Decoder speed

[Sirber]

I just produced a "upsampled" clip using FastEDIUpsizer:

Source: 640x480
Output: 1280x960

Encoding:
CBR 600kbps, 1-pass, EHQ100
Total RAM needed (inc swap) to encode: 512MB

The file is unplayable on my 2000+. Could someone tells me with what CPU it can be played realtime? Source uses ~40% CPU (in RMVB).

http://www.detritus.qc.ca/test.avi.rmvb

[Hiro2k]

It was very sluggish on my system. I'm on an XP 2800+, which runs at 2.08 GHZ.

[Sirber]

ouch...

Is the decoder ready for HDTV on current CPUs?

(I had HFE2 + Sharpen activated)

@Hiro2k

Satsuke? :D

@All

If you can guess what serie is the clip about I give you a pre-release of RealAnime 2.10!!! (CQ still dead) :D :D :D

[karl_lillevold]

yes, the decoder is ready for current CPUs, not yesterday's... 1280x960 requires something like a P4 2.4 GHz, that's actual GHz (not AMD's version thereof). It also benefits from hyper-threading, since it runs two threads if multiple procs are available.

[Sirber]

bou hou hou :(

No doubt my computer is called "Detritus" :D

[damrod]

arggg

my poor celeron2.4 ;-)

btw sirber cq600 ehq100 1pass => do you have a good quality and did it takes long to encode??

i wonder if ehq100 + cq500 1 pass can give good quality for 640*480 anime

[Sirber]

hum... I did CBR for fun, just wanted to do it fast with EHQ. CBR spent too much bit out there.

[Hiro2k]

Originally posted by karl_lillevold
yes, the decoder is ready for current CPUs, not yesterday's... 1280x960 requires something like a P4 2.4 GHz, that's actual GHz (not AMD's version thereof). It also benefits from hyper-threading, since it runs two threads if multiple procs are available.

Now by current CPU's are you talking about Intel and AMD or just Intel? Because the Athlon64's have barely reached 2.4 GHZ IIRC. So what kind of playback is expected from them? I have a Barton 2800+ running at 2.08 GHZ and the file Sirber provided plays back choppy. Would an Athlon64 at the same speed work just as choppy or can it play back the file normally? I guess my real question is, is playback compeltely dependant on CPU speed or do optimizations play a role?

The reason I ask is because I'm looking to buying an Athlon64 in the near future. If it can't playback HD content because of it's speed, then I'm going to have to buy an Intel.

[Sirber]

I'm going to get a P4 socket 775 soon, I think they will be faster than any current 64bit CPU. I don't use any 64bit applications so I don,t mind staying on a 32bit one. Also, I plan to move to linux one day...

[karl_lillevold]

The problem with AMD64 is that there are so many unknowns..

will you be running 64bit OS? If so, will the apps be compiled for 64 bit? If so, the current compilers do not support inline MMX or SSE or SSE2 optimizations, and you will get worse performance. If in 32 bit mode, I do not know how things will compare to a native Pentium. I know that it will be a long time until Producer or RealVideo decoder DLLs will be compiled and released for native 64 bit. It is however clear both Intel and AMD are moving to 64 bit, and 64 bit will eventually outperform 32 bit by a large margin. It is still too early to tell what the performance difference will be, or how long it will take before today's 64 bit processors will be truly useful.

Today, I can say than RealVideo will encode and decode faster on Pentium 32 bit processors with hyper threading, but I can not say how the situation will be in one or two years from now.

[Hiro2k]

Well currently the fastest Athlon 64 is beating the fastest P4 even in encoding apps! Check out the review on anandtech. This is kinda of biased though because they only use AutoGk for testing. And we all know that virtauldub mod doesn't supports multiple threads so the P4's hyper threading is wated. But other apps might take advantage of that on the P4 and beat out the AMD 64. And IIRC real producer will take advantage of hyper threading so it would be cool to see some benchmarks on that. And this is all in 32 bit, so once some 64 bit apps come out, the Athlon will surely beat out the P4. :D

[karl_lillevold]

I have seen the benchmarks, but they do not include RealVideo, which has a huge amount of MMX and SSE optimizations. The problem with native 64 bit is that inline MMX and SSE instructions are not currently supported in existing Microsoft compilers. The RealVideo encoder runs 4X faster with these instructions than without.

I do however have an AMD64 processor at work, provided by AMD, but I installed WinXP 64 bit, which is somewhat useless, since very few native 64 bit apps exist. I will probably install WinXP 32 bit and 64 bit dual boot, and try to run some RealVideo benchmarks, since none of the hardware sites seem to know RealVideo exists :(... and I know there are a lot of AMD fans (kind of like Apple), that would like to know the real world performance for their favorite apps.

EDIT: Many, but not all, 32 bit apps run in WinXP 64 bit, so I will try that benchmark first.

[Hiro2k]

Sweet thank God someone is going to do a real benchmark! I know what you mean, it's like Real doesn't exist on the internet. :( You should talk to the guys at anandtech and maybe they will include it later on. That's how they changed thier encoding test from Flask to VirtualDub and now AutoGk. I sure they use it so users can see how it effects apps that are most commonly used.

I wish I had an Athlon64 and a P4 to test on :(

[damrod]

what's cool with the p4 prescott : you don't fear cold winter!!!

(+ 15°C with celeron/pentium 4 prescott..... :-( )

[Dark-Cracker]

the one piece sample work like a charm on my P4 2.4 Ghz

[Sirber]

@DC!

You found it! :D It's one piece :D :D :D. Want RealAnime 2.10 URL? ;)

So:

P4 2.4: fine
Celeron 2.4: choppy
2000+: choppy
2800+: choppy

[karl_lillevold]

Originally posted by karl_lillevold
yes, the decoder is ready for current CPUs, not yesterday's... 1280x960 requires something like a P4 2.4 GHz, that's actual GHz (not AMD's version thereof). It also benefits from hyper-threading, since it runs two threads if multiple procs are available.

DC: Thanks for verifying my estimate :)

[damrod]

@sirber : you want us to find the anime??

people seems to like pirate story....

[Sirber]

Originally posted by Sirber
@All

If you can guess what serie is the clip about I give you a pre-release of RealAnime 2.10!!! (CQ still dead) :D :D :D No one find it except DC :(

[LiFe]

Wish Helix Community would get someone to begin optimising the codec for AMD systems. There's a lot to like about their IT solutions.

LiFe.

[Sirber]

I bugged them a lot to have 3DNOW(+) optimization, but they just don't want :( Anyway, AMD CPUs are old, get a P4!

[LiFe]

OK, now you've turned this thread into an Intel vs AMD one:

What utter nonsense.

AMD CPUs run at about twice the efficiency in power/heat and speed as equivalent Intel CPUs with most applications except those highly optimised to take advantage of specific Intel traits. Even medium optimised apps will often work as well or better on a lowwer clocked AMD machine. Not to mention the consumer's cost savings.

Further AMD64 was quite a Coup, with Intel having to implement the exact same technology (with inferior 64-bit memory support).

Video Design Studios are now flipping over to AMD64 even though Maya et al for 64 bit are not ready. Max RAM available to Win32 is 4GB, most of which is taken by windows and maya and less than half is left for rendering. In Win-AMD64 32 bit emulation mode, 4GB RAM is emulated for the 32 bit process, so maya has 4GB for itself and rendering.

This does not take into account the near 2x increase in speed expected when rendering apps are recompiled to crunch twice the data in each clock, the ~1.2x - ~1.5x? increase as you take advantage of twice the number of general purpose registers and the ~1.2x? increase when you take advantage of the built in RAM controller.

All this while intel had been focusing on Itanium and continuosly upheld their belief that 64 bits on the desktop was unneccessary and not due for years.

Now we're gonna have dual core 64 bit processors from both camps in 2005.

The downside of all this? Intel has more money to pump into 3rd party support and optimisation (AFAIK Intel actually optimise RV themselves, Real don't do it). But now that Intel has adopted AMD64, they will eventually be putting their considerable resources into it.

I'd be willing to wager that Real's decision not to optimise for AMD is because noone has offered to do it for free. Further, I'd wager that optimisations do not always require you invest extensively in 3DNOW, as AMD procs all use MMX+, SSE and the new ones SSE2, as much as you invest in taking advantage of AMD strengths.

LiFe.

[Sirber]

RV is optimized for MMX, SSE, SSE2, SSE3, just not 3DNOW(+).

[edit]

http://www.amd.com/us-en/Processors/ProductInformation/0,,30_118_9485_9488%5E9494,00.html
http://usa.asus.com/products/mb/socket939/a8v-d/overview.htm

No PCI-E yet :(

[Sirber]

Is RealVideo optimized for those CPUs? What's the encoding speed compared to P4 socket 775?

[edit]

Welcome Thread #300 :D

[iwod]

Why are you keep posting the same questions?

LGA 775 makes no difference on encoding speed compare to previous Pentium Northwood.

AMD64 still slower than Intel, mainly because the Encoder is not Optimize for AMD. And i think that will be the case for the forseeable future mainly because there seems to be relationship between Real and Intel.

However this should changes if AMD does introduces Dual Core Processor in 2h 2005.

[Sirber]

What's the difference between P4 428 and P4 775 then?

[Hiro2k]

There is no actual difference between the two processors other than the pincount. But the 775 will allow Intel to go past the 4GHZ without having to re-design the processor. What has changed is the chipset for the 775 processor. The new chipset supports PCI-Express, DDR2 memory, and something else I can't remember off hand.

So yeah there is no difference between the processors, other than the pincount. Also if you have seen the new 775 processors, you'll notice that the pins are no longer on the processor, they are now on the motherboard. :confused: :confused: :confused: One thing I do like about the new sockets are the new heatsinks. They don't stress the motherboard like the older ones.

[Sirber]

Cool! Might get one once I get more money! Donate now! :D

[Sirber]

P4 here I come! :D

[iwod]

LGA775 has NOTHING to do with New Chipset......you can get a Socket 428 with i9xx series chipset.

Bascially as far as Real Encoding goes. Intel is the way to go.

However i am interested in How well does the Pentium M do in RV10 Encoding.

[Hiro2k]

Originally posted by iwod
LGA775 has NOTHING to do with New Chipset......you can get a Socket 428 with i9xx series chipset.

I understood that the newer chipsets where only going to come with the new LGA755 socket. Could you point me to where you read that? It makes sense from a marketing point of view, why limit new features to just the newest processors if you can just upgrade the motherboard and get all new stuff with the older 428's. It is also very possible from a technical point of view since the processors are almost identical and the only thing changing is chipset. It would make the P4 much better since you could upgrade and make it go on for a while longer. But all I've seen of the new i9xx chipset says that it's only for the socket 755. :confused:

For those of you that don't know the i925XE will allow the P4 to use a 1066MHZ FSB and allow it to reach clocks speeds over 4GHZ. Hopefully by the end of the year we will see the first EM64T processors. Actually they are already here but the 64bit instructions are disabled. I wonder if there will be some kind of hack to make it 64bit and not have to pay for it. :P That remindes me of when the first Athlon MP's came out and you could change the Athlon XP's into them by justing closing a few bridges on the processor. :D

I really want to see how those compete with the Athlon64's and how the new Xeons compete with the Opterons. Oh and how could I forget about the dual core technologies that both companies are going to come out with! Maybe with these processors we will be able to run longhorn! :eek:

Next year is going to be a wild ride. :D I plan an upgrading when the second generation of these new technologies come out. It takes a while to get the kinks out ;).



Edit:
I merged this thread and the other Athlon/Opteron thread because they were very similar.

[karl_lillevold]

I created a new thread (http://forum.doom9.org/showthread.php?s=&threadid=81323) for the AMD64 vs P4 RealVideo encoding speed benchmarks, since it would be hard to find in a "Decoder speed" thread. I would suggest to continue posting encoder speed questions and benchmarks on that thread.