Media Player Classic - Jerky/ freezing when playing a DVD?

[Chas Uno]

Ok, another question about my new build

I have built my PC with the following:

AMD XP1800+ Processor in appropriate mobo.
750 mb ram (1 x 512, 1x 256)
160GB PATA Hard Drive
A Radeon something or other graphics card
Creative Audigy ZS soundcard
Windows XP Pro

All seems to be working fine and dandy, and it is MUCH faster than my old PC (a P3 700mhz that I never did get to run properly). However, I have one little issue:

When I try and play a DVD movie with Windows Media Player Classic, it plays fine but then 'stutters' every now and then. Basically the screen will freeze for a second or so while the hard drive manically accesses itself, then it will run fine again and the HDD quietens down. Until maybe a few seconds later it will do it again. It does it worse the further you go into a movie (i.e. plays pretty much ok at the beginning but starts to stutter/ freeze towards the end).

I does it more so in the standard Windows Media Player (version 11).

Is my computer too slow to work properly with DVD movies, or am I missing something with the settings? Is 750mb or ram not enough perhaps?

Otherwise the computer is running really well and I'm very happy with it

 

[soap_dodger]

Have you tried using VLC???

http://www.videolan.org/vlc/

Hope this helps.

 

[Rampage94]

lack of RAM mate. XP pro likes 756MB of RAM just to run. if you wanna watch dvd's you need a gig+ because when your HD goes ape, thats it acting as RAM.

 

[Chas Uno]

Just tried VLC Soap, it ran worse and crashed the machine a couple of times

Rampage - 750mb is 'not enough' memory? Bloody hell, I remember when my 64k Commodore 64 seemed to have an enormous amount! So every time the HDD goes Spazzy it's because it's trying to act as memory? Looks like I'll be on the hunt for more memory now

 

[Stu DemonD]

How did you install MPC, via a codec pack?

 

[custard]

Just tried VLC Soap, it ran worse and crashed the machine a couple of times

Rampage - 750mb is 'not enough' memory? Bloody hell, I remember when my 64k Commodore 64 seemed to have an enormous amount! So every time the HDD goes Spazzy it's because it's trying to act as memory? Looks like I'll be on the hunt for more memory now

must admit everythings ram hungry now.this pc originally came with 512 and worked fine.
however it got sluggish after a couple of years so 2 1gb sticks sorted that!

 

[Chas Uno]

How did you install MPC, via a codec pack?

It got installed during the WinXP Pro 'Essential' installation, as did the standard Win Media Player. Not sure why it installed both?

By the sounds of it I need more memory, will be on the hunt for 2 x 1gb sticks like Custard recommends. Ah well, at least the computer works properly unlike the last disaster build I put together

Gotta go to work now... On a Sunday... From 1pm to 9pm... While everyone is at Stanford...

 

[custard]

i'll try and find the ebay guy i used

edit: http://search.ebay.co.uk/_W0QQsassZfastmemoryman

got them off that seller.no customs charge and quick postage.he had BIN but i made a best offer and saved few extra quid

 

[beau]

how much did it cost you? i fancy making a computer, only need basic stuff like you have..

 

[colin79666]

have you installed all the motherboard drivers?
sounds like your dvd drive might not be operating in DMA mode...

 

[Chas Uno]

how much did it cost you? i fancy making a computer, only need basic stuff like you have..

Off the top of my head:

ATX Tower Case - £22 (Dabs.com)
160GB HDD - £33 (Dabs.com)
AMD Athlon 1800+ CPU + mobo + Radeon Graphics - £10 donation to FF!
Creative Audigy ZS Soundblaster - £52 (Ebay)
WinXP - £10 donation to FF (shhh!)
DVD ROM - Already had it
750GB Ram - Already had it
PSU ATX - Already had it

Total = £127

The mobo came with perfectly good onboard sound, but as I want to do music recording and needed the front panel input 'drive' I bought the Audigy package. Most people wouldn't need this, so the average user could build what I had for £75.

Also worth bearing in mind what Dave was looking at for £150 - that was a duo core mobo, processor, heatsink/ fan and 2 gig of memory!

Still need a case and other bits but you could still put together a fast PC for not a lot of money.

have you installed all the motherboard drivers?
sounds like your dvd drive might not be operating in DMA mode...

Mobo was second hand and seemed to be all set up. I just 'plugged and played' all the devices, which the mobo/ BIOS seemed quite happy to install.

What's DMA mode?

 

[colin79666]

http://www.microsoft.com/whdc/device/storage/IDE-DMA.mspx
make sure dma is enabled
if it won't let you select it or it keeps jumping back to pio you probably need to install some motherboard drivers (from the mobo manufactures website)

 

[arc]

aye, it sounds like a software problem - or if it is hardware.. do you have the DVD drive on the same IDE channel as the HDD? If you do, move it.

I'm 99% sure it won't be a RAM issue, winxp pro runs fine on my p3 500 with 256mb! To eliminate the issue of windows resizing the virtual memory..

right click my computer > properties > advanced > performence [settings] > advanced > virtual memory [change] > custom size > set a 1024mb min and max setting, then reboot and see if it does the same thing.

 

[Chas Uno]

http://www.microsoft.com/whdc/device/storage/IDE-DMA.mspx
make sure dma is enabled
if it won't let you select it or it keeps jumping back to pio you probably need to install some motherboard drivers (from the mobo manufactures website)

Right, I've checked my two IDE channels and found this:

The Primary IDE channel has two HDD's on it. The master is my new 160GB Seagate, and according to the properties it is running in Ultra DMA Mode 2. The slave is an old 17 GB drive, and that is running in PIO mode, even though Transfer mode is selected to "DMA Mode if available". It's a very old HDD so maybe that is why?

The Secondary IDE channel has a single DVD/ CD Rom (CD burner) on it. It's from this that I am trying to play DVD movies. Transfer Mode is selected to "DMA if available", and it states current transfer mode is "Multi-Word DMA Mode 2".

So it does look like the DVD/ CD Rom is running in DMA mode. Not sure what else I need to look up?

See pics attached of the primary and secondary IDE results.

aye, it sounds like a software problem - or if it is hardware.. do you have the DVD drive on the same IDE channel as the HDD? If you do, move it.

Nope. 2 x HDD's on the primary IDE, and 1 x DVD/ CD on the secondary IDE.

I'm 99% sure it won't be a RAM issue, winxp pro runs fine on my p3 500 with 256mb!

My PC is running fine apart from bogging down with DVD movies! I also noticed that it also bogs down with large WMV files (200mb'ish) though plays them ok. Otherwise there are no issues of it struggling at all in other areas, and it's blindingly fast compared with what I used to have!

To eliminate the issue of windows resizing the virtual memory..

right click my computer > properties > advanced > performence [settings] > advanced > virtual memory [change] > custom size > set a 1024mb min and max setting, then reboot and see if it does the same thing.

Tried looking at that. It tells me that the initial size is set to 1152mb, and the maximum size is 2304mb. Is that enough or should I make it bigger? Attached a picture of what it says I have.

The only other thing I can think is that maybe the DVD rom itself is not up to scratch? It's an LG DVD Rom and that's all it says on the front, no other details are on it such as 25 x speed or such. It burns CD's fine so that area is working fine, but is it possible that it is it too slow or wearing out? It was second hand so I've no idea how old it is.

Any other ideas/ suggestions?

I really do appreciate you all helping out, thank you.

 

[custard]

i would try different playback software.evaluation copys easily found on torrents

 

[arc]

Tried looking at that. It tells me that the initial size is set to 1152mb, and the maximum size is 2304mb. Is that enough or should I make it bigger? Attached a picture of what it says I have.

set the min and max sizes to 1152mb.

what might be happening is the page file gets filled to a point, and then windows decides it needs to resize - hence the sudden hard drive thrashing. if you lock the max and min sizes to the same value, it removes the option for windows to resize it.

however, ive just looked on my laptop and playing a 228mb WMV file over the network - windows media player is using circa 10mb, and cpu usage is around 30-40%. remember this is a 6 year old p3 500mhz laptop with 256mb ram. (still running windows xp pro) what i'm saying is you don't need more RAM, or at least you shouldn't do assuming the PC is setup properly

Check the memory useage when u are playing back DVDs.

in task manager (control+shift+escape), look at processes - watch it, and then try and make the dvd skip. what for process using a sudden amount of CPU or memory.

i would suspect audio, graphics or motherboard drivers are at fault. What motherboard do you have.

might be worth playing with the audio settings. look for an option to disable sound processing. look for an option to pass through to SPDIF. That way the software just demuxes it and sends the raw ac3 stream to the spdif port on the sound card, *should* elimiate any issues with sound processing.

 

[Liam]

Put your paging file on your 2nd HDD.

Liam

 

[Chas Uno]

Right, I set the min and max sizes to 1152mb, restarted PC and...

...no difference!

However, I opened up task manager and that showed some interesting goings on. Or rather interesting things not going on.

Even when the DVD video was jumping and freezing CPU usage was barely into double figures (9%). Page File Usage was pretty much fixed at 186mb, flat lining along the bottom of the graph. However, when I tried to get to the end of the DVD movie Media Player started using 99% of the CPU and then pretty much crashed. I ended the program and the rest of the PC was running fine.

What also seems to be interesting is that until Media Player crashes the rest of the computer is running fine while the video hiccups and freezes, so I'm beginning to suspect that maybe that the DVD ROM drive itself is dodgy. Might also explain why it plays ok at the beginning of a movie but starts playing up towards the end?

For the record my mobo is:

Elitegroup K7S5A

And drivers are here:

http://www.ecs.com.tw/ECSWebSite/Do...New&DetailDesc=&CategoryID=1&MenuID=6&LanID=8

Should I try disabling the audio sound processing like Arc suggested, put paging file onto the second HDD like Liam suggested or just get another DVD Rom Drive? Could it still be a driver problem?

Thanks for all the help

Chas

set the min and max sizes to 1152mb.

what might be happening is the page file gets filled to a point, and then windows decides it needs to resize - hence the sudden hard drive thrashing. if you lock the max and min sizes to the same value, it removes the option for windows to resize it.

however, ive just looked on my laptop and playing a 228mb WMV file over the network - windows media player is using circa 10mb, and cpu usage is around 30-40%. remember this is a 6 year old p3 500mhz laptop with 256mb ram. (still running windows xp pro) what i'm saying is you don't need more RAM, or at least you shouldn't do assuming the PC is setup properly

Check the memory useage when u are playing back DVDs.

in task manager (control+shift+escape), look at processes - watch it, and then try and make the dvd skip. what for process using a sudden amount of CPU or memory.

i would suspect audio, graphics or motherboard drivers are at fault. What motherboard do you have.

might be worth playing with the audio settings. look for an option to disable sound processing. look for an option to pass through to SPDIF. That way the software just demuxes it and sends the raw ac3 stream to the spdif port on the sound card, *should* elimiate any issues with sound processing.

 

[jug]

interesting, get someone to lend you a dvd drive to test your theory.

 

[fatboyj]

Hi

I have only quickly read so this have been suggested but have you updated the codecs??? I have had very simular problems with media players and it has always been the codecs. Update them and see if this makes any difference.