Minimum CPU/Mem config for HD playback?

[Apulo]

I've been asked to create a media PC that can play back unencrypted (HD DVD and Blu- Ray are of no concern) HD content - either 720p or 1080p, in h264 or VC1. Audio will be AAC.

With no decoding support from the graphics card, what kind of Core 2 Duo am I looking at, minimum? Would a Core 2 Duo Merom (laptop) be sufficient too (at what clockrate)?

Is a lot of memory required?

Would the CoreAVC codec make a lot of difference - I'm told it's a lot faster than the ffmpeg AVC implementation but isn't there a payoff in picture quality? Their desktop TCPMP desktop player didn't look too great to me.

I'm not into HD much myself (yet) apart from playing back an occasional HD encoded fansub, so I'm rather curious what your replies will be. Thanks in advance!

[Jerry Jones]

Don't forget to pay close attention to the video display adapter.

1. ATI supports H.264 playback through AVIVO technology:

http://ati.amd.com/technology/Avivo/index.html

2. NVIDIA supports H.264 playback through PureVideo technology:

http://www.nvidia.com/object/nvidia_purevideo.html

Jerry Jones

http://www.jonesgroup.net

[Jerry Jones]

The APPLE system recommendations are here:

http://www.apple.com/quicktime/guide/hd/recommendations.html

The MICROSOFT system recommendations are here:

http://www.microsoft.com/windows/windowsmedia/musicandvideo/hdvideo/contentshowcase.aspx#sysreq

The MICROSOFT system recommendations, however, are strictly for Windows Media HD.

Jerry Jones

http://www.jonesgroup.net

[mmp121]

This Anandtech article might be of interest to you then.

http://www.anandtech.com/video/showdoc.aspx?i=2886

Seems that even a Core 2 Duo E6600 CPU might not be able to handle what you are requesting without a video card to help in doing the decoding.

[Apulo]

Thanks both for the links and information. Looks like a heavy-duty CPU is required. The GFX cards do help but not to the extent I would expect (from MPEG2 experiences). But maybe the X1300 is an option there, as it doesn't use much power and may provide enough power to decode 1080p with a Core 2 Duo 6600. If it would, it would be the most economic solution.

Bigger GFX cards aren't an option, too much power used, too much heat, too much noise. And expensive, and since the rig will only be used as a media PC, I think I would be better off putting the money towards a fast CPU.

Does the playback software need to support the GFX acceleration, or is this handled by the driver? I think he prefers Media Player Classic or VLC.

And are the claims of the makers of CoreAVC true, concerni ng the reduced hardware requirements?

Finally, Jerry, do you know if the "3GHz" CPU in the requirements page by Microsoft is still from the P4 days or are they talking Core 2 Duo?

Thanks!

[Jerry Jones]

I suspect that was written in the P4 days.

However, I would recommend the fastest processor you can afford for H.264 HD.

Jerry Jones

http://www.jonesgroup.net

[Nowhere]

CoreAVC uses somewhere around 60% of the CPU power used by ffdshow when decoding the same H264 video.

[Apulo]

Is the picture quality of CoreAVC as good as the ffdshow implementation?

[Hulk]

UPDATE

If you didn't know, until now without hardware decode you would need about 2.4 or more GHz of Core 2 Duo power to decode H.264.

With a new nVidia 8500 or 8600 graphics adapter, both of which are very affordable, even an E6420 can do the decode with less than 30% CPU usage.

http://www.anandtech.com/video/showdoc.aspx?i=2977

According to the above article even with the relatively slow E6420 (1.86GHz) max CPU usage with the 8600GTS is only 32.9%.

You can get a card like this for less than $200 at NewEgg. The 8500 series are less than $100 and supposedly decode as nearly as well. HD decode is now really not a big deal. http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16814125062

[Nowhere]

I didn't notice any difference (and from various comments/wiki article I was under the impression that as of now it is thought that CoreAVC team really did a great job and rest of the teams tries to figure out how the hell they did it).

However I didn't use ffdshow postprocessing options with H264, too weak CPU.

[Technoid]

CoreAVC team really did a great job and rest of the teams tries to figure out how the hell they did it).

It's the ancient and almost lost art of optimizing

[Hulk]

What ever happened to assembly language programming for often used routines?

I remember using Software Audio Workshop (SAW) in the early '90's with a Pentium 90 and it worked great with 8 or more tracks of audio. The whole darn program was under 1.5MB and ran from the *.exe file. Nothing to install.

Being hand coded Assembly programming and bypassing the Windows interface it probably ran 10 times faster than if it was a Windows application. It was like having a Pentium 900 when the fastest actually available was 90Mhz.

Bob Lentini (the programmer) is a real genius. I wonder what a little assembly programming would do with the often used video routines...

[mmp121]

Mark,

The NVIDIA 8500/8600 series only fully decodes H.264 video in the GPU. It does partial GPU decoding of VC-1. But it is a good option for Apulo to use for a graphics card selection.

[Hulk]

Mark,

The NVIDIA 8500/8600 series only fully decodes H.264 video in the GPU. It does partial GPU decoding of VC-1. But it is a good option for Apulo to use for a graphics card selection.

Yes you are right. But according to the Anandtech tests VC-1 decoded with 8500/8600 graphics adapter shouldn't be a problem even for a low end C2D.

I'm going to be building a HTPC and am going to use an 8600 graphics adapter and probably my old E6400 CPU. That'll be when I can get the Q6600 for $266 sometime in August hopefully

[Apulo]

The nVidia cards were known for a rather horrible MPEG2 decoding quality, so I'm going to wait to see some quality tests as well. Also, it's rather bothersome to have to use PowerDVD or WinDVD. I'm not sure I'm going to be able to convince my friend to dump his favourite player software for an at the moment buggy alternative. Anandtech also wrote as much.

Considering the price of a cheap ATI card plus the jump to a Core 2 Duo 6700 is about the same as one of those nVidia cards, I'm in doubt of which direction to go.