[mythtv-users] My experience with HD video and the Nvidia 6200TC

[Steven Adeff]

On 5/15/06, Jonathan Rogers <jonner at teegra.net> wrote:
> Steven Adeff wrote:
> > On 5/15/06, Jonathan Rogers <jonner at teegra.net> wrote:
> >> James C. Dastrup wrote:
> >>>> I am able to happily view high-definition (1080i and 720p) video
> >>>> through MythTV. Here are the ingredients:
> >>>>
> >>>> * A powerful-enough frontend. As I understand it, my Pentium 4 3.0GHz
> >>>>  frontend/backend is just over the line in terms of having enough
> >>>>  horsepower to display HD without XvMC. This is important, as I'll
> >>>>  get to later.
> >>>> * A supported video card. For HD, this generally means an Nvidia 5200
> >>>>  (AGP) or 5300 (PCI Express; rare), or later; I have an Nvidia 6200
> >>>>  TC with 128MB. ATI owners who want to display HD (as opposed to
> >>>>  standard-definition) are, from what I understand, out of luck due to
> >>>>  driver-support issues.
> >>> ATI owners with a 9600 AGP or above and 128 MB video RAM will find
> >>> HD works just fine using the fglrx drivers.  There is much documentation
> >>> on the wiki and other places that no problem exists.
> >> I am currently using a Radeon 8500 with the X.org 7.0 radeon driver and
> >> an LCD TV connected via DVI. It works fine except that the Athlon64
> >> 3700+ CPU is sometimes overloaded playing and deinterlacing 1080i. I
> >> expect that to change when I switch the CPU to an Athlon 64 X2 3800+.
> >
> > Jonathan, what percentage of the CPU does X use and what percentage is
> > Myth using? My 3200+ handles deinterlacing 1080i fine, but I've got a
> > FX5200, I'm trying to get a handle on how much CPU the ATI Xorg driver
> > uses compared to the nvidia drivers.
>
> Playing a 720p movie, the "X" process takes about 50% CPU time and
> "mythfrontend" about 30%. Playing 1080i show with Bob, "X" takes about
> 53% and mythfrontend about 30% to 40%. Those percentages can vary quite
> a bit with the program and even scene, which is why it usually keeps up,
> but sometimes stutters.

strange to me that X takes up so much CPU on your system while it
takes very little on mine. Are you sure Xv is enabled? Your Myth usage
seems a bit lower than mine, but I'm running a 3200+, compared to your
3700+. Have you tried the fglrx drivers to see if they improve your X
usage?


> I've also tried a Radeon 9000 with the "radeon" driver because it is
> fanless, but it performed much worse and has a pink bar on the right
> side of a 1080i video. I'm hoping to find a card that's slightly better
> than the 8500 without a fan that will still work with the X.org driver
> and will use somewhat less CPU time.

my laptop (Xpress 200M) has the pink bar issue with Xv as well, though
lately i've noticed it hasn't been there in Myth, I haven't poked
around to see if it was the driver update or if Myth is reverting to
X11...

-- 
Steve
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