DOS ain't dead

Thanks to Michael Kostylev, MPLAYER has been ported to DOS (using DJGPP compiler and Allegro library for video and sound output). You can download it here: http://mik.mkw.ru/dos-stuff/

It works well enough with my four VESA 2.0 compatible video cards, but a member of this board has complained that he has some VESA problems running it (See: http://www.bttr-software.de/forum/forum_entry.php?id=1127).
Test for yourselves and if you detect some problems, please inform Michael Kostylev.

Actually it uses Allegro only for sound output. Video output uses a patched version of MPLAYER vesa driver. I can confirm now that there is a VESA problem with some video cards. It seems that the video mode list is overwritten. The problem appears in case the pointer to the video modes returned by VESA function 4f00h is relative to the buffer address passed to the function, i. e. the mode list is returned in that buffer.

> Actually it uses Allegro only for sound output. Video output uses a patched
> version of MPLAYER vesa driver. I can confirm now that there is a VESA
> problem with some video cards. It seems that the video mode list is
> overwritten. The problem appears in case the pointer to the video modes
> returned by VESA function 4f00h is relative to the buffer address passed
> to the function, i. e. the mode list is returned in that buffer.

???
Well, my GeForce has full VESA 3.0 support and all other VESA programs work OK. BTW: Deniska found an interresting thing - if you redirect the output to nul:
"MPLAYER vide.avi > nul" it (after few error messages) works.
However you can't choose a resolution and fullscreen option (/fs) breaks screen aspect ratio.

> ???
> Well, my GeForce has full VESA 3.0 support and all other VESA programs
> work OK.

I think you didn't understand what I said. Please read more carefully. Some video cards return the video mode list in the buffer passed to VESA function 4f00h. If you use the same buffer with VESA function 4f01h without copying the available video mode list in other place, it is overwritten. If this is the problem (so it seems to me), it is a bug of MPLAYER DOS port.

> BTW: Deniska found an interresting thing - if you redirect the
> output to nul:
> "MPLAYER vide.avi > nul" it (after few error messages) works.

In case MPLAYER doesn't work with that specific video card, is hard for me to belive this could be a solution. Have you tried?

> In case MPLAYER doesn't work with that specific video card, is hard for me
> to belive this could be a solution. Have you tried?

Yes, I did - it works.

> Yes, I did - it works.

Very strange. I've found two ATI video cards (ATI MACH64 and ATI RADEON 9200) which show the VESA problem, and I can asure you that redirecting the output to nul doesn't help at all. The problem is still the same.

> that redirecting the output to nul doesn't help at all.

OK, more tests:

From 3 PC's not a single one worked without "nul" hack ...

With "nul" hack 2 started working (both NVIDIA VESA 3.0), but still bugs:

- Excessive crying (see my shots) before playing starts
- Steals up to 10 seconds of movie while crying
- On some movies bad scaling (width cca doubled, height OK), not specific to -fs
- Some movies + some VESA's shut down the monitor before playing, "plays" nevertheless (you just don't see anything useful ) - HD active, ESC aborts

When it works, it works pretty well (centered on screen by default, -fs works as supposed, seems acceptably fast ...

No help with "nul" hack on old ATI VESA 2.0

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This is a LOGITECH mouse driver, but some software expect here
the following string:*** This is Copyright 1983 Microsoft ***

Khusraw wrote:

> I tested Michael Kostylev's MPLAYER DOS port, and it works very well
> There is no VESA problem.

Well means without "nul" hack and without whining visible in my shots ?

> It works well enough with my four

Different ?

> VESA 2.0 compatible video cards

ATI / NVIDIA ?

> Actually it uses Allegro only for sound output.

I wonder what soundcards are supported ...

> Video output uses a patched version of MPLAYER vesa driver.
> I can confirm now that there is a VESA
> problem with some video cards. It seems that
...
> If this is the problem (so it seems to me), it is a bug of MPLAYER DOS port.

Thanks. Hope this helps fixing the bug.

> In case MPLAYER doesn't work with that specific video card,
> is hard for me to belive this could be a solution. Have you tried?

Indeed. There are 2 bugs, one of them can be "fixed" with the "nul" hack, the other can't ... on some PC's "nul" helps, on some not

Anyway, the "nul" hack is actually the same as I several months ago found out and documented in the DR-DOS-Wiki for using MPLAYER Win32 via HX GUI

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This is a LOGITECH mouse driver, but some software expect here
the following string:*** This is Copyright 1983 Microsoft ***

I am sure now that the VESA problem appears because the video mode list is overwritten by the bug in MPLAYER DOS port.

I wrote a TSR which copies the video mode list to another memory location and then returns a pointer to that memory in the buffer passed by the program to VESA function 4f00h. In this case MPLAYER port works even with those cards whose VESA code returns the video mode list in the buffer passed to function 4f00h.

There are other known problems: text must be redirected, slow speed etc.

See my previous post in this thread (http://www.bttr-software.de/forum/forum_entry.php?id=1175).

I've visited a Russian DOS forum today and guess what? The
patched executable has already been compiled. The video card
problem has been fixed! I've tested this on my computer and
everything works very well! =D Enjoy!

http://mik.mkw.ru/dos-stuff/mplayer.7z

Probably the VESA bug is fixed, with my S3 Virge video cards it works the same as before (they didn't show the VESA bug), i.e.:

The annoying console text must still be redirected. Playing with sound is slow enough (almost ten times slower than is QuickView Pro without hardware acceleration option).

> See my previous post in this thread
> (http://www.bttr-software.de/forum/forum_entry.php?id=1175).

Please don't use absolute URLs! See Welcome to our support forum!for use of {msg} tag.

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Forum admin

> I've visited a Russian DOS forum today and guess what? The
> patched executable has already been compiled. The video card
> problem has been fixed! I've tested this on my computer and
> everything works very well! =D Enjoy!
>
> http://mik.mkw.ru/dos-stuff/mplayer.7z

Give us the link to this DOS russian forum, please.

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DOS-u-akbar!

> http://mik.mkw.ru/dos-stuff/mplayer.7z

Nice to see that here's DOS port of mplayer!
I tested this patched version on my system (C2D@2,4G, 1G RAM, nV 7600GS, DOS 6.22):
1) VESA videooutput image looks good but it is too slow, sometimes looks jumpy and visible screen redraw. I tried enable MTRR for LFB to write-combining (i don't know if mplayer do) but same result. Also in different resolutions. Other apps using VESA are pretty fast.

2) As noticed, the position messages need to be redirected to >nul to avoid its flickering but when I pressed forward key it appeared again even if it was redirected and when I release key it disappeared.

3) It displays something that cannot find home directory at beginning.

4) Sadly I don't have any soud output on my SB Live
(SB emulation DOS drivers doesn't longer work on new HW but it's another sad story how HW manufacturers are making craps).
It would be nice if someone will port MPXPLAY sound drivers to mplayer - they have working SB Live/Audigy 1,2 driver. But as I looked at it contains some assembly that would need to be rewritten to be able to compile it under DJGPP, coz MPXPLAY uses OpenWC.

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DOS gives me freedom to unlimited HW access.

> The annoying console text must still be redirected. Playing with sound is

You can use the -quiet option to disable the annoying console text.

> Probably the VESA bug is fixed

Confirming. Now works. More later

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This is a LOGITECH mouse driver, but some software expect here
the following string:*** This is Copyright 1983 Microsoft ***

> Give us the link to this DOS russian forum, please.

http://groups.google.com/group/fido7.ru.dos/

> Nice to see that here's DOS port of mplayer!
> I tested this patched version on my system (C2D@2,4G, 1G RAM, nV 7600GS,
> DOS 6.22):
> 1) VESA videooutput image looks good but it is too slow, sometimes looks
> jumpy and visible screen redraw. I tried enable MTRR for LFB to

Strange. I have a Pentium III, 700 MHz with TNT2 and I can view high
quality DIVX and DVD's very smoothly, without dropping any frames. I
enable MTRR manually.

> 2) As noticed, the position messages need to be redirected to >nul to

Use the -quiet option.

> 3) It displays something that cannot find home directory at beginning.

If you wish, you can set up the environment variable HOME to point to
the program's directory. It will allow MPLAYER to use a configuration
file, but this is not necessary.

> Strange. I have a Pentium III, 700 MHz with TNT2 and I can view high
> quality DIVX and DVD's very smoothly, without dropping any frames. I
> enable MTRR manually.

Then I tested it on my notebook PIII@1.2G/256M/ATI Radeon Mobility VBE 2.0 and it was slow too. Is there any option to display current FPS?

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DOS gives me freedom to unlimited HW access.

> Strange. I have a Pentium III, 700 MHz with TNT2 and I can view high
> quality DIVX and DVD's very smoothly, without dropping any frames. I
> enable MTRR manually.

Please post an URL of such a movie, so we are talking about the same file.

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Forum admin

> Please post an URL of such a movie, so we are talking about the same file.

Well, at evening. It's DivXed DVB RIP 720x756. I also tried smaller divx but still seemed to me worse than windows playback.

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DOS gives me freedom to unlimited HW access.

> > Please post an URL of such a movie, so we are talking about the same
> file.
>
> Well, at evening. It's DivXed DVB RIP 720x756. I also tried smaller divx
> but still seemed to me worse than windows playback.

Here's a cut of beginning another movie http://localhost/
but doesn't matter, all are slow for me.

About -quiet parameter, it works same as >nul, when I hold fw/rew key the messages are displayed until release key.

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DOS gives me freedom to unlimited HW access.

And BTW problem is not throughput of my gfx system, asi I tested with my vesatest I got 137MB/s with default and 1988 MB/s with write-combining LFB @1024x768/32

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DOS gives me freedom to unlimited HW access.

> Here's a cut of beginning another movie
> http://localhost/
> but doesn't matter, all are slow for me.

I'll test it this evening.

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Forum admin

> Here's a cut of beginning another movie http://localhost/
> but doesn't matter, all are slow for me.

Sorry, I had to remove your link for its unclear legal status.

Here's an alternative movie: http://www.sequentialpictures.com/moviestarwarsepisode3.html
I had to disable audio output: mplayer -ac null swe3_sma.wmv
Otherwise I get:

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Forum admin

> Sorry, I had to remove your link for its unclear legal status.

Well, given the vast amounts of legal documents one has to read, understand and obey in every single detail of our lives, it's impossible to be fully compliant with all the laws. Therefore, most of us are just uncaught criminals. Some are big criminals (like me), some are small criminals (like you). But we indeed are!

Unless you are a lawyer, of course

> > Sorry, I had to remove your link for its unclear legal status.
>
> Well, given the vast amounts of legal documents one has to read,
> understand and obey in every single detail of our lives, it's impossible
> to be fully compliant with all the laws.

Especially in Germany. Every week new judgments, which complicate website owner's work.

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Forum admin

> Well, given the vast amounts of legal documents one has to read,
> understand and obey in every single detail of our lives, it's impossible
> to be fully compliant with all the laws. Therefore, most of us are just
> uncaught criminals. Some are big criminals (like me), some are small
> criminals (like you). But we indeed are!
>
> Unless you are a lawyer, of course

huh, proud to be big criminal ;)

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DOS gives me freedom to unlimited HW access.

> Here's an alternative movie:
> http://www.sequentialpictures.com/moviestarwarsepisode3.html
> I had to disable audio output: mplayer -ac null swe3_sma.wmv
> Otherwise I get:
>

For this video I got same crash, something wrong with wma stream decoding? I most tested divx/mpeg with mpx sound, decoded ok.

Interesting, I found when run
mplayer -benchmark -nosound -quiet -x 1024 -y 768 -zoom S2.AVI
it plays the movie pretty fast, within one second (23s long) so mplayer CAN do better display performance on my system but only in benchmark mode. If I run benchmark without -nosound it's slow the same as normal playback. Without -benchmark -nosound doesn't make diff in speed. It seems some problem with sync/timing of videooutput?

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DOS gives me freedom to unlimited HW access.

> Then I tested it on my notebook PIII@1.2G/256M/ATI Radeon Mobility VBE 2.0
> and it was slow too. Is there any option to display current FPS?

Have you tried the -vsync option. That is what I use on my fast P4 machine.
It makes a hell of a difference!

Like I said earlier... If you want to avoid flickering and what seems to be slow frame speed, use -vsync option! It worked for me.

> Like I said earlier... If you want to avoid flickering and what seems to be
> slow frame speed, use -vsync option! It worked for me.

Oh, sorry I overlooked it. I'll let know.

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DOS gives me freedom to unlimited HW access.

> Especially in Germany. Every week new judgments, which complicate website owner's work.

Sorry to hear that! But this is in many countries. Even here in Bulgaria, the "National Service for Combating Organized Crime" (masked police thugs) raided in the "Arena" torrent tracker, similar to the raid in the Swedish "Pirate Bay", which was done shortly after the announcement of their Piratpartiet (Pirate party, followed by another 20 Pirate Parties around the world, according to the Pirate International). After that, there were several demonstrations in Sofia against the brutality of the authorities under the motto "We are not criminals".

The so-called DHT (Distributed Hash Table) "trackerless" Bittorrent mode may put down the last nail in the coffin of copyright.

For now, be assured that we will try to not complicate your life as a webmaster by not publishing here any suspicious links

> Like I said earlier... If you want to avoid flickering and what seems to be
> slow frame speed, use -vsync option! It worked for me.

Yes it make it much better but still not 100% smooth. In some intervals I can see peak slowdown. The best playback i got combined with -vsync and -benchmark, then it's perfectly smooth. (MPLAYER -quiet -nosound -benchmark -zoom -x 1024 -y 768 -vsync S2.AVI)

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DOS gives me freedom to unlimited HW access.

> I had to disable audio output: mplayer -ac null swe3_sma.wmv
> Otherwise I get:

What memory manager do you use? I'm playing around it and when I boot clean DOS 6.22 or 7.1 mplayer doesn't more crash on this WMV!

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DOS gives me freedom to unlimited HW access.

> What memory manager do you use? I'm playing around it and when I boot
> clean DOS 6.22 or 7.1 mplayer doesn't more crash on this WMV!

IIRC it was plain MS-DOS 6.22 with HIMEM.SYS loaded. Normally I use HIMEM.SYS from Windows 9x, but not this time. I'll try it again and post my result.

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Forum admin

> > What memory manager do you use? I'm playing around it and when I boot
> > clean DOS 6.22 or 7.1 mplayer doesn't more crash on this WMV!
>
> IIRC it was plain MS-DOS 6.22 with HIMEM.SYS loaded. Normally I use
> HIMEM.SYS from Windows 9x, but not this time. I'll try it again and post
> my result.

Then found it's crashing only with QEMM 9.0 (with any parameters, disabled stealth opt. - doesn't have effect). With HIMEM.SYS from win98SE + UMBPCI it's fine. (normally I use qemm because of it makes max. free mem and nice quickboot feature. Other DJGPP programs I tried don't crash)

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DOS gives me freedom to unlimited HW access.

> What memory manager do you use? I'm playing around it and when I boot
> clean DOS 6.22 or 7.1 mplayer doesn't more crash on this WMV!

Clean booting doesn't change anything. Same for "mplayer-nosse.7z".

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Forum admin

> > What memory manager do you use? I'm playing around it and when I boot
> > clean DOS 6.22 or 7.1 mplayer doesn't more crash on this WMV!
>
> Clean booting doesn't change anything. Same for "mplayer-nosse.7z".

I tried nosse version but also crashed with qemm, then I started to do some DPMI change experiments and memory management changes and found what I said and same for previous sse version. I don't understand why it doesn't help you if you tried same clean os. Maybe some HW incompat./bugga - did you tested your memory modules? or try switch default clock speed and mem timings if you overclocked. Hated voodoo magic... :\

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DOS gives me freedom to unlimited HW access.

> > On my bedside table: "Star begotten" by H. G. Wells
> > In my CD player: "Revolver" by The Beatles

Considering how things are going here lately, maybe that should be
On my bedside table: Revolver by Smith&Wesson