README.TXT For REALmagic Hollywood Plus(TM) 
Release 1.8.2 (Build 125) for Win 95/98 ----- June 8th, 2000
============================================================

Congratulations on your purchase of REALmagic Hollywood Plus DVD/MPEG2
multimedia Playback .  This file contains important information for 
installation of the drivers and application software for this card.

	      _____________________________________
			
	FOR FUTURE UPDATES & NT DRIVERS VISIT OUR WEB SITE
		     www.sigmadesigns.com
              Latest Drivers & FTP Access - Hollywood_Plus
		     ____________________

WHAT'S NEW IN THIS RELEASE 1.8.2
================================
-  If you need to start DVD Station in full-screen mode, you can do
   it now by adding the line "fullscreen=1" in the [Settings] section
   of WVP.INI in the directory where you installed the applications
   (usually REALmagic).  
   For audio CDs and drives with MPEG contents (defined as data by
   DVD Station panel, you can start DVD Station in Repeat mode by
   adding the line "repeatmode=1" in this same section [Settings].
-  A fix for the movie "The Sixth Sense" for R2/R4.
-  Some movies encoding require to disable the UDF format. for proper
   playback. Please see note 15 in section VI below for details.
-  This release of the drivers will behave like rel 1.7 as far as
   the support to special sound cards.


CLARIFICATION NOTE ABOUT REGION CODES :
-------------------------------------
The program "DVD Drive Region" in the REALmagic Group is for setting
the region code of the RPC2 drives.  The region code on the hardware
of Hollywood Plus is irrelevant in this case.

If you don't have an RPC2 drive, then the control will be by the region
code on the Hollywood Plus.  This can be set by running SETUP from
the second diskette (application) and select the second option in the
menu : "1 - Install Application, 2 - Set the region code".  





WHAT'S NEW IN THIS RELEASE 1.8.1
================================
-  A fix for a bug while accessing the MPEG data on some movies that
   leads to the error message MMSYSTEM275. This bug was introduced
   in release 1.8.
-  Some region 4 movies published by a certain company are exhibiting
   audio noise during playback. This is due to some CRC errors in the
   AC-3 stream and can be fixed by ignoring these errors using the 
   registry entry 
      IgnoreAc3Crc=1   in the folder 
   HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\Software\Sigma Designs\REALmagic\13
   It is recommended to have it equal to the default value zero to
   allow the driver to handle these errors by not decoding these 
   blocks (or passing them to the external AC-3 decoder, if 
   available).


WHAT'S NEW IN THIS RELEASE 1.8
==============================
-  DTS is now supported : whenever you choose the DTS option in a
   movie menu the OUTPUT WILL BE DIRECTED THRU THE SP/DIF OUPUT IN
   DIGITAL FORMAT REGARDLESS OF THE DVD STATION AUDIO OUPUT SETTING,
   so the DTS stream is NOT decoded thru the analog mini audio jack
-  NTSC to PAL conversion does not suffer of the 1 sec stuttering
-  The audio volume sliding bar shows in full screen
-  PC Friendly will show the playback of movie with the black
   key color (video was not shown with rel 1.7 - audio only heard)
-  A timimg fix for the Jaton's OEM board on Pentium III systems
-  The audio special output (6 channel Wave) support to sound cards
   is removed for copyright issues

WHAT'S NEW IN THIS RELEASE 1.7
==============================
-  Implemented basic support for RPC2 drives (DVD-ROM drives that 
   carry the region code)
-  Added auto-calibration "on the fly" when no calibration has been
   done before at the current resolution/color depth.
-  The audio special output (6 Channel Wave) supports the ForteMedia
   sound card.

WHAT'S NEW IN THIS RELEASE 1.6.2
=================================
-  A fix for the playback with AC-3 audio output for some movies
   (in the previous release it needed to start in Stereo output mode)
-  An improvement in the auto-calibration
-  The Help file shows a description for the buttons which did not
   have one in the previous release.
-  Support for Chinese help under Chinese Windows
-  There is a special audio output now for the Formosa (nFIC) sound
   card based on the ESS Canyon3D sound chip.  This audio output 
   setting will route internally the audio output to the sound card,
   downmixing to 6 channels WAVE API. NO output comes from the stereo
   audio jack of Hollywood Plus.  This setting is ONLY good for this
   sound card. If you don't have this sound card, please do not use 
   this setting. 

WHAT'S NEW IN RELEASE 1.6
==========================
-  The TV output option has two new settings :
     -  MultiSystem :   the output will follow the source of the movie,
                        i.e. if an NTSC movie the output will be NTSC 
                        and the same for PAL
     -  PAL 60 : the output will be at a frequency of 60 Hz, the same
                 as NTSC but with PAL colors (needs TV set with this
                 capability)
-  A fix for the playback on some systems that were crashing when
   outputting to TV
-  A fix for the permanent display of some movies' subtitles
-  A better handling of the AC-3 output to suppress noise appearing on
   some Dolby Digital decoders (when AC-3 output is enabled)
-  A fix for the disappearance of the second subtitle line or the 
   highlighting of a wrong area for the menus buttons on TV (when
   loopback cable is not present)
-  A fix for movies encoded the same way like "Die Hard III" region 4
   which was not played back properly
-  A larger tolerance range for the PAL TV sets
-  Addition of a button in DVD Station to set your preferred default
   DVD-ROM drive
-  Addition of the option "/f=filename" on the command line of
   DVD Station to allow the direct play back of the file
-  Compatibility with the IBM MPEG 2 title  "Worldbook 1999"



CONTENTS
========					
I   - DRIVER AND APPLICATIONS INSTALLATION	
II  - BORDER ADJUSTMENT AND COLOR CALIBRATION	       
III - DVD REGION CODE CHANGE				
IV  - TV OUT
V   - FULL SCREEN PLAYBACK
VI  - HINTS TO RESOLVE PROBLEMS AND BETTER PLAYBACK

I   - DRIVER AND APPLICATIONS INSTALLATION
      ====================================
    
After the hardware installation of the card do the following:

1.  For an existing installation (if not go to step 2): uninstall the
    previous software by going to the REALmagic Group - Uninstall, 
    reboot, and follow next steps 2 to 7 below.
    NOTE : You do not need when running SETUP of step 5 to set the 
           region code again as mentioned in step 6.
 
2.  On booting your system, Windows 9X will detect the card. Insert the
    REALmagic Hollywood Plus Drivers Disk in your floppy drive A and 
    click Finish. This will install Hollywood Plus drivers on your hard
    disk.
3.  To install the DVD navigation software insert Application Disk into
    drive A and run SETUP.
4.  The Setup program will show two options: Install the REALmagic DVD
    application or Change the DVD region code.
5.  Check the DVD application installation option and follow the 
    instructions.
6.  After the files are copied, set a DVD region code as part of the 
    setup program.
    Note: Setup will not ask you to set the DVD region code if you 
          install the card later in the same region.
7. Click Finish to complete the installation process by performing
   Auto Calibration.

   
II - BORDER ADJUSTMENT AND COLOR CALIBRATION
      =======================================

    NOTE: If the border is not adjusted properly after Auto Calibration
          you may need to set the Border Adjustment to get more 
          accurate adjustment. You need to set the Border Adjustment 
          only once for each setting of display resolution.

1.  At the Start button, click Programs and select REALmagic Hollywood
    Plus program group. Click REALmagic Configuration.
2.  Click on Adjust Border and use the proper buttons to adjust the 
    black rectangle in the magenta box.
3.  Change different values to adjust stability if you are viewing 
    jumping pixels on MPEG video. Click OK when you are done. 
4.  The Reset Default button will reset the color calibration and 
    border adjustment values to the factory default settings.

    Note 1: Color calibration is required if the colors are not 
            normal or the screen is pink or not clear. If color 
            calibration is required, Click on "Auto Calibration". The
            screen will flash for 5 to 10 seconds then displays a 
            message that the calibration is complete. Click OK.
    Note 2: In the cases where this calibration is unsuccessful, 
            you can click on Advanced..., then the Manual 
            Calibration. This will involve fixing the R, G, B 
            sliders as shown in the window four times. You can use the
            up/down arrow keys for fine tuning and you don't need
            necessarily to see the cross but just the disappearance
            of the vertical bar.

III - DVD REGION CODE CHANGE
      ======================

1.  Run SETUP from Application disk. Select DVD Region Code 
    change option. Set the region code according to the country you 
    are in. This setting goes onto the hardware of Hollywood Plus
    and there is NO need to set it again if you move the board to 
    a different system.
      _._._._._._._._._._._._._._._._._._._._._._._._._._._._._._._._
    Note: The setup program will allow you to change the region code 
          for five times. If you want to reset the region code settings
          after five times contact the card manufacturer or an 
          authorized distributor or service center. A nominal handling
          fee will be charged.
      _______________________________________________________________
    Note: If the system includes an RPC2 DVD-ROM drive that carries
          its own region code, DVD Station will check the code against
          the movie and will issue an appropriate message if not 
          matching (the Hollywood Plus region code is ignored in this
          case).  Movies will not playback if the drive is new and has
          NOT been set for a region.

IV  - TV OUT
      ======

    The REALmagic Hollywood Plus can display on a VGA monitor or a TV.
    To switch between these modes an icon is provided on the left 
    corner of the DVD Station control panel that toggles between 
    computer monitor and TV.

    In order to display on a TV, some additional settings may be 
    required. From the DVD Station control panel click Options button.
    This will open a window for options setting. Click the settings tab.
    Select the options according to your TV type. The color control, 
    brightness, and contrast controls have also been provided for TV.

    Note :  Some TVs are sensitive with video frequency input and may 
            show Black and White video on TV. This has specially been
            noticed on some PAL TVs. In such a situation do the 
            following WHILE the TV-Out option is active and DVD/MPEG is
            playing on TV.:
		1. From the DVD station click the "Options Dialog -
                   Settings tab.
		2. Press Configure and then press Advanced Settings.
		3. Select Expert Settings and click the mouse. This 
                   will open a pop-up window. Adjust different values
                   until you have color picture on TV.  Notice that you
                   need to keep on going in one direction when changing
                   the values i.e. either always increasing or 
                   decreasing because of the hysteresis nature of this
                   adjustment.
	   
		     					

V  - FULL SCREEN PLAYBACK
     ====================

    In order to playback in full screen, double click the left button
    of mouse anywhere in the MPEG window or press Ctrl+Z. This will 
    playback the video in full-screen mode. In order to go back to the
    window mode, press Space in full-screen mode and it will resume 
    playback in the restored MPEG window. See "What's new in 1.8.2."
    above for details in starting DVD Station in full-screen mode.
      


VI - HINTS TO RESOLVE PROBLEMS AND BETTER PLAYBACK 
     =============================================

1.  The drivers are installed and the Hollywood Plus appears in the 
    "Device Manager" but the CD's won't play.

    Run SETUP from the second diskette (Applications) to create the 
    "REALmagic Hollywood Plus" group. This group contains the 
    DVD-Station, README file, REALmagic Configuration, and Uninstall.

2.  With the Hollywood Plus board and the drivers correctly installed 
    the system crashes after boot-up.

    Start Win 9X in the Safe mode, select the Hollywood Plus board in
    the Device Manager, manually change the Memory Range to a different
    setting for the Hollywood Plus and reboot.

3.  The REALmagic Configuration can be run but when the DVD-Station is
    started (or the Media Player with an MPEG file ) the system hangs.

    Check the Device Manager for a conflict in the IRQ resources and 
    make the necessary change(s).

4.  After installing the first disk for the drivers, and run SETUP from
    the second disk, the following message comes up : "Driver cannot be
    loaded, another instance from the driver may be running".  Or when
    playing an MPEG file after the software installation, there is an
    error message  "MMSYSTEM 266 : undetectable error ...".

    Reseat Hollywood Plus in different PCI slots because of some of 
    the motherboards BIOSes handling of the resources.


5.  The MPEG files play and the audio can be heard but the video is a 
    solid color.

    Run "REALmagic Configuration" and select "Auto Calibration." Or, 
    make sure that the output of the Display Adapter is routed to the
    Hollywood Plus input and the Display Adapter's output is routed to
    the monitor.

6.  The picture is waving.

    Run "REALmagic Configuration," select "Border Adjust" and adjust 
    the STABILITY: smoothness of the two vertical sides.

7.  MPEG 1 files run normally, but DVD movies are shaky.

    Make certain that the DVD-ROM drive is connected as a Master on the
    IDE controller. And turn ON the DMA flag in the 
    "Device Manager-DVD ROM drive-Settings-DMA."

8.  When running Video CD on the CD-ROM drive, the playback is shaky.

    Connect the Video CD drive as a slave to the hard disk and not on 
    the same controller with the DVD-ROM drive. If you are using the 
    original release of Win 95 make sure you have installed the 
    Microsoft fix (IOSYSUPD.EXE - from their web site). This fix 
    smoothes the playback of Video CDs from the slave drives.

9.  I get an "MMSYSTEM error 275" when I try to play a DVD encrypted 
    movie.

    This can happen if you are using the original release of Win 95 and
    you have the CD-ROM drive as a slave to the DVD-ROM drive. Replace 
    the file ESDI_506.PDR with its equivalent in OSR2 in the 
    subdirectory IOSUBSYS of Windows/System.  Or, you can download from 
    www.sigmadesigns.com - "Knowledge Base, FAQ about Hollywood Plus" 
    an ATAPI driver compatible with most IDE DVD-ROM drives.  Other 
    possible reasons the installation of incompatible SCSI drivers or
    an RPC2 DVD-ROM drive NOT set for any region.  Some movies will
    require turning ON the "Disable UDF format" as described in 
    point 15 below.  If still problems with UDF, disable the UDF
    readers of the CD burner installed.

10. For DVD-ROMs that require high data transfer rates, it is better to
    have the DVD-ROM drive connected to an IDE controller with the 
    "Bus Master" mode activated.   
    
11. If you are using Rel OSR2 of Win 95 or Win 98, check on the DMA
    feature of your DVD-ROM drive. This can be found in the Device
    Manager by double-clicking the entry for the DVD-ROM drive, 
    clicking the tab Settings, and checking 'On' the DMA feature.

12. Playing long DVD movies, above 4 GB in size, is supported by the 
    Microsoft CDFS.VXD of Win 95 Rel OSR2 and later versions.

13. Capturing of an MPEG frame from an encrypted DVD movie is not 
    supported because of Copyright issues. In other cases the capture
    feature gives its best results at a color depth of 64K (16 bits) 
    or higher.

14. Playing VOB files using the Media Player might not show the best 
    performance because of different navigation schemes. Use the 
    DVD Station for this.

15. Playing DVD under WIN98 will show better performance for some 
    movies if you run MSCONFIG, General, Advanced and turning ON
    "Disable UDF file system".   If there is still a problem to play
    the movie, make sure the UDF readers of some CD burners are
    disabled.
  	 
16. Video is fine on VGA but is Black and White on TV.
 
    Please see section for TV-Out.  Please note that some TV sets in
    Europe using the SCART connector have inputs for S-Video but do 
    not support, however, the S-Video signal.  The display will be
    B&W.  Check your TV manual for details.

17. When watching the movie on TV, the picture gets dimmer and brighter
    at short intervals and with some movies some yellow horizontal
    lines appear on the TV screen.

    The TV set is connected to the PC system via a VCR or an alike 
    device.  This device initiates the Macrovision protection of the
    movie.  Connect the TV directly to the PC system.

18. The S-Video connector on Hollywood Plus is a 7-hole jack and
    my S-Video cable has a 4-pin socket only.

    The 4-pin cable is compatible with the 7-pin socket.  There are
    more pins on the 7-pin socket to provide for the composite TV
    output.

19. I lost the S-Video/Composite Converter cable and have no access to
    another one.

    Order another one from your supplier.  In the USA, you can check
    the phone number or the email address of the fulfillment center on
    the web site . The  pinout of this converter is as follows :

          _________
	 /         \
	|  7  6  5  |
	| 4 3   2 1 |
	|           |
	 \  OOOOO  /
	  ---------

	1:GND
	2:Composite
	3:GND
	4:GND
	5:Luma
	6:not connected
	7:Chroma
            

20.  You can watch some movies but not others, using a Toshiba DVD-ROM
     drive model SD-1202 with the firmware number 1018.

     Upgrade the firmware to 1020.

21.  If the TV button is missing in DVD Station and you only have the
     fullscreen button, do the following :

       - Close DVD Station
       - Run RegEdit 
       - Go to H_KEY_LOCAL_MACHINE, SOFTWARE, Sigma Designs, 
         REALmagic, Station 
       - Delete the "Board" entry 
       - Close RegEdit 
       - Run DVD Station 

22.  The Hollywood Plus drivers do not support DTS audio on DVD movies.
     It allows only the DTS stream to go out to an external decoder.
     If you do not have such decoder, play the Dolby AC-3 stream instead.
     

23.  You want DVD Station to check your DVD-ROM first and it has a 
     drive letter after the CD-ROM.  

     Rel 1.6 and later of this DVD Station allows you to set your 
     preferred drive.  Options Dialog-Play List-Default Drive.

24.  You see the video but no audio.

     - Try first the speakers plugged in Hollywood Plus and be sure the
       output from DVD Station is Stereo.
     - Then check the audio jumper cable from the output of Hollywood
       Plus to the input of the sound card. If no sound, check the
       volume mixer to have Line-in NOT muted or at low level.
     - If you are using a Dolby Digital Receiver, make sure that it 
       accepts AC-3 streams (if your setting in DVD Station is AC-3),
       otherwise it must be a PCM decoder and in this case set the 
       DVD Station output to PCM.
     - There is no need for an audio cable between the back of the 
       DVD-ROM drive and the CD-IN of Hollywood Plus.  You can connect
       this cable straight to the CD-IN of the sound card.  This is 
       used by the audio CDs and not the DVD discs.
    

25. The maximum refresh rates allowed with the Hollywood Plus MPEG
    playback depends partially on the display board.  However, the 
    following can be used as a guideline:

		 640 x  480	120 Hz
		 800 x  600	100 Hz
		1024 x  768	 85 Hz
		1152 x  864	 85 Hz
		1280 x 1024	 85 Hz (75 with some boards)
		1600 x 1200	 85 Hz
   
    If you have some blurriness on the Windows desktop due to the
    analog overlay and some display adapters, please reduce either
    the resolution or the refresh rate of the display adapter 
    for a better display.   You can remove the pass-thru cable if
    you watch the MPEG video on the TV set only.

26. The Hollywood Plus does NOT support the MP3 files playback.

27. While the movie is playing, the DVD Station freezes.  

    Check if you have a network card 3C905B.  If it is, uninstall its
    driver and install only the 4th disk (avoiding the diagnostic
    program).

28. You have a third generation DVD-ROM drive (RPC2 specs that require
    a region code on the drive) and you cannot playback movies.

    Run the utility for this drive to set the region code to your 
    country code.

29. One of the possible reasons of being unable to play encrypted 
    movies is having a Virus Scanner running on the system.  
    Another reason could be the presence of a CD-RW Burner software
    which uses special SCSI drivers.  Disable these drivers before
    playing movies (such as SCSIHLP.VXD, PU66VSD.VXD, .... )

30. What is the pinout of the VGA signals on the pass-thru cable ?

       View of the 9 pin socket of the pass-through cable,
       seen from the bracket:
                         
                         _________
                        /_________\
                       |           |
                       | 9    8  7 |
                       |  6 5 4 3  |
                        \   2 1   /
                         ---------

                       1:Blue  IN
                       2:GND
                       3:Green IN
                       4:GND
                       5:Vsync IN
                       6:Hsync IN
                       7:Red   IN
                       8:SDA (from pin12 of DB15) - for PnP monitors
                       9:SCL (from pin15 of DB15) - for PnP monitors

 ======================================================================

	END   OF    FILE

