version of PowerDVD 11 (11.0.2114.53) also on XP SP3 (on the same computer) with no luck. It just refuses to play a big list of my BD titles by giving the message "There is a disc with an unsupported format in drive F:" but then again plays some of my BD titles without any issues.

From my point of view this is clearly an indication of faulty and buggy software. It's unbelievable that you let out this kind of hit-and-miss software. From your side it's useless to say that you can't reproduce it if your competitor such as Arcsoft Total Media Theater 5 plays everything normally. They have just done their job better than you.

I've been reading other forums (e.g AVS forum) and there seems to be many people who have changed their players because Cyberlink has lost a lot of credibility, for example, due to "constant problems with playing new BD titles". So I guess I'm also done with Cyberlink.

tech81

Newbie Joined: Dec 14, 2010 17:00 Messages: 38 Offline

Oct 09, 2011 15:50

In answer to your question it's fair to say both.

PowerDVD like all software contains bugs, unfortunately running on a Windows based PC it has to deal with all sorts of combination of environments, nVidia, ATI, Realtek ... the list goes on. It's impossible for a software house to quality assure the software for everyone.

TMT5 may well work well now for all of your BD's but I suspect it will trip up somewhere, sometime (I've had issues with TMT3). To my knowledge there are only two other software alternatives to PowerDVD and TMT (from Roxio and Corel).

As for the Blu Ray format, I think it is broken, it appears to be a rushed project and is constantly changing, Profile 1, Profile 1.1, Profile 2.0, Profile 5.0 ... Given the amount of time BD has been available it should no longer be bleedin' edge technology it should be bedded in proven and accessible for the masses.

All the best with your setup BaldEagle.

CyberLink-Joseph

Newbie Joined: Aug 24, 2010 21:59 Messages: 46 Offline

Oct 12, 2011 04:53

Hi BaldEagle

I've reported your issue to our Research and Design team, they are investigating you issue now.

And seems you have two computers, XP and Vista. Can you also provide the DxDiag.txt for the XP one to us for checking?