Using Microsoft DTV-DVD Video Decoder to play H264 video

Question

I am trying to play an H264 video with graphedit on Windows 7 32bit. Graphedit is unable to render the file. I tried to mount the graph manually using the Microsoft DTV-DVD Video Decoder (also know as Microsoft MPEG-2 Video Encoder) but I could not connected the filters. Here is the pipeline I tried :

File Source >> Microsoft DTV-DVD Video Decoder >> Video Renderer (or VMR9)

I also tried this :

File Source >> MPEG-2 Demultiplexer >> Microsoft DTV-DVD Video Decoder >> Video Renderer (or VMR9)

In either case, I could not connect anything to the file source filter. The H264 video I am trying to play is the Serenity trailer I downloaded from here : http://www.h264info.com/clips.html

Do you have any idea how I could play the h264 video file with graph edit?

Thank you

Answer 1

Use the File source but connect it to Geraint Davies' free mpeg4 demux available at http://www.gdcl.co.uk/mpeg4/

If you then render the output pins of the demux, the video decoder will automatically be inserted. I just tried it with the video you mentioned and it works fine.

Answer 2

For starters. That file is an mp4, so you need an mpeg4 demuxer filter, which Microsoft does not provide for DirectShow. MediaFoundation supports it natively, but that functionality is not exposed to DirectShow. There are commercial DirectShow filters available or the open-source "ffdshow" plus "Haali Media Splitter" will do it. If your project can use the open source products, that will also provide a decoder with wide-ranging compatibility.

Assuming you don't want to use ffdshow and instead get a demuxer from elsewhere, it may or may not work with the Microsoft DTV-DVD Video Decoder. I've seen erratic results with it. A lot of content it just doesn't want to play.

One other thing is that you will likely want to use the Enhanced Video Renderer in Win7 instead of VMR9. VMR9 is neutered in Win7 (compared to XP). It's no longer compatible with dxva hardware acceleration, and the scaling is limited to the ugliest mode.