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Sound Bites LLC

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Everything posted by Sound Bites LLC

  1. MPEG 2 is your best choice. Here is the official guide to video encoding for Watchout: http://forum.dataton.com/index.php?app=core&module=attach&section=attach&attach_id=114 Hope this helps.
  2. The Lightware DVI Routers can also output 1080i30 whilst taking in 1080p60. FYI
  3. I always do a clean install. I also uninstall the CM software before reinstalling.
  4. Sorry, I was just posting a link to current BM products that do 4K switching. The Analog Way Ascenders can do 4K with the upgrade option and have 3 DisplayPort inputs per unit. http://www.analogway.com/en/products/mixers-seamless-switchers/premium-av-switchers/ I have not looked for 4K capable DP EDID managers.
  5. https://www.blackmagicdesign.com/products/atem
  6. We have just never had an issue with the BlackMagic cards in my systems. Even the inexpensive Mini Recorders work without issue. One thing you need to do is open the BM Media Express software, then in the Preferences, set the Project Video Format to the format you will be feeding it, i.e; 720P @60 or 1080i @30, etc. You also need to make sure you have selected the right input that you will be using in the Windows Control Panel applet. They do not auto-detect the incoming signal. If you don't do this step, then it won't work in ANY program, let alone Watchout. They have never failed to work for me when set up correctly. I've even used them with Microsoft Expression Encoder for simple webcasting without any headache whatsoever. I'm sure the DataPath products are great. So are the BM cards. They just require proper setup, as with any software or hardware. My .02 Galen
  7. Thanks for the response and the advice, Mike. I'll give a shot at re-encoding the videos and see how it goes with ffmpeg. It's cool regarding the support for the HAP codec. Looking forward to seeing Watchout 6 in action. What I'm really curious about though is why does Watchout 5.x use up so much more CPU to play the same videos? Any thoughts on that?
  8. Hi All, So yesterday, Steve Farris and I tested some 4K playback on 2 different systems. One was a new Mac Pro w/ the Quad Core 3.7GHz Xeon w/ D300 GPU's and the other was my machine with an AMD FX-9590 @4.7GHz w/ a FirePro W9100. Both of these offer similar performance in the CPU department. Both machines are running Windows 8.1 Pro 64 Bit, fully updated. SSD's in both systems. Plenty of RAM. We only tested 2x 4K screens per machine since that's all that was available. These videos had the following basic parameters: 3840x2160 pixels H.264 24 or 29.97 FPS (depended on the individual video) Variable Bitrate that swings between 15-33Mbps Using VLC to play 4K videos, each machine could play 6x 4K videos using between 85-92% of the CPU on average. In Watchout 5.5.2, only 3 streams of any of these would play smoothly. Adding a 4th would peg the CPU. 2 of these 4K videos used approximately 60-65% CPU when using Watchout. The same vids played in VLC only used 25-28% CPU. It made no difference if the vids were full screen or windowed in VLC or full screen or scaled in Watchout. Is this just due to CODEC issues? VLC is not configured to offload any decoding to the GPU. VLC was also not installed, but in a standalone folder using the portable version. No CODEC packs were installed on the systems. Any ideas? EDIT: I'm going to add to this that I tested these same videos in QuickTime and it couldn't play 2 of these videos at the same time smoothly. They paused randomly, and stuttered. The CPU hovered between 40-50%.
  9. We always use DVI routers on Watchout shows. Generally, Lightware products. We then convert at the output of the router to either fiber or SDI to make the runs to the projectors. The Lightware products provide solid EDID management and if there is ever a problem, it's either a faulty cable, adapter or video output on the video card itself.
  10. I would just get the Active adapters with the Female HDMI connectors, then get locking HDMI cables. Adapters: http://www.accellcables.com/collections/adapters/HDMI Cables: http://www.accellcables.com/collections/cables/products/avgrip-pro-locking-high-speed-hdmi-cable?variant=846828341 Hope this helps. Galen
  11. The HD 7750 and the FirePro W600 use the same GPU. So this card: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814129274has the same amount of graphical horsepower as this card: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814195115&cm_re=firepro_w600-_-14-195-115-_-Product With the FirePro, you're paying for driver certification and testing, plus some extra features like Projector Overlap support and additional Eyefinity configurations, which Watchout doesn't need, nor use. So, for light duty shows, the 7750 listed is as suited to Watchout as the W600 is. IMHO. I'd get the Eyefinity 6 version, personally. Hope this helps. Galen
  12. On some motherboards, the x4 slots are configured by default to run @x1 speeds and need to be set to run @x4 speeds in the BIOS. Generally, you can just install these cards in the X16 slots and call it good. Hope this helps. My .02 Galen
  13. Regarding the new Mac Pro's and the GPU arrangement: Only 1 card is connected to the video outputs, just like in a standard Crossfire arrangement. (SLI is Nvidia's term) The other GPU is only used for GPGPU purposes under OSX; things like GPU accelerated Video Encoding for programs like FCX, and Adobe CS/CC. When running Windows 8.x, the cards are Crossfired with no ability to turn this off and unless an application has a Crossfire profile written for it by AMD, there is no benefit provided by the 2nd card. These cards would use the FirePro drivers under Windows. Eyefinity works under Windows and all 6 outputs are able to be used. You can use standard SL-DVI-D Active Adapters for all 6 outputs under Windows. These cost about $30.00. You don't have to use to the Apple DL-DVI-D $150.00 adapters. Personally, I think they're really overpriced since you are stuck with the configuration they designed and do not have the luxury of configuring things as easily as you would with a full Windows PC. Also, under OSX, there are a lot of GPU features that lay inaccessible, such as Eyefinity or the ability to use all 12 video outputs from the 2 GPU's. However, for every Mac Pro sold, AMD sells 2 GPU's, so there's that. ;-) I'm glad you were able to get some more value out of those quirky little things. Depending on the CPU you went with, such as the 6 Core Xeon @3.5GHz w/ 12 Threads, you could run some intensive Watchout shows I would imagine. My .02 Galen
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