kplayer/doc/en/howto-devices.docbook

<sect1 id="howto-devices">
<title>Disk and tuner devices</title>

<sect2 id="howto-devices-setup">
<title>Setting up devices</title>

<para>&kplayer; tries to find any disk and tuner devices you have on your
system. The ones it finds it puts on the
<link linkend="menu-file"><guimenu>File</guimenu> menu</link> and on several
<mousebutton>right</mousebutton> click <link linkend="popup-menus">popup
menus</link>, as well as in the <guilabel>Devices</guilabel> section of the
<link linkend="parts-library"><interface>multimedia
library</interface></link>.</para>

<para>If the device you want &kplayer; to use does not show up on those lists,
you can add it manually by selecting the <guilabel>Devices</guilabel> node in
the <interface>multimedia library</interface> and choosing
<menuchoice><guisubmenu>Add</guisubmenu>
<guimenuitem>Device...</guimenuitem></menuchoice> command from the
<link linkend="menu-library"><guimenu>Library</guimenu> menu</link> or the
<mousebutton>right</mousebutton> click <link linkend="popup-library">popup
menu</link>. &kplayer; will show the <guilabel>Add device</guilabel>
dialog:</para>

<mediaobject>
<imageobject>
<imagedata fileref="device-add.png" format="PNG"/>
</imageobject>
<textobject>
<phrase>Add device dialog</phrase>
</textobject>
</mediaobject>

<para>Enter a unique descriptive name for the device and the path to the device
node under the <filename>/dev</filename> directory. Select the device type from
the drop down box. For a <acronym>TV</acronym> device select a channel list and
an input driver, usually <guilabel>Video4Linux 2</guilabel> or
<guilabel>Video4Linux</guilabel>. A <acronym>DVB</acronym> device needs the path
to a channel file in the <quote>zap</quote> format. You can get the file from
the Internet or create it using the <command>scan</command> utility that comes
with <acronym>DVB</acronym> drivers. &kplayer; looks for existing
<filename>channels.conf</filename> files and selects the first one it finds by
default.</para>

<para>To set additional options for a device, select it in the
<interface>multimedia library</interface> and choose the
<guimenuitem>Properties...</guimenuitem> command from the
<link linkend="menu-library"><guimenu>Library</guimenu> menu</link> or the
<mousebutton>right</mousebutton> click <link linkend="popup-library">popup
menu</link>. Most of the options are the same
<link linkend="howto-properties">properties</link> available for every
multimedia item in &kplayer;.</para>

<para>Tuner devices have several specific options detailed in the <link
linkend="properties"><guilabel>Properties</guilabel> dialog</link> chapter. The
<link linkend="properties-general"><guilabel>General</guilabel> page</link>
has the options to select a list of channels available from the device and an
input driver as discussed above. Other options are on the
<link linkend="properties-video"><guilabel>Video</guilabel></link>,
<link linkend="properties-audio"><guilabel>Audio</guilabel></link> and
<link linkend="properties-advanced"><guilabel>Advanced</guilabel></link> pages
of the dialog.</para>

<para>For a detailed description of the multimedia library feature see the
<link linkend="howto-library">Multimedia library micro-HOWTO</link>.</para>

<para>If you had <userinput><option>-dvd-device</option></userinput> or
<userinput><option>-cdrom-device</option></userinput> options in the
<guilabel>Additional command line parameters</guilabel> box on the
<guilabel>Advanced</guilabel> page in
<link linkend="settings-advanced">&kplayer; Settings</link>, you have to remove
them, because since version 0.6 &kplayer; supplies those options to &mplayer;
automatically.</para>

</sect2>

<sect2 id="howto-devices-playing">
<title>Playing from devices</title>

<para>When you put a disk into a <acronym>CD</acronym> or <acronym>DVD</acronym>
drive, &kplayer; detects what kind of disk it is and how many tracks or titles
it has, and updates the <link linkend="submenu-device">device submenu</link> of
the <guilabel>File</guilabel> menu accordingly. The submenu includes commands to
play the whole disk or an individual track or title from it.</para>

<para>&kplayer; supports video <acronym>DVD</acronym>, video
<acronym>CD</acronym>, including <acronym>SVCD</acronym> and other
<acronym>VCD</acronym> varieties, audio <acronym>CD</acronym>, data
<acronym>DVD</acronym> and data <acronym>CD</acronym> disks. If &kplayer; does
not detect your disk automatically for any reason, you can kick off the
detection process manually by selecting the <guimenuitem>Load Disk</guimenuitem>
command from the <link linkend="submenu-device">device submenu</link>.</para>

<para>Tuner devices like <acronym>TV</acronym> or <acronym>DVB</acronym> also
have their own submenus that contain commands to play each individual channel
available on the device. Or you can open the device in the <interface>multimedia
library</interface>, select some channels and play them using the commands on
the <link linkend="menu-library"><guimenu>Library</guimenu> menu</link> or the
<mousebutton>right</mousebutton> click <link linkend="popup-library">popup
menu</link>.</para>

<para>Another way to play an entire disk is through the
<filename>media:/</filename> or <filename>system:/</filename>
<acronym>I/O</acronym> Slaves. If you have the <interface>Devices</interface>
applet enabled in the &kicker; panel, it will show disks you insert into disk
drives. You can then <mousebutton>left</mousebutton> click the disk icon and
select the <guimenuitem>Play</guimenuitem> command. This will start &kplayer;
if it is not already running and play the disk. Similarly, if disk icons show
up on your desktop, you can <mousebutton>right</mousebutton> click them and
select <guimenuitem>Play</guimenuitem>. You can also display the disk icons
in &konqueror; file manager by opening <filename>media:/</filename> or
<filename>system:/media</filename> <acronym>URL</acronym>s in it.</para>

</sect2>

<sect2 id="howto-devices-deinterlacing">
<title>Inverse telecine and deinterlacing</title>

<para>Video on <acronym>DVD</acronym> disks is often telecined. The
<literal>pullup</literal> filter does a decent inverse telecine. To use it,
select the disk or one of its titles in the <guilabel>Devices</guilabel> section
of the
<link linkend="parts-library"><interface>multimedia library</interface></link>
and choose the <guimenuitem>Properties...</guimenuitem> command from the
<link linkend="menu-library"><guimenu>Library</guimenu> menu</link> or the
<mousebutton>right</mousebutton> click <link linkend="popup-library">popup
menu</link> to open the disk properties, then go to the
<link linkend="properties-advanced">Advanced page</link> and enter <option>-vf
pullup</option> in the <guilabel>Additional command line arguments</guilabel>
field before playing the video. Setting the property on the disk will apply the
filter to all titles on the <acronym>DVD</acronym>.</para>

<para>Some <acronym>DVD</acronym> disks and many <acronym>TV</acronym> and
<acronym>DVB</acronym> channels are interlaced. There are several deinterlacing
filters in &mplayer;. Each of them has its own advantages and disadvantages, so
try a few of them starting with <option>-vf yadif</option> and see which one
gives the best results for the particular video you are trying to watch. The
full list is available by running</para>

<para><userinput><command>mplayer</command> <option>-vf help</option>
<option>-pphelp</option> | <command>grep</command>
<option>deint</option></userinput></para>

</sect2>

<sect2 id="howto-devices-deblocking">
<title>Deblocking, deringing, denoising</title>

<para>The <option>-vf</option> option is in charge of video filtering in
&mplayer;. To get the full list of available filters, run</para>

<para><userinput><command>mplayer</command>
<option>-vf help</option></userinput></para>

<para>from the command line. Most of them are described on the
<ulink url="man:/mplayer">&mplayer; manpage</ulink>. One of the most useful
filters is <literal>pp</literal>, the postprocessing filter. Among other things
it can smooth blocky <acronym>MPEG</acronym>s using the deblocking filters
<literal>hb</literal> and <literal>vb</literal> or <literal>h1</literal> and
<literal>v1</literal>, usually combined with the deringing filter
<literal>dr</literal> like this: <option>-vf pp=hb/vb/dr</option> or
<option>-vf pp=h1/v1/dr</option>. To get a full list of <literal>pp</literal>
filters, run</para>

<para><userinput><command>mplayer</command>
<option>-pphelp</option></userinput></para>

<para>from the command line. Another useful filter is <literal>hqdn3d</literal>
that does high quality denoising: <option>-vf hqdn3d</option>.</para>

<para>You can combine several filters together and use them on the same device
or file by separating them with a comma without spaces, for example:</para>

<para><option>-vf pullup,pp=h1/v1/dr,hqdn3d</option></para>

<para>Put that into the <guilabel>Additional command line arguments</guilabel>
field on the <link linkend="properties-advanced">Advanced page</link> in
<guilabel>File Properties</guilabel>.</para>

</sect2>

</sect1>