<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>