New VCD player release.

[OneThirty8]

I've just uploaded a scrambled binary and the source code for a fairly simple and probably buggy VCD player for Dreamcast over at the DCEmu.co.uk forums. Check it out if you're bored.

[Juan]

Nice

[tekkaman1]

Does it work?

[OneThirty8]

Of course it works. If it didn't work, I wouldn't release it. It may not work perfectly, but it will play MPEG movies, MP3 files, and VideoCDs. Those are things I've tested it with. I also tested it with my Star Wars Starfighter disc for PS2 (one of the few CD games I own) and it plays the pss files without sound. I've been told that it also plays SVCD, and it should, but you don't get to do cool things like menus and MPEG stills until I figure out more about what makes those things work. I think it works great with the movies I download from archive.org. VCD works but I need to work on a better audio output system so higher-bitrate streams (such as standard-compliant VCD) will sound better.

[curt_grymala]

I have tried it with VCD's and SVCD's made with both Nero Vision Express and DVD2SVCD.

It plays the video extremely well. The audio seems to skip a bit, which OneThirty8 is aware of and working on. It seems to be a problem that the memory can only pick up like every other byte of sound or something, and so you get a split second of sound followed by a split second of silence, followed by another split second of sound.

The only other problem I've found with the player is, if you put in a (S)VCD, it will auto-play the disc. However, if you use the player's controls to stop the disc, I have not yet found a way to start the disc over again without opening the lid of my DC and closing it again (so that the CD auto-plays again).

[OneThirty8]

I'm not sure if the sound problem is exactly as you describe (it *sounds* like what you describe, but I don't think that's the problem--I've gone over the output code pretty carefully looking for an error in my figuring out the size of the sound chunks and haven't found one, and the audio decoding code is exactly the same as for MP3, which plays fine) but it's definitely the weak point. On the plus side, I've released the source, and I'm still tinkering with it myself. The whole reason for doing this was that I wanted a good MPEG player with sync that doesn't require WinCE libs, and that has source code available for somebody else to improve if I get stuck on it.

[Shapyi]

Its great to see another MPEG player being worked on for Dreamcast. Thanks for the release!

[curt_grymala]

I've gone ahead and uploaded an SBI (I didn't realize OneThirty8 had already made one until I had already uploaded mine) to the DCHelp SBI repository.

I also uploaded the source to that same site.

[Nico0020]

unexpected and cool.

[dream devil]

it is very cool. I would love if you implement divx plug-in..... The options
Fast-forward is not working very well, because this option is very slow.

Please try adding some new features for it. NOw you re very intelligent

[OneThirty8]

I'll try to work on the fast-forward. All it does is skip everything but I-frames. I had it working a bit faster at one point by skipping every other i-frame, but it looked like garbage. DivX isn't a priority. If I add it, it will just just be DCDivX.

[Shapyi]

I finally got around to burning this app. I ran some tests with some anime VCDs I made awhile back. I have to say great work so far. I think this player has the potential to be a fully functiong VCD player. The audio was very skippy. I can't wait for the next version, keep up the good work

[OneThirty8]

*BUMP*

I'm finished with my BA in English, so I have time for some of my hobbies again. I think I just fixed the sound output problem in VC/DC. This thing should be seeing a bugfix release in the not-too distant future.

[emptythought]

SFD a possibility?

http://www.geocities.co.jp/Playtown/2004/dcdev/

Reame of sfd2mpg:
o audio streams is ADX adpcm format.
o video stream is I,P picture only. not used B picture.
o usualy mpeg has one system header for audio and video,
but sfd has two system header: one for audio, another for video.
o sometime additional data at top of file.

Unfortunately it doesn't have the source to it, but the adx2wav program does, which is what the audio stream is.

[OneThirty8]

SFD a possibility?

http://www.geocities.co.jp/Playtown/2004/dcdev/

Reame of sfd2mpg:
o audio streams is ADX adpcm format.
o video stream is I,P picture only. not used B picture.
o usualy mpeg has one system header for audio and video,
but sfd has two system header: one for audio, another for video.
o sometime additional data at top of file.

Unfortunately it doesn't have the source to it, but the adx2wav program does, which is what the audio stream is.

Maybe. I'll take a look. I think pss might be doable. La Cible had it working pretty much the same way I had mpeg audio working, so if I rewrite his code to be like mine, it should work in theory. My only concern would be that adding too many things to look for in the demuxer might slow down the program, so we'll see. But I would like it to support as many formats as possible. AC3 is also on my list--but these things aren't as important to me as a decent VCD player.

[OneThirty8]

Huh. I just found a glitch that I hadn't considered before. If you try to play an MP3 file that has an ID3v2 tag, you're going to get a bunch of garbage out of your speakers and the program will choke on you. I don't imagine people are really using my initial release for much (the sound on mpeg movies is admittedly horrible) but if you are, this issue exists in the publicly available version as well as my current development version, numbered 0.1a, as my next release will be a long-overdue 'bugfix,' although this particular bug may not be fixed. The bug I'm working on now is that movies with mono soundtracks play back all sorts of screwed up.

On the plus side, I think that within a few days you'll actually be able to watch VideoCDs on your Dreamcast with a free player. But still no support for menus. That'll be a huge undertaking if I ever manage to get it to work.

[Christuserloeser]

On the plus side, I think that within a few days you'll actually be able to watch VideoCDs on your Dreamcast with a free player. But still no support for menus. That'll be a huge undertaking if I ever manage to get it to work.

I tested VCD playback with two VCDs and it was really excellent. Some frames were skipped here and there but sound was spot-on. I think it's better than the one by Xing/Echelon.

I also threw a couple of MPG clips on a disc. They were encoded for Gypplay some time ago, but some also were taken straight from some websites. Funny thing is that the ones I encoded for Gypplay didn't seem to work too well, but the ones downloaded worked almost as good as VCD playback. Here's some info:


C:\BootDreams\vcdc\lasthope.mpg
General
Complete name : C:\BootDreams\vcdc\lasthope.mpg
Format : MPEG-1 Program
Format/Family : MPEG-1
File size : 21.8 MiB
PlayTime : 2mn 10s
Bit rate : 1397 Kbps
Video
Codec : MPEG-1 Video
Codec settings/Matrix : Custom
PlayTime : 2mn 10s
Bit rate : 1150 Kbps
Bit rate mode : CBR
Width : 352 pixels
Height : 240 pixels
Aspect ratio : 4/3
Frame rate : 29.970 fps
Interlacement : Progressive
Bits/(Pixel*Frame) : 0.454
Audio
Codec : MPEG-1 Audio layer 2
PlayTime : 2mn 10s
Bit rate : 224 Kbps
Bit rate mode : CBR
Channel(s) : 2 channels
Sampling rate : 44 KHz
Resolution : 16 bits

Playback: Definitely watchable, but with noticable frameskipping.

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------


C:\BootDreams\vcdc\aotb-teaser1.mpg
General
Complete name : C:\BootDreams\vcdc\aotb-teaser1.mpg
Format : MPEG-2 Program
Format/Family : MPEG-2
File size : 12.4 MiB
PlayTime : 53s 800ms
Bit rate : 1931 Kbps
Video
Codec : MPEG-2 Video
Codec profile : Main@Main
Codec settings/Matrix : Custom
PlayTime : 53s 800ms
Bit rate : 2500 Kbps
Bit rate mode : CBR
Width : 480 pixels
Height : 576 pixels
Aspect ratio : 16/9
Frame rate : 25.000 fps
Standard : PAL
Chroma : 4:2:0
Interlacement : Progressive
Bits/(Pixel*Frame) : 0.362
Audio
Codec : MPEG-1 Audio layer 2
PlayTime : 53s 655ms
Bit rate : 224 Kbps
Bit rate mode : CBR
Channel(s) : 2 channels
Sampling rate : 44 KHz
Resolution : 16 bits
Video0 delay : -40ms

Playback: Almost watchable but parts of top of the screen are also repeatedly displayed on the bottom of the screen.

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

C:\BootDreams\vcdc\trailer_jag.mpg
General
Complete name : C:\BootDreams\vcdc\trailer_jag.mpg
Format : MPEG-1 Program
Format/Family : MPEG-1
File size : 28.2 MiB
PlayTime : 2mn 50s
Bit rate : 1392 Kbps
Video
Codec : MPEG-1 Video
Codec settings/Matrix : Custom
PlayTime : 2mn 50s
Bit rate : 1150 Kbps
Bit rate mode : CBR
Width : 352 pixels
Height : 288 pixels
Aspect ratio : 4/3
Frame rate : 25.000 fps
Interlacement : Progressive
Bits/(Pixel*Frame) : 0.454
Audio
Codec : MPEG-1 Audio layer 2
PlayTime : 2mn 50s
Bit rate : 224 Kbps
Bit rate mode : CBR
Channel(s) : 2 channels
Sampling rate : 44 KHz
Resolution : 16 bits

Playback in VC/DC: Frameskipping just slightly noticable. Almost perfect.

[OneThirty8]

Thanks! That info is pretty helpful!

*edit* Ooooh... I think I might know what's up with that one video showing stuff on the bottom of the screen that should go on the top. I think I only allowed for a height of 512 pixels. I'll have to double-check that after I finish hunting down the cause of this other problem I'm experiencing...

[Christuserloeser]

I uploaded the files and edited the links in my previous post

[OneThirty8]

Awesome! Thank you!

Oh, and for the record... this player likes files with B-frames. I couldn't figure out why some files I downloaded played so slowly. They were encoded without B-frames. I'll be banging my head against the wall over this one for a bit...