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M90 1080p stuttering

post #1 of 15
12/7/06 at 2:51pm
Thread Starter 
Hi guys,

I bought my M90 when it first came out, with 2.13Ghz core duo, 2gb RAM and 512mb vid card.

Just recently I bought a 1080p tv so decided to try and play some 1080p films. However, they stutter terribly and drop frames making them unwatchable. This is using VLC and FFDShow. Are there any settings I'm missing or is the machine just not fast enough?

Incidentally I tried Flightplan 1080i and it was perfect, then tried Independance Day 1080i but it stuttered terribly also.

Thanks
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post #2 of 15
12/7/06 at 2:54pm
Any unnecessary tasks running in the background?
Have you tried runnning VLC on your second core?
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post #3 of 15
12/7/06 at 3:04pm
Thread Starter 
Quote:
Originally Posted by WackyT
Any unnecessary tasks running in the background? Have you tried runnning VLC on your second core?
Not sure about tasks. If I ran in safe mode would this remove the processes? How do you ensure VLC runs on the second core? For the 1080p source I'm trying VLC doesn't even show any pictures, whereas media player does, but stutters as mentioned. I am aware of the Notebook control stutter solution (http://www.notebookforums.com/showth...ighlight=1080p) but I'd already set these months ago. I suspect that because the source is 5 channel DD the machine isn't fast enough EDIT: I should also mention that I tried the Windows 1080p demos months ago, and they all played fine. http://www.microsoft.com/windows/win...tshowcase.aspx
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post #4 of 15
12/7/06 at 3:14pm
Wouldn't work in safe mode. Try seeing if anything nonessential is running on bootup in msconfig.

To set program affinity: CTRL-ALT-DEL > Processes tab > right-click the process you want to change > Set Affinity... > Set to CPU 1
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post #5 of 15
12/7/06 at 3:14pm
Not sure what video drivers you are utilizing at the moment, but give these a try
http://www.notebookforums.com/thread183684.html

These new drivers support PureVideo, which is something Nvidia has built into the hardware of the G70 series chips. Purevideo is supposed to provide WMP and some other programs with a special hardware decoding function that smooths out the framerates and eliminates stutter, while reducing the workload on the CPU in the process...

Whats it hurt, give em a try and if they don't help we can go from there!
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post #6 of 15
12/7/06 at 4:17pm
You don't have CPU Speed Step on, do you?

If you have no idea what I'm on about, then try downloading Notebook Hardware Control, and put the CPU speed to maxium. That should do it.
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post #7 of 15
12/7/06 at 4:22pm
Thread Starter 
Thanks for the replies guys, I'll try them.

Incidentally, the likes of Elephants Dream avi (1080p) works perfectly. The problem seems to occurs with 1080p TS files.

I don't have speedstep enabled, so that isn't the problem. I also tried from safe mode and the same stuttering occurs. Perhaps I have some dodgy codec settings (H264?)

EDIT: Affinity was set to run on both cores. I raised the process priority but no change. Since windows 1080p stuff works it seems either the film takes up too much processing, or the codecs or drivers need to be updated.

As a slight aside, does anyone know if the video card supports 1080p ov er HDMI? I have a Sony 40w2000 and it is a full HD panel including 1080p. I can't get it to clone the desktop at anything other than 1080i. I'm a newbie to the home theatre stuff, so perhaps I need to do some speedstep messing about....
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post #8 of 15
12/7/06 at 6:30pm
Thread Starter 
Eek. I tried the other drivers. If anything they ran worse, so I did a driver rollback, but some of the new features were still there, so I did a system restore. The trouble is files that were playing smoothly are now stuttering. I don't know whether the drivers have caused these or whether it is indicative of some other problem.

I'm currently loading the original drivers to re-install. Hopefully that'll get me back to square one.
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post #9 of 15
12/7/06 at 7:53pm
If you're seeing it with only one type of file then it seems the codec for that compression type is what is choking the machine. You should have NO issues with what you're trying to do as I did it with a 2.0Ghz P-M a year ago. I use the Purevideo decoder for the MPEG2/DVD stuff and then for .ts stuff I found a codec that called itself the HDTVPump or some such and the .TS streams have worked fine ever since
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post #10 of 15
12/7/06 at 8:18pm
Thread Starter 
Quote:
Originally Posted by Fry-man22
If you're seeing it with only one type of file then it seems the codec for that compression type is what is choking the machine. You should have NO issues with what you're trying to do as I did it with a 2.0Ghz P-M a year ago. I use the Purevideo decoder for the MPEG2/DVD stuff and then for .ts stuff I found a codec that called itself the HDTVPump or some such and the .TS streams have worked fine ever since
Cheers Fryman, I'll look into that. Any idea how individual codecs can be removed? Is it the case that they are uninstalled along with the program that uses them? As I say all was well a few days ago, perhaps I added a couple of dodgy codecs
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post #11 of 15
12/7/06 at 8:34pm
Quote:
Originally Posted by JimBob
Cheers Fryman, I'll look into that. Any idea how individual codecs can be removed? Is it the case that they are uninstalled along with the program that uses them? As I say all was well a few days ago, perhaps I added a couple of dodgy codecs
As a rule the codec (or codec pack as the case is sometimes) will show up in some way under the Add/Remove Programs list in Control Panel. I think under most circumstances the last codec installed is the one that gets used (IE if I install three divx decoders then the last one that is installed will actually decode Divx files I watch). I think this is true because I installed the "Combine COmmunity COdec Pack" after I installed Purevideo and the real Divx codec and thne it started decoding these file types as well. Good luck.
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post #12 of 15
12/7/06 at 8:37pm
Yeah I doubt it was power related. If my old Inspiron 8600 with a 1.7Ghz PentiumM cpu could run Terminator 1080p then you certainly should not have issues at all.
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post #13 of 15
12/7/06 at 8:59pm
Thread Starter 
Quote:
Originally Posted by Fry-man22
As a rule the codec (or codec pack as the case is sometimes) will show up in some way under the Add/Remove Programs list in Control Panel. I think under most circumstances the last codec installed is the one that gets used (IE if I install three divx decoders then the last one that is installed will actually decode Divx files I watch). I think this is true because I installed the "Combine COmmunity COdec Pack" after I installed Purevideo and the real Divx codec and thne it started decoding these file types as well. Good luck.
Thanks. It is particularly annoying as all played well on my machine until Independance day 1080i failed. I think I installed a bunch of other codecs which have probably messed up my machine. The situation was muddied by changing the video drivers earlier.... I may have to bite the bullet and wipe my machine if I don't have some success soon.

I just hope it isn't some video setting in the drivers that could have been fixed in 10 secs
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post #14 of 15
12/8/06 at 1:54pm
Thread Starter 
Just to let you guys know, the machine now plays the files fine after I installed the CoreAVC codec. Oddly VLC still doesn't work.
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post #15 of 15
12/8/06 at 10:25pm
Sweet; glad it worked out.
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