Is ATI doing H.264 encoding with GPU ???

[audyovydeo]

I have an NVidia card so I don't usually hang around ATI places.
But can anyone tell exactly what is this :

http://ati.amd.com/technology/avivo/technology.html
http://support.ati.com/ics/support/default.asp?deptID=894&task=knowledge&questionID=21793

** The Avivo Video Converter is only supported on Radeon™ X1000 Series or new GPUs.
* H.264/AVC profile supported when using Apple iPod format.

???
If so, ATI looks way ahead of NVidia.

cheers
audyovydeo

[Sharktooth]

:search:

[CruNcher]

They showed 720p Mpeg-2 Encoding on the GPU @ Siggraph 2007 , the libraries to build such a encoder are also available from them as SDKs so it's definately possible and for sure to a degree also H.264 Encoding :)

[SpAwN_gUy]

so.. i guess Yesterday was "the" day .. i just found today, thou...

Catalyst 8.12
New Features
This section provides information on new features found in this release of the
Radeon™ Display Driver. These include the following:
• ATI Stream Computing Support
• ATI Stream Application: ATI AVIVO Video Converter

ATI Stream Computing Support
With the release of ATI Catalyst 8.12 users can unlock the potential of accelerated
applications enabling ATI Stream technology for millions of ATI Radeon™
graphics processors worldwide
• ATI Stream computing harnesses the tremendous processing power of the
graphics processing unit (GPU) for high-performance, data-intensive computations
over a wide range of scientific, business and consumer applications.
• ATI Stream technology enables the hundreds of parallel Stream cores inside
AMD graphics processors to accelerate general purpose applications. These
capabilities will allow ATI Stream-enabled programs, for a variety of different
tasks and from a growing number of software vendors, to operate with optimized
performance or with new functionality.
ATI Stream Application: ATI AVIVO Video Converter
• Using ATI Stream technology, owners of ATI Radeon™ HD 4800 Series and
ATI Radeon™ HD 4600 Series of graphics cards can help accelerate the conversion
of standard and HD video into multiple formats for use on differing
consumer electronics devices

(prooflink link for Vista64)
http://game.amd.com/us-en/drivers_catalyst.aspx?p=vista64/common-vista64

and common PDF:
https://a248.e.akamai.net/f/674/9206/0/www2.ati.com/gamesite/Catalyst_812_release_notes.pdf

i just can't wait to test it out :) ('cause i don't have nVidia.. and i do Have HD3870)

[Sharktooth]

actually only 4xxx series cards can accelerate encodings

[LoRd_MuldeR]

actually only 4xxx series cards can accelerate encodings

After reading this (http://forum.doom9.org/showthread.php?t=143377) I'm not too sad that my X1950 XTX card can't use it, as long as x264 does run perfectly fine on my Q6600 :p

[CruNcher]

actually only 4xxx series cards can accelerate encodings

Though how do they explain that i mean since the start of the 3800 series they where advertising with GPU transcoding support :) also technically i don't understand why it shouldn't work
sure the 3800 series is slower but anyways it should work i absolutely don't understand why they do that i had the same thing with a DSL Modem the manufacture advertised @ the release with ADSL2+ ready (it was on the package) so i bought it then ADSL2+ arrived and i couldn't use it because no firmware yet, i really thought about suing them (but first i got in contact with them and asked them whats with the advertised feature, and suddenly they remembered that there was something ;)).
Not sure either if what people show here with the new Avivo is GPU Encoding as the CPU overhead seems much to high for it, also in direct comparison with Nvidia.

[laserfan]

After reading this (http://forum.doom9.org/showthread.php?t=143377) I'm not too sad that my X1950 XTX card can't use it...You're lucky you have the 6600; I was really hoping this would work (well) with my own X1950Pro for aiding HD encodings. :(

[ndkamal]

The free H.264 encoder of ATI is ONLY SOFTWARE, for proof I have the Radeon HD4670, and during the encoding the cpu usage is at 100% (E4400 : 2 ghz), moreover the temperature of the GPU doesn't change during the transcoding. The quality of picture is similar to Badaboom. You can also seen the article of PCInpact (FRENCH) http://www.pcinpact.com/articles/avivo-video-converter-h-264-test/353-1.htm. A big disappointment.

[toytown]

The free H.264 encoder of ATI is ONLY SOFTWARE

I also want to add that there is no GPU offload with the 8.12s. I used the ATI control center and GPUz to monitor GPULOAD and GPUTEMPs neither changed at all whilst the application was encoding.

If i ran an application in the background which used CPU resources then the encoding time would shoot up.

My card 4870

[rica]

Hi guys,
don't forget Cyberlink has given up playing the game with Ati as well, correct? Why?
Let me say: no hope..

http://www.cyberlink.com/multi/products/item_4_5_2.html

[hoboX10]

If it's ATI, who cares.

[Sharktooth]

The free H.264 encoder of ATI is ONLY SOFTWARE, for proof I have the Radeon HD4670, and during the encoding the cpu usage is at 100% (E4400 : 2 ghz), moreover the temperature of the GPU doesn't change during the transcoding. The quality of picture is similar to Badaboom. You can also seen the article of PCInpact (FRENCH) http://www.pcinpact.com/articles/avivo-video-converter-h-264-test/353-1.htm. A big disappointment.
false.
http://forum.doom9.org/showthread.php?t=143377
and
http://forum.doom9.org/showthread.php?p=1222793#post1222793

[deekey777]

Hi guys,
don't forget Cyberlink has given up playing the game with Ati as well, correct? Why?
Let me say: no hope..

http://www.cyberlink.com/multi/products/item_4_5_2.html

They gave up? Really?
http://www.computerbase.de/bildstrecke/23381/3/

[tomos]

false.
http://forum.doom9.org/showthread.php?t=143377
and
http://forum.doom9.org/showthread.php?p=1222793#post1222793

really? doesnt work here and loads of forums (here, anandtech, guru3d, overclockers UK etc etc) users report the same thing as i have. a lucky few seem to report something working as it was advertised mind. i'm thinking possibly those that installed the betas first.

I have a ticket with AMD at the mo regarding this. I was hoping for a response that would be useful, but they advised me to install the catalyst drivers for vista 32 when i have vista x64 - and already told them i had them installed.

Personally?, i feel ripped and am looking into moving to an 8000 series Nvidia card. at least i could try neuron2s dgavc project.

[rica]

They gave up? Really?
http://www.computerbase.de/bildstrecke/23381/3/

I gave the reality from the official site not the expectation by a non-official one.

[tomos]

ok, installed the betas instead of the finals (file is larger).

using avivo now and GPU-Z shows 15-25% GPU usage. encode looks like carp until i used the tray tools front end for it. maxed out all the settings and seems to be encoding just above real time. 26ish fps. messing around with it now.

if this does end up working decently, i wonder if megui/x264 will be able to offload some of the encoding work to our GPU's

[deekey777]

I gave the reality from the official site not the expectation by a non-official one.

What "expectation by a non-official" site? It's a slide from the official presentation (Nov. 13th).

Officially enough?

http://ati.amd.com/technology/streamcomputing/consumer-entertainment.html

The ATI Video Converter is designed to enable GPU transcoding of HD video streams. CyberLink PowerDirector 7, available now, provides a robust set of features and functionality for capturing, editing and distributing HD video, and is expected to be updated in Q1 2009 to include accelerated video conversion that in many cases exceeds the capabilities of the free ATI Video Converter.
ATI Stream Team Interview (http://www.rage3d.com/articles/stream/index.php?p=3)

[rica]

Yes it is.
Thanks.
Hope someday...