Database Users

Where are multi-format Video Players? Core? mVideoPlayer? BluMedialab Media Player?

Quite simply, I've wanted to play my downloaded itunes TV shows, which are in .m4v format. Searched high and low. I'm not a developer, just a savvy end user, but I was surprised at how few offerings exist for multi-format video players on Android.
Here's what I've found so far. What am I missing?
1. BluMedialab.com 's Media Player v 1.6 - costs approx $3.50 USD - claims to play .m4v files. I bought it, it doesn't. Uninstalled and got refund.
The player that plays more media on your DROID then other apps: from your SD Card or streaming from web.
SD card: WMA, MP3, MP4, M4V, (small!) WMV, MID, 3GP (some)
Streaming: WMV, M4V, MP4 (also non-progeressive!)
Has a built-in SDcard browser, video RSS reader and webbrowser with Google search.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
They say their new TRIAL version is more advanced... So why they continue to sell any version at all is beyond me. But they do. This should be highly discouraged in my view. The moment it's clear an app doesn't perform as advertised, to sell it in the store is morally wrong, and I think such app developers should be economically punished by horrible reviews, and hammered with email til they take down their pay versions. It's ridiculous.
Here is their Trial Version Media Player v 2.2
FIXED crashing!. Please upgrade and update your reviews!
Plays media from your SD Card or streaming from web.
SD card: WMA, MP3, MP4, M4V, (small!) WMV, MID, 3GP(some)
Streaming: WMV, M4V, MP4 (also non-progeressive!)
Has a built-in SDcard browser, video RSS reader and browser with Google search.
Remembers your recents!
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
2. Core Player is coming, so they say: from Aug 2009:
While Android works great for many apps.... its A/V system designed by PacketVideo is far from robust enough to add onto no less use. David Turner one of the lead Android Devs even noted last week that there are major changes coming this way with each SDK/NDK release as it relates to multimedia, quoting: "(and believe me the graphics and media frameworks are under extensive changes at the moment, and will keep doing so for quite a number of upcoming releases)".
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
AndroidForums and other sites announce that CorePlayer Mobile 2.0 is soon coming to Android OS!!!
And here is, according to that thread, a pic of a build:
{
"lightbox_close": "Close",
"lightbox_next": "Next",
"lightbox_previous": "Previous",
"lightbox_error": "The requested content cannot be loaded. Please try again later.",
"lightbox_start_slideshow": "Start slideshow",
"lightbox_stop_slideshow": "Stop slideshow",
"lightbox_full_screen": "Full screen",
"lightbox_thumbnails": "Thumbnails",
"lightbox_download": "Download",
"lightbox_share": "Share",
"lightbox_zoom": "Zoom",
"lightbox_new_window": "New window",
"lightbox_toggle_sidebar": "Toggle sidebar"
}
and here is another from sizzlecore.com:
3. mVideoPlayer for Android:
Some user comments from AndroLib.com :
Without a doubt the best app for the G1 no damn question.
by Brandon the 3/5/2010
I love srt support. Now it's my default video player. Five star well earn. Thank you, Nexus One
by Karan the 3/2/2010
Works great for mp4s I play on here.
by Izzy the 3/2/2010
I like the UI and the "watched" color coding. Please add an "any order defined" playlist function... No other video app is doing that - be the first!
by Hunter the 3/1/2010
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
4. Everything Else....
I found this, Act 1 Video Player at hyperaware.com, and they say:
December 1, 2009 - There is a new version of the app called "Act 1 Video Player for And 1.5" which is intended for the Motorola Cliq and HTC Hero because they are currently stuck at Android 1.5. This version is equivalent to the old 1.13 version of the app and will receive no future upgrades, HOWEVER, you can feel confident purchasing this app because we will be issuing discounts to the latest version of the app when your phone's Android OS ugrades. When this happens, go ahead and purchase Act 1 Video Player then contact us with your Google Checkout order numbers for both "Act 1 Video Player" and "Act 1 Video Player for And 1.5". We will manually refund the difference in price between them.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
The comments from the Core Codec site explain why multi-format video players are not prevalent yet for Android. I have to say, really? After a whole year, and Google can't enrich their OS to play videos properly?
Someone please enlighten me. Where's that great app I am missing?

You forgot about the chinese app:
http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=642713

video format?

If I want to view video files on my Hero what format do I need to use? The files I currently want to watch are in divx format.
Thanks, TL

Time_Lord said:
If I want to view video files on my Hero what format do I need to use? The files I currently want to watch are in divx format.
Thanks, TL
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
If you download double twist to your computer, it will automatically format the video format to watch on your phone. Its super simple.

They need to be in mp4 format.

Time_Lord said:
If I want to view video files on my Hero what format do I need to use? The files I currently want to watch are in divx format.
Thanks, TL
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
divx is a avi which is not supported. I think there maybe a app that plays them but im not sure that its stable. Covert them to mp4.

I believe Meridian Noble plays AVI, not sure about DivX encoding.

It has to be encoded as mp4 and not divx or xvid. There is no codec in android currently to read a divx or xvid file.

ElAguila said:
It has to be encoded as mp4 and not divx or xvid. There is no codec in android currently to read a divx or xvid file.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Video support in Android just plain sucks in general imo.

i think yxflash supports divx, not sure how well it plays though and you have to pay for it

katmandu421 said:
Video support in Android just plain sucks in general imo.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Not necessarily any developers fault (not that you where blaming one) but its difficult to make an Android app run native code which is needed for decoding. The JVM from what I understand cannot handle that kind of work so it is passed on thru Native Code. Not impossible, just difficult.

Something to clarify: The difference between audio/video format and file container.
MKV, AVI, MP4, 3GP .. these are all containers. This DOES NOT specify the video or audio format.
I believe the best core supported media format is h.264 AVC video with AAC audio in the MP4 file container. You might be able to use different file containers or audio/video formats so you will just have to experiment.
I have not tried doubleTwist for video encoding yet, but you can find A LOT of info on video encoding over at the doom9.org forums. MediaCoder is also an excellent freeware application which has some device specific versions.

taken from my post in PPCGeeks
So far Format Factory seems to be the ticket for me with these settings. Played with Meridian of course
{
"lightbox_close": "Close",
"lightbox_next": "Next",
"lightbox_previous": "Previous",
"lightbox_error": "The requested content cannot be loaded. Please try again later.",
"lightbox_start_slideshow": "Start slideshow",
"lightbox_stop_slideshow": "Stop slideshow",
"lightbox_full_screen": "Full screen",
"lightbox_thumbnails": "Thumbnails",
"lightbox_download": "Download",
"lightbox_share": "Share",
"lightbox_zoom": "Zoom",
"lightbox_new_window": "New window",
"lightbox_toggle_sidebar": "Toggle sidebar"
}
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
http://forum.ppcgeeks.com/showpost.php?p=1744509&postcount=15

venumx said:
i think yxflash supports divx, not sure how well it plays though and you have to pay for it
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
that app doesn't work on the hero at all.

.mp4 format is the proper format I do believe.
-------------------------------------
Sent via the XDA Tapatalk App

[GUIDE] 720p Handbrake preset for TF101 (HC3.1 Update)

Update 5/28: Honeycomb 3.1 upgraded TF101 can playback 720p High Profile natively!
Verified with native player and Mobo(HW playback). Modified steps 3-3.1 to reflect HP settings, added HP preset and sample. Enjoy!
Since this question gets asked a lot lately and my post on one of the thread was buried, so I figured a separate thread would be helpful.
Background
As I understand it, Tegra 2 should playback up to High Profile 720p and Main Profile 1080p. However, with limitation on Honeycomb and/or lack of driver release by Nvidia, current crop of HC tablets do not playback anything above Baseline Profile smoothly. Future updates by Google/Nvidia should fix this issue, but it looks like we may have to reencode High/Main profile media for the time being.
Note that there are few software codec players(Mobo/Vital) that are able to playback High/Main profile H264 media files. My experience with these players were less than satisfactory and I wanted to stick with hardware decoding to maximize smoothness.
Guide
HandBrake is an open-source, GPL-licensed, multiplatform, multithreaded video transcoder, available for MacOS X, Linux and Windows. It offers variety of H264 encoding options via GUI and easy to use. Best of all, it is FREE.
You can obtain HandBrake from this link.
Once you have HandBrake installed and have a source file opened, there are only few tabs you need to setup.
1. Select the mp4 container and set the picture width to 1280. Anamorphic should be loose and Modulus 16. Large File Size can be check for better compatibility.
{
"lightbox_close": "Close",
"lightbox_next": "Next",
"lightbox_previous": "Previous",
"lightbox_error": "The requested content cannot be loaded. Please try again later.",
"lightbox_start_slideshow": "Start slideshow",
"lightbox_stop_slideshow": "Stop slideshow",
"lightbox_full_screen": "Full screen",
"lightbox_thumbnails": "Thumbnails",
"lightbox_download": "Download",
"lightbox_share": "Share",
"lightbox_zoom": "Zoom",
"lightbox_new_window": "New window",
"lightbox_toggle_sidebar": "Toggle sidebar"
}
2. Under Video Tab, Make sure the options are set to "H.264","Same as source", and "Constant Quality". You can keep it a RF:20. Optionally, you can change the RF slider for better quality or smaller size. Higher RF number means smaller size but less quality. Also, you can choose "Average Bitrate" or "Target Size" option if you like.
3. Update: For Honeycomb 3.1, Follow step 3.1 for high profile settings. Last Tab but most important, set your advanced options exactly same as picture below. You can play with settings but CABAC, 8x8, and P-Frames has to be checked off to keep it baseline profile.
3.1 This is High Profile settings for HC 3.1 TF101.
That's it. Start your encode and enjoy your 720p on your Transformer.
Included below is my presets and sample movies I encoded using the profiles.
Baseline Sample on Megaupload
High Profile Sample on Megaupload

Whoa, baseline can't use B-frames? No wonder it's so much worse than main/high. I hope 720p high profile support gets fixed soon.

hows the file sizes after conversion? i have some movies that are 6GB and won't fit on the formats required for android memory.
so i was hoping to do something like this to knock them down to under 4.

With constant quality, average bitrate comes out to about 2600Kbps for above sample. Source file size for the above sample(130mb) was around 480mb. For better size control, you can try the target size option from video tab.

I encoded a 720p 130MB file and it turned out at 146MB with the profile file.

I used this Handbrake preset on a 986MB 720p high profile 2 hour movie and the resulting file size was 2.48GB. Movie played great with the default video player, just can't get many on an 8GB microSD card.

I used to use MeGUI to reencode videos for my PSP,and it's good at this job.
I'll have a try according to your post,thanks.

If you are used to MeGUI, then no need to use Handbrake. Just select the baseline from x264 option and configure the rest to your likings.

Is badaboom any good for this purpose? Both handbrake and badaboom have cuda acceleration, correct?

looking at the demo video of badaboom, there is baseline setting under advanced option so I assume it will work as well. It doesn't seem to have detailed options so tweaking doesn't seem possible though. I wouldn't spend $40 on badaboom while handbrake does the job for free.

I've converted it to your settings. However my file is only 1.3GB. When I connect my unit through usb and try to add it by dragging and dropping, it says that the operation cannot continue. My only options are to stop or skip the file transfer.
Edit- Nevermind. It wasn't finished converting yet! Duh!

the demo clip in the OP is excellent and plays smooth as butter on my E pad and looks brilliant

I have played 1080p AVCHD files via moboplayer and they are flawless. Or am I missing something?

Players like mobo, rock, and vital are all utilizing software decode playback. While software decoding handles some/most of HD profiles, it certainly is not the end-all be-all answer. Software decoding does a decent job of playback HD on some media, but tends to choke once the decoding process gets complicated. Re-encoding allows you to playback your media files with player of your choice including default player using hardware decoding. Until there is a HC/Nvidia "fix" to allow maximum hardware decoding capabilities of Tegra 2, re-encoding is the best at the moment solution for smooth playback. However, if you are happy with software players, I don't see a reason to waste time on re-encoding.

I made a mistake. When I streamed my AVCHD files from my core i5 laptop, they were great. When I streamed the same files from my Core2Duo laptop there were problems.

dont understand high profile /main profile stuff but i can confirm i used these handbrake settings on a 1920 x1080 .ts of i robot it went from 9.89 gog to 3.27 gig and work flawlessly on my transformer , excellent picture and no audio out of sync, as i plan to us the dock as well then a using the SD card slot for loads of films to take on holiday etc for the kids should not be an issue
my only question now is why in the gallery when you see movie folders and all the movies does it not display the titles underneath?

buri73 said:
Players like mobo, rock, and vital are all utilizing software decode playback. While software decoding handles some/most of HD profiles, it certainly is not the end-all be-all answer. Software decoding does a decent job of playback HD on some media, but tends to choke once the decoding process gets complicated. Re-encoding allows you to playback your media files with player of your choice including default player using hardware decoding. Until there is a HC/Nvidia "fix" to allow maximum hardware decoding capabilities of Tegra 2, re-encoding is the best at the moment solution for smooth playback. However, if you are happy with software players, I don't see a reason to waste time on re-encoding.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
could you maybe explain this a little more? what's wrong with software decoding if it's smoother than hardware? does it use a lot more battery or something?

combat goofwing said:
my only question now is why in the gallery when you see movie folders and all the movies does it not display the titles underneath?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
That's gallery by design. It doesn't show title of any media inside the folders.
fastfood8891 said:
could you maybe explain this a little more? what's wrong with software decoding if it's smoother than hardware? does it use a lot more battery or something?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Like I said above, if you are happy with software decoding then you don't have to reencode anything. Some of high profile/bitrate HD media can not be handled by software alone. That's where re-encoding comes in.
I don't know if this is the best analogy, but software decoding to me is like you buying a hybrid car and only be able to use the gas engine only. With the help of 3rd party modification(software player in our instance), you may get more mileage out of the gas engine, but you are not utilizing the car to it's full potential.

Players like mobo, rock, and vital are all utilizing software decode playback. While software decoding handles some/most of HD profiles, it certainly is not the end-all be-all answer. Software decoding does a decent job of playback HD on some media, but tends to choke once the decoding process gets complicated. Re-encoding allows you to playback your media files with player of your choice including default player using hardware decoding. Until there is a HC/Nvidia "fix" to allow maximum hardware decoding capabilities of Tegra 2, re-encoding is the best at the moment solution for smooth playback. However, if you are happy with software players, I don't see a reason to waste time on re-encoding.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Are you sure there will be a fix? Asus manual says the transformer supports simple profile. Of course, they could lose sales if they do not "fix" it.

buri73 said:
looking at the demo video of badaboom, there is baseline setting under advanced option so I assume it will work as well. It doesn't seem to have detailed options so tweaking doesn't seem possible though. I wouldn't spend $40 on badaboom while handbrake does the job for free.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Yep. Handbrake doesn't do CUDA, but it does use multiple cores if you have them available. Last I heard, badaboom's output wasn't all that great anyway.

Best Apps & Video Player for Xperia Play: Supporting MKV with srt /ssa subs '720p'

Best Apps & Video Player for Xperia Play: Supporting MKV with srt /ssa subs '720p'
I'am an huge fan of Japanese anime and i do prefer watching my movies and series in their native language with subs. Yesterday i was checking the market for the Holy grail and after 4 hours i finally found the solution.
So after installing and checked every player in the market i finally found the only player that can play BD Rip 720p (1280x720) with subs (srt & ssa) function with hardware acceleration.
I tested all the Free and priced application and i can tell for sure that many of those one don't play MKV and need optimization and work on hardware acceleration:
RockPlayer (pro) 1.7.2 : Laggy, don't load subtitles, glitch/pixelation/macroblock depending on the video.
No support for hardware acceleration for Xperia Play use software mode to play the video.
Good Menu and options
Move to SD
Vplayer 0.9.4 (unlocker): Buggy, laggy, don't load subtitles inside MKV incremented, glitch/pixelation/macroblock depending on the video.
No support for hardware acceleration for Xperia Play use software mode to play the video.
Move to SD
Best video Player : Might be the same as above with a different name Not tested...
VLC direct pro: Streaming load movies and video from computer...
Forget about it...
VitalPlayer 1.2.7 (Pro): Play fine with little lag in software mode, don't load subtitles inside MKV. (UTF 8 not supported ?) glitch/pixelation/macroblock depending on the video.
No support for hardware acceleration for Xperia Play use software mode to play the video.
Good option and menu but ugly interface
Move to SD
MvideoPlayer 2.8.2 : This app is weird cause it says that it DOES ONLY PLAY WHAT YOUR PHONE ALREADY SUPPORTS... but to tell you the truth what the purpose of a player if it plays what you have already.
Don't load any MKV on Xperia Play
No support for hardware acceleration for Xperia Play use software mode to play the video.
Good interface.
Move to SD
QQplayer 1.0.152: One of the best player i tested using Software acceleration - in fact this player can play everything i tried with some little lag at starts but really the subtitles are working with some errors on opening in Anime but everything works fine when you are watching the episode.
Many usefull option and simple interface.
No support for hardware acceleration for Xperia Play use software mode to play the video.
Move to SD (really small size)
ArcMedia 1.5 (pro): What! No app2SD! Big! Don't waste my time ! Not tested
MoboPlayer v1.2.145 Free; This player is awesome, great interface can play everything smoothly, Move to SD small size in internal, Thumb support, Ultra great option that permit almost everything. Support Hardware Acceleration for Xperia Play ! No Lag, Subtitle working greatly (multi sub track works) Opening in anime show all the subtitles : lyrics/translation/japanese
1080p: Laggy
Play every Format and accept stream
Best of the Best
https://market.android.com/details?id=com.clov4r.android.nil&feature=top-free
Website: http://www.moboplayer.com/moboplayer_en.html
{
"lightbox_close": "Close",
"lightbox_next": "Next",
"lightbox_previous": "Previous",
"lightbox_error": "The requested content cannot be loaded. Please try again later.",
"lightbox_start_slideshow": "Start slideshow",
"lightbox_stop_slideshow": "Stop slideshow",
"lightbox_full_screen": "Full screen",
"lightbox_thumbnails": "Thumbnails",
"lightbox_download": "Download",
"lightbox_share": "Share",
"lightbox_zoom": "Zoom",
"lightbox_new_window": "New window",
"lightbox_toggle_sidebar": "Toggle sidebar"
}
Description
Enjoy Your Videos.
The best video player on Android! Watch any of your videos on a phone without conversion, anytime and anywhere.
We feature the best playback experience and quality.
Our video player supports:
All video formats (need to choose "software decoding" mode in most cases)
Popular subtitle formats such as SRT, ASS, and SAA
Subtitles built in MKV, MPV, MOV, and others
Multi-audio streams and multi-subtitles
Playlists and continuous play on same type files
Videos streamed through HTTP, RTSP protocols
Media libraries and sort videos by type
Thumbnail displays of videos
Changelog Already Added. 5 Star PLZ!! -_-!!!
---
Make the best player for Android platform can not satisfy us now! Now we want to develop a perfection software on Android. If you have any suggestions or bugs, you are welcome to notify us by the following ways:
email: [email protected]
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
This link is only for those who cannot access market ! Remember the app is free and the count is important for the dev! Also there is update made for this tool! you might want the last version ?
http://www.megaupload.com/?d=ZUGZK1J4
If someone found another great player and make a review and share it. That would be Great
-------
Update May 18: (see post bellow)
Application Compatible and working fine with Xperia Play
I did some other test/comparison on many others program here what I found and chosen per Type:
Note Almost all of them move to SD
Remote: MPC-HC Remote
FTP client (Phone to pc): AndFTP
IRC client : Android IRC
Unrar/rar/zip/unzip : Androzip
File transfer Wifi GPRS : Dropbox
PC Control: Teamviewer
Emulation (Neogeo and others): Tiger Arcade and N64oid
File Explorer: Astro, AndExplorer, Appinstaller
Task Management: Advanced Task Killer
Cache Cleaner: 1Tap Cleaner
GPS: IGO
Music: PowerAMP
I will make another thread for Games (i have tested a lot too)
Enjoy your xPlay

Great post, good of you to take the time out to post your testing results.

+1, This is a great post . Never thought of watching anime on my phone. Might have to give it a try. Thanks for taking the time saves me some trouble.
I'am an huge fan of Japanese anime and i do prefer watching my movies and series in their native language with subs
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
*shudders @ the thought of people watching english dubs*

And, gotta give you thanks for the heads up on mobo player.
I've been converting all my video files for use with mVideoPlayer. Just tested mobo player with a couple of files (mp4, mkv, wmv & 'video clip'), works a treat, you've saved me a lot of time there.

just what i was looking for, thank for the time spent m8

No problem i like helping when i found something usefull
I did some other test/comparison on many others program here what I found and chosen per Type:
Note Almost all of them move to SD
Remote: MPC-HC Remote
FTP client (Phone to pc): AndFTP
IRC client : Android IRC
Unrar/rar/zip/unzip : Androzip
File transfer Wifi GPRS : Dropbox
PC Control: Teamviewer
Emulation (Neogeo and others): Tiger Arcade and N64oid
File Explorer: Astro, AndExplorer, Appinstaller
Task Management: Advanced Task Killer
Cache Cleaner: 1Tap Cleaner
GPS: IGO
Music: PowerAMP
I will make a thread for Games (i have tested a lot too)

I was lucky and found Mobo Player in a few minutes. Didn't realise people didn't know about it or i woulda made a mobo player thread ages ago.
Here's a tip for Mobo Player -
If a video file doesn't play, switch to software mode and it will work.
I havn't come across an.avi file that hasn't worked perfectly on my Xperia Play with Mobo Player yet.
It is indeed awesome

cant say I've gotten around to watchning videos on the device apart from BBC iPlayer or YouTube but I'll definitely give it a shot. You never know when you need a video player

Thanks dude I do lots of road trips and this will be perfect, especially since rockplayer doesn't work for me
Sent from my R800i using XDA App

I don't really have a Play, but seeing Arc and Play are pmuch the same thing - Arc Media Pro is hands down the best media player, MoboPlayer lags when you compare the two

Weird...I tried to play a 720p episode of flight of the conchords...no audio.
Next, 720p episode of South Park...audio, but no video..then force close, leaving my cpu pegged at 100% with no visible process to end. Must Reboot.
well..terrible time with it so far..dunno why it hates me

speedyink i have both mobo and QQ installed i don't have any problem playing my anime episode 720p. but i had an incompatibility once on an episode and used QQ to play it. You should have at least two installed to do the comparison on some files.

kenshindono said:
speedyink i have both mobo and QQ installed i don't have any problem playing my anime episode 720p. but i had an incompatibility once on an episode and used QQ to play it. You should have at least two installed to do the comparison on some files.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I'll try qq player

Great post! Thanks for all the information and details. This will be good for those who follow serialized dramas!

Don't forget use cifs.ko to stream 720 over wifi
Sent from my R800i using XDA Premium App

Mozza2k11 said:
+1, This is a great post . Never thought of watching anime on my phone. Might have to give it a try. Thanks for taking the time saves me some trouble.
*shudders @ the thought of people watching english dubs*
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
True that. Totally prefer in original language. (Although the occasional ParodyDub is fun). As a US person though, besides FanSubs, I also make use of a service called "CrunchyRoll" which has an android app. I suggest US folks try it out. I know it is also available in several other places (minus Japan) and lots of current series are simulcast (well within an hour of broadcast in Japan, and with subtitles) for subscribers and available otherwise after 1 week.

Try Diceplayer 1.3.0
Diceplay finally support Xperia Arc.
Diceplayer can play 720p High + DTS + MKV files with HW Video Acceleration.
ssa/srt/smi external sub + mkv embedded subs

FrAsErTaG said:
Don't forget use cifs.ko to stream 720 over wifi
Sent from my R800i using XDA Premium App
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Is that in the market? Do I need to root?
Edit: Never nind. I found it. I'll try it when I get home.
Thanks

Yup! i using MOBO player just like you, and its great!

FrAsErTaG said:
Don't forget use cifs.ko to stream 720 over wifi
Sent from my R800i using XDA Premium App
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Cifs.co does not work for me. I get a null pointer error when I try to connect to a share.

[Q] Stuttering on video playback - MP4 1280 x 720

I have some high quality video (BBC Frozen Planet - "H264 - MPEG-4 AVC (part 10) (avc1) 1280 x 720" according to VLC Codec Details) that really stutters with the standard video app. I tried DICE Player and it was no better. I tried MX Video Player and I finally seem to be getting somewhere - but I am puzzled.
MX Video Player has a choice of decoding modes at the touch of a button:
H/W Decoder
S/W Decoder
S/W Decoder (fast mode)
H/W mode is still stuttering, but the other two seem to work perfectly. (Wow - I love this screen!!)
So why doesn't H/W mode work?
And does anyone know which of the other two is the best (by which I probably mean uses least battery)?
Will S/W modes use more power than H/W?

fjuniper said:
So why doesn't H/W mode work?
And does anyone know which of the other two is the best (by which I probably mean uses least battery)?
Will S/W modes use more power than H/W?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
1. I can't give you any details about why the HW decoder would have issues without the video in question, but I assume it has some unusual settings in the encoding that confuse or bog down your decoding hardware. It's not something that comes up a lot, honestly--usually hardware decoding either works fine or fails outright, in which case you can fall back to software decoding.
2. I honestly don't know exactly the difference between fast and normal software decoding in MX. I assume the "fast" flavor is optimized for speed at the cost of quality, but I haven't been able to discern any differences between the two modes.
3. Yes, SW decoding uses massively more power than HW. The tab has fixed-function video decoding units that use relatively little power for the codecs it supports, while the CPU can sit idle. In software mode, the CPU is doing the decoding, so you're going to be taxing it heavily, which is a very large power drain. I almost never play software video on mobile devices, but I'd expect your battery life to be about half as good with software decoding compared to hardware.

stuttering has to do with bitrate...especially since the format your file is is what I rip to and I've had no problems...even in software...I've found that you lose no quality with a bitrate of around 6k for 720p...I haven't tried higher because you get close to the 4gb FAT32 limit with a full length film
Have you tried the file on your pc? And if your bitrate is too high...use format factory to bring it down

Thank you for your detailed answers teiglin and bdroc.
@teiglin (3) Confirmed what I thought about H/W versus S/W.
@bdroc The attached image from VLC suggests that the bit rate is around 400 kb/s, which seem an awful lot less than the 5k you mention, so I am not sure how low I should go if I re-encode in Format Factory. I am trying the Mobile Devices preset -> HD AVC(H264) 1280x720 which uses 1500KB/s. 1% complete so far...
The file came direct from the BBC btw, using get_iPlayer. It plays perfectly on a laptop. With the window sized to 7.7 inches like the tablet, the tablet looks so much better! (ThinkPad T400).
{
"lightbox_close": "Close",
"lightbox_next": "Next",
"lightbox_previous": "Previous",
"lightbox_error": "The requested content cannot be loaded. Please try again later.",
"lightbox_start_slideshow": "Start slideshow",
"lightbox_stop_slideshow": "Stop slideshow",
"lightbox_full_screen": "Full screen",
"lightbox_thumbnails": "Thumbnails",
"lightbox_download": "Download",
"lightbox_share": "Share",
"lightbox_zoom": "Zoom",
"lightbox_new_window": "New window",
"lightbox_toggle_sidebar": "Toggle sidebar"
}

I like this program to look at video info
http://mediainfo.sourceforge.net/en

Masterface7 said:
I like this program to look at video info
http://mediainfo.sourceforge.net/en
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Thanks for that. So my original files was:
Overall bit rate : 2 467 Kbps
Bit rate : 2 367 Kbps
Maximum bit rate : 3 500 Kbps
And the same file after conversion in FormatFactory using the preset mentioned below is:
Overall bit rate : 1 617 Kbps
Bit rate : 1 489 Kbps
The second file seems to play perfectly well in MX Video Player in H/W Decoder mode, so that is good, though it is a shame to have to convert what seem to be perfectly good files to be able to use them on the Tab... It took 1hr 47mins to convert the 58 minute file!