DVDs only play audio, no video

I am running K-Lite Codec Pack 14.6.0 Full on a Dell Inspiron 15-7559 laptop which has two GPUs, Intel HD 530 and NVIDIA GTX 960M. This has the most recently updated Windows 10 x64.

When I try to play an ordinary DVD using an external USB DVD drive, all I get is the audio, but only a black screen for the video. And the audio is choppy. I've tried it using VLC as well as Media Player Classic, same problems on both. This system doesn't have Microsoft Windows DVD Player so I can't try that.

Any ideas? I'm guessing the codec settings are confused as to which video chip to use, but there are too many settings and I don't know what the change.

I'm willing to install a different free DVD player if someone suggests one and thinks that may resolve the issue.

Playing non-DVD videos, e.g. old Quicktime or MPEG files on my hard drive, works with no problems.

Thanks.

Here's my log info:
Codec Tweak Tool | Log file | Generated at 2018-12-15 20:27:28

##### System Information #####

OS: Windows 10 Home (10.00.17134) (x64)
CPU name: Intel(R) Core(TM) i7-6700HQ CPU @ 2.60GHz
CPU speed: 2592 MHz (8t)
Memory: 8064 MB
Screen size: 1920x1080 (32bits) (60Hz) (125%)
Video card 1: Intel(R) HD Graphics 530
VendorID: 8086, DeviceID: 191b, SubSys: 07061028
Video mem: 1024 MB
Video driver: igdumdim64.dll (Version 23.20.16.4973) (2-28-2018)
Video card 2: NVIDIA GeForce GTX 960M
VendorID: 10de, DeviceID: 139b, SubSys: 07061028
Video mem: 4096 MB
Video driver: nvldumdx.dll (Version 25.21.14.1701) (11-15-2018) (NV 417.01)
Audio device: NVIDIA Virtual Audio Device (Wave Extensible) (WDM)
VendorID: 0955, DeviceID: 9000
Audio driver: nvvad64v.sys (Version 4.11.1.0) (8-22-2018)

##### K-Lite Codec Pack #####

KLCP version: 14.6.0
KLCP type: full

Speaker conf: 2.0

MPC renderer: EVR CP
MPC subs: ISR
MPC audio: System Default

##### Decoder Settings #####

LAV Video:
H264=DXVA2CB HEVC=DXVA2CB VP9=1 VC1=1 MPEG2=DXVA2CB MPEG4=1 WMV3=0

LAV Audio:
MP3=1 AC3=1 DTS=1 DTSHD=1 EAC3=1 TRUEHD=1 AAC=1 Vorbis=1 LPCM=1 WMA=0

##### DirectShow Filters (32-bit) #####

(A total of 70 filters, 0 shown, 70 hidden)

##### DirectShow Filters (64-bit) #####

(A total of 69 filters, 0 shown, 69 hidden)

##### ICM Class Manager (32-bit) #####

(A total of 2 filters, 0 shown, 2 hidden)

##### ICM Class Manager (64-bit) #####

(A total of 2 filters, 0 shown, 2 hidden)

##### Default source filters (32-bit) #####

(A total of 63 default source filters, 0 shown, 63 hidden)

##### Default source filters (64-bit) #####

(A total of 55 default source filters, 0 shown, 55 hidden)

##### ACM and VFW Codecs (32-bit) #####

(A total of 14 codecs, 0 shown, 14 hidden)

##### ACM and VFW Codecs (64-bit) #####

(A total of 13 codecs, 0 shown, 13 hidden)

##### DirectX Media Objects (32-bit) #####

(A total of 14 DMO, 0 shown, 14 hidden)

##### DirectX Media Objects (64-bit) #####

(A total of 14 DMO, 0 shown, 14 hidden)

Open the DVD drive in Explorer and go to the VIDEO_TS folder. Are you able to play the large .vob files?

Also test with hardware acceleration disable for MPEG-2 in LAV Video decoder. That isn't useful anyway, since MPEG-2 doesn't need much CPU power.

Admin wrote:Open the DVD drive in Explorer and go to the VIDEO_TS folder. Are you able to play the large .vob files?

Tried that with VLC.  Got this error:

Your input can't be opened:
VLC is unable to open the MRL 'file:///D:/VIDEO_TS/VTS_01_1.VOB'. Check the log for details.

I don't know where VLC keeps its logs though, there's nothing in the crashdump folder, but it wasn't really a crash.

Admin wrote:Also test with hardware acceleration disable for MPEG-2 in LAV Video decoder. That isn't useful anyway, since MPEG-2 doesn't need much CPU power.

No difference in Media Player Classic - still just sound, no video.

BTW, I've tried this with several DVDs with the same result. And I tried the DVDs on a different computer which does have Windows 10 Media Player, and it played them just fine. So I'm fairly sure it is not a problem with the DVD itself.

What is shown in MPC-HC menu > Play > Filters?
It should show DVD Navigator, LAV Video Decoder, and LAV Audio Decoder.

Admin wrote:What is shown in MPC-HC menu > Play > Filters?
It should show DVD Navigator, LAV Video Decoder, and LAV Audio Decoder.

Yes, here's the list:

Filters currently loaded:
 - Default DirectSound Device
 - Enhanced Video Renderer (custom presenter)
 - Audio Switcher
 - LAV Video Decoder (internal) (low merit)
 - LAV Audio Decoder
 - DVD Navigator

Also I tried a different DVD from a different manufacturer, and it works fine. (I had several DVDs with the same problem, and they worked in a different computer, so I still don't think it's just a bad DVD.)  Are different DVDs encoded with different codecs or something?

Click on "LAV Video Decoder" in the list, and then go to the "Pin Info" tab. Copy those details here. That contains the format.

Admin wrote:Click on "LAV Video Decoder" in the list, and then go to the "Pin Info" tab. Copy those details here. That contains the format.

Filter : LAV Video Decoder - CLSID : {EE30215D-164F-4A92-A4EB-9D4C13390F9F}

- Connected to:

CLSID: {9B8C4620-2C1A-11D0-8493-00A02438AD48}
Filter: DVD Navigator
Pin: Video

- Connection media type:

Video: MPEG2 Video 720x480 (16:9)

AM_MEDIA_TYPE:
majortype: MEDIATYPE_DVD_ENCRYPTED_PACK {ED0B916A-044D-11D1-AA78-00C04FC31D60}
subtype: MEDIASUBTYPE_MPEG2_VIDEO {E06D8026-DB46-11CF-B4D1-00805F6CBBEA}
formattype: FORMAT_MPEG2_VIDEO {E06D80E3-DB46-11CF-B4D1-00805F6CBBEA}
bFixedSizeSamples: 1
bTemporalCompression: 0
lSampleSize: 1
cbFormat: 136

VIDEOINFOHEADER:
rcSource: (0,0)-(0,0)
rcTarget: (0,0)-(0,0)
dwBitRate: 0
dwBitErrorRate: 0
AvgTimePerFrame: 0

VIDEOINFOHEADER2:
dwInterlaceFlags: 0x00000000
dwCopyProtectFlags: 0x00000000
dwPictAspectRatioX: 16
dwPictAspectRatioY: 9
dwControlFlags: 0x2a0d2581
dwReserved2: 0x00000000

MPEG2VIDEOINFO:
dwStartTimeCode: 0
cbSequenceHeader: 0
dwProfile: 0x00000002
dwLevel: 0x00000002
dwFlags: 0x00000000

BITMAPINFOHEADER:
biSize: 40
biWidth: 720
biHeight: 480
biPlanes: 1
biBitCount: 0
biCompression: 0
biSizeImage: 0
biXPelsPerMeter: 0
biYPelsPerMeter: 0
biClrUsed: 0
biClrImportant: 0

pbFormat:
0000: 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 ................
0010: 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 ................
0020: 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 ................
0030: 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 10 00 00 00 09 00 00 00 ................
0040: 81 25 0d 2a 00 00 00 00 28 00 00 00 d0 02 00 00 %.*....(...Ð...
0050: e0 01 00 00 01 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 à...............
0060: 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 ................
0070: 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 02 00 00 00 02 00 00 00 ................
0080: 00 00 00 00|00 00 00 00 ........

That looks normal.

If you right-click on the player's .exe you should be able to choose which GPU it uses: Intel or NVIDIA. You could try if that makes any difference.

Admin wrote:That looks normal.

If you right-click on the player's .exe you should be able to choose which GPU it uses: Intel or NVIDIA. You could try if that makes any difference.

The default GPU was Intel. I tried it with NVIDIA. Didn't make any difference.

Is there anything suspicious about VLC not working either? Or would you expect them both to use the same codec?

The decoder from VLC is similar (also based on FFmpeg project), but the rest of the DVD handling is totally different.

The only weird thing in your filter list was that "LAV Video Decoder (internal) (low merit)", where I would expect the external "LAV Video Decoder" in case of default settings. Not an issue since it is the same decoder, but internal one uses its own copy of the settings.

One thing that you could try is a different video renderer in MPC-HC (options > playback > output).

Since it happens with specific DVDs, perhaps they have a different region? Normally you should get an error when drive and disc have different regions, but who knows.

All my DVDs are region 1 as is the player, so that's not it.

I tried changing the DirectShow video renderer to System Default, which I think I changed to the NVIDIA chip earlier, and MPC crashed. But when I restarted it, the DVD played correctly!

Thanks! This solves the immediate problem. I'm still curious about why VLC doesn't work, I'll go look and see if it has a renderer setting too.

VLC has rendering options as well in its advanced settings.

Most likely a driver issue. There is a newer Intel driver, maybe that helps.