• VLC & GOM Screenshots

    From LRESA500@aol.com@LRESA500@aol.com to alt.computer on Sun Jan 17 08:48:10 2021
    I really like the VLC player but my screenshots keep coming as solid green.
    I unistall the player then reinstall. Screenshots work a few days then go green again. I'm getting ready to delete VCL forever. Seems related to Windows update (Ver 10). I also often get error messages when I use my GOM player screenshot. The error # is 0 x 80070057.
    Thanks
    Gary
    --- Synchronet 3.20a-Win32 NewsLink 1.114
  • From Paul@nospam@needed.invalid to alt.computer on Sun Jan 17 16:02:22 2021
    LRESA500@aol.com wrote:
    I really like the VLC player but my screenshots keep coming as solid green.
    I unistall the player then reinstall. Screenshots work a few days then go green again. I'm getting ready to delete VCL forever. Seems related to Windows update (Ver 10). I also often get error messages when I use my GOM player screenshot. The error # is 0 x 80070057.
    Thanks
    Gary

    Are you using Windows 10 "snippingtool.exe" ?

    To show the basic principle, there is FFMPEG and its "gdigrab".
    It has the ability to capture from the regular graphics plane.
    To place graphics in the regular graphics plane, "disable hardware acceleration".

    There are two other graphics planes. There is VMR7/VMR9 for
    video playback, and they would have been popular for video playback
    in a previous generation. This would be the DirectShow and KCodec Pack
    path. Attempting to capture them would likely give a green rectangle.

    The third plane, is 3D capture in games. There is some apparent
    difference between "windowed" games and "full screen" games. This
    too makes a difference to the "surface or plane" of capture. NVidia
    provides in-game Shadowplay??? to capture some of that. I've never
    tried this plane, limiting my capture to the front plane only
    (unaccelerated).

    There are a lot of rules to remember.

    Windows 7 is the last full-service OS. You could buy a copy of the
    "FRAPS" third party product, and capture everything. FRAPS cheated
    by injecting a DLL in every program folder, and the filter driver
    (at a guess that's what it amounts to), it intercepts graphics
    calls, and it records graphics calls rather than pixels as such.
    That's how it was able to do such a thorough job. But the author of
    that, lost the battle with Microsoft - FRAPS could never be made to
    work with Win8/8.1/10 so the author stopped selling it.

    Windows 7 allows recording at 60FPS.
    Win8/8.1/10 has a capped recording rate of 30FPS.

    For lowest latency and jitter, you disable Aero effects.

    The graphics business has been working on a "secure enclave" hardware capability for some time, and this too is intended to prevent memory
    copying from a graphics card. All that has to happen, is some Hollywood
    DRM cuts in, requests security, and then a gdigrab method won't work
    (because for the front plane, it's just taking copies of the double buffer).

    Another thing you might have noticed, is the VGA connector disappeared
    from new video cards. This completes the route of "analog bypass". Without unencrypted analog output, many attempts to do external capture of
    monitor content are thwarted. Hollywood has won. Sneaky, eh?
    First the YPbPr analog coax cable output disappears, then they
    set to work setting the VGA connector on fire. Villains.

    With the analog hole closed, HDMI or DisplayPort can use HDCP (encrypted digital stream), to thwart these types of cards. In their heyday, this
    class of card was around $100 each. You want the units with passthru,
    two HDMI connectors, one HDMI-in, one HDMI-out, and then the
    capture device can be put "in-line" with the monitor output you
    want to capture. This capture concept is also available in USB3
    capture box format - however, you need the "best-in-class" USB3
    for that, it must be chipset USB3, not add-on chip USB3. One of
    the USB3 products actually has a "benchmark" of sorts which will
    declare your USB3 port "a loser" for you :-) This is why I
    selected some PCI Express cards to demonstrate the concept, as
    the developers can select a decent number of PCI Express lanes
    as needed. If a x4 interface is needed, they'll just put an
    x4 connector on it.

    https://www.amazon.com/Elgato-Game-Capture-HD60-Pro/dp/B014MQIVPS

    https://www.amazon.com/Elgato-Game-Capture-4K60-MK-2/dp/B07VWXCXM7

    If your OS uses HDCP, the earlier version of HDCP was cracked,
    as the keys leaked for it. (Thus there have been HDCP strippers
    shipping from China in disguise as "buffers". You put a stripper
    plus the capture card, for example.) But that stopped
    when HDCP 2.1 or so came out, as that one might not be cracked yet.
    Capturing an HDCP monitor cable signal gives "colored snow" as the
    only object captured. No recognizable image at all.

    *******

    Summary: Try to use another OS. Win7 is a nice choice.
    Try to disable hardware acceleration in the things you do. (Prefs:Tick Box)
    Don't really expect screen capture to work worth a damn in future.
    Go hardware capture for some fun.

    I wouldn't be too quick to condemn the application developers,
    because they have to know all the above inside-out, to stand
    a chance of making anything work. And as Windows 10 is a rolling
    release, the feature they just made work, could be "broken on Tuesday".

    Paul
    --- Synchronet 3.20a-Win32 NewsLink 1.114
  • From LRESA500@aol.com@LRESA500@aol.com to alt.computer on Mon Jan 18 21:27:55 2021
    On Sunday, January 17, 2021 at 4:02:24 PM UTC-5, Paul wrote:
    LRES...@aol.com wrote:
    I really like the VLC player but my screenshots keep coming as solid green.
    I unistall the player then reinstall. Screenshots work a few days then go green again. I'm getting ready to delete VCL forever. Seems related to Windows update (Ver 10). I also often get error messages when I use my GOM player screenshot. The error # is 0 x 80070057.
    Thanks
    Gary
    Are you using Windows 10 "snippingtool.exe" ?

    To show the basic principle, there is FFMPEG and its "gdigrab".
    It has the ability to capture from the regular graphics plane.
    To place graphics in the regular graphics plane, "disable hardware acceleration".

    There are two other graphics planes. There is VMR7/VMR9 for
    video playback, and they would have been popular for video playback
    in a previous generation. This would be the DirectShow and KCodec Pack
    path. Attempting to capture them would likely give a green rectangle.

    The third plane, is 3D capture in games. There is some apparent
    difference between "windowed" games and "full screen" games. This
    too makes a difference to the "surface or plane" of capture. NVidia
    provides in-game Shadowplay??? to capture some of that. I've never
    tried this plane, limiting my capture to the front plane only (unaccelerated).

    There are a lot of rules to remember.

    Windows 7 is the last full-service OS. You could buy a copy of the
    "FRAPS" third party product, and capture everything. FRAPS cheated
    by injecting a DLL in every program folder, and the filter driver
    (at a guess that's what it amounts to), it intercepts graphics
    calls, and it records graphics calls rather than pixels as such.
    That's how it was able to do such a thorough job. But the author of
    that, lost the battle with Microsoft - FRAPS could never be made to
    work with Win8/8.1/10 so the author stopped selling it.

    Windows 7 allows recording at 60FPS.
    Win8/8.1/10 has a capped recording rate of 30FPS.

    For lowest latency and jitter, you disable Aero effects.

    The graphics business has been working on a "secure enclave" hardware capability for some time, and this too is intended to prevent memory
    copying from a graphics card. All that has to happen, is some Hollywood
    DRM cuts in, requests security, and then a gdigrab method won't work (because for the front plane, it's just taking copies of the double buffer).

    Another thing you might have noticed, is the VGA connector disappeared
    from new video cards. This completes the route of "analog bypass". Without unencrypted analog output, many attempts to do external capture of
    monitor content are thwarted. Hollywood has won. Sneaky, eh?
    First the YPbPr analog coax cable output disappears, then they
    set to work setting the VGA connector on fire. Villains.

    With the analog hole closed, HDMI or DisplayPort can use HDCP (encrypted digital stream), to thwart these types of cards. In their heyday, this
    class of card was around $100 each. You want the units with passthru,
    two HDMI connectors, one HDMI-in, one HDMI-out, and then the
    capture device can be put "in-line" with the monitor output you
    want to capture. This capture concept is also available in USB3
    capture box format - however, you need the "best-in-class" USB3
    for that, it must be chipset USB3, not add-on chip USB3. One of
    the USB3 products actually has a "benchmark" of sorts which will
    declare your USB3 port "a loser" for you :-) This is why I
    selected some PCI Express cards to demonstrate the concept, as
    the developers can select a decent number of PCI Express lanes
    as needed. If a x4 interface is needed, they'll just put an
    x4 connector on it.

    https://www.amazon.com/Elgato-Game-Capture-HD60-Pro/dp/B014MQIVPS

    https://www.amazon.com/Elgato-Game-Capture-4K60-MK-2/dp/B07VWXCXM7

    If your OS uses HDCP, the earlier version of HDCP was cracked,
    as the keys leaked for it. (Thus there have been HDCP strippers
    shipping from China in disguise as "buffers". You put a stripper
    plus the capture card, for example.) But that stopped
    when HDCP 2.1 or so came out, as that one might not be cracked yet. Capturing an HDCP monitor cable signal gives "colored snow" as the
    only object captured. No recognizable image at all.

    *******

    Summary: Try to use another OS. Win7 is a nice choice.
    Try to disable hardware acceleration in the things you do. (Prefs:Tick Box) Don't really expect screen capture to work worth a damn in future.
    Go hardware capture for some fun.

    I wouldn't be too quick to condemn the application developers,
    because they have to know all the above inside-out, to stand
    a chance of making anything work. And as Windows 10 is a rolling
    release, the feature they just made work, could be "broken on Tuesday".

    Paul
    Thanks very much.
    --- Synchronet 3.20a-Win32 NewsLink 1.114