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My HTPC needs help
    #13995315 -

Ok, I need to fix my HTPC.  It just cant keep up anymore.  Lately I have been watching larger video files, normally X264 movies that are between 10GB and 20GB.  Many times I get choppy, unsatisfactory performance.  I feel like my hardware should be able to keep up with this.

(Keep in mind I am a computer noob when it comes to anything more than throwing some parts together and loading an OS)

The hardware... My HTPC is made out of a Shuttle barebones box.  It has
CPU: AMD Athlon 64 X2 4800+ (2.5GHz)
RAM: 2GB, DDR2 (PC2-6400)
Graphics: Radeon HD 4670

The software... Im running Windows 7 64bit.  All of the media files get stored in a different computer on the network, which is also Windows 7 64bit.  The applications I try to play my x264, .mkv files in are usually XBMC, VLC and Media Player Classic.  Normally, when one of these players sucks at playing a file, they all do.  I then try copying the file to the HTPC's hard disk, but performance isnt any better there.

One of my CPU's cores does go up to the 90% region when playing video.  My CPU probably is the bottle neck here, but I feel it should still be good enough.  Shouldn't the video decoding be done on the video card anyway?  Could it be that the files I am getting have shittie encoding?




Any ideas?

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Re: My HTPC needs help [Re: DieCommie]
    #13999984 -

How are you sharing the files over the network? I'm assuming you are just using standard windows file sharing and playing from windows explorer.

Are you doing this over wifi? I have found that due to network latencies, wifi sucks at this kind of thing.

One possible solution is to use VLC's built in server for streaming the file so that the bulk of the processing is done on your remote box, and the local HTPC is just streaming from there. Have you tried that?


--------------------
"I'm gonna clear the air, with the metal that's known to divide the whole atmosphere, and I love to share, them bullets come dime a dozen I kept 2 so I could have spare."

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Re: My HTPC needs help [Re: abetterlie]
    #14000158 -

No, I havent tried that.  I stream them over a wired connection.  Ill give it a shot, but my HTPC has better hardware than the server.

Thx for the tip!

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Re: My HTPC needs help [Re: DieCommie]
    #14000413 -

VLC doesn't have hardware acceleration I thought?

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Re: My HTPC needs help [Re: Chespirito]
    #14000647 -

That means the video card does the decoding rather than a piece of software using the CPU for the decoding?

I dont know the answer to your question.  Could I be inadvertently be not using my video cards "hardware acceleration"?

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Re: My HTPC needs help [Re: DieCommie]
    #14000688 -

I was under the impression that VLC does all its processing work on the CPU.  However that might have changed since I last looked into this.

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Re: My HTPC needs help [Re: Chespirito]
    #14000721 -

Seems that in the preferences menu, under codecs, you can enable something called GPU acceleration.  Might be worth seeing if that helps with your CPU load.  On my Core i5 it seems to do little to nothing but Intel might have x264 and video decoding in hardware at this point

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Re: My HTPC needs help [Re: Chespirito]
    #14001352 -

VLC's GPU acceleration is still considered and experimental feature.

XBMC is by far the most efficient that ive found.

you need to update your video drivers. that card should be able to handle GPU offloading.

my HTPC is an Intel Atom based machine with Nvidia Ion graphics.. it is MUCH more low powered than your machine and i have no problem streaming 1080p video from my server. i have never seen a stutter during playback.


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Re: My HTPC needs help [Re: frith]
    #14001419 -

Yea, my video drivers are updated.  Im not sure what I should do.  :mad:

I guess I will google hardware acceleration some more, make sure that my video card is doing what it should.  Otherwise, I could just to a reformat and hope that it was a rouge software issue...


Thx for the thoughts fellas

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Re: My HTPC needs help [Re: DieCommie]
    #14015565 -

Ugg...

I just reinstalled the OS, updated my video drivers, installed XBMC and tried to play a 10GB x264 movie over the network.  It lags like a motherfucker, skipping audio and video.  With VLC it skips still, but much less.

I installed XBMC and VLC on my performance machine, and the same file plays fine.


WTF is wrong with my hardware?  :crazy2:

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Re: My HTPC needs help [Re: DieCommie]
    #14015580 -

What kind of wireless speed are you measuring between computers?  Maybe it just lacks bandwidth necessary to carry the movie?

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Re: My HTPC needs help [Re: Chespirito]
    #14020321 -

Chespirito said:
What kind of wireless speed are you measuring between computers?  Maybe it just lacks bandwidth necessary to carry the movie?


sounds about right.

copy the file to the HTPC and try to play it locally.. see what happens.


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Re: My HTPC needs help [Re: frith]
    #14024497 -

Its a wired, 1Gbps connection.  :/

I have tried playing it locally on the disk, it still lags (but not as much).  Yesterday I opened the case and all the heat sinks felt remarkably cool. 

Im really at a loss here...  I guess my next action should be to post this info on a HTPC specific forum.

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Re: My HTPC needs help [Re: DieCommie]
    #14024669 -

im wondering if it has something to do with the quality of the 64bit drivers. ATI drivers have always been horrible for me (although i am a linux user :shrug:).

is there any reason you are running 64 instead of 32? you only have 2gb ram..


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Re: My HTPC needs help [Re: frith]
    #14024774 -

Im running 64 bit just because its the same OS image I put in all my other computers.  I may give 32 bit a try, thx.

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Re: My HTPC needs help [Re: DieCommie]
    #14025612 -

Quote:
Ugg...

I just reinstalled the OS, updated my video drivers, installed XBMC and tried to play a 10GB x264 movie over the network.  It lags like a motherfucker, skipping audio and video.  With VLC it skips still, but much less.
 


Have you tried all of the various video output modules in vlc preferences?  you may have better luck w/ one other than the default...


--------------------
Everything is better than it was the last time.  I'm good.

If we could look into each others hearts, and understand the unique challenges each of us faces, I think we would treat each other much more gently, with more love, patience, tolerance, and care.

It takes a lot of courage to go out there and radiate your essence.

I know you scared, you should ask us if we scared too.  If you was there, and we just knew you cared too.

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General Interest > Science and Technology
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