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Errr yes...I said "Cyberlink does it with true theatre motion". That gives you frame interpolation
You need to grasp what is jerky playback by design in 24 fps content versus what is just simply poor performance and not doing the video fast enough
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Billy I would not expect Cyberlink to add new features in maintenance cycles of PDVD 16. At best, it might come with PDVD17 but who knows, like how you were disappointed when 15 didn't have it, and 16 did not have it either.
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It is supported. Its just via software not full decode in suitable GPUs 
Clearly that is going to be something for the UHD 4k bluray release
For Pdvd16 they will just do error fixes as needed for maintenance
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Once a system problem is ruled out, often the cause is the DVD or the Bluray itself. 24 FPS isn't a good frame rate. You need to do *frame interpolation* to really fix this on that sort of content. Cyberlink does it with true theatre motion
Some like the jerkiness cos they reckon its a film effect
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For me personally:
1. Faster. No longer do I wait with a small square box at the beginning of video playback for example
2. DSD audio support is welcome
3. Multi chan FLAC support is welcome
4. The fact they finally fixed the clhelper.sys device driver from failing microsoft WHQL tests and they are actually windows platform passable using MS tests is outstanding. Many of you did not understand the ramifications of this problem when I was talking about in prior versions.
5. Better 4K display support
6. Access to the latest code base for fixes from bugs
Only you can decide if it's worth it for you or not, I know PowerDVD 16 has problems and I want to see them fixed but IMHO as a technical user it is the best version so far from Cyberlink
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On bug two, if you read my post you will see that I came to realise the work around is to disable the UHD performance mode. However it is only a work around as I do not seem to be able to get hardware acceleration happening with this off while running a 4K 60 Hz desktop resolution 3840 x 2160. It is not desirable as hardware acceleration is needed for complex video codes with say high FPS, eg 60 FPS, and high bit rates. Software just cant keep up with those sorts of videos and you must use GPU decoding for it to work not software. The real solution that is needed here, is for the hardware acceleration to still work while having readable subtitles in 4K resolutions at high DPI rates. The current solution does not accommodate the gamut of DPI differences properly on 4K displays.
On bug five, there is no longer PDVD15 as it was uninstalled as part of the PDVD16 upgrade. What is left, is cruft, unwanted artefacts that did not install correctly. Windows 10 knows that PDVD15 is no longer installed so when a user tries to click on the open with PDVD15 command verb right mouse click option, Windows 10 goes into the select which application to run this file process because PDVD15 is no longer installed.
On bug 1 Ill see about posting data on that
Cheers
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Quote:
but you are still saying "not Possible"
What I am saying is:
- It is possible to use letterboxing/pillarboxing as needed to display, without distortion, without loosing parts of the image, specific content in specific aspect rations that do not match the display aspect ratio of a particular display. I said to you, that this is possible and a reasonable case to press to Cyberlink.
- What is not possible, is to always have no letterboxing/pillarboxing for all content across a range of different aspect ratios given one fixed display aspect ration. Techniques that do this, either distort the image or cut parts of the image out.
The two above cases are quite distinct and different from each other. That is why when you clarified what you meant, I said in the case of item one above, it was a more reasonable suggestion than the impossibility of case 2.
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Interesting, and HEVC hardware encoding is somehow a major new feature in PowerDirector 15, although as you mentioned almost no cards support it.
In PowerDVD 15, we got main profile HEVC hardware acceleration support.
Both PowerDVD 15 and 16, do not support main 10 profile HEVC which is basically the 10 bit high defintion colour standard that will be common in UHD bluray 4K discs up to 127 MBPS
There is not much content in say BT2020 colour formats outside of UHD bluray. It will become common I imagine with digital TV but so far I'm not aware of it being routine apart from special test broadcasts of say sporting events in high defintion 10 bit colour.
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So in your first post your complaint is basically that you always wants a DAR "..without large boarders top and sides in PowerDVD 15 & 16" where this, which you should know if what you claim with your work is true, is impossible. You must crop and/or distort the image to do so, it cannot be done properly where the image integrity remains. Its a physically unavoidable fact.
If your clarification in your last post is that you are seeing letterboxing when you are only expecting pillarboxing then that is a more sensible issue and is quite different to the above.
I suggest you need to give Cyberlink a clear example of a specific bit of video with a specific aspect ratio, where you can say it should only be pillarboxed not letterboxed. It all depends on the source content aspect ratio. If you give them a specific bit of footage and some screenshots that would prove your case.
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It slipped out awhile back on the PowerDVD 15 forum
I can understand why. 10 bit display even in full screen on windows 10 is cutting edge. That takes a fairly significant investment of people and time. Then, you need to add new decoders and demuxers.
Even after youve done that, the system requirements for real time playback of HEVC Main 10 60 FPS would mean greater than 80% of the people buying it cant use it. The only way to do real time HEVC MAIN 10 60 FPS display is on something with a full hardware HEVC decoding engine like a Nvidia GTX 960 or 950. Everything else *wont work* you cannot do this via CPU software.
The spec allows for 127 MBPS in HEVC MAIN 10, think on that
ALso, thats not even getting into all the coding required to keep the UHD bluray license OK and actually be approved to license it in software. Thats a major bit of work
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Its all good mate
The issue is, that any digital audio must at the end of the day be decoded down into a AC signal. Do you know what happens when you send a DC signal to amplifiers and speakers? They really don't like it and will often be destroyed
For you to make sound and not blowup your expensive hifi, it needs to be converted into analogue.
People have different ways of doing this and while Billy is doing a more rare method of doing it, he still is pointing to a problem that is meaningful to him and hes quite correct in the facts of what he is saying.
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Sorry, but you guys just don't get it. Its not a Cyberlink conspiracy folks.
A 21:9 monitor has a display aspect (DAR) ratio of 2.33.
If the footage uses square pixels meaning it is not anamorphically encoded, then:
2.35 will have black bars, same with 2.39, 2.40 and 2.55 and 2.89
Same with for example the movie Tron shot at 2.20, other titles in 1.85, 1.78 and 1.37
The only footage that will display pixel perfect on a 21:9 monitor is 2.33 everything else will have black bars so it displays correctly without losing bits of the image or distorting the image and wrecking image quality
You need to let that last point sink in - there is no method to redo the DAR without either loosing some of the image or distorting the image.
Ive explained it many times before on this forum. You chose to buy a monitor in that DAR, so you get what DAR it has.
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DSD is the encoding format for SACD. It cannot be read by a bluray player. DVD audio is not supported by PowerDVD 16.
You can either rip your SACD media into DSD files or get them from internet stores.
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In my tests, both HEVC 4K in main and main10 profiles will playback. Even 60 FPS footage will.
Only main profile has hardware decode but the software in main10 still works
Try updating your GPU drivers.
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Its because you guys that bring this up, dont know what your talking about I've explained it before. You cannot do this without either culling parts of the image or wrecking the display of the image.
A bloke in the past even tried to debate that there was no image distortion when you do this. The fact is, there is.
The solution is to watch the video the way the director intended you to watch it.
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4K is not an open standard. HEVC is heavily encumbered by a patent pool.
Mayve VP9 and WebM will come to dominate, but in UHD 4K blurays it is HEVC MAIN 10 all the way for that format atleast
Billy I do admire sir your tenacity with Cyberlink on this
Mate maybe it will come when they do UHD 4K bluray support.
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Unlike the great majority of reviews that have conflicts of interest, here is my honest user review of PDVD16:
Missing Features Found In Other Players Including Free Open Source Players
- No 10 bit HEVC main10 GPU full hardware decoding support
- No WEBM playback support
- Subsequently I dont know if VP9 full hardware decoding is supported
- Some types of TS videos wont playback. M2TS content does work however
- I do not have the equipment to test high resolution colour, outside of 709 into BT2020 and the like
- I'm not counting UHD BD support as a missing feature cos it was never meant for this version. VP9, WebM, 10 bit should be in this version though as it is in every decent open source software player, its in FFMPEG and basically everywhere.
- This is all 32 bit when the world is 64 bit. Performance suffers as a result.
Bugs
- When viewing music in the library, some of my music repeats pictures that are not associated to the song. Like I keep seeing a Bee Gees picture for songs that are not the Bee Gees at all.
- Subtitles in non-disc based videos continue to be badly bugged. When running a 4K UHD screen, windows defaults to a font scaling of 300% to accomodate the high DPI display. The subtitles in videos of say MP4 or MKV (not disc) become way too large and basically wreck the video playback because it is so large. When a user tries to adjust the subtitle font size in the settings, this setting actually has no effect in playback. Nothing changes in playback regardless of the size the user puts for the font in the Cyberlink subtitle setting.2A) I reported this in the Cyberlink 15 beta, it was ignored. Raised a support ticket, no result.2B) I reported this in the Cyberlink production release, it was ignored. Raised a support ticket, no result.2C) Now in the next version, this bug continues to not be resolved HOW TO FIX THIS: You must disable the UHD performance mode. This mode turns off all the subtitle processing and allocated an arbitary default font size that does not work on UHD 4K screens with high DPI and font scaling. I discovered this myself, Cyberlink support has been useless with this. Now the problem seems to be I am always falling back to software and I cant get hardware decoding working, so I need to fiddle around with it more.
- Deinterlacing does not work properly. I have submitted to Cyberlink, two simple test files, one if top field first and the second in bottom field first interlacing. This was way back in Powerdvd 10, were talking years and years ago. Despite ongoing feedback about this bug and the implications it has, the "world best media player" continues to be unable to do things which the most basic free open source media players do. In PowerDVD 16, deinterlacing continues to be broken.
- When a video file is played back that has no audio track, the player will in error say unsupported audio when in fact there is no audio.
- The upgrade process is bugged. PowerDVD 15 remains an "...open with" right mouse click option for media files, even though in the upgrade.
The Good Of Version 16
- Its faster and the new audio support is welcome
- Gone is the horrid clhelper sys object that failed the Microsoft tests for Windows platform readiness and failed the Windows Hardware Quality Labs requirements. That device driver has been removed and the world is a happier place without it. Cyberlink were slient about this on their forums but it's good to see they actually fixed something for once.
- 3D playback is now more reliable on Windows 10. Cyberlink were quick to blame Nvidia or Microsoft, without detailing how they were partnering with them to actually work on fixing it, so it worked. It now works, but then again I am on the fast ring for the windows insider OS previews so I dont know if the current production version of Windows 10 is OK or not.
- The smart theatre enhancements for video in particular are most excellent, both from an image quality and performance perspective.
Conclusion
Cyberlink are the last commercial supplier of real software for home theatre duties, the other commercial ones are missing even more features than PowerDVD and arent suitable for home theatre. None of the open source players work correctly as they are missing the blu ray menu support and the commercial ones with a full feature set have ceased trading. This is a better version than 15, but it has bugs and features which are missing; of which most of those features are present in free to use open source software players. Cyberlink need to vastly improve their beta testing process and community engagement on fixing bugs. Cyberlink have a support process that is painful and actually getting Cyberlink to fix bugs is hit and miss. It is my sincere hope that Cyberlink get serious about fixing bugs and truly achieving the worlds best media player, without pretending like they currently do. The worlds best media player needs to be more reliable, with more useful features, than open source competitors. PowerDVD16 is neither more reliable or more feature full than FFMPEG, say with LAV filters and MPC-BE.
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I can definitely agree that more hardware may be required. I would be completely fine waiting for all these pieces to get sorted out, IF somebody on the PC side (AMD, Nvidia, Cyberlink, etc) would come forward and say they would work on it.
So I suppose we should just watch out and report it.
My GTX 960 mate already does HDMI 2/HDCP 2.2, it has native 10 bit full hardware decode engines (not some hybrid like older GPUs but full native decode acceleration) in *botb* HEVC and VP9
Using free open source software (they're killing you Cyberlink the FFMPEG based stuff actually works!!!!) I can do full hardwarde accelerated VP9 and HEVC in 10 bit, including 125 Mbps material at 60 FPS in 4K UHD resolution.
WIth lav filters, madVR and MPCHC/BE like Jeff Mentions I can do frame inteloperation for fixing any juddger with specific FPS content
Whats missing is the drivers for UHD discs being able to be read, and the software to crack all the DRM. Sadly, Slysoft were bulled out by the media carterls and we need a new group to front up and demonstrate a way to defeat UHD DRM. Once thats done, eveything else is available ENTIRELY FOR FREE AND JUST WORKS and is ready to go now right now.
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Guys Ive been down this route with Cyberlink before in prior releases, reporting 3d bluray bugs in betas (which were never fixed) and in the end with a whole bunch of time wasting by support asking questions I've already answered / giving rubbish boiler plate cut n paste responses that were of no relevance to the actual defects - Cyberlink basically blamed Nvidia on it. When I asked them how they were working with Nvidia on getting it fixed and what the nature of their partnership with Nvidia is, that was met with silence.
I don't have any "issue" with Cyberlink apart from their utter incompetence in getting their software to work right. In my experience, their development and testing approach is flawed and needs complete revision. If they actually provided working software I'd be their biggest fan. The saddening thing is that people like us who want to help fix the bugs largely get stuffed around by Cyberlink and they remain dysfunctional in how they do testing and especially how they handle beta cycles.
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As I said, I reported this problem to CYberlink ages ago. When the tech support mob say they forwarded it to the Dev Team, dont hold your breath. It doesnt mean they will fix it. Im still waiting since PDVD version 10 for deinterlacing to work. And I'm still waiting for subtitles in high DPI situations in 4K to be fixed. If they fix anything at all, be prepared to wait months minimum for it. They may never fix it however.
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