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Decklink HD Extreme with Windows Media Encoder
I could swear I’ve seen some posts about this somewhere but I can’t find anything specific.
We have a PC server I built that’s using a Decklink HD Extreme. In addition to the uses for which it was built, my boss would like to use it to encode video from our video server (an old MediaPool system using SDI) that can be archived or streamed directly to a dedicated Windows Media server.
I downloaded Windows Media Encoder and installed it, I then installed the latest DeckLink drivers. The problem I ran into was that WME would lockup hard (requiring a restart to kill the app) if the RS-422 port on the DeckLink was enabled. If I disable the port WME works pretty well. The problem is we also need to use the port to capture from the server. We can playout manually and capture but that won’t work well, we plan on programming some automation into the PC for use with a Harris ADC system.
I’ve downloaded and installed all the latest drivers/firmware for the PC so that shouldn’t be a problem. Has anyone seen this behavior? I think WME uses the DirectShow filter to work with the HD Extreme card, maybe it isn’t designed correctly to work with the DeckLink port?
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1 Reply
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Followup:
I found that if a deck is connected to the RS-422 port, is on and in remote mode, WME will work properly. The problem seems to be Windows Media Encoder, it just hangs waiting for a response from the RS-422 port. There also doesn’t seem to be any way to force WME to ignore the port.
If WME was smart it would sense that the deck was in local mode (if connected to a powered deck) or timeout (if the deck was off or not connected) and indicate that no control was possible. The BlackMagic Design deck control & capture application works fine in this regard.
Maybe I’ll try to get my boss to switch to Darwin (QuickTime) Streaming server for Windows.
Brian Hughes
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