HD video playback on PC

[NotoriousJTC]

What would normally be the biggest bottleneck in an older system, preventing it from playing back HD video content smoothly? Is it a CPU thing? Video card? RAM? A combination?


Thanks.

 

[ForumMaster]

the CPU. if you use a graphic card and software that supports hardware acceleration, it can help a lot. having a decent amount of ram (atleast 1GB), and a conroe 6700 is enough to keep from dropping frames from the HD-DVD article that Anand did.

 

[regnez]

Originally posted by: ForumMaster
the CPU.

:thumbsup:

The other things you mentioned matter, but nothing is as important as the CPU. For 720p you really only need about 512mb of ram and a decent single core processor. Bump that up to 1080p and you are going to need quite a system to run it smoothly.

The processor is the most important, but a good video card with a lot of pipes can help too. And ram, at least a gig for 1080p.

 

[JAG87]

CPU + GFX card are the bottle necks for compressed HD video

Hard drive is the bottle neck for uncompressed HD video

 

[Roguestar]

What they said ^. Decoding HD is very expensive (in CPU terms) and any help it can get will do; graphics cards with hardware decoding is a good benefit.

 

[sparks]

CPU I think. I have a 1080P WMV file that I tried to play on my system and its choking. I don't have the latest system, but its no slouch either. Opteron 175, 2GB RAM, 7800GS. I don't think I can upgrade the system adequately for me to be able to play this file. Probably need a new PC.

 

[gsellis]

The biggest bottleneck is based on the codec. If it is H.264, it is the CPU, but can be potentially fixed with the graphics card. Same with MPEG. VC1 is a little more efficient on decode, so has less load on the CPU, but can also benefit from a GPU solution. You could get into a situation where the CPU is sufficient, but the GPU cannot keep up if the video is scaled too. But all the answers so far are on target.

BTW, a slow, busy, badly fragmented drive can potentially cause issues with a stored video in 1080. I would always recommend a drive to store you video on that is not the app/OS drive. Better still, use a swappable bay and you can "change" your stores.

 

[StopSign]

Originally posted by: sparks
CPU I think. I have a 1080P WMV file that I tried to play on my system and its choking. I don't have the latest system, but its no slouch either. Opteron 175, 2GB RAM, 7800GS. I don't think I can upgrade the system adequately for me to be able to play this file. Probably need a new PC.

That's weird. I could play 1080p WMV files on my old A64 @ 2.5 perfectly smooth. It was h.264 that brought the system to its knees.

 

[sparks]

Originally posted by: StopSign

Originally posted by: sparks
CPU I think. I have a 1080P WMV file that I tried to play on my system and its choking. I don't have the latest system, but its no slouch either. Opteron 175, 2GB RAM, 7800GS. I don't think I can upgrade the system adequately for me to be able to play this file. Probably need a new PC.

That's weird. I could play 1080p WMV files on my old A64 @ 2.5 perfectly smooth. It was h.264 that brought the system to its knees.

Its a .WMV file, so I assume its WMV, but it is dropping frames like crazy. Wonder if I can burn the file to a disc and play it on the XBOX360?

 

[Auric]

WMV 9 encompasses various profiles just like MPEG-4 so a simple/main profile encode is less demanding than advanced profile. Once in the realm of advanced then bitrate becomes the determining factor.

So, a system might easily manage MPEG-2 (DVD), MPEG-4 ASP (DivX, XviD, Nero Digital), WMV-HD, MPEG-2 HD (transitional disc and broadcast), and even low-bitrate AVC (Apple trailers) but struggle with commercial VC-1 and AVC (disc and in the latter case broadcast as well).

Still, I have an average four-year-old system with a two-year-old (and much derided in some circles) CPU and the addition of a low to mid-range GPU (happens to be 7600GT but even cheaper would do) and DxVA decoder turned it from borderline to overkill for 20Mbps AVC schtuffs.

Ergo, the bottleneck could be any combination of CPU, GPU or decoder since they are all critical components. Sure, a current higher-end CPU alone with no GPU and even the worst decoder may overcome the inefficiency with brute force but at this point I think GPU assist can almost be considered a necessity or at least preferred -especially for a multi-use, multi-tasking system (as opposed to a compact HTPC).

 

[JonnyBlaze]

i would have to say the monitor

 

[Oyeve]

Originally posted by: JonnyBlaze
i would have to say the monitor

I was gonna laugh but hes right. IMO DVDs look like crap on LCDs, I dont know how HDDVD looks but I hope its a helluva lot better than DVDs.

 

[secretanchitman]

cpu and gpu. i would recommend at least a dual core (rig in my sig plays 1080p nicely, dunno about blu-ray or hd-dvd though) and a geforce 7 series (6 series is all broken for hd crap - trust me) or an ati x1900/x1950 series card.

 

[Intelman07]

Software.

 

[Dman877]

Originally posted by: Oyeve

Originally posted by: JonnyBlaze
i would have to say the monitor

I was gonna laugh but hes right. IMO DVDs look like crap on LCDs, I dont know how HDDVD looks but I hope its a helluva lot better than DVDs.

Getting DVD's to look good on a computer is quite an under-taking. I used to use my 37inch 1080p lcd with my comp and dvd's played through PowerDVD looked like crap. I know there are ways to get them to look good but I didn't have the patience.

I went out and bought an upconverting smasung dvd recorder and an avia home theater setup disk. After setting up the lcd correctly (it was way off with the factory settings and my own tweaking went no where) dvd's played on the samsung look about as good as HiDef broadcasts from 3 feet away or more.

 

[0roo0roo]

video card makers have been touting hd acceleration and better video processing for a while, dunno what came of it. i think quicktimes h264 is all cpu though

 

[Auric]

A lot came of it. It's as genuine and useful as MPEG-2 acceleration was in the olden days, if not more so. Heck, with the kinda pathetic abundance of MPEG-2 HD content these days even that has new found relevance.

QuickTime for Windows AVC decoder performance is average to poor versus others likewise lacking DxVA or with the function disabled (and possibly worse when using its own player) and of course is awful compared to the likes of CyberLink and Ahead/Ateme with their DxVA active.