[Asazel]

i don´t know if it is possible, but it would be nice to have a detection for 16/9 video material. so when a 16/9 source is detected the xbox should send the widescreen switching signal to the tv, if the source is 4/3 the xbox should not send the widescreen switching signal, so that the tv can zoom the letterboxed sources. the reason for this is, that some pal 16/9 tv don´t allow zooming if there is the switching signal on the rgb-cable.

mfg,

asazel

[jmarshall]

what "widescreen switching signal" is this?

there is no widescreen switching signal for standard 16:9 televisions - they always take in the same signal. it is the source (dvd player or xbox) that simply stretches the video source vertically so that when it is squished vertically (or stretched horizontally) by the 16:9 tv, it looks as it should.

as for "autodetection" of 16:9, i've coded this up, and i'm sure it'll be added shortly. note that it will only work if the source video has an aspect ratio flag that the core player (mplayer) can detect. all mpeg1/2 videos will be fine, so vobs, svcd etc. etc. will look exactly as they are intended to look. avi has no support for an aspect ratio setting, so they're always assumed to have a pixel ratio of 1:1. we may add support for users to specify the pixel ratio separately sometime in the future, depending on the demand for such a feature.

cheers,
jonathan

[SteveX]

i'd love to drum up some demand to add a feature for setting different aspect ratios for avis. i personally like to save my mpeg2 files as divx files.

[ageddon]

http://www.matroska.org/

avi needs to die.

[SteveX]

avi needs to die.

so does the matroska container have an aspect ratio field and does xbmp/xbmc support it?

[Asazel]

@jmarshall

there is a switching signal for widescreen, two different voltage levels on one pin of the scart-plug let the tv know if there is a widescreen soure or not. for example the dbox(dvb-receiver) can detect the source and set this signal on the fly.

mfg,

asazel

[jmarshall]

thanks for the correction, asazel - i didn't consider scart connections, as they're not the norm here in nz.

assuming the xbox correctly sets this voltage level (and you have it hooked up via scart), then yes, this will be possible to add.

is the xbox hardware doing this correctly? (ie if you set widescreen mode under the msdash, does the tv correctly detect a widescreen signal? also, if you set the msdash up as non-widescreen, does the tv then correctly zoom the image?)

if so, then this can be easily implemented. if not, it will likely be impossible without inside knowledge of the tv encoder (which we don't have).

cheers,
jonathan

[ageddon]

avi needs to die.

so does the matroska container have an aspect ratio field and does xbmp/xbmc support it?

matroska has everything a container format could need right now (including aspect ratio flag), and is extendible for the future.

xbmp had semi-decent support for it until a recent move to vs.net. here's to hoping it will return shortly!

[burriko]

as for "autodetection" of 16:9, i've coded this up, and i'm sure it'll be added shortly. note that it will only work if the source video has an aspect ratio flag that the core player (mplayer) can detect. all mpeg1/2 videos will be fine, so vobs, svcd etc. etc. will look exactly as they are intended to look.

yes, at last! i just tried the latest cvs compile, and the ar detection works brilliantly. do you think these changes will also make it into xbmp?

thank you for a feature that i've been wanting for a long time.

[Asazel]

@jmarshall

no problem, if i set msdash to 4:3 the tv is in 4:3 mode, if set to 16:9 the tv is in 16:9 mode, so the xbox set this mode correct. i asked for this because most of my svcd are 4:3 in source, but with embedded black bars(i think its called letterbox). so if xbmc zoom this files to full 4:3 output (with black bars on top and bottom) the tv can zoom this and cut the black bars away more or less because of different movie ar(16:9 or 2.35:1). the tv can only zoom if it is in 4:3 mode

asazel

[jmarshall]

thanks for testing that out.

now my next question:

how should we implement this exactly? your widescreen tv has this handy auto-switching ability, but some may not. (any tv hooked up not using scart for instance.) there is no way to check this, so it definitely shouldn't be global behaviour. perhaps an option "this display can auto-switch 4:3 and 16:9" is the way to do it? if this is on, then when we look at the video file to obtain the correct resolution for it, we can set the mode correctly to 4:3 or 16:9, depending on the source.

how does that sound?

cheers,
jonathan

[Asazel]

hi jonathan,
this is exactly that what i mean. the option for setting autoswitching on or off sounds like the best way to go. so people with non-scart connections could still set it manual.

asazel

[jmarshall]

i've done some preliminary work on this, but need testers.

please pm me if you have a tv capable of switching from 16:9 to 4:3 zoomed based on source.

also, if you have a hdtv, that'd be handy too.

cheers,
jmarshall