How do Avisynth and the available filters perform on a 64bit OS?

[Chainmax]

I am building a machine that will mainly be dedicated to video processing. The amount of RAM that will go into it depends on whether I go the 32bit XP route or the 64bit Vista one. Therefore, I would like to know what your experiences have been when using Avisynth and its filters on a 64bit OS. Any kind of feedback will be appreciated.

[mahsah]

Well, I just got a q6600 recently, and from what I've seen most of the stuff still runs in 32-bit mode... I guess since it's all open source anyway you could recompile it yourself, but I guess there is no real benefit in doing so. Plus there doesn't seem to be a mingw64.

The only 64 bit thing I can think of is the 64-bit decoding option in dgindex, and it works fine with all the other 32-bit stuff.

Basically it doesn't really matter at the moment unless you have more ram then a 32 bit os supports.

[Raere]

Well, I just got a q6600 recently, and from what I've seen most of the stuff still runs in 32-bit mode... I guess since it's all open source anyway you could recompile it yourself, but I guess there is no real benefit in doing so. Plus there doesn't seem to be a mingw64.

The only 64 bit thing I can think of is the 64-bit decoding option in dgindex, and it works fine with all the other 32-bit stuff.

Basically it doesn't really matter at the moment unless you have more ram then a 32 bit os supports.

The 64-bit decoding option in DGIndex doesn't make any use of a 64-bit processor as far as I know, it's always worked fine on my old computer. I know the two 64-bit iDCTs have the best quality, I'm assuming it's because they're more accurate or something. I don't know. But I don't think it actually has anything to do with 64-bit processors.

I found a small collection of 64-bit avisynth filters, but I don't know if they even work. I can't find the link at the moment, but I know it's out there.

e: As for your main question, I have a Q9450 and Vista 64-bit. I haven't encountered a problem at all. I have 4GB of RAM, but nothing I throw at my computer has ever taken up more than 3. At least it's fairly future-proof. The main thing for me was getting a 4 cores, which gives me a lot more options. 64-bit doesn't really affect you at all as far as Avisynth goes. It's the multithreading that you'll gain benefits with.

[Blue_MiSfit]

There are speed benefits if you plan on running x264 - roughly 10% faster IIRC. However, AviSynth in 64 bit is another story. Squid_80 has made a heroic effort to maintain and enhance many filters for x64, with mixed results. I messed around with it several years ago..

I run Vista x64 ATM, and just run everything 32 bit :) No problems..

~MiSfit

[squid_80]

Vista = yuk. Winxp x64 ftw!
I definitely recommend going 64-bit and cramming it full of RAM.
The nice thing about using 32-bit software under a 64-bit OS is that if you've got a crapload of ram, each 32-bit process can get a full 2gb (more in some cases) to work with. (Currently avisynth is greedy and gobbles it all for it's cache causing out of memory errors elsewhere, but that will be fixed soon (or by using setmemorymax().) I guess most processes wouldn't actually need anywhere near 2gb, lately I've been doing a lot of VM work and compilers tend to use a lot.

[Zarxrax]

I would recommend xp x64 as well, if you are going to have 4gb of ram or more. I ran vista for a few months, honestly tried to give it a chance, but it made some seemingly basic tasks incredibly frustrating. For instance, microsoft apparently removed the ability the change the icon associated with a filetype. Another one, some dialog boxes that used to be simple "yes/no/cancel" now require you to read entire sentences to understand what each choice does!

Aside from the ram thing, there really isn't any benefit from going 64bit right now. There are some 64 bit versions of some codecs, but they can only be used from within a 64bit application, such as virtualdub 64bit. Essentially your entire processing chain has to be 64bit apps, and since a lot of stuff if still only available as 32-bit, it's more a hassle than anything else, so you are best just running the 32bit version of everything.

One word of warning about 64 bit OS... any codec that installs through an inf file will not install! This includes huffyuv, lame acm, and others. You can still install these manually but its pretty difficult. Even googling for how to install them will return forum threads that go on for pages and pages as people offer up numerous solutions that don't work :p But it is still possible to install them, so I wouldn't let this one little problem stop you from going 64-bit. That's definitely where things are heading for the future, so you probably don't wanna lock yourself into 32-bit.

[Ranguvar]

My personal opinion, 64-bit Windows is nowhere near ready. If you want 64-bit, go Linux :)

[Chainmax]

I was asking the question because I seem to recall numerous threads where people stated all kinds of issues trying to use Avisynth and its filters on a 64bit OS. From your replies I see now that it was a misinterpretation and that it is perfectly possible to use any of the current tools as they will run in 32bit mode without issues. I'll probably get WinXP 64bit then (maybe Vista as well, on a separate partition, if a really worthwhile game comes up that needs it).

Thanks for all your advices, it has been very helpful http://smilies.vidahost.com/otn/wink/thumb.gif.

[mahsah]

Heh, I just got Windows Server 2008. It is actually fairly good for a workstation OS.

[IanB]

Current known problem :- The default SetMemoryMax calculated value can exceed the total free 32bit process address space, i.e 2GB. The code is slack and unforgiving when malloc returns a null pointer. Workaround is to put a SetMemoryMax(1024) at the start of your scripts.

[LoRd_MuldeR]

I would recommend xp x64 as well, if you are going to have 4gb of ram or more.

I can sign that :)



There are speed benefits if you plan on running x264

Yes, but only for 64-Bit Linux, not Windows.

There currently is no 64-Bit x264 for M$ Windows and Akupenguin is not willing to implement it.
You can of course run 32-Bit x264 on x64 Windows, but it won't be any faster/slower than on x86 Windows...