crashing display engines while fading movies

[Svenny]

Hi,

 

I’m working with watchout 5.5.1. and I have the problem that while I’m fading movies in and out my display engines (I’m working with four devices and each one with one output) crash in different intervals.

I tested my show with a different setup and it works, so I suppose that it has something to do with my hardware, but i can’t pinpoint it.

Does anyone of you encounter a problem like this bevore? Or do you have any possible solutions?

 

Thanks a lot

Svenja

[Jonas Dannert]

I think you need to feed us with more information, in order for anyone being able to help out here.

 

- what hardware/software platform? (processor/SSD/graphics card/OS/properly tweaked etc)

- what kind of content? (codec/file-size in pixels/bitrate/framerate etc)

 

/jonas

[Svenny]

Motherboard: ASUS P7P55D-E

CPU: Intel I5-680 3,6 Ghz

graphics card: NVIDIA GeForce GTX 470

SSD: Kingston HyperX 256GB

RAM: G.SKILL F3-12800CL9D-8GBRL - 16GB total

Windows 7 Professionell 64-Bit

for sure they are all properly tweaked

 

the first time a display engine crashed, I had a Quicktime H.264 movie with 20Mbps, 50fps, constant bitrate, 1920*1080 pixels

later I worked with Mpeg Elementary Stream movies with 20Mbps, 25fps, 1920*1080 pixels and I also tested a Mpeg Program Stream file, but it was the same solution. My display engines crashed ...

[jfk]

Also, tell us about the display signal path.

Yes, I know, it has all the symptoms of a software / computer issue.

Yet when we observed events that would fit your description,

it worked out to be !*%& HDMI connections.

Our signal path was graphics card, MDP->HDMI 1.4a active adaptor, 1m 4k rated HDMI cable, 4k display

Granted we were driving HDMI at 3840x2160@30p.

Just the same, we were at a trade show exhibiting WATCHOUT

with a pretty solid brain trust on hand.

What to everyone appeared to be a software instability,

and make no mistakes, watchpoint was locking up

and the display never stopped showing an image.

Yet in fact this was a mechanical, display chain hardware triggered event.

Thanks to Fredrik Svahnberg for identifying this one.

Solution was to strain relief and tape all display connections.

[screenshaper]

Svetlana, what is the software you use to encode your movies?

H264 .mov often fails on watchout.

H264 .mp4 files are rock solid instead.

[Mike Fahl]

H264 .mov often fails on watchout.

H264 .mp4 files are rock solid instead.

 

Do you have an example of a "H264 .mov that often fails on watchout"? If so, please send it to support@dataton.se so we can take a look. In general I'd say the two container formats are equivalent. While a MOV file can contain a wider variety of things than an MP4, the MP4 standard is derived from the MOV file format, so at the core, they're pretty much the same, and are internally treated in the same way in WATCHOUT. Neither touches QuickTime these days, but play using WATCHOUT's native codecs.

 

Mike

[screenshaper]

I agree with you that h264 should be quite the same into .mp4 or .mov container, but I have experienced so many times .mov files that show just the first 10 - 20 frames and then freeze in WO display.

Just re-encoded in .mp4 files, they work perfectly.

 

Next time I will send one.