Is there anyone that can play this H264 clip on Timeline SU3500 without 100% CPU load?

Update: problem has been solved by using Windows 7 and Windows Media player 12.

This clip causes 100% CPU load on my 1810T. It seems to play smooth though.

Is there anyone that can play it with lower CPU load and good image quality?
If so, what is your setup?

 

I don't know anything about video acceleration but this might help:
http://nunnally.ahmygoddess.net/watching-h264-videos-using-dxva/

 

My 3810T with a SU3500 used about 80% of the CPU for the zoom player exe. the DWM (windows desktop manager) used another 8-11%.

 

Probably the similar as mine, mine goes between 70% and 100%.

 

Hi. I have also tried running this clip on my 4810T with a SU3500 getting some very strange results.Using BSPlayer resulted in choppy playback and a constant 100% CPU load. Just out of curiosity, I then played the clip with Media Player Classic, and , surprisingly, the playback was kind of smooth, with some picture distortions and frames drop-outs now and then. The CPU load was, beleive it or not, somewhere between 40-50 %. Don´t understand!

 

Maybe you guys would be interested in this topic

 

Hi

Try this Player (and don't forget to enable hardware acceleration):

www.mirillis.com/splash.html

I got 20 ~ 30 % on my 3810T with SU3500 !!

 

The G45 IGP has working DXVA H.264 acceleration with Media Player Classic Home Cinema under Vista SP1 (not XP). Unless something is goofy with the encode it should play back fine.

 

This is your answer for ~10% Usage.

 

I'll try some of the suggestions in this thread today or tomorrow.

It should be possible without.

 

There's a problem with this guide. When it says "you will see a dialog window like below." there is no image.

 

Ignore it, if you don't have FFDShow installed, H.264 videos should play through the internal DXVA filter by default if you use this installation ( http://mpc-hc.sourceforge.net/).

The one below is a must though, as many H.264 videos are not within the guidelines for processing on the 4500MHD chip, but will still run, but might not playback with deblocking.

Code:

HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Gabest\Filters\MPC Video Decoder
- Key name : CompatibilityMode
- type : DWORD
- value : 16 (Hex value)

Also, try installing the DivX 7 H.264 codec (a very efficient codec on par with CoreAVC; during installation, on the component selection screen, uncheck everything but 'H.264 Decoder' under DivX Plus DirectShow Filters) and use it in conjunction with MPC-Homecinema (after installing divx you will only have to disable the internal MPC H.264 codecs first - View, Options, Internal Filters, and under Transform Filters, uncheck H264/AVC (DXVA and FFmpeg).

 

It plays back 'fine' but CPU utilization is around 80% with peaks to 100% with DXVA is enabled.

Thanks for the suggestion. Well it works with lower CPU utilization that is true, but image quality is lower, frames are dropped and audio is out of sync. MPC does better.

 

Thanks how do I do this? I can't find regedit in Vista.

 

Another tutorial:
http://forum.notebookreview.com/showthread.php?t=399952

Edit:
NBR user "embrion" seems to be very knowledgable and could help with the other tutorial.

 

Press Windows Key + R and type in regedit.
Attatched is a reg file, you just have to rename the file to blah.reg

 

Lol I followed that one with MPC and that delivered the 80-100% CPU.

Is there any point in trying the same again with MPC HC instead?

 

Thanks. There is no "HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Gabest\Filters\MPC Video Decoder"

See screenshot.

 

I think that should be the key factor in this acceleration stuff

 

You are right. That did it

Initially I did follow this guide but I did it with MCP not HC.

Now with MPC HC it works with 40%-50% CPU.

 

There wouldn't be unless you changed any of the MPC Video Decoder settings.

 

Strange though, so playback with MPC HC is now giving around 40-50% CPU load which is good, but if I play this video (very fast action) some frames are dropped (just like with splash player).

Actually it looked better before when CPU load was 100%.

 

This is a post of someone else who did some tests with 4500MHD and DXVA.

 

Like I said, deblocking is partially broken with DXVA on the 4500MHD.

 

Image quality without DXVA enabled is shockingly better.

I just watched The Bourne Supremacy trailer, it's 100% smooth, no dropped frames and audio in sync. CPU load hits 100% sometimes but it doesn't seem to matter. (MPC HC with Cyberlink H264, DXVA disabled)

When I enable DXVA frames start dropping and a lot of information is missed because certain shots are not displayed at all.

It's interesting to see the difference between DXVA enabled and disabled.

After discovering this the 1810T is a great machine for movie lovers. With the excellent speakers and a good looking HD screen it's quite amazing.

 

I can play all h264 Files with mirillisa Splash.
best free software for HD video decoding.
easy (even my mother could make it work with dxva) and gives great picture quality.

it is also the only player that works fine with dxva on my wifes notebook with nvidia 8400.

i find media player classic as a piece of crapp... works different way on each PC. hard as hell to set up.

 

I tried the trailer of the Bourne Ultimatum with Splash, but image quality suffered with DXVA enabled.

http://www.h264info.com/clips.html

 

Thanks Namaiki for your your clear guidelines. I have just played the Bourne Ultimatum clip and it´s absolutely smooth. Excellent!! Cheers

 

damn. there is really big issue with deblocking on intel with dxva enabled.
good im not using my notebbook too much. everything is ok with dxva on my desktop PC with geforce.

do you know what is the reason of the problem on intel? drivers?

 

I'm not sure but Namaiki seems to know what he is talking about:

 

thanks.
i think i will wait some time for software or driver updates and if it wont be fixed (video decoding quality) i will try to exchange my notebook for something with nvidia... :/

 

Actually it looked great without DXVA. Only downside is 100% CPU peaks, but I don't see that as a problem. The 1810T hardly gets hot and the fan stays pretty quiet.

 

thats true, but when you want to be mobile then it is good to have working dxva.
watching time on batteries can be 3-4 time longer with dxva (compared to cpu).
sure, its not much 40 or 50minutes of playback (full hd h.264) on batteries, but it is enough for a train tip to work
this is actually the only reason i need dxva with notebook.

well, i hope intel, splash or mpchc will solve the problem
meantime i will put my glasses off hehe

 

Plays fine in WMP12 + Haali on Windows 7 build 7600. CPU averages about 55%.

Windows 7 may be the solution to HD video problems on the Timelines!

-Dan

 

It works fine in Vista too.

But the problem of DXVA is the image quality. Try this clip for an example:
http://www.dvdloc8.com/clip.php?movieid=12954&clipid=1

It looks MUCH better without DXVA on my 1810T.

 

Hi. I´ve tried playing a BBC Planet Earth 720.p HDTV clip with the DXVA switched off+registry tweak as suggested by Namaiki, and the result is simply amazing. Absolutely smooth, excellent picture quality. Can´t believe it.

 

I did a CPU time test with timecodec.exe, this program plays the video using the selected codec and shows you the amount of CPU time it takes up. The clip was a H.264 encoded 1440x1080 video of 90 seconds, size ~90MB(including audio). My results are as follows:

codec name - total CPU time (seconds) - fps - dfps (not sure.. d-something frames per second?)
DivX 7 H.264 filter
25 179 107
CoreAVC
26 664 102
PDVD9 (DXVA disabled)
34 152 79
FFDShow MT
35 558 77
Microsoft DTV-DVD decoder
37 43990 78 <- really high fps but still uses more CPU time

Two close winners divx 7 and coreavc.

<s>by my results, DivX 7 wins, but I purchased CoreAVC, so that's what I'm using.</s>

Decided to do a test on another clip. H.264 encoded 960x540, 24 mins, size 180MB(including audio).

(name of codec)
(for the first 4 numbers less is better (cpu usage) for the last 2 higher is better (fps))

CoreAVC (deblocking: skip when safe - no artifacting)
19 0 20 83 2107 506
CoreAVC (default)
18 0 19 96 2199 438
DivX
26 3 29 104 1421 407
PDVD9 (DXVA off)
59 1 61 172 692 246

coreavc definitely beats out divx7 here but still faster than PDVD9

That registry entry only helps MPC-HC with opening videos in DXVA.

For now, MPC+DXVA+4500MHD is something funny.. deblocking is not working.

When you watch with DXVA you see the actual video, however, with H.264, part of the specification is deblocking (which smooths over those artifacts that you don't usually see because it is turned on by default).

If you disable deblocking in any other H.264 decoder (you can't with PDVD9, or MS DTV-DVD), you will see the same results as you currently get with the Intel 4500MHD. The exact same configuration as above + GeForce 9600M GT (my laptop has hybrid graphics) has deblocking working fine, so therefore there must be something not working with the intel card or the graphics drivers or MPC's connection to the intel card.

 

namaiki, thanks for nice tests!

i guess its not possible to test splash codec with timecodec.exe cause its not a directshow plugin? i was testing it through task manager and it was a little better than ffmpeg.

i checked again and splash does have this deblocking issues as well.
and arcsoft total theatre doesnt support intel gpu :/

 

Splash uses it's own internal filters that are not directshow, so it won't run with timecodec. After using it for about 2 minutes; "Splash pro coming soon 5..4..3..2..1" every time you seek... I'm never using it again.

 

yep. thats frustrating... but it provides great picture quality so i keep using it.

 

Can't be better than the source.

 

Just downloaded and tested with a Timeline 3810T.... cpu is at 32%-55% w/ some spikes to 60%. But hovers in the 30%s during most of this HD trailer. Using Vista's own Windows Media Player.

Videoclip: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RMDzUKPyicA

 

You probably missed the discussion on the last couple of pages. Please try The Bourne Ultimatum clip and watch the image quality.
http://www.h264info.com/clips.html

 

true for progressive sources.
but Splash does great job for interlaced content ( i got AVCHD camcorder).

 

okay, so i just posted this in the timeline owners lounge, but it seems like it would also be good to put it here:

I downloaded a 1080p copy of Quantum Of Solace (great film) and wanted to play it on my 1080p TV via HDMI. it was a .mkv file, so first i downloaded the standard for playing non-supported file formats, the VLC media player. The VLC would play it, but it was extremely choppy and eventually the image just froze as the audio continued, so that option was out. Next i downloaded a player that i read about here, called 'Splash Player' this seemed to work well, it played the movie with CPU usage hovering around 50% and physical memory usage well below 50%. however, the .mkv file i downloaded had DTS audio, and in its free, beta stage, Splash Player does not support DTS audio so that was out. Finally, i downloaded a codec pack (The Matroska codecs) to make windows media player/media center be able to play .mkv files, along with an audio codec to make it handle DTS audio, and i was on my way. I watched the thrilling first few minutes of Quantum of Solace up to the opening credits sequence on my 1080p TV (in the first few minutes a LOT is happening, so i figured it would be a good test of whether the computer could handle it) CPU usage with windows media player was hovering around 50% and things seemed perfect, the opening minutes were nearly flawless. Later that night, i had family and friends gathered to watch the movie in HD, and within about 15 minutes, strange things began happening. heavy pixelation occurred and sometimes the movie would be tinted in colors like green red or yellow. I tried everything i could think of, from changing the priority of the task in task manager to changing the codec settings. nothing worked. eventually after several different tactics, i played the file, it worked for another 15-20 minutes, the same issues started happening, then the application shut down. and the screen went black then came back on. the taskbar informed me that the graphics/display driver had encountered an error, and had to shut down, but was able to recover. i tried once more to play it, and 15 minutes later, i saw the same error, then got the blue screen of death. It ran so well for 15 or 20 minutes. nearly flawless HD with very occasional slight pixelation that was hardly even noticeable. CPU usage was not 100% or anywhere near, and i just dont know what happened and why. i was convinced it was a codec issue, so i downloaded some new, different codecs to perform the same task, and got the same problems. now i really have no idea what the problem is. Other than that issue, watching things on my TV is great, i watched a full streaming episode of entourage on full screen today without a hiccup. Again, CPU usage is low, and the codecs seem okay, and it looks so great for 15-20 minutes before it goes crazy. anyone experienced anything similar, or know what is happening? i could live with not being able to play 1080p movies, it took a week to download the whole thing anyway, and this is the first time ive done it on any computer ive owned...

 

Did you check the memory usage along with the CPU usage? Could be that the memory is being used as an unsustainable rate, and it takes 15-20 minutes to fill it up. That could explain the BSOD. Does it do the same thing with 720p?

Also, what OS are you running?

 

i actually didnt check memory usage coming up to the time (its hard to anticipate just when it will freeze up) but that seems a likely cause. certainly at the beginning of the viewing the memory usage seemed stable and within normal limits though. As far as 720p, i dont know... this video took me 5 days to download from a bittorrent, so i would basically be waiting another 5 days to test that out... It is my belief though that this may not happen with 720p, it really might be that this computer just cant handle 1080p. I am running windows 7 RC (build 7100)

 

I would definitely experiment with 720p stuff, if you can spare the download time, and see if the memory usage could be the problem.

Also, I am running Win 7 build 7600 (supposed RTM version...) and I play all my HD stuff with WMP. It plays fine (50-60% CPU) and doesn't require any codecs. Try that out and see if it works. I don't know whether HD playback was fixed before your version, but I know for sure 7600 works.

 

so ur watching 1080p stuff without issue? part of my overall issue is that the file was a .mkv which windows does not recognize. does it recognize and play them in 7600 or are you just watching different file formats than the one ive got? in my experience, anytime you have to get downloaded codecs involved, the BSOD is soon to follow... WMP worked great at the start, low CPU usage (same as you described) but i had to use a codec. i should try converting the file to MPEG and see if that is playable...

 

Ok guys, I've been trying to figure this out, but I'm getting confused. I've seen links to different tutorials and have tried going through them, but it seems like for Windows 7 things are different. That being said can someone point me towards the best way for efficient Windows 7 playback? I just want to get 720p mkv files working with the lowest cpu usage I can so I can extend battery life. Thanks.