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-
- VMPEG V1.6a Lite
-
- Windows 3.1 MPEG player
-
- by Stefan Eckart
-
- May 1995
-
-
- 1. Features
- ===========
-
- - full MPEG-1 video standard (ISO 11172-2): I,P,B frames of arbitrary size
-
- - plays system layer (ISO 11172-1) and video compression layer files
-
- - decodes layer II MPEG-1 audio (restricted to 15 seconds monaural decoding)
-
- - high speed: e.g. up to 28 frames/s on a Pentium 90 for a 352x240
- video only sequence
-
- - display options: 4x4 ordered dither normal size (8 bit)
- 4x4 ordered dither double size (8 bit)
- grayscale (8 bit)
- true color (24 bit)
-
- - MCI (Media Control Interface) provided
-
- - generates stream information and decode speed statistics
-
- - frame rate control: full speed (no rate control)
- synchronous (real-time)
- manual (rate set by user)
-
- 2. Requirements
- ===============
-
- - '386 (or better) processor
- - 4 MB RAM (8 MB recommended)
- - VGA or Super VGA
- - Windows 3.1
-
- For video and audio playback of full resolution MPEG files a Pentium
- based PC and a PCI graphics card is required.
-
- The Win32s extensions are not required.
-
- This release of VMPEG is a demonstration version. For this reason audio is
- restricted to 15 seconds, and stereo decoding, DCI support and Video CD
- playback have been disabled.
-
- VMPEG is copyrighted software, (C) Stefan Eckart, 1995. You may use, copy and
- distribute this program solely for demonstration purposes, only in unmodified
- form and without charging money for it. Commercial use of this demonstration
- version is strictly prohibited.
-
- Disclaimer: This program comes without any warranty. You are using it at your
- own risk.
-
-
- 3. Installation
- ===============
-
- - create a temporary directory, e.g.
-
- MD VMPEG.INS
-
- - change to this directory
-
- CD VMPEG.INS
-
- - extract the content of VMPEG16A.ZIP
-
- PKUNZIP ..\VMPEG16A
-
- (PKUNZIP is available at many ftp sites and BBSs)
-
- - run the setup program (from either DOS or Windows)
-
- SETUP
-
- The setup program will ask you if you want to install the WinG runtime
- libraries. Installing them usually improves performance considerably. On the
- other hand there are some graphics cards which are not entirely compatible
- with WinG. In this case you may have to de-install WinG as described below.
-
- Be aware that the installation of WinG may overwrite an existing dva.386 in
- the windows\system directory. It may be a good idea to make a backup of this
- file before installing WinG. Otherwise you might have to re-install the
- Windows drivers for your graphics card (in case you run into problems with
- WinG).
-
- If you start VMPEG (or any other program using WinG) for the first time, a
- performance test window appears which adapts and optimizes WinG for the VGA
- in your PC. This may take several minutes.
-
- The setup program performs the following steps:
-
- - if you choose to install WinG:
-
- - copies the files wing.dll, wing32.dll, wingde.dll, wingdib.drv,
- and wingpal.wnd to the windows\system directory.
-
- - copies dva.386 to the windows\system directory and adds a line
- 'device=D:\WINDOWS\SYSTEM\dva.386' to the [386Enh] section of
- system.ini (only for Windows 3.1x)
-
- - copies vmpegwin.exe, vmpeg.dll, vmpeg.hlp and readme.txt to the
- directory you have been prompted for
-
- - creates a program group and program entries for VMPEG, the
- associated help file and for the readme file in the program manager
-
- - asks you to restart Windows (only if dva.386 is installed and has
- not been installed earlier)
-
- To de-install VMPEG and/or WinG simply reverse these steps manually.
-
-
- WinG is also available separately from:
-
- ftp.microsoft.com:/developr/drg/WinG/WinG10.ZIP
-
- and via CompuServe.
-
-
- The MCI driver can be installed from the control panel drivers applet:
-
- - from the Drivers dialog box, choose the Add button
-
- - select Unlisted or Updated Driver and click OK
-
- - enter the path name of your installation directory (containing the
- file oemsetup.inf) or click Browse... to locate this directory,
- then click OK
-
- - select the '[MCI] VMPEG MPEG Player' from the list of drivers
- (actually this is the only one), and choose the OK button
-
- - quit the Drivers dialog box
-
- You can now use the Media Player to play MPEG files. It is recommended
- to use the improved version included in the Video for Windows runtime
- rather than the original one included in Windows 3.1 and 3.11.
-
- The MCI driver can be uninstalled via the control panel. In this case
- you should also delete the line 'mpg=MpegVideo' from the [mci extensions]
- section of the WIN.INI file in the Windows directory.
-
-
- 4. Known bugs and limitations
- =============================
-
- - only one instance of VMPEG can be run simultaneously
-
- - D pictures are not yet supported (you will have a hard time
- to find a D pictures MPEG stream anyway)
-
- - audio layer I streams do not work correctly
-
- - the MCI driver does not implement the complete MCI specification;
- it is sufficient to be controlled from the Media Player, but
- it does not yet work satisfactory with MCIWnd window class
- applications (like the mplay Movie Player from Video for Windows)
- - MCI notification callbacks are always called immediately instead
- of after completing the action
- - MCI wait is not implemented for the play command
- - MCI test is not implemented
- - the MCI driver does not use window handles provided by the client,
- it always uses the default window
-
- - VMPEG sometimes crashes when exiting the program after doing seeks
- in the stream
-
- - the seek command always seeks to the next key-frame after the given
- position instead of before the given position or the exact position
-
- - the video window is not redrawn when becoming uncovered
-
- - VMPEG sometimes crashes Windows under low memory conditions
- (unfortunately this seems to be a bug of the compiler runtime
- library, not VMPEG itself)
-
- - changing audio settings via the Media Player Configure...
- menu item only becomes effective after closing and re-opening
- the MPEG file
-
-
- Please refer to the Windows help file for additional information.
- --
-