Broken Hardware acceleration since X4?

[GT-Force]

Hi,

I own VS X4, and cannot activate hardware accelerated encoding as the option is greyed out. As I searched the forums, I've found people complaining about the same issue for X5. Then, I downloaded and installed the trial version for X6, and guess what, it is still greyed out!

Clearly, Corel doesn't know how to fix it and get it to work, so they should stop misadvertising their products saying that they support hardware acceleration.

Moreover, what the heck is that hardware? There isn't even a line of info anywhere about what hardware is required. Should Corel include that SOMEWHERE? As I've found out in the forums, it is CUDA, and I do have a dual SLI GTX 770 setup, which sure has CUDA support, so how come VS X4, X5 AND X6 cannot detect it?

I have been using Corel products since Corel Draw 3, but looks like acquiring Ulead was one of the worst things they could do to their name, as VS is a smear to their name built by their great line of Corel Draw products. Such a shame...

Making it almost impossible to reach them, and limiting their support to 90 days also should raise a big flag, as any company that cares about its customers would do the opposite. Selling broken products such as VS series, and then not providing support for them is simply unacceptable!

So, did anyone ever discover a solution to this "greyed-out hardware acceleration encoding" issue?

Thanks.

[RobertOZ]

Is this what you are trying to achieve

Robert

[Ken Berry]

I also have it enabled in both X6 and X5, without any special tweaking. It might be noted that while Hardware Decoder Acceleration is greyed out, it is nonetheless ticked and active by default.

I don't have X4 on this computer so can't check that. As you will see from my Profile, I have an AMD GPU, though in reality it is a dual GPU system, with the other chip being an Intel on-board one.

Unfortunately, I cannot offer any explanation, let alone solution, to why some users can't enable these features. While most (all?) of us here would agree with your comments that paying for tech support from Corel is a very regrettable development, some people have found that posting their problems on Corel's Facebook page often draws quick responses from Corel itself, possibly because they want to create a responsive image on such a public forum as Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/corelvideostudio

[GT-Force]

Yes Robert, that's exactly what I'm trying to achieve. After spending hours searching online and trying various things suggested to fix the greyed-out hardware encoding, it remains as such since no suggested solution worked.

Ken, thanks for pointing out Corel's Facebook page, I'll certainly try that.

I am sure that this is a Corel issue, as I have many programs that can use the CUDA extensions on my machine. What is surprising is the fact that Corel seemingly completely ignored this issue and failed to provide a fix for three consecutive versions!

[GT-Force]

Hi again,

Since hardware acceleration for encoding is enabled on your machines, would you mind checking and/or posting the contents of your afMediaBaseProfile.ini file under C:\Program Files (x86)\Corel\Corel VideoStudio Pro X6 or wherever your installation folder is? I suspect that may be the place for setting the flag for enabling it.

I also checked the registry, but I could not see anything relevant there. If you don't mind checking, it's under
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Wow6432Node\Corel\VSPro\Version16

If you can find out in which ini file or where in the registry it is set, even better.

Thanks in advance.

[Ken Berry]

I did a search of my Registry for that entry but could not find it. Haven't really got time now to search further but will try later.

As for the afMediaBaseProfile.ini file, this is how mine reads -- though I can see no reference to encoder/decoder acceleration. Again I have no time right now to look at other ini files but will try later.

[GetFrameHelper]
EnableYUV=2
EnableImpreciseFrame=0
EnableSmartProxy=1

[CacheManager]
EnableCache=0
CacheWidth=400
CacheHeight=300
MaxMemorySpace=100
MinFrameWidth=0
MinFrameHeight=0
CacheQuality=30
CacheFileFrame=300
CacheDuration=20

[VIOFileRender]
EnableYUVRender=1
FramePoolSize=100

[BufferPool]
MaxMemorySpace=0

[SmartProxy]
AutoProxy=1
MinSrcFrameDimension=1200x900
OutputFrameDimension=320x240,720x480,480x360
OutputFrameQuality=40
DiscQuota=20000

[AppResourceRender]
EnableRenderPNGto8bbp = 0

[SequentialFrameCache]
MaxMemorySpace=800

[Ken Berry]

I've now had time to do a full search of my Registry, using "accel" as the target.There were many returns, including accelerated graphics for Sony and Magix. But the only related ref I could find to Corel was afAcceleratedLib.dll for both X5 and X6.

I have now opened every ini file in the general X6 folder, but could find nothing which appeared to relate to acceleration of any kind, let alone specifically linked to encoder/decoder/hardware acceleration. I have also opened ini files in the ulead.dat sub-folder. There are quite a few of them and some of them quite long. But again I could not spot anything of relevance.

So I'm afraid I strike out!

[RobertOZ]

My afMediaBaseProfile.ini is exactly the sale as Kens, and like Ken I can find no further reference on my computer.
My understanding is that hardware acceleration is a graphics card issue. In your DirectX Diagnostic Tool is it showing that DirectDraw,Direct3D and AGP Texture Acceleration are enabled.

Sorry cannot help any further, just don't know where to look, maybe other users with nVidia cards can assist.

Robert

[GT-Force]

Thanks to you both for all your efforts. It's unfortunate that force-enabling hardware accelerated encoding is not as easy as changing a value in an ini file

Meanwhile, this is what I've received from Corel:

"Videostudio versions supporting CUDA, only run on Version 2 or 3. The current production release of this technology is version 5.5, and Videostudio has not yet been updated to recognize this revision. Regretfully at this time, there is no way to force the CUDA enabled support.
This particular issue was raised to me not too long ago, and I was in contact with the developers, however, have not received any update regarding later version support thus far."

Corel VS supports version 2 or 3?!? What were the Corel VS software team doing while nVidia was hard at work releasing CUDA 3.5, 4.0, 5.0, 5.5? nVidia even has clear documentation about how to use CUDA for hardware encoding and decoding:

http://docs.nvidia.com/cuda/video-encoder/index.html

http://docs.nvidia.com/cuda/video-decoder/index.html

Are Corel software engineers as incompetent as not being able follow a documentation? Do their superiors know about this flop? Just wondering...