windows.md

Installation on Windows

I don't know very much about windows, so corrections to these instructions are welcomed.

Installing Python

Get the Windows installer from https://www.python.org/downloads/windows/ - Install it. Suggest "add to PATH".

I would recommend Python 3.11 - as there are known problems with package dependencies on Python 3.12. If you have luck installing on 3.12 please let me know.

Sometimes, on Windows only, errors are not printed to the console as they should be. Suggestions are welcomed for why this happens.

Installation

python3 -mvenv venv
venv/Scripts/pip install gopro-overlay

You'll also need to install ffmpeg, if you don't have it already. You can download this from https://www.gyan.dev/ffmpeg/builds/ - The "essential version" is OK. Unzip this somewhere. The default might be something like: C:\Users\james\Downloads\ffmpeg-6.0-essentials_build

Windows might not have Roboto Font, so start with a standard windows font - on my Windows 11 box, Trebuchet is installed.

In PowerShell...

Set-ExecutionPolicy Unrestricted -Scope Process
.\venv\Scripts\activate.ps1
python .\venv\Scripts\gopro-dashboard.py --font trebuc.ttf --ffmpeg C:\Users\james\Downloads\ffmpeg-6.0-essentials_build\ffmpeg-6.0-essentials_build\bin input.mp4 output.mp4

Configuration files will go into %UserProfile%\.gopro-graphics

On my (pretty quick) Windows 11 Box, I get 35 fps (=3.5x realtime) on 2.7k with CPU only, and about the same with GPU.

I did get two errors running with GPU:

• decoder->cvdl->cuvidCreateDecoder(&decoder->decoder, params) failed -> CUDA_ERROR_INVALID_VALUE: invalid argument
  • This was fixed by following insttructions in docs/bin/README.md (adding -threads parameter)
• The minimum required Nvidia driver for nvenc is 522.25 or newer
  • Needed to upgrade nvidia driver.

--double-buffer DOES NOT WORK on Windows - shame - I don't really know how to implement this on Windows.