akc21 -- Thanks for the post. I only have a 27" Toshiba regular ol' tube TV (flatscreen though). Nothing fancy. So am I correct in thinking that it's not even worth the $50 to get a new player with the higher video capabilities I described, as I wouldn't see any difference on my TV? Let me know...
I bought this DVD player off of ebay because my extremly old Toshiba died on me, and I was in dire need of a cheap DVD player that could play my extensive collection of Japanese concert DVDs...
The only thing is, is that when I turn it on, I am not able to see the video.
I'm pretty sure, after looking through every single page of this thread, that the Progressive Scan is still on from the last owner (who refuses to help me, the -bleep-).
I tried opening the tray and pressing one, but that doesn't seem to help. I can hear audio, but not see video.
Can anyone give me the stroke guide to get the Progressive scan off? I've been trying to figure this out all day (really... ever since I woke up at nine this morning) and I just can't find any website that helps.
... but now I have another problem... I can only watch my DVDs in black and white.
I tried going through all of the colour things and changing them, but nothing makes any difference.
Watching Malice Mizer in black and white isn't exactly the coolest thing... after all, half the reason I watch it is because of their colourful costumes.
mmurakami: What output are you using from the player... if S-vid, you may have a bad cable there (you are getting the picture info but not the colour info).
If you're using s-vid or the composite (single yellow RCA jack), then it is possible the problem could be a standards setting on the player. NTSC-PAL: try changing them up and see what you get.
I burned a downloaded TV show to DVD to watch on my 642 player, and two out of the six episodes there is no picture, only a blank screen. But there is audio. I'm pretty sure I tested all six shows on the computer and on my friends 3040 player and they all played with picture.
Is there some reason why the 642 wouldn't show the picture on two of them?
Could they possibly be encoded a different way than the others?
@ bcounty: Yep, check them with mpeg4modifier. I always run my vids through mpeg4modifier before burning.
Load the vid into mpeg4modifier by either browsing for it, or just drag and drop it onto the app.
Here is what you want to see: square pixels, no more than 2 consecutive B-vops, no Qpel, no GMC, if there is a mpeg CUSTOM quantization type, it will not work. It should be H263, or MPEG, I have not had a problem with either quant type.
Packed bitstream or not... does not seem to have any effect, I have AVIs that have both, they work fine.
Of course there will also be some files that mpeg4modifier will not open at all, these will not work in this player. You will need to full re-encode these.
I have prolly forgotten some other shiznit, but this is the basics for playing vids on this fussy player. BTW, it ain't fussy if you know what to give it!! ;-)
Hope this helps. :-)
bcounty..Also U can try to run them through VirtulDub with Direct stream copy checked.This has helped me quite a bit.Save as new file,copy it to a RW & SEE IF IT PLAYS,But definetly check for QPEL,GMC if these are displayed your player will not play these.Although even audio won't play if these are present,i think nandub might be your answer or bad S/L
uSE g-sPOT FOR Audio & Video codes
I'm going to be converting some of my TV shows on dvd to DivX format, and it was suggested to me to use autogk to do so. I looked at that site, and it says you need to download the DivX 5.2.1 codec. 1. Can the 642 play DivX 5.2.1?
When I look it up on the Philips website, it just says DivX 5 as compared to it saying DivX 5.x for the 5140. It is the same thing and just Philips being inconsistant with how they list it?
It also says it's helpful to know the chipset of your player. 2. What is the chipset of the 642?
You also have the option of converting to XviD or DivX. What's the difference? 3. Can the 642 play XviD?
bcounty..Yep it will play them..But check out DrDivx..it does a better job on Audio & Video sync..Don't think U need any added codecs either..But if U do need codecs get K-Lite
Are there different versions of the 642 player that have different chipsets? I looked around a bit and it sounds like all 642's have the ESS Vibratto II chipset.
bcounty, XviD = mpeg4 = DivX, slightly different implementations of the same thing. That thread explains how to reencode an XviD file using qpel, gmc, etc. I can't explain the technical aspects of XviD, but apparently XviD allows for options not included in DivX and those options make the file unplayable on the 642.
So XviD is playable on the 642 WITHOUT those extra options you said that you can have in it that aren't available in DivX? (You had said there were certain options that make it unplayable on the 642, then you said that you play them on the 642 all the time...)
Thanks!
Oh, and would you say that both DivX and XviD are the same quality-wise?
Push the system button twice to have the player adjust itself to proper resolution and sound
Hi.. I bought a dvp642 at circuit city delivered for $49 after rebate... now that I feel good about that I wanted to add something simple that I didn't see in this thread but really didn't read each page... quite a bit here... I have the version 37 which may not matter but i had been going thru the hassle of trying to select the right screen resolution when the picture was distorted.. one time I accidently hit the system button twice(finger fart) and presto.. the movie was right.
I'm very happy with this player .. I put 6 XviD movies on each disk using nemo as a DVD DATA disk... takes less than 10 minutes.. shrinks the physical size of my library and it's nice to fall asleep and not wake up to a blue screen... my thinking is that the disk must spin much slower so some of the balance problems with burnt DVDs may be gone.
Haven't we covered this before? Like a couple of weeks ago. XviD contains options that make the file unplayable on a 642 --- OPTIONS --- meaning optional. Some XviD files will play, some won't, depending upon how it's encoded. I'm pretty sure this was posted here before, read it carefully:
Quote:*** Lisa B.'s Guide to Standalone DVD Player Compatibility ***
If you are tired of burning an AVI to disc, only to find out that it
doesn't play in your standalone DVD player, then this is the guide for
you!
Although I wrote this guide with the Philips 642 in mind, I will talk
about just about every AVI feature that could possibly affect standalone
playback, so it should be useful for anyone with a standalone DVD player.
There are really only two tools that you need to diagnose your AVI's -
MPEG4Modifier and GSpot. The latest versions of these can always be
downloaded at the great general-purpose video site, www.videohelp.com, in
the Tools section. Make sure to download the latest Beta of GSpot, since
it contains many features not in the latest stable version. You may also
want to download VirtualDubMod from the same site.
After launching MPEG4Modifier, simply click the browse button, then
select and open your AVI.
A. Aspect Ratio
This should be "Square Pixels". If it is anything other than "Square
Pixels", the Philips 642 will not play it. For other players, you may
want to make a small test sample, burn to CDRW, and see what happens.
To change the Aspect Ratio to "Square Pixels", just click the radio
button for "Square Pixels", click the "Save..." button, and you will be
prompted for a new AVI name....it will take a few minutes as it saves the
new, modified, AVI.
Keep in mind that MPEG4Modifier is not an encoder. When you save out a
new AVI, it is just changing header and/or packaging information, so
there will be no loss of video quality.
B. Packed Bitstream
The Philips 642 has no problem with packed bitstream, so if you have a
Philips 642, don't touch this option. Some other standalones have
problems with packed bitstream...the problem has been described as a
"stuttering" of the video. Keep in mind, though, there are other
possible causes of "stuttering", so you'll want to eliminate the other
possible causes first.
You should not unpack the bitstream unless you need to. Packed bitstream
can help maintain audio synch after editing or remuxing, for example.
To unpack the bitsteam, just click the radio button for "Unpack", click
the "Save..." button, and you will be prompted for a new AVI name....it
will take a few minutes as it saves the new, modified, AVI.
C. User Data
This is not very important, but it can tell you what version of DivX or
XviD was used to encode the AVI. You may also tell if someone has
mistakenly changed the 4CC code of the file.
D. Interlacing
The Philips 642 has no problem with a properly interlacedAVI. That
being said, I have yet to come across a properly interlacedAVI in all my
roaming around the internet. By "properly interlaced", I mean that the
original material was truly interlaced (not just telecined), and that the
interlace was properly maintained from source to final encoded AVI.
Here is what happens when you take a *progressive* source and encode it
as interlaced:
1. In the Philips 642, if the frame rate is *not* 29.97, then there will
be a very jerky playback. If the framerate is 29.97, then the interlace has no effect.
2. In other standalones, interlaced avi's may not play at all, or they
may look fine. This you'll need to test using the provided support
files.
MPEG4Modifer cannot "uninterlace" an AVI. If you are dealing with a
jerky playing interlacedAVI (and this is not due to wrong field order),
then you will need to re-encode it.
The other thing that can go wrong with an interlacedAVI is that the
field order can be wrong. If the field order is wrong, you will have a
very odd jerky movement which I can't quite describe, so refer to the
support files.
If you need to change the field order, just click the radio button that
is not currently selected (either "Top First" or "Bottom First"), click
the "Save..." button, and you will be prompted for a new AVI name....it
will take a few minutes as it saves the new, modified, AVI.
E. Video Info
This button supplies some additional important info. Click it, and look
for the following features:
1. QPel - The Philips 642 will not play Qpel. Some standalones will.
You may want to make a small test sample and see what happens.
QPel cannot be removed from an AVI. If your player doesn't play QPel,
then you will have to re-encode the AVI.
2. GMC - in parenthesis, you will see how many "warp points" were
possible. GMC is associated with S-VOPs. At the bottom of the window,
there will be a statistical breakdown of how many warp points were
actually used in the S-VOPs. The important thing to note is the
following: if it uses only 1 warp point 100% of the time, then the AVI will play without problems in the Philips 642. If, on the other hand,
some S-VOPs use more than one warp point, then the AVI will quit playing
as soon as it hits a "multi-warp-point" S-VOP.
GMC cannot be removed from an AVI, nor can the number of warp points be
modified. If your player doesn't play GMC, then you will have to re-
encode the AVI.
3. Quant type - The Philips 642 will play "H.263" or "MPEG" quantization
type. The Philips 642 has problems playing "Custom MPEG" quantization
type, but there is a workaround.
When the Philips 642 tries to play an AVI using "Custom MPEG"
quantization, then you will typically see all these pixellated, blocky,
psychedelic colorings. This can be fixed by pressing the "System Menu"
button (on the remote control) twice.
The "System Menu" fix is a cheap fix, and you will still notice some
funky color smearing throughout the film. This is mild enough that it is
acceptable to many people. To get the best results, though, all AVI's
with "Custom MPEG" should be re-encoded for proper playback on the
Philips 642.
There is also a minor incompatibility between the Philips 642 and the
"MPEG" quantization type, which is noticeable in certain kinds of
scenes.
This is why I do all my own encodes using H.263. See the support files
for more details.
4. N-VOPs - This is the rather interesting thing I discovered, that, to
my knowledge, no one else has discovered. The Philips 642 seems not to
recognize N-VOPs...in other words, it just skips right over them. This
leads to audio synch problems. The audio can be brought back in synch by
fast forwarding or rewinding a few frames, but then it will go back out
of synch the next time it encounters more N-VOPs.
Look at the number of N-VOPs. Keep in mind that everytime the player
hits an NVOP, the audio will get out of synch...if your AVI has more than
1 or 2 N-VOP's, you'll probably want to re-encode the AVI if you want it
to play back in synch on the Philips 642.
If you have a different player, it may play N-VOP's just fine, so test it
out with the file that I supply in the support files.
Don't use GSpot to figure out if you file has N-VOP's...GSpot will say
that all packed bitstream AVI's have N-VOP's whether they do or not!
MPEG4Modifier is great, but the one thing it doesn't tell you about is
how your AVI is interleaved. Interleaving tells you how the audio is
mixed with the video. This isn't important for playback from a hard
drive, but it is important when you are playing it off of a CD or DVD.
GSpot will tell you how your AVI is interleaved.
A. Audio
Look in the "Codec" field and see whether your AVI has MP3 or AC3 audio.
If the audio is something else, then you will have to re-encode the audio
if you want to play the AVI on the Philips 642. Re-encoding audio is
easy, but is beyond the scope of this guide.
B. Container
The container should be either "AVI v1.0" or "OpenDML (AVI v2.0)". If it
is anything else, then you should re-mux the AVI.
There should be a line labeled "Interleave:". If there is not, then your
audio is not interleaved with your video and you need to re-mux the AVI.
"preload" should be around 500. If it is 300-600, then great. If it is
not, then you should re-mux the AVI.
The other part of the interleave parameters depends on what kind of audio
you have.
1. Open AVI in VirtualDubMod.
2. If you get some kind of warning about VBR header, and it asks the
question "Do you want to rewrite the header?", then say "No".
3. Select "Video - Direct Stream Copy" (i.e., direct stream copy in the
"Video" menu)
4. For AC3 audio, select "Streams - Stream List"...Right-Click on the AC3 audio stream...Select "Interleaving..." from the pop-up menu...choose to
interleave audio every 64 ms (remember to click the "ms" radio button).
Then exit out of the dialog and the stream list (i.e., hit "OK" twice).
5. Select "File - Save As..."
6. Specify a new file name, and click OK.
*** Making a test sample of your AVI with VirtualDubMod ***
There's no need to burn the whole AVI just to test it out in your
standalone -- make a sample! Keep in mind though, that the sample is
"re-muxed", so just because it plays perfect in your standalone doesn't
mean that you don't need to check the interleaving of the original AVI with GSpot!
1. Open AVI in VirtualDubMod.
2. If you get some kind of warning about VBR header, and it asks the
question "Do you want to rewrite the header?", then say "No".
3. Select "Video - Direct Stream Copy" (i.e., direct stream copy in the
"Video" menu)
4. Select "Video - Select Range"...in the "Frames" column, set the length
to 3000, then exit out of the dialog (i.e., hit "OK").
5. Select "File - Save As..."
6. Specify a new file name, and click OK.
This isn't difficult, but is beyond the scope of this guide. One day
I'll write a re-encoding guide!
*** Support Files ***
I have a variety of little AVI clips that will let you test your
standalone, and see examples of various AVI problems and
incompatibilities. Information is in a separate read-me file.
*** Tips ***
1. If you have more than 1 physical hard drive in your computer, then
when you modify an AVI, or re-mux an AVI, you should choose a destination
folder which is not on the same physical hard drive as the source. This
will make the process a *lot* faster.
2. Unless you do a lot of encoding, you probably want to go into the
VDubMod's preferences and set "Direct Stream Copy" as the default video
processing mode...that way you won't have to set that option every time.
*** About the Guide ***
A lot of this I learned from an awful lot of trial and error. I hope you
guys find this to be useful information!
I don't know if this has shown up in this forum before, but I havn't seen it on the pages I've looked and and I've looked at a few.
I recently hooked up my Phillips DVP 642/37 up to an LG 37" LCD TV, flipped on the Progressive scan, hooked up the component video....
And I have a "flicker". That's all I can think to describe it. It only appears in the bottom third of the screen, and sometimes looks like an old horizonatal hold problem, but more often looks like the picture has jumped just slightly to the side. It lasts only a milisecond; it happens too fast to pause, and it can happen while the image is paused. It's not a problem with the discs, because when you rewind and play again, it's not there. You can take the disc out and put it back in, and it won't be there.
I can't predict when it'll happen, or with what disc.
It doesn't happen with my Playstation on progessive scan.
Is it the player (which I love for its verstility) or the cable? Some transmission problem from somewhere else?
My HDTV started having a similiar problem after I started using a system selector. I think it is diluting the signal strength just a tad. You may check your connections/cables.
Hi, does anybody know what DAC the 642 uses for audio processing - I know that it is a 192khz 24 bit setup but not the make/model is it a Burr-Brown ?. I tried asking Philips but they would not tell me adn it seems impossible to find out
The low end Burr-Brown 192/24 chips are only $5 or so and I guess if bought in bulk a lot cheaper - but you are probably right. So who else makes 192/24 chips for budget players ?
