[MPlayer-users] Performance optimisation (DIVX playing)

[Stefan Lange]

kyfmpl at fnord.to wrote:
> [Automatic answer: RTFM (read DOCS, FAQ), also read DOCS/bugreports.html]
>   I was wondering if there were some undocumented tricks to speed up video
> (divx) playing. There are a few files that ooze along at about 1 frame every
> 3 seconds in certian places (namely with alot of quick movement). It may be
> that my machine really _is_ too slow...the file is DIVX3, 640x480, 1512.4 kbps

I also have trouble with hi-res and/or hi-bitrate videos on my old 
K6-2/400. Both 640x480 and 1500kbps are very high.


> If not (or even if so) is there anything I can try to speed things up?
> 
> 
> HW:
> CPU: K6/2 500
> RAM: 384
^^^^^^^^^^
There are some Super7-Boards that only have a cacheable area of 128 MB. 
In that case using more memory than 128 MB will slow things down.

Try to find out if that's true for your mainboard, if yes reduce memory 
size to 128 MB and see if that gives any advantage.


> Video: S3 Virge DX AGP
>   or Riva TNT2 AGP (stock Xfree 4.2.0 driver)
>   or Voodoo Banshee PCI 32M: /proc/mtrr correct: base=0xe6000000 (3680MB), size=  32MB: write-combining, count=1
> Audio: Soundblaster 16 ISA (Possible bottleneck?)

PCI soundcards use a little less CPU, but it shouldn't make too much 
difference

> 
> SW:
> Kernel: 2.4.19
> Distro: Slackware 8.1
> Xfree: 4.2.0
> MPlayer: 0.90rc2 (./configure --enable-qtx-codecs --with-xanimlibdir=/usr/local/lib/mplayer/xanimdlls --with-reallibdir=/usr/local/mplayer/rp9codecs)
> 
> mplayer.conf: cache = 8192
> 
> cmdline: nice -20 mplayer -framedrop -vo xv -ao oss hellsing-13.avi
> 
> also tried:
> -nocache
> -vo sdl, -vo sdl:dga, -vo x11, -vo vesa (some speedup, but it nukes my
>   display on exit)
> -ao sdl, -ao sdl:esd, -ao sdl:esd (with ESPEAKER set to remotehost)
> 

-vo tdfxfb (with your voodoo3) is also worth a try, it's quite fast. 
(but use a 24bit mode, with 16bit it looked awful on mine)

Regards
Stefan

> Additional info (From output spew):
> CPU: Advanced Micro Devices K6-2 (Family: 5, Stepping: 12)
> CPUflags:  MMX: 1 MMX2: 0 3DNow: 1 3DNow2: 0 SSE: 0 SSE2: 0
> Compiled for x86 CPU with extensions: MMX 3DNow
> VIDEO:  [DIV3]  640x480  24bpp  29.97 fps  1512.4 kbps (184.6 kbyte/s)
> AUDIO: 48000 Hz, 2 ch, 16 bit (0x10), ratio: 16000->192000 (128.0 kbit)
> Selected audio codec: [mp3] afm:mp3lib (mp3lib MPEG layer-2, layer-3)
> Selected video codec: [ffdivx] vfm:ffmpeg (FFmpeg DivX ;-) (MS MPEG-4 v3))
>