STHVCD 5.3 is a powerful VCD MP3 and CD player.now support DVCD.
This 32-bit VCD decoder software only run in Windows95 Win 97(Windows 95 OSR2) Windows 98 or Windows NT 4.0(W/S) 5.0 etc, not Win16,because it is developed specially for Windows95 and NT4.0,To Windows NT, the version must be 4.0 or higher,Not Support NT3.51.
New Function On Chinese Tip,You can view the file CHINATIP.TXT or STHVCDCH.HLP
You can see different mono only by adjusting the color differences U and V, the speed is very fast in mono, because only decoding for luminance not for chrominance.
Change the display to mono display if the picture appears dark, through adjusting the color differences U and V to make the dark image in the picture clearly, only need to drag up the V instead of adjusting the luminance.
Color differences is not decoded in mono display, so previous color differences is not matched with current frame when it changes into color display. Then wrong color blocks appears, but these blocks will be replaced by right ones.
If you haven't installed DirectDraw driver, the result of color window display is bad, on the contrary, the result is fine in mono display because of using GDI display and flutter color display.
The graphic driver VESA brought by the SuperDecoder displays the image by interlace in high resolution, it is not to blacken a line simply, but alternative scan, you can see the field image with more like DVD, the still image is very clear, but the motion image is not clear because of the alternative scan.
If your DirectDraw driver doesn't support YUV display,Superdecoder still can make mode switch, and make mono and color fullscreen display.
Supports many kinds of YUV formats, they are: YUY2, YVYU, UYVY, Y221, YV12, YVU9, IF09 and so on, as well as their priority sequence.
If Windows 95 is not optimized setting, many other decoder software can't read from VCD,and a MCI error occurs when playing. But you won't have this problem during using Superdecoder even you switch off all the 32-bit safe mode drivers, because it has its own CD-ROM interface.
Superdecoder may try to skip bad sector, if it doesn't work in certain condition, such as too many continuous bad sectors, it will stop playing and have you to skip them by manually relocation. Otherwise the playing can't be continue.
It takes CD-ROM much time to read data in bad sector, the author had tried his best to adjust the time out of CD-ROM, without good result.
You can follow the steps to continue playing when CD-ROM can't read in bad sector for a long time: forcibly eject VCD, stop the data reading of CD-ROM, then get it back and relocate.
Many player software can't open and play the VCD file if a bad sector occurs in beginning of the movie file, but Superdecoder can deal with the problem as eject the VCD and replace it.
Sometime some VCD can't be recognized in Windows95, you can't see the catalog although the volume label is normal, VCD player can play this kind of VCD, and "Superdecoder" can play them as well without seeing the catalog, but it is impossible for most decoder software.
Audio quality is high by using floating point decode. SuperDecoder is based on appreciation, so it doesn't support 11KHz and 8-bit audio. Common speakers can't tell the difference between 22050Hz and 44100Hz.
Only supports 16-bit 22KHz and 44KHz mono & stereo, the speed of playback is high in 11Khz and 8-bit ,but it doesn't meet the demand for appreciation.
Stereo mixture audio is to combine left and right two audio channels into one audio channel, it makes the speed of decode faster.
If you only want audio there is a single program for audio decode to meet your demand.
The quality of image is adjustable, you can adjust the decode quality lower to accelerate decode.
When fullscreen display, press the right key of mouse, it ejects a control menu. When playing VCD, double click the left key of mouse in picture window, a control selection panel ejected to make interactive operation. It is convenient to use keyboard to achieve too. No control selection panel when playing single file.
To control audio switching, press Ctrl+Del or Del; To control the volume, press Ctrl+,Ctrl-, or +-keys.
Saved amplified image is horizontal and vertical bi-directional.
You can save as YUV format image and RLE compressed YUV format image, that is RIFF file format. YV12 format is Y data package + V data package + U data package,Y:V:U=4:1:1, to RLE compressed YUV image, it is compressed by block not by line, Y data is one block, as well as U and V.
You can see the VIEWYUV source program brought by Superdecoder for the detail of YUV, there are data structure and its process method about YUV, decompression algorithm of RLE compressed YUV, the conversion algorithm in the source program.
There are 3 dither methods : 8X8 pattern match dither, error difuse dither and adaptive error difuse dither,the quality highers on turn, you can get a similar 256-color graphic as  true color graphic by adaptive error difuse dither.
When playing through display mode switch, the mouse works without the arrow being seen, press the right key to dispear a control selection menu, double click the left key to view a control selection panel to interactive operation. So does with keyboard, for example, Ctrl+Home is for fullscreen display, Ctrl+End is for switching back to window mode, Ctrl+P is for starting, Ctrl+S is for stopping.
Ctrl+Home is for  fullscreen display, Ctrl+End is for switching back to window mode,	Ctrl+PageUp Jumping play backwards,Ctrl+PageDn Jumping play forwards,Ctrl+T Stepping frames.Ctrl+right arrow next section when playing, directly choose by Number key
It may lead to stop the volume if you open a certain dialog box of this program when playing, to switch the volume control can solve the problem.
You'd better to stop other programs which have occupied the audio before opening the audio, otherwise the volume can't be opened because of the occupation of those programs.
No audio during the playing. Note that your sound card must support 16-bit 22K and 44.1K.
If there is no audio, you may check your sound card, whether it supports 16-bit 44KHz or 22KHz, mono or stereo, or the audio has been occupied by other programs, the use of audio is matched or not etc.
Supports Chinese GB code and English interface,automatically use Chinese interface in the system which supports double bytes.
You have to rename or delete the file SthChina.DLL to change the interface to English if the operation system is Taiwan version Windows etc,or the interface is wrong.
Saved mono is in current mono status, you can adjust the color differences U and V before saving it.
The display aspect rate of some display card is higher than 1:1.0, the default picture is too small to be displayed, you have to drag it bigger. Generally, 1:1.0 graphic can't be reduced in 640X480, 1:1.3 graphic must be dragged bigger to full screen in 800X600. 1:3.5 graphic can reach full screen in 1024X768, you can move a part of window out of the screen to drag.
There are 3 files about display hardware setting: K2V_DIG.INI, K2V_HWC.INI and K2V_SWC.INI. The rate related to YUV display rate is setted in K2V_SWC.INI, according to display memory type, scan frequency, resolution rate, different rates occur. The rate is calculated by multiplying 100, 1:3.5 is defined as 3500.
This software uses pink as colorkey, that is RGB=(255,0,255). If you want specially result of throught window, change the color of window to pink(start/setting/control/panel/display/configuration).Thus the window covers the video window, the picture can pass throught.
Press "Select Loop" button, the playing will loop constantly, selection field appears in play stage bar, default is all, choose new starting point and end point of round by dragging the location bar, when entering selection round field, playing will round work, you still can start playing by locating outside the field.
Full Supports VCD2.0, makes the interaction of VCD2.0 more flexible, unlike the old VCD2.0 ,the VCD2.0 menu tree of SuperDecoder shows the whole interactive operation.
The interaction menu tree of VCD2.0 makes it more convenient to interactive  operate the disc by one step. You don't have to spend much time on pressing the option key to skip the content you don't need.
Even the VCD1.1, old Karaoke CD, you can directly select the song by menu so that getting the interaction capability similar as VCD2.0.
This software supports interaction operation fully, when the VCD is opened, you can do the operation at any time:Ctrl+right arrow is [NEXT],Enter next program section; Ctrl+ left arrow is [PREV],Enter previous program section;Ctrl+ down arrow is [RETURN] return previous program.
Permits keyboard choosing under VCD interaction operation, you only need to press key 8 to select No.8 song, Ctrl+1, then Ctrl+7,and key 8 is entering No.178 song.
Supports multidisc continuously playing, if you have more than one CD-ROM, disc numbers are c:, d:, e:, f:, g:,it follows the sequence c to g to play, check D: after finishing C:, until Z:. Note that only CD-ROM can be checked not including other hardware.
You can set ejecting the disc after all VCD disc are finished in setting session window, ejecting depends on the CDAUDIO MCI.interface. Automatically ejecting will be prohibited without the interface. If you have more than one CD-ROM, you may need to choose automatically clean after the disc is finished playing to enter next VCD. Otherwise, the playing will be stopped.
Choosing automatically eject means automatically clean, it is wrong not to clean after the disc is ejected.
When playing, the program works, it is same as pressing auto Ctrl+[right arrow] no matter what kind of VCD . This is default routine of playing VCD.
Program introduction in VCD2.0 is different with common video-audio file,video decode is bring by audio, so audio can't be switched off at this time. When you listen to the music by audio, you can make recording, it is to directly save the MPEG audio data which are decoded by sophisticated 44100Hz with distortionless. It is much better than the audio which is recorded after it is played by sound card.
There is a decode program named DECODER in SuperDecoder which is used to read video data stream or audio data stream from MPG or DAT file. You can decode the audio data stream of Karaoke as MPA file, as well as video data. Normally the number of MPA file data is very little.
Continuously save all the graphic as file in pointed file format by the option Save Sequence , for example, you point the file name as Save,it will be saved from Save001 until you press stop button or the files are finished playing.
Entering next file may stop the saving.	The speed for saving all kinds of format file can't meet the demand for real-time synchronization play, so you can’t hear audio. When playing the interactive program introduction of VCD2.0, you can hear audio because the decoding is master  by audio. It is an exception.
Making recording is available when you have no audio device or audio is occupied by other programs, or audio doesn't support  16-bit 44100Hz, playback is executed virtually.
Press Ctrl+PageUp or Ctrl+PageDn to jump backwards or forwards, you may encounter double jumping, because PageUp and PageDn are control keys in scrolling bar which has focus, as a result, VCD control command and then scrolling bar control command lead to double jump. The problem can be avoided if you don't press Ctrl key.
Although SuperDecoder emphasis 16-bit Sound Card, you can still play 8-bit audio by replacing the driver STHAUDIO.DLL by a 8-bit compatible audio decode program STHADO08.DLL in SuperDecoder.
The Screen save program will be disable when SuperDecoder is running.
